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Questions & Answers about Вчера я пошёл на работу.
What does Вчера mean in this sentence?
Вчера means "yesterday" in English, indicating when the action took place.
Why is the verb пошёл used instead of ходил, and what does this choice signify?
Пошёл is the perfective past tense form of the verb meaning "went". This choice emphasizes that the action is a completed, one-time event, rather than a habitual or ongoing action, which would be expressed with the imperfective form ходил.
Why is the masculine form пошёл used here, and would it be different for a female speaker?
In Russian, past tense verbs agree with the gender of the subject. Пошёл is the masculine form, so it is used if the speaker is male. If a female speaker were expressing the same idea, the verb would change to пошла.
What does the phrase на работу mean, and why is the preposition на used?
The phrase на работу translates to "to work" or "to the workplace". The preposition на is used to indicate direction or destination, which is a common construction in Russian when referring to places like work.
Is the word order in Вчера я пошёл на работу typical in Russian, and what does its structure tell us?
Yes, this word order is quite typical. Starting with Вчера sets the time frame for the action. Following that with the subject я and then the verb phrase пошёл на работу follows a natural Russian sentence structure that emphasizes the temporal context before describing the action.