Tafadhali zima meko kabla ya kuondoka.

In Swahili, a command to one person often uses the bare verb stem. So zima is the imperative form of the verb -zima.

The subject you is understood, so Swahili does not need to say it separately here.

• Zima taa. = Turn off the light.
• Funga mlango. = Close the door.

If you were speaking to more than one person, you would normally use zimeni instead.

Tafadhali means please. It softens the command and makes it more polite.

Without it, Zima meko kabla ya kuondoka is still correct, but it sounds more direct.

You can also place tafadhali in different positions, for example:

• Tafadhali zima meko kabla ya kuondoka.
• Zima meko kabla ya kuondoka, tafadhali.

Here, meko refers to the stove, cooker, or cooking heat source. In real usage, the exact sense can vary a bit by region or household context.

So in this sentence, it means the thing you should switch off before leaving the place.

A learner should know that Swahili vocabulary for kitchen items can vary, and another common word you may also meet is jiko.

Swahili does not have articles like a, an, and the.

So meko can mean a stove or the stove, depending on the context. In this sentence, the context makes it clear that it means the stove.

This is very normal in Swahili:

• Nina kitabu. = I have a book / the book, depending on context.
• Funga mlango. = Close the door.

In Swahili, kabla ya is the normal pattern for before when it is followed by a noun or an infinitive phrase.

So:

• kabla ya kuondoka = before leaving / before you leave

The ya acts as a linker between kabla and what follows.

You can think of kabla ya as a set expression that often works together.

Kuondoka is the infinitive form of the verb -ondoka, meaning to leave, to depart, or to go away.

The prefix ku- is the infinitive marker, similar to English to in to leave.

So:

• -ondoka = leave/depart
• kuondoka = to leave / leaving

After kabla ya, Swahili commonly uses this infinitive form.

Not in this pattern.

After kabla ya, Swahili normally uses:

• a noun, or
• an infinitive like kuondoka

So kabla ya kuondoka is correct.

Forms like kabla ya ondoka and kabla ya unaondoka do not fit this structure. A full clause can be used in other ways in Swahili, but in this sentence the infinitive construction is the natural one.

Not always. -zima has the broader idea of extinguish, put out, or turn off, depending on what the object is.

For example:

• zima taa = turn off the light
• zima moto = put out the fire
• zima televisheni = turn off the television

So in zima meko, the natural English meaning is turn off the stove.

You would normally change the imperative from zima to zimeni:

Tafadhali zimeni meko kabla ya kuondoka.

So:

• zima = command to one person
• zimeni = command to more than one person

Everything else in the sentence can stay the same.

It is polite enough for normal everyday use because of tafadhali.

Swahili commands can sound direct if you use only the verb, but adding tafadhali makes the request much softer. So this sentence is a normal, natural way to give a polite instruction.

If you remove tafadhali, it becomes more like a straightforward order:

• Zima meko kabla ya kuondoka.

With tafadhali, it sounds more like:

• Please turn off the stove before leaving.