Learn Hardcore Vietnamese: An muốn biết nhà tôi ở đâu.

In Vietnamese, muốn means want and biết means know. When expressing the idea of wanting to know, you put these two words together: muốn (want) + biết (know). There is no single verb that encapsulates want to know in one word, so you see it as two separate words.

What is the role of nhà tôi in this sentence?

Nhà tôi literally means my house. In Vietnamese, possessive structures often place the noun before the pronoun. So nhà tôi is house (of) me, which naturally translates to my house in English.

Why is ở đâu placed at the end of the sentence?

Ở đâu means where in Vietnamese, and it usually appears at the end of a sentence when you’re asking about a location. The question word placement differs from English; however, the meaning remains ...where is (something)?

Could we say An muốn hỏi nhà tôi ở đâu instead?

Slightly different nuances can appear, but generally, muốn hỏi (wants to ask) and muốn biết (wants to know) are quite similar. Muốn hỏi suggests the action of asking a question directly, whereas muốn biết focuses on the desire to have knowledge about something. Both can be used in everyday speech, though muốn biết sounds more like wanting to find out rather than wanting to ask directly.