Mai întâi voi șterge praful de pe masă și de pe rafturi.

Mai întâi means first, first of all, or to begin with.

It is a common adverbial expression used to show the first step in a sequence:

• Mai întâi voi șterge praful... = First, I’ll dust...

You can think of it as setting up an order: this action happens before the others.

Yes. Voi șterge is a standard way to form the future in Romanian.

Here:

• voi = future auxiliary for I
• șterge = infinitive/base form of to wipe / to clean

So voi șterge means I will wipe / I will clean.

A useful thing to notice: voi can also mean you (plural) in other contexts, but here it is clearly the future auxiliary because it is followed by a verb in the infinitive: șterge.

A șterge usually means to wipe, to erase, or to clean by wiping, depending on context.

In this sentence, a șterge praful is the natural Romanian way to say to dust.

So literally:

• voi șterge praful = I will wipe the dust but idiomatically:
• I will dust

Because praful is the definite form: the dust.

Romanian adds the definite article to the end of the noun:

• praf = dust
• praful = the dust

In this sentence, the speaker is talking about the dust that is there on those surfaces, so the dust makes sense.

De pe means from off, from on, or more naturally in English here, from a surface.

It is made of:

• de = from/of
• pe = on

Because the dust is sitting on the table and on the shelves, Romanian uses de pe:

• de pe masă = from the table
• literally: from on the table

This is very natural in Romanian when something is being removed from a surface.

It is repeated for clarity and natural rhythm.

Romanian often repeats the preposition when two nouns are coordinated:

• de pe masă și de pe rafturi

This makes it clear that the dust is being removed from both places. In fast or less careful speech, speakers may sometimes omit the second preposition, but repeating it is very normal and often better style.

This is something that often surprises English speakers.

In Romanian, after prepositions, especially in everyday location expressions, nouns are often left without the definite article even when English would use the:

• de pe masă = often naturally translated as from the table
• de pe rafturi = from the shelves

So the lack of the article does not always mean the meaning is fully indefinite in English. Context often makes the reference clear.

If you wanted to make the nouns explicitly definite, Romanian could also do that in some contexts:

• de pe masa din bucătărie
• de pe rafturile din sufragerie

But the bare forms in your sentence are very natural.

Rafturi is the plural of raft, which means shelf.

So:

• raft = shelf
• rafturi = shelves

This plural ending -uri is common with many Romanian neuter nouns:

• birou → birouri
• lucru → lucruri
• raft → rafturi

Here is a quick guide:

• ș = sh as in ship

  • șterge starts with sh

• ă = a short, weak vowel, similar to the a in sofa

  • masă

• î = a sound English does not really have; it is a close central vowel

  • you hear it in întâi
  • a rough approximation is to say ee but with the tongue pulled back more centrally

A few words from the sentence:

• mai întâi ≈ my in-tuhy (very approximate)
• șterge ≈ sher-jeh
• masă ≈ MAH-suh

These are only approximations, but they can help at first.

Yes, Romanian word order is fairly flexible.

The sentence:

• Mai întâi voi șterge praful de pe masă și de pe rafturi.

could also be phrased as:

• Voi șterge mai întâi praful de pe masă și de pe rafturi.

Both are correct. The original version puts more emphasis on first right away, which sounds very natural when listing planned actions.

It is specifically about the future because of voi șterge = I will dust.

So it sounds like:

• a plan
• an intention
• the next step in a sequence

If you wanted to talk about a habit, Romanian would normally use the present tense instead:

• Mai întâi șterg praful... = First I dust... / First I dust the surfaces...