Breakdown of Ты не работаешь? Тогда мы дома.
не
not
дома
at home
ты
you (singular)
мы
we
работать
to work
тогда
then, in that case
Questions & Answers about Ты не работаешь? Тогда мы дома.
The lesson talks about "потом" (then/later). Could I use "потом" instead of "тогда" in this sentence?
No, because they mean different kinds of "then." The word потом means "then" as in "later" or "after that" (talking about time). The word тогда means "then" as in "in that case" or "under those circumstances." Because the speaker means "If you are not working, in that case we stay home," you must use тогда.
Where is the word for "stay" or "are" in "Тогда мы дома"?
Russian drops the "to be" verb (like am, is, or are) in the present tense. Literally, the second half of this sentence says "Then we at home." We translate this into English as "Then we stay at home" or "Then we are at home" to make it sound natural, but Russian doesn't need an action verb here.
Why does the sentence use "дома" instead of "дом"?
The word дом is a noun meaning "a house" or "a building." The word дома is a special location word (an adverb) that specifically means "at home." Whenever you want to say where someone is, and they are at their home, you use дома.
How do you form a question like "Ты не работаешь?" without a question word?
In Russian, you don't need helper verbs like "do" or "are" to ask a question. You just use the exact same word order as a normal statement and raise the pitch of your voice on the most important word. Here, you would make your voice go up on работаешь to show you are asking if they are working.
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