Mama alimwambia mtoto apulize uji polepole kwa sababu ulikuwa moto sana.

Alimwambia can be broken down like this:

• a- = he/she
• -li- = past tense
• -mw- = him/her
• -ambia = tell / say to

So alimwambia means he/she told him/her or he/she said to him/her.

In this sentence, because the subject is Mama, it means Mother told him/her.

That -mw- is an object marker, and Swahili often uses it even when the noun is also stated.

So:

• alimwambia = she told him/her
• mtoto = the child

Together, alimwambia mtoto means she told the child.

This is very normal in Swahili. The object marker helps link the verb to the object, and the noun after it makes clear who that object is.

Because after -ambia when you mean tell someone to do something, Swahili usually uses the subjunctive form.

So:

• a-li-puliza would mean he/she blew
• a-puliz-e means something like that he/she blow

In English we say told the child to blow.
In Swahili that idea is expressed with the subjunctive: alimwambia mtoto apulize.

Kupuliza is the infinitive form, meaning to blow.

But after alimwambia mtoto, Swahili does not normally use the infinitive the way English uses to blow. Instead, it uses the subjunctive:

• apulize = that he/she blow

So alimwambia mtoto apulize is the natural way to say she told the child to blow.

Polepole means slowly, gently, or carefully.

It looks doubled because reduplicated forms are common in Swahili. In this case, polepole is just the normal word. You should learn it as a whole expression.

Here, apulize uji polepole means the child should blow on the porridge gently / slowly, probably so it cools down safely.

Because uji belongs to a noun class that takes the subject marker u-.

So ulikuwa breaks down like this:

• u- = subject marker agreeing with uji
• -li- = past tense
• -kuwa = be

So uji ulikuwa moto means the porridge was hot.

It is not alikuwa, because a- is for he/she or other class 1 singular nouns, not for uji.

It can mean either, depending on context.

• As a noun, moto can mean fire
• In a sentence like uji ulikuwa moto, it means hot

Here it clearly means hot, because it is describing the temperature of the porridge.

Sana means very or a lot, and in Swahili it usually comes after the word it modifies.

So:

• moto sana = very hot
• polepole sana = very slowly
• anapenda sana = he/she likes very much

That is why the sentence says moto sana, not the equivalent of very hot with very first as in English.

Kwa sababu means because.

It introduces the reason:

• kwa sababu ulikuwa moto sana = because it was very hot

You can think of it as a fixed expression meaning because.

Mtoto is gender-neutral. It just means child.

So by itself, it does not tell you whether the child is a boy or a girl. You need context if that matters.

Swahili normally does not use articles like English a and the.

So:

• mama can mean mother or the mother
• mtoto can mean a child or the child
• uji can mean porridge or the porridge

The exact meaning depends on context.

The sentence can be understood in parts:

• Mama = subject
• alimwambia mtoto = told the child
• apulize uji polepole = to blow the porridge gently
• kwa sababu ulikuwa moto sana = because it was very hot

So the sentence is built as:

Mother told the child to blow the porridge gently because it was very hot.

A good thing to notice is that Swahili packs a lot of information into verbs, especially tense and object markers.