Learn Hardcore Vietnamese: Hoa trong vườn đẹp sau khi tôi dọn vườn sáng nay. - The flowers in the garden are beautiful after I cleaned the garden this morning.

Hoa trong vườn đẹp literally means “Flowers in the garden beautiful”, but the adjective đẹp acts like “are beautiful”.
You normally do not use là before a simple adjective.
- Correct: Hoa trong vườn đẹp.
- Wrong/very unnatural for beginners: Hoa trong vườn là đẹp.

Use là mainly when linking to a noun phrase, not an adjective:

Hoa trong vườn là niềm tự hào của tôi.
→ The flowers in the garden are my pride.

Does hoa mean “flower” or “flowers”? How do I know if it’s singular or plural?

Vietnamese usually does not mark singular/plural on the noun itself.

hoa by itself can mean “flower/flowers”. The number is understood from context.
In this sentence, Hoa trong vườn is naturally understood as “the flowers in the garden”.

To be more explicit:

một bông hoa – one flower
những bông hoa – (some/the) flowers
các bông hoa – the flowers (more clearly a specific set)

So you could also say:

Những bông hoa trong vườn đẹp…
→ more clearly plural, but also a bit heavier/longer.

Why is trong vườn right after hoa? Could I move it somewhere else?

Here Hoa trong vườn is one noun phrase:

hoa – flowers
trong vườn – in the garden (a location phrase modifying hoa)

This pattern [noun] + [location phrase] is very common:

người trong phòng – the people in the room
xe ngoài đường – the cars on the street

If you move trong vườn, you change what it is modifying:

Hoa đẹp trong vườn
→ tends to mean “The flowers are beautiful in the garden (as a place)”, not “the flowers that are in the garden are beautiful.”

The original:

Hoa trong vườn đẹp…
→ The flowers that are in the garden are beautiful… (location describes the flowers themselves)

So the current position is the most natural for “flowers in the garden.”

Why is vườn repeated? Could I avoid saying vườn twice?

The sentence has:

Hoa trong vườn – flowers in the garden
tôi dọn vườn – I cleaned/tidied the garden

Repeating vườn is very normal in Vietnamese and does not sound awkward.

Alternatives:

You can omit the object if it’s obvious from context:
- Hoa trong vườn đẹp sau khi tôi dọn sáng nay.
  → The flowers in the garden are beautiful after I tidied (it) this morning.
  Here dọn has no explicit object; listeners infer it’s the garden.
Using nó for an inanimate thing like a garden is possible but often less natural here:
- sau khi tôi dọn nó feels a bit marked/forced in this context.

So repeating vườn is perfectly fine and stylistically neutral.

What exactly does sau khi do here? Is sau khi tôi dọn vườn sáng nay its own clause?

Yes. sau khi introduces a time clause meaning “after (doing something)”.

Structure:

sau khi + [subject] + [verb phrase]

In the sentence:

sau khi – after
tôi dọn vườn – I tidied/cleaned the garden
sáng nay – this morning

So sau khi tôi dọn vườn sáng nay is a subordinate clause:

(Hoa trong vườn đẹp) – main clause
(sau khi tôi dọn vườn sáng nay) – time clause (after I cleaned the garden this morning)

Can I move sau khi tôi dọn vườn sáng nay to the beginning of the sentence?

Yes. Both orders are natural:

Hoa trong vườn đẹp sau khi tôi dọn vườn sáng nay.
Sau khi tôi dọn vườn sáng nay, hoa trong vườn đẹp.

When the sau khi clause comes first, you normally put a comma after it. The meaning is the same; putting it first just sets the time/background first, which is very common in Vietnamese.

Where can sáng nay go? Is sau khi sáng nay tôi dọn vườn okay?

Natural placements of sáng nay:

tôi dọn vườn sáng nay
sáng nay tôi dọn vườn
sau khi tôi dọn vườn sáng nay (as in the original)

All of these are fine.

But:

✗ sau khi sáng nay tôi dọn vườn is not natural.
sau khi should be followed directly by the clause (subject + verb phrase). Time expressions like sáng nay usually appear inside that clause, not between sau khi and the subject.

Should I add đã to mark the past, like sau khi tôi đã dọn vườn sáng nay?

You don’t need đã here.

sáng nay (this morning) and sau khi (after) already clearly show that the action happened in the past and is completed.
sau khi tôi dọn vườn sáng nay is fully natural and clear.

