Learn Hardcore Malay: Dia hidupkan lampu sekejap supaya tulisan di kertas tak sukar dibaca. - He/She turns on the light for a moment so that the writing on the paper is not difficult to read.

In Malay, dia is gender‑neutral. It can mean he, she, or even they (referring to a single person in a casual sense) depending on the context.

Malay usually does not mark gender in pronouns, so you know whether it’s he or she only from context (who you were talking about earlier, names, etc.). If you really need to specify gender, people might add a word like:

dia lelaki itu – that man / that male person
dia perempuan itu – that woman / that female person

But in everyday speech, dia alone is normally enough.

Why is it hidupkan lampu instead of something like buka lampu or nyalakan lampu? Do they all mean the same?

All of these can be used to mean turn on the light, but there are some preferences and nuances:

hidupkan lampu
- Literally: make the light alive / make it come on
- Means: turn on the (electric) light
- Correct and understandable. More common in some regions and styles than others.
nyalakan lampu
- From nyala (to burn / to be lit) + -kan
- Also means turn on the light
- Quite standard and neutral.
buka lampu
- buka literally = open
- In everyday colloquial Malay (and especially in Indonesian) this is very common for turn on when talking about electrical devices:
  - buka lampu – turn on the light
  - buka TV – turn on the TV

In your sentence, Dia hidupkan lampu sekejap… is natural and means He/She turned on the light for a moment…. In many contexts you could also say:

Dia nyalakan lampu sekejap…
Dia buka lampu sekejap… (more colloquial)

Why is it hidupkan and not menghidupkan? Is something being left out?

Base verb: hidup (to live / to be on, as in an electrical device).
Causative/transitive forms:

menghidupkan – the fully prefixed form (more formal/standard)
hidupkan – a shorter form very common in spoken Malay

Both mean roughly to turn on / to switch on / to make (something) come to life.

In more formal written Malay, you would often see:

Dia menghidupkan lampu sekejap supaya…

In everyday speech and informal writing, dropping the meng- and using hidupkan is very normal, especially when the object (lampu) comes right after the verb.

So nothing is missing in terms of meaning; it’s just a more informal/streamlined form.

What exactly does sekejap mean, and where can it go in the sentence?

sekejap means for a short while, for a moment, or briefly.

In your sentence:

Dia hidupkan lampu sekejap…
→ He/She turned on the light for a moment…

Typical positions:

After the verb phrase:
- Dia hidupkan lampu sekejap.
At the beginning (more like just for a bit / wait a sec):
- Sekejap, dia hidupkan lampu. – Just a moment, he/she will turn on the light.

A near synonym is sebentar. In many contexts:

sekejap ≈ sebentar

Stylistically:

sekejap: very common in Malaysia, especially in speech.
sebentar: more common in Indonesian; also understood in Malaysia.

In your Malaysian‑style sentence, sekejap is perfectly natural.

What does supaya do here? How is it different from agar or untuk?

supaya introduces a purpose or desired result, usually translated as so that or in order that.

In the sentence:

…supaya tulisan di kertas tak sukar dibaca.
→ …so that the writing on the paper is not difficult to read.

Comparison:

supaya – so that / in order that (very common, neutral)
agar – also so that / in order that (slightly more formal or written; common in Indonesian and formal Malay)
untuk – to / for / in order to (usually followed by a noun or a verb, not a full clause with its own subject)

You could rewrite more formally as:

…supaya tulisan di kertas tidak sukar dibaca.
…agar tulisan di kertas tidak sukar dibaca.

Using untuk here would usually require changing the structure, for example:

Dia hidupkan lampu sekejap untuk memudahkan pembacaan tulisan di kertas.
(He/She turned on the light for the purpose of making it easier to read the writing on the paper.)

Why is it tulisan di kertas and not something like tulisan kertas or tulisan pada kertas?

tulisan di kertas literally means writing on the paper:

tulisan – writing / handwriting / written text
di – at / in / on (location preposition)
kertas – paper

The structure is noun + prepositional phrase:

tulisan di kertas = the writing that is located on the paper

Why not tulisan kertas?

tulisan kertas would be interpreted more like the paper’s writing / the writing belonging to the paper, which sounds odd and unnatural. Malay does not usually express on this way.

What about tulisan pada kertas or tulisan atas kertas?

di, pada, and atas can all be used in some contexts with slightly different traditional roles:
- di kertas – on the paper (most common modern choice)
- pada kertas – also possible; sounds a bit more formal/bookish
- atas kertas – literally on top of the paper; also correct, but a bit more specific or physical

In contemporary usage, tulisan di kertas is very natural and common.

