Breakdown of Gosti su ispred zgrade, a komšija otvara ulaz.
biti
to be
a
and
otvarati
to open
ispred
in front of
Questions & Answers about Gosti su ispred zgrade, a komšija otvara ulaz.
Why does the first clause use su, but the second clause does not?
Because the two clauses are built differently.
Gosti su ispred zgrade = The guests are in front of the building
- Here su is the present-tense form of biti (to be) for they.
- The clause needs a form of to be because ispred zgrade is not a conjugated verb phrase.
komšija otvara ulaz = the neighbor opens / is opening the entrance
- Here otvara is already a fully conjugated verb, so no extra is/am/are-type word is needed.
So:
- su = are
- otvara already means opens / is opening
Why is it ispred zgrade? Why does zgrada change to zgrade?
Because ispred (in front of) requires the genitive case.
The base form is:
- zgrada = building
After ispred, Serbian uses genitive:
- ispred zgrade = in front of the building
This is very common in Serbian: many prepositions require a specific case, and ispred takes the genitive.
So:
- zgrada = dictionary form
- zgrade = genitive singular form used after ispred
What exactly does a mean here? Is it just and?