Adding đã:

sau khi tôi đã dọn vườn sáng nay is possible, but it can sound a bit heavier or like you are emphasizing completion (after I had already finished cleaning the garden this morning).

For everyday speech in this sentence, most speakers would simply omit đã.

Could I say Hoa trong vườn rất đẹp… instead? What does rất do?

Yes, that’s very natural.

đẹp – beautiful
rất đẹp – very beautiful

So:

Hoa trong vườn đẹp sau khi tôi dọn vườn sáng nay.
→ The flowers in the garden are beautiful…
Hoa trong vườn rất đẹp sau khi tôi dọn vườn sáng nay.
→ The flowers in the garden are very beautiful…

Intensifiers you’ll see often:

rất – very
lắm – very (usually after the adjective: đẹp lắm)
quá – so / too (often after the adjective: đẹp quá)

Why don’t we use a classifier, like những bông hoa, in Hoa trong vườn?

Classifiers (like bông, cái, con) are important in Vietnamese, but they are not required every time you mention a countable noun.

Common patterns:

With a number:
- ba bông hoa – three flowers
With a specific single item:
- một bông hoa – one flower
- bông hoa này – this flower
For a clear set of plural things:
- những bông hoa trong vườn – the flowers in the garden (some flowers)

But when referring to a kind or group in a more general way, you can omit both những and the classifier:

Hoa trong vườn đẹp.
→ Natural, meaning “The flowers in the garden are beautiful.”

So Hoa trong vườn đẹp… is perfectly good, everyday Vietnamese.
If you want to be more explicit about “some specific flowers,” Những bông hoa trong vườn đẹp… is also fine, just a bit more marked.

Can I say Hoa trong vườn là đẹp… with là, like “flowers are beautiful”?

In standard, everyday Vietnamese, you should not put là directly before a simple adjective like this.

Hoa trong vườn đẹp. – correct, natural
Hoa trong vườn là đẹp. – generally wrong / unnatural in this basic meaning

Use là mainly to link to a noun group:

Hoa trong vườn là niềm vui của tôi.
→ The flowers in the garden are my joy.

There are some special emphasis patterns where là can appear before adjectives (in certain dialects or styles), but as a learner you’re safest to remember:

Subject + adjective for “X is Adj.”,
without là.

Do I need thì after Hoa trong vườn, like Hoa trong vườn thì đẹp…?

You don’t need thì, but you can use it for a particular nuance.

Hoa trong vườn đẹp… – neutral statement:
The flowers in the garden are beautiful…
Hoa trong vườn thì đẹp, … – thì marks a topic or contrast:
As for the flowers in the garden, (they) are beautiful, … (maybe followed by a contrast like nhưng… – but…)

So:

With no contrast or special emphasis, the version without thì is simplest and most common.
Add thì when you want to set up a comparison/contrast or highlight that as the topic.

Does this sentence describe something happening right now, or a general fact? How does Vietnamese show tense here?

Vietnamese does not change the verb form for tense. Time is usually shown by:

Time words: sáng nay, hôm qua, ngày mai, etc.
Aspect particles: đã, đang, sẽ, etc.
Connectors: sau khi, trước khi, etc.

In Hoa trong vườn đẹp sau khi tôi dọn vườn sáng nay:

sáng nay
- sau khi tells us:
  - The cleaning happened this morning (past).
  - The flowers being beautiful is the result now (after that cleaning).

So the natural understanding is:

Now, after I cleaned the garden this morning, the flowers in the garden are beautiful.

If you wanted a general/habitual idea, you’d normally phrase it differently, e.g.:

Mỗi khi tôi dọn vườn buổi sáng, hoa trong vườn lại đẹp.
→ Whenever I tidy the garden in the morning, the flowers in the garden (then) look beautiful.

What exactly does dọn vườn mean? Is it the same as làm vườn?

They’re related but not identical:

dọn vườn
- literally “tidy/clean the garden”
- focuses on cleaning up: removing rubbish, sweeping, trimming, making it neat.
làm vườn
- literally “do garden(ing)”
- broader: planting, weeding, watering, taking care of plants, etc.

So in this sentence, dọn vườn emphasizes that the garden was cleaned/tidied, and as a result the flowers look beautiful. If you said làm vườn, it would sound more like you were gardening in general, not specifically cleaning.