Breakdown of รถยนต์ ของ เขา โดน ขโมย เมื่อวาน
เขา
he, she, they
รถยนต์
car
ของ
of (belonging to)
เมื่อวาน
yesterday
โดน
to be subjected to
ขโมย
to steal
Questions & Answers about รถยนต์ ของ เขา โดน ขโมย เมื่อวาน
How exactly does โดน make this sentence passive?
In English, we change the verb itself to say 'was stolen'. In Thai, