Learn Hardcore Malay: Pada musim jerebu, kami pakai topeng ketika berjalan di taman. - During the haze season, we wear masks when walking in the park.

Pada is a preposition that, among other uses, marks time. Here it means “during / in / at (the time of)”, so pada musim jerebu ≈ “during the haze season”.

With pada: Pada musim jerebu, kami pakai topeng…
Sounds natural and slightly more careful/complete, especially in writing.
Without pada: Musim jerebu, kami pakai topeng…
Still understandable, but feels more like headline style or very casual speech.

So you can leave it out in informal contexts, but using pada is safer and more standard, especially in anything written or formal.

Is musim jerebu a fixed expression? What does it literally mean?

Literally:

musim = season / period
jerebu = haze / smog

So musim jerebu literally means “haze season” or “the hazy period”.

In Malay, musim is widely used not only for the four seasons but for many types of “periods”:

musim hujan – rainy season
musim panas – hot/dry season
musim durian – durian season
musim pilihan raya – election season

Similarly, musim jerebu is a common way to refer to recurring periods when the air is hazy or polluted.

What is the difference between kami and kita, and why is kami used here?

Both kami and kita mean “we”, but they differ in who is included:

kami = we (not including you, the listener) – exclusive we
kita = we (including you, the listener) – inclusive we

In the sentence:

Pada musim jerebu, kami pakai topeng ketika berjalan di taman.

kami suggests the speaker is talking about their own group, which does not include the person they’re talking to (for example, “my family”, “our team”, “people in my city”).

If you said:

Pada musim jerebu, kita pakai topeng ketika berjalan di taman.

it would imply you and I (and maybe others) all wear masks when walking in the park.

So kami vs kita changes who is being counted in the “we”.

What’s the difference between pakai and memakai? Is pakai too informal?

Both pakai and memakai mean “to wear / to put on / to use”.

pakai
- Very common in everyday spoken Malay and in neutral writing.
- Slightly more casual/direct.
- Example: Saya pakai baju biru. – I wear a blue shirt.
memakai
- Morphologically the meN- form of pakai.
- Tends to sound more formal or written, especially in official documents, essays, or news reports.
- Example: Mereka memakai pakaian seragam. – They wear uniforms.

In your sentence, kami pakai topeng is completely natural. In a very formal text, you might see:

Pada musim jerebu, kami memakai topeng ketika berjalan di taman.

Both are correct; the difference is register (casual vs slightly more formal), not meaning.

There is no word like “am/are/is” and no tense ending on pakai. How do we know if this is present, past, or habitual?

Malay does not conjugate verbs for tense the way English does. The verb pakai stays the same regardless of time. Instead, Malay relies on:

Time expressions:
- semalam (yesterday), esok (tomorrow), tadi (earlier), sekarang (now), etc.
Context and habitual markers like setiap hari (every day), selalunya (usually).

In your sentence, the phrase pada musim jerebu (“during the haze season”) plus the general context makes it sound habitual: something we normally do whenever it’s haze season.

If you specifically wanted to highlight:

Continuous / right now:
Sekarang musim jerebu, kami sedang pakai topeng ketika berjalan di taman.
(sedang ≈ “in the middle of doing”.)
Future:
Pada musim jerebu, kami akan pakai topeng ketika berjalan di taman.
(akan ≈ “will”.)

The base verb pakai itself does not change for tense.

Can I replace ketika with apabila, semasa, or bila? Do they all mean “when”?

They are all related to the idea of “when”, but with different typical uses and levels of formality:

ketika – when / while, neutral to slightly formal; good in both speech and writing.
- Pada musim jerebu, kami pakai topeng ketika berjalan di taman.
apabila – also when, quite formal, common in writing and speeches.
- Pada musim jerebu, kami pakai topeng apabila berjalan di taman.
semasa – during / while, also fairly formal; often used like ketika.
- Pada musim jerebu, kami pakai topeng semasa berjalan di taman.
bila – literally “when?” as a question word, but often used as “when” in informal speech.
- Formal: Bila is mostly used in questions:
  - Bila musim jerebu akan bermula? – When will the haze season start?
- Informal conversation:
  - Pada musim jerebu, kami pakai topeng bila berjalan di taman. (okay in speech, but not ideal in formal writing.)

So in your sentence, ketika, apabila, and semasa are all acceptable; ketika is a good all‑round choice.

Does berjalan di taman mean “walking in the park” or “walking to the park”? How does di compare with ke?

berjalan = to walk / to go on foot
di = in / at / on (location)
ke = to / towards (direction)

In your sentence:

berjalan di taman = walking in the park

If you said:

berjalan ke taman – walking to the park (the park is the destination, not the place where the walking happens).
berjalan-jalan di taman – strolling / going for a walk in the park (more clearly for leisure, because of the reduplication -jalan).

So:

di taman = you are already at/in the park.
ke taman = you are going to the park.

Is the word order fixed? Can I move pada musim jerebu or ketika berjalan di taman to other positions?

Malay word order is relatively flexible for time and place phrases. All of these are grammatical, with small differences in emphasis:

Pada musim jerebu, kami pakai topeng ketika berjalan di taman.
– Time phrase first (haze season) → emphasises when (the period).
Kami pakai topeng pada musim jerebu ketika berjalan di taman.
– Focus on we wear masks, then add when and where.
Ketika berjalan di taman pada musim jerebu, kami pakai topeng.
– Emphasises the situation of walking in the park during haze season, then states what we do.

As long as you keep:

Subject + verb + object together (kami pakai topeng)
And don’t break up fixed units oddly,

you can normally move whole time/place phrases (pada musim jerebu, di taman, ketika berjalan) around for emphasis.

Is topeng the usual word for “mask” in this context? I’ve seen pelitup muka and masker too.

topeng is a general word for mask:

Can be a face mask for health (like during haze or COVID).
Can also be a costume/party/theatre mask.

In health or official contexts in Malaysia you’ll often see:

pelitup muka – literally “face cover”, official term for face mask.
Previously also penutup mulut dan hidung – “cover for mouth and nose”.

In Indonesian, masker (from English mask) is very common.

In everyday Malaysian Malay, pakai topeng is widely understood as “wear a mask”, especially if the context is air pollution or illness. To be very clear and neutral/formal, you might say:

pakai pelitup muka – wear a face mask
memakai topeng muka – wear a face mask (topeng + muka)

Do we really need kami? Can the subject be dropped in Malay?

Yes, in Malay the subject pronoun is often optional if it is clear from context.

So, for casual speech or an instruction-like sentence, you might hear:

Pada musim jerebu, pakai topeng ketika berjalan di taman.

This can sound like a general instruction to whoever is listening (similar to English “During haze season, wear a mask when walking in the park.”).

However:

Keeping kami makes it clearly about “we/us (not including you)”.
Dropping it makes the sentence more impersonal or imperative-like.

In formal writing or when clarity is important, it is usually better to keep the pronoun (kami).

How would I make this sentence negative or turn it into a yes–no question?

1. Negative

Use tidak (formal/neutral) or tak (informal) before the verb:

Pada musim jerebu, kami tidak pakai topeng ketika berjalan di taman.
– During haze season, we do not wear masks when walking in the park.

2. Yes–no question

a) Just use a question mark and rising intonation (very common in speech):

Pada musim jerebu, kami pakai topeng ketika berjalan di taman?
– “During haze season, do we wear masks when walking in the park?”

b) Add kah or adakah for a more formal question:

Adakah kami pakai topeng pada musim jerebu ketika berjalan di taman?

In everyday conversation, simply changing your tone and adding ? in writing is usually enough.