Breakdown of Мама завтракает на новой кухне.
мама
mom
новый
new
завтракать
to have breakfast
на
on, at / by (transport) / to (a place) / to (in answer to)
кухня
kitchen
Questions & Answers about Мама завтракает на новой кухне.
Why do we use на here when the English translation says "in"? Shouldn't "in" be в?
In Russian, a few specific words pair with на (on/at) instead of в (in) to indicate location, even when we would say "in" in English. Кухня (kitchen) is one of these traditional exceptions. You always say на кухне for "in the kitchen".
Why does the word for "new" change to новой here?
It is in the prepositional case because it describes the kitchen, which is the location where the action is happening. For feminine adjectives in the prepositional case, the standard dictionary ending -ая changes to -ой (so новая becomes новой).
I remember that "kitchen" is кухня. Why does it end in -е here?
This is also the prepositional case, triggered by the preposition на. When talking about location, feminine nouns ending in -а or -я (like кухня) change their last letter to -е.
The translation says "is eating breakfast", but завтракает is just one word. How does that work?
Russian doesn't have a separate "is doing" tense (present continuous) like English does. The single present-tense verb завтракает can mean either "eats breakfast" (as a general habit) or "is eating breakfast" (right now), depending on what makes sense in the situation.
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