Breakdown of Sila pilih mana-mana tempat duduk di lobi hotel.
Questions & Answers about Sila pilih mana-mana tempat duduk di lobi hotel.
Sila is a polite word used to invite or request someone to do something. In this sentence it corresponds to please.
- It is very common in customer-service situations (hotels, banks, offices, announcements, notices).
- It usually comes at the start of the sentence: Sila duduk. (Please sit.), Sila tunggu sebentar. (Please wait a moment.)
- It sounds polite and neutral, suitable for talking to guests, customers, or people you don’t know well.
- You normally do not need to add a pronoun like anda after sila; the subject you is understood from context.
Malay often leaves out pronouns when they are obvious from context. In Sila pilih mana-mana tempat duduk di lobi hotel, the subject you is implied.
If you really want to say you, you can add it, but it is not necessary:
- Sila pilih mana-mana tempat duduk di lobi hotel.
(standard, natural; you is implied) - Sila pilih mana-mana tempat duduk di lobi hotel, ya.
(adds a softening particle ya, still implied you) - Sila pilih mana-mana tempat duduk, tuan / puan.
(more explicitly addressing sir / madam)
Using anda here is grammatically fine (Sila anda pilih…) but sounds stiff or textbook-like in many real-life situations. Native speakers prefer to drop the pronoun or use titles like tuan / puan.
Pilih is the base verb meaning to choose / select.
Malay verbs are not conjugated for tense or person, so pilih itself can mean choose / chooses / choosing / chose / to choose, depending on context.
Here, because the sentence starts with sila and has no subject pronoun, pilih functions as an imperative:
- Sila pilih …
≈ Please choose …
There is no special imperative form; you just use the plain verb, often introduced by sila or tolong when you want to be polite.
Mana-mana means any (indefinite choice among options).
- mana by itself means which (used in questions).
- Awak duduk di mana? – Where are you sitting? / At which place are you sitting?
- mana-mana is a reduplicated form that turns it into an indefinite word: any.
In this sentence:
- mana-mana tempat duduk = any seat
The hyphen shows reduplication: mana → mana-mana. This is standard spelling for many reduplicated words in Malay.
mana = which / where, used for asking questions:
- Awak nak yang mana? – Which one do you want?
- Dia tinggal di mana? – Where does he/she live?
mana-mana = any, used for giving free choice, not asking:
- Pilih mana-mana. – Choose any (one).
- Anda boleh duduk di mana-mana. – You may sit anywhere.
In Sila pilih mana-mana tempat duduk, the speaker is not asking which seat? but saying any seat is fine. That is why the -mana is reduplicated.
Both can be translated as seat, but they are slightly different:
- kerusi = chair (a specific piece of furniture).
- tempat duduk = literally place to sit, i.e. seat as a location.
Using tempat duduk is more general and can refer to:
- a chair,
- a spot on a sofa,
- a place on a bench,
- a seat in a waiting area, bus, cinema, etc.
In a hotel lobby, there might be different kinds of seating (chairs, sofas, couches), so mana-mana tempat duduk sounds very natural: any seat / any place to sit.
You could also say:
- Sila pilih mana-mana kerusi di lobi hotel.
This focuses specifically on chairs, and is still grammatical and understandable, but a bit narrower in meaning.
In Malay, words like mana-mana that act like determiners or quantifiers (any, all, some) normally come before the noun:
- mana-mana tempat duduk – any seat
- semua tempat duduk – all seats
- beberapa tempat duduk – some seats
So mana-mana tempat duduk is the natural word order.
Putting mana-mana after the noun (tempat duduk mana-mana) is not idiomatic Malay and would sound wrong or at least very strange to native speakers in this context.
Di is the preposition in / at / on.
The phrase di lobi hotel is structured as:
- di = in/at
- lobi hotel = hotel lobby (literally lobby [of] hotel)
Malay often forms noun + noun compounds where the first noun is the main thing and the second noun specifies it:
- bilik hotel – hotel room
- restoran hotel – hotel restaurant
- lobi hotel – hotel lobby
You only need di once, at the start of the whole place phrase:
- di lobi hotel – in the hotel lobby
- not *di lobi di hotel
So the whole sentence is:
- Sila (please)
- pilih (choose)
- mana-mana tempat duduk (any seat)
- di lobi hotel (in the hotel lobby).
Malay usually does not use articles like the / a / an. Definiteness (whether you mean the or a) is understood from context.
- lobi hotel can mean the hotel lobby or a hotel lobby, depending on the situation.
If you really want to specify, you can add:
- ini = this
- itu = that
For example:
- di lobi hotel ini – in this hotel’s lobby
- di lobi hotel itu – in that hotel’s lobby
In real life, if the hotel staff says di lobi hotel, it will be understood as in the lobby of this hotel because you are already in that hotel. No extra word is needed.
Yes, that is a very good natural translation. Roughly word by word:
- Sila – please
- pilih – choose
- mana-mana – any
- tempat duduk – seat / place to sit
- di – in / at
- lobi hotel – the hotel lobby
So:
Sila pilih mana-mana tempat duduk di lobi hotel.
≈ Please choose any seat in the hotel lobby.
You can say Sila duduk di lobi hotel, and it is correct, but the meaning is slightly different:
Sila duduk di lobi hotel.
= Please sit in the hotel lobby.
(Focuses on the action of sitting; no explicit mention of choosing.)Sila pilih mana-mana tempat duduk di lobi hotel.
= Please choose any seat in the hotel lobby.
(Explicitly tells the guest they are free to choose whichever seat they like.)
So the original sentence is more specific about choice and emphasizes that any seat is acceptable.