What is the difference between tak, tidak, and bukan? Why does the sentence use tak?

In the sentence we have:

tak sukar dibaca – not difficult to read

tak

Shortened form of tidak
Very common in spoken Malay (especially Malaysian) and informal writing
Can usually replace tidak in casual contexts.

tidak

Standard negative for verbs and adjectives:
- tidak tahu – do not know
- tidak sukar – not difficult
More formal or neutral, used in writing, news, formal speech.

bukan

Negative used for nouns and pronouns:
- Dia bukan guru. – He/She is not a teacher.
- Itu bukan rumah saya. – That is not my house.
Also used for contrastive emphasis:
- Bukan saya, tetapi dia. – Not me, but him/her.

So in your sentence:

Informal: …supaya tulisan di kertas tak sukar dibaca.
More formal: …supaya tulisan di kertas tidak sukar dibaca.

Using bukan here (bukan sukar) would be ungrammatical, because sukar is an adjective, and adjectives take tidak/tak, not bukan.

What does sukar mean exactly, and how is it different from susah or payah?

sukar means difficult / hard, especially in a somewhat formal or written style.

In your sentence:

tak sukar dibaca – not difficult to read

Related words:

susah
- Very common in everyday speech
- Also means hard / difficult / troublesome
- You could say: tulisan di kertas tak susah dibaca. (more colloquial)
payah
- Also hard / laborious / troublesome
- Often implies effort, struggle, or inconvenience
- tulisan di kertas tak payah dibaca would sound odd; payah is less natural here, but you might see payah with actions like payah nak buat (hard to do).

Formality level (rough):

Most formal: sukar
Neutral/colloquial: susah
More specific nuance of effort/trouble: payah

So the original sentence leans a little to the formal side with sukar.

Why is it sukar dibaca and not sukar untuk dibaca or sukar untuk membaca? Are those wrong?

sukar dibaca is a compact, very natural pattern in Malay:

adjective + passive verb
sukar dibaca ≈ difficult to be read → difficult to read

Here dibaca is a passive form:

baca – to read
dibaca – to be read

Alternatives:

sukar untuk dibaca
- Literally: difficult for being read
- Also correct and commonly used
- Slightly longer, a bit more formal or explanatory.
sukar untuk membaca
- Literally: difficult to read (active)
- Grammatically possible, but less natural in this context because there is no explicit subject doing the reading. Malay usually prefers the passive dibaca here.

So you could say:

tulisan di kertas tak sukar dibaca. (natural, concise)
tulisan di kertas tak sukar untuk dibaca. (also acceptable, slightly heavier)

But tulisan di kertas tak sukar untuk membaca is not the usual way to express this idea.

What is the function of di- in dibaca? Is this the passive voice?

Yes, di- is the standard prefix for the passive voice in Malay.

Base verb: baca – to read
Passive: dibaca – to be read

In tak sukar dibaca, we have:

tak – not
sukar – difficult
dibaca – to be read

So literally: not difficult to be read, which is the natural way to say not difficult to read.

Malay uses this pattern (adjective + passive verb) very often:

senang difahami – easy to understand
sukar dijelaskan – hard to explain
mudah diingat – easy to remember

Could the sentence be made more formal or textbook‑like? How would it look?

A more formal or textbook version might be:

Dia menghidupkan lampu sebentar supaya tulisan di atas kertas tidak sukar dibaca.

Changes:

menghidupkan instead of hidupkan – full prefix, more formal
sebentar instead of sekejap – slightly more neutral/formal, common also in Indonesian
di atas kertas instead of di kertas – a bit more precise (on top of the paper)
tidak instead of tak – standard negative in formal writing

All versions, including your original sentence, are grammatical; they just differ in formality and style.

Malay has no tense markers here. How do we know if it’s past (turned on), present (turns on), or future (will turn on)?

Malay verbs usually do not change form for tense. The bare form covers past, present, and future. The sentence:

Dia hidupkan lampu sekejap supaya tulisan di kertas tak sukar dibaca.

can be understood as:

He/She turned on the light for a moment… (past)
He/She turns on the light for a moment… (habitual)
He/She will turn on the light for a moment… (future)

The actual time reference comes from:

Context (what has been said before and after)
Optional time words:
- tadi – earlier
- sebentar lagi / nanti – later
- setiap malam – every night, etc.

For example:

Tadi dia hidupkan lampu sekejap supaya tulisan di kertas tak sukar dibaca.
→ Clearly past (earlier he/she turned on the light…).

Without such markers, Malay leaves the tense to be inferred from context.