Breakdown of Ikiwa taa hizo zitafanya kazi vizuri, wageni watavutiwa na ukumbi wetu usiku.
Questions & Answers about Ikiwa taa hizo zitafanya kazi vizuri, wageni watavutiwa na ukumbi wetu usiku.
Swahili distinguishes between near and far demonstratives.
• taa hizi = these lights (close to the speaker)
• taa hizo = those lights (farther from the speaker)
Here the speaker chooses hizo to mean those lights.
Breakdown of zitafanya:
• zi- = subject marker for class 9/10 nouns (here taa “lights”)
• -ta- = future tense marker
• fanya = verb root meaning do/make
So zitafanya literally means they will do but in context they will work or function.
• kazi = work, task
• fanya = do/make
Together fanya kazi = to work.
kazi vizuri adds well, so zitafanya kazi vizuri = they will work/function well.
Active verb vutia = to attract. To form the passive:
- Replace final -a with passive suffix -wa → vutia → vutiwa
- Add subject marker wa- (class 2 for wageni) and tense -ta- (future):
wa-ta-vuti-wa = watavutiwa
It’s used to say they will be attracted rather than they will attract.
In a passive sentence, na introduces the agent (the one doing the “attracting”), equivalent to English by.
So watavutiwa na ukumbi wetu = they will be attracted by our hall (or more naturally, to our hall).
ukumbi is a class 3 noun with prefix u-, and its possessive pronoun for our is -etu.
So ukumbi wetu = our hall. You don’t use sisi directly here.