Tối nay, mẹ tôi sẽ nấu ăn trong bếp.

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Breakdown of Tối nay, mẹ tôi sẽ nấu ăn trong bếp.

• sẽ: will
• tối nay: tonight
• trong: in (enclosed by something)

Questions & Answers about Tối nay, mẹ tôi sẽ nấu ăn trong bếp.

Why does the sentence start with Tối nay?

Vietnamese very often puts time expressions near the beginning of the sentence. That sets the time frame first, and then the rest of the sentence follows.

So:

• Tối nay = tonight
• mẹ tôi = my mother
• sẽ nấu ăn = will cook
• trong bếp = in the kitchen

This time-first pattern is extremely common in Vietnamese:

• Hôm nay tôi đi làm. = Today I go to work.
• Ngày mai cô ấy sẽ đến. = Tomorrow she will come.

You could sometimes place the time elsewhere, but sentence-initial time phrases are very natural.

What does Tối nay mean exactly?

Tối nay means tonight.

Breakdown:

• tối = evening / night
• nay = this / tonight / today in context

Together, tối nay refers to this evening / tonight.

A few similar expressions:

• sáng nay = this morning
• chiều nay = this afternoon
• đêm nay = tonight (more specifically nighttime)
• hôm nay = today

So tối nay is specifically the evening period of today.

Why is there a comma after Tối nay?