Breakdown of Við heilsumst alltaf þegar við hittumst í stigaganginum.
við
we
alltaf
always
í
in / into / to (before the hour, in telling time) / per (in frequency expressions)
hittast
to meet each other
þegar
when
heilsast
to greet each other
stigagangurinn
the stairwell
Questions & Answers about Við heilsumst alltaf þegar við hittumst í stigaganginum.
How do the verbs heilsumst and hittumst show that the action happens to "each other"?
The -st ending is doing the work here. When you add -st to the active plural verbs heilsum (we greet) and hittum (we meet), it creates a reciprocal meaning, which is a helpful way of saying the people are doing the action to each other.
I learned earlier that the verb heilsa requires a dative object. Why isn't there a dative word here?
Because the "each other" meaning is already built right into the -st ending of heilsumst. Since there is no separate noun or pronoun acting as the object receiving the greeting, you don't need to worry about applying the dative case.
How is the word stigaganginum put together?
The dictionary form is the masculine noun stigagangur (stairwell), which combines stigi (stairs) and gangur (corridor). In this sentence, it gets the dative "the" ending -num because the preposition í triggers the dative case when describing a fixed location where an action happens.
Why does the subject við come right after þegar instead of the verb?
The word þegar (when) introduces a dependent clause, which usually keeps standard subject-verb word order (við hittumst). The strict verb-in-second-place rule that sometimes flips words around applies to main clauses, not after conjunctions like þegar.
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