Learn Romanian: Angajatul îl sună pe șeful lui imediat. - The employee is calling his boss immediately.

In Romanian, when the direct object (the one receiving the action of the verb) is a specific human being, you must put the preposition pe in front of it. Since "his boss" is a specific person, we have to say pe șeful lui instead of just șeful lui.

What is the word 'îl' doing before the verb?

îl is a short pronoun meaning "him". Romanian has a special rule: whenever you use pe for a specific person, you must also add a short pronoun matching that person right before the verb. Literally, the sentence is saying "The employee him calls on his boss."

Why is "his boss" translated as 'șeful lui'?

To say "his" in Romanian, we place the word lui immediately after the noun. However, the noun must have the definite article ("the") attached to it first. So, șef (boss) becomes șeful (the boss), and adding lui makes it literally "the boss of him" (his boss).

Both 'angajatul' and 'șeful' end in '-ul'. How do we know which one is doing the calling?

The -ul ending is just the masculine definite article ("the") attached to the end of a noun. You know angajatul is doing the calling because it comes before the verb (like in English). More importantly, the word pe serves as a big flashing sign that tells you șeful is the one receiving the action (the object).