Tocătorul este lângă ustensilă.

Because Romanian usually puts the definite article at the end of the noun, not before it.

• tocător = an indefinite noun
• tocătorul = the
  • noun

So -ul here is the definite article ending. This is very common with masculine and neuter singular nouns.

It is a neuter noun.

That can be confusing at first, because Romanian neuter nouns behave:

• like masculine nouns in the singular
• like feminine nouns in the plural

So in the singular you get tocătorul, which looks masculine in form. That is normal for neuter nouns in Romanian.

Este is the 3rd person singular of a fi, meaning to be.

So the structure is:

• Tocătorul = subject
• este = is
• lângă ustensilă = prepositional phrase

Romanian normally keeps este in a full sentence like this. In very short labels, captions, or informal notes, people may sometimes leave it out, but in standard grammar it belongs here.

Lângă is a preposition meaning next to, near, or beside.

It introduces the location phrase:

• lângă ustensilă = next to a utensil

After lângă, Romanian uses the normal noun form, not a special extra ending in this case.

Because ustensilă is indefinite, while ustensila is definite.

• ustensilă = a utensil
• ustensila = the utensil

So:

• lângă ustensilă = next to a utensil
• lângă ustensila = next to the utensil

The preposition lângă does not force the noun to be indefinite. Both forms are possible; it depends on meaning.

Ustensilă is feminine.

A useful clue is the ending -ă, which often marks feminine nouns in Romanian, though not always without exception.

Some forms are:

• ustensilă = singular indefinite
• ustensila = singular definite
• ustensile = plural

Yes. Romanian word order is more flexible than English word order.

The most neutral version is:

• Tocătorul este lângă ustensilă.

But you can also move things around for emphasis, for example:

• Lângă ustensilă este tocătorul.

That still means basically the same thing, but it puts more focus on the location.

They are two different Romanian vowels.

• ă is like a short, relaxed vowel, similar to the final sound in English sofa
• â has no exact English equivalent; it is a central vowel pronounced deeper in the mouth

In this sentence:

• lângă contains both â and ă
• ustensilă ends in ă
• tocătorul also contains ă

Very rough English-style approximations would be:

• lângă ≈ LUHN-guh
• ustensilă ≈ oos-ten-SEE-luh

Those are only approximations, but they can help as a starting point.

Because Romanian usually uses a postposed definite article, meaning the article is attached to the end of the noun.

Compare:

• English: the noun
• Romanian: noun + the

So:

• tocătorul literally works like tocător + the

This is one of the biggest structural differences between Romanian and English, and it shows up constantly.