Ayakkabı dar olunca ayaklarım şişiyor.

to be

Breakdown of Ayakkabı dar olunca ayaklarım şişiyor.

• benim: my
• ayakkabı: the shoe
• ayak: the foot

Questions & Answers about Ayakkabı dar olunca ayaklarım şişiyor.

What does olunca mean here?

Olunca comes from olmak (to be / to become) plus the ending -ınca / -ince.

In this sentence, it means something like:

• when
• once
• sometimes whenever
• and depending on context, even because / since

So Ayakkabı dar olunca is literally something like when the shoe becomes/is tight.

In natural English here, it is best understood as:

• When the shoes are tight, my feet swell.

Why is olmak used with dar? Why not just use dar by itself?

Because dar is an adjective, meaning tight / narrow, and the ending -ınca attaches to verbs, not directly to adjectives.

So Turkish uses:

• dar olmak = to be tight

Then:

• dar olunca = when it is tight

Compare:

• Ayakkabı dar. = The shoe is tight.
• Ayakkabı dar olunca... = When the shoe is tight...

So olmak is helping turn the adjective phrase into something that can take the -ınca ending.

Why is ayakkabı singular? Shouldn’t it be ayakkabılar if the meaning is shoes?