Breakdown of Não conheço a cidade aonde esta autoestrada te leva!
não
not / no
este
this (este, esta, estes, estas)
conhecer
to meet / to get to know / discover
a cidade
the city
Questions & Answers about Não conheço a cidade aonde esta autoestrada te leva!
Why do we use aonde instead of onde in this sentence?
Aonde specifically means "to where," as it combines the preposition a (to) and onde (where). We use it here because the verb levar (to take) involves motion towards a destination. The motorway is taking you to the city.
What if the sentence was "I don't know the city where this motorway is"? Would we still use aonde?
Why is the pronoun te placed before leva instead of after it?
In Portuguese, certain words act like magnets and pull object pronouns (like te) to the front of the verb. Relative pronouns, such as aonde, are "magnet" words. Because of this, the pronoun moves before the verb, making it ...aonde esta autoestrada te leva rather than ...aonde esta autoestrada leva-te.
Could I use Não sei instead of Não conheço to translate "I don't know"?