Breakdown of Мы покупаем продукты в магазине.
в
in / to (direction)
магазин
store, shop
покупать
to buy
продукты
groceries, food products
Questions & Answers about Мы покупаем продукты в магазине.
Why is продукты used here to mean "groceries"?
While продукты literally translates to "products", in everyday Russian it is the standard word for "groceries" or "food supplies". If you need to talk about non-food items, you would normally use a different word like товары (goods).
What case is продукты in, and why doesn't its ending change?
It is in the accusative case because it is the direct object of the sentence (the thing being bought). For inanimate plural nouns like продукты, the accusative form looks exactly the same as the nominative (dictionary) plural form.
Why does магазин change to магазине?
The ending changes to -е because the word is in the prepositional case. We use the preposition в (in/at) plus the prepositional case to describe a static location, answering the question "where?".
Could покупаем also mean "we are buying" right now?
Yes! Russian doesn't have a separate "continuous" tense like English does. Depending on the situation, the imperfective verb покупаем can mean a routine habit ("we buy") or an action happening right at this very moment ("we are buying").