Breakdown of Турист хотел бы посмотреть этот музей.
музей
museum
этот
this [f: эта, n: это]
хотеть
to want
турист
tourist
посмотреть
to watch (perfective) / to look at (perfective)
бы
would (conditional particle) / concessive particle
Questions & Answers about Турист хотел бы посмотреть этот музей.
Why use хотел бы instead of the present tense хочет?
Adding the particle бы to the past tense creates the conditional mood. Here, it softens the statement from "The tourist wants" (турист хочет) to a much more polite "The tourist would like" (турист хотел бы).
Wait, why is the verb хотел in the past tense if the tourist wants to see the museum right now?
In Russian, the conditional mood (meaning "would do something") is always formed using the past tense of the verb plus the particle бы. Even though хотел is a past tense form, хотел бы applies to present or future desires!
Why use the perfective verb посмотреть here instead of смотреть?
The tourist wants to visit and see this specific museum as a single, completed action. The perfective посмотреть emphasizes achieving that result. The imperfective смотреть is usually for continuous actions, like "watching" a movie or staring at something over time.
Shouldn't the ending of этот музей change since it is the direct object being seen?
It actually is in the Accusative case because it's the direct object! However, for masculine nouns that are inanimate (non-living things) like музей, the Accusative case looks exactly the same as the Nominative (dictionary) form. The pronoun этот also follows this rule, so neither word changes its spelling here.
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