Imagine you are working at a security desk and someone hands you a lost ID card. To find out who it belongs to, or who to give it to, you need the interrogative word cui.
Cui is the Genitive/Dative form of cine (who). It translates to either "to whom" or "whose", depending on how it is used.
Asking "To whom?" (Dative)
When asking who is receiving an object or an action, use cui on its own. Because it acts as an indirect object, it usually triggers a matching Dative pronoun copy (like îi or i-) right before the verb.
To answer this kind of question, you place the recipient in the Dative case:
Asking "Whose?" (Genitive)
When asking who owns an item, cui translates to "whose". In this case, it cannot stand alone! It must always be preceded by a possessive linking article.
Just as we saw in the previous lesson, this article must perfectly match the gender and number of the object being owned, not the person you are asking about.
| Object Gender | Singular | Plural |
|---|
| Masculine | al cui | ai cui |
| Feminine | a cui | ale cui |
| Neuter | al cui | ale cui |
Because umbrela (the umbrella) is feminine singular, the question must use a:
Because fular (the scarf) and buletin (the ID card) are both neuter singular, they use al:
At the Security Desk
Now let's put it all together with a few common actions used to manage lost and found items, like a preda (to turn in / hand over) and a recupera (to get back).
