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Questions & Answers about Mereka duduk dekat.
What exactly does mereka mean? Is it only "they"?
Mereka is the standard Malay third-person plural pronoun meaning “they / them”.
It doesn’t show gender (it can mean they (men), they (women), or a mixed group), and it doesn’t show any formality level.
It’s roughly equivalent to English they when you’re talking about more than one person.
Can mereka refer to objects, or only people?
In normal Malay, mereka is used mainly for people (or groups treated like people, e.g. a company, a team).
For inanimate things, Malay often just repeats the noun or drops the pronoun instead of saying “they”.
- People: Murid-murid itu pandai. Mereka rajin. – Those students are smart. They are diligent.
- Objects: More natural is something like Buku-buku itu mahal. Semuanya mahal. – Those books are expensive. All of them are expensive.
So in Mereka duduk dekat, you should imagine people sitting near.
Does duduk always mean “to sit”, or can it also mean “to live / stay”?