Learn Hardcore Malay: Di rumah, nenek menunjukkan album lama yang penuh dengan poskad dari negara lain. - At home, grandmother showed an old album full of postcards from other countries.

Putting Di rumah first emphasizes the place (a bit like English: At home, Grandma showed...). The comma simply marks a pause where the location phrase is fronted. Grammatically, it would still be fine without a comma in everyday writing, but the pause is natural in speech.

What’s the difference between tunjuk, menunjuk, and menunjukkan?

All three are related to show / point:

tunjuk – base verb: to show / to point (at). Often used in everyday speech:
- Nenek tunjuk album lama. – Grandma showed an old album.
menunjuk – derived verb (meN- + tunjuk): to point (often with a direction/target implied).
- Dia menunjuk ke gambar itu. – She pointed at that picture.
menunjukkan – derived verb with -kan: to show something (to someone), often more clearly transitive and a bit more “complete” in meaning.
- Nenek menunjukkan album lama. – Grandma showed an old album.

In this sentence, menunjukkan sounds natural and slightly more formal; tunjuk would also be very common in everyday conversation.

Does menunjukkan mean past tense (“showed”)? How does Malay show tense here?

Malay verbs do not change form for tense. Menunjukkan itself is tenseless; it just means to show / showing / showed / will show, depending on context.

The English translation uses showed because the story is clearly about a past event. To specify tense in Malay, you normally rely on:

Time words: semalam (yesterday), tadi (earlier), nanti (later), esok (tomorrow), etc.
Context in the surrounding sentences.

So Nenek menunjukkan album lama can mean:

Grandma is showing an old album.
Grandma showed an old album.
Grandma will show an old album.

Context decides which is correct.

Why is it album lama and not lama album? Where do adjectives go?

In Malay, adjectives usually come after the noun:

album lama – old album
rumah besar – big house
baju merah – red shirt

Lama album is not correct for old album. If you see lama before a noun, it usually has a different function or meaning (for example, in some fixed expressions), but not as the normal adjective old in this sense.

So the phrase album lama is a noun phrase:
album (noun) + lama (adjective).

What is the role of yang in album lama yang penuh dengan poskad?

Yang introduces a relative clause or a descriptive phrase, similar to that / which / who in English.

The structure here is:

album lama – an old album
yang penuh dengan poskad dari negara lain – that is full of postcards from other countries

Together: album lama yang penuh dengan poskad dari negara lain
= the old album that is full of postcards from other countries

So yang links the noun (album lama) to the extra description (penuh dengan poskad...).

How does penuh dengan work? Can I just say penuh poskad?

Penuh means full, and penuh dengan X means full of X.

penuh dengan poskad – full of postcards
penuh dengan orang – full of people
penuh dengan buku – full of books

In casual speech, you might hear penuh poskad or penuh buku, and people will understand you. However, the more standard, clear pattern is penuh dengan + noun, which is exactly what you see in the sentence.

Why is it just poskad, not poskad-poskad for plural “postcards”?

Malay usually does not mark plural forms the way English does. The noun poskad can mean postcard or postcards, depending on context:

penuh dengan poskad – clearly full of postcards (because “full” implies many)

You can use reduplication (poskad-poskad) to emphasize plurality or variety:

penuh dengan poskad-poskad lama – full of (many) old postcards
(emphasis on a lot of them, or various ones)

But it’s not required. The basic, natural choice here is just poskad.

What’s the difference between dari and daripada, and why is dari used in dari negara lain?

Both dari and daripada can be translated as from, but they tend to be used in different contexts:

dari – mainly for places, time, directions, sources
- dari sekolah – from school
- dari pagi – since morning
- dari negara lain – from other countries
daripada – mainly for people, comparisons, abstract sources
- hadiah daripada nenek – a gift from Grandma
- lebih besar daripada itu – bigger than that

Here, negara lain is a location/source, so dari negara lain is the natural choice.

What does negara lain mean exactly, and how is it different from negara-negara lain or lain-lain negara?

negara lain = another country / other countries
The noun is singular in form, but can refer to one or more, depending on context.
negara-negara lain = other countries (explicitly plural; you’re stressing the plurality or variety)
lain-lain negara = also various other countries, but this order is less common in normal speech; you’re stressing the variety of “other” countries.

In poskad dari negara lain, context (album full of postcards) clearly suggests from other countries (plural) even though negara is not reduplicated.

Does nenek always mean “grandmother,” or can it refer to any old woman?

Nenek primarily means grandmother / grandma (either your own, or someone else’s, depending on context).

However, in everyday Malay:

It can be used as a respectful or familiar way to refer to an elderly woman:
- Seorang nenek sedang duduk di sana. – An old lady is sitting there.
It can also be used as a form of address:
- Nenek, sudah makan? – Grandma, have you eaten?

In the given sentence, with context like album lama and a family-like scene di rumah, nenek is most naturally understood as (my/our) grandmother.