Breakdown of Min kollega stängde dörren innan pausen.
innan
before
dörren
the door
min
my (min/mitt/mina)
kollegan
the colleague
Questions & Answers about Min kollega stängde dörren innan pausen.
How do we know to use the -de ending for stängde?
Stänga (to close) is a Group 2 verb. To make it past tense (preteritum), we drop the -a to get the stem stäng-. Because the stem ends in a voiced consonant sound (the ng sound), it belongs to Group 2a and takes the suffix -de. If the stem ended in an unvoiced consonant like p, t, k, or s, it would be a Group 2b verb and take -te instead.
Why is it min kollega instead of the definite form min kollegan?
In Swedish, whenever you use a possessive word like min (my), din (your), or deras (their), the noun that follows must always remain in the indefinite form. Even though you are talking about a specific colleague, the possessive word already does the job of pointing out exactly whose colleague it is!
Can I use före instead of innan to say 'before the break'?
Yes, you can absolutely say före pausen. Traditionally, före is a preposition used before nouns (like pausen), while innan is a conjunction used before a full phrase (like 'before we took a break'). However, in modern everyday Swedish, innan is widely accepted in both situations, which is why it works perfectly here.
What are the base forms of dörren and ?