Word
Электрик пришёл вовремя и объяснил, что проблема была в старом кабеле.
Meaning
The electrician arrived on time and explained that the problem was in an old cable.
Part of speech
sentence
Pronunciation
Course
Lesson
Breakdown of Электрик пришёл вовремя и объяснил, что проблема была в старом кабеле.
в
in
быть
to be
объяснить
to explain
и
and
Questions & Answers about Электрик пришёл вовремя и объяснил, что проблема была в старом кабеле.
Why is it пришёл (past tense) and why does it end in -ёл?
Russian past tense agrees in gender/number with the subject.
- Электрик is masculine singular, so you get masculine past: пришёл.
- The base verb is прийти (perfective, to come/arrive). Its past masculine form is пришёл. Spelling note: ё is often written as е in texts, so you may also see пришел, but it’s pronounced пришёл.
Why are both verbs perfective: пришёл and объяснил?
Perfective is used for completed, one-time actions in the past.
- пришёл = he arrived (finished event)
- объяснил = he explained (finished act of explaining) If you wanted to emphasize an ongoing process, you’d use imperfective (e.g., объяснял = he was explaining / he explained (as a process), depending on context).
What does вовремя mean grammatically, and why isn’t it в время?
вовремя is an adverb meaning on time / punctually. It’s a fixed, fused form historically related to в + время, but in modern Russian it’s normally written as one word: вовремя.
Why is there no comma before in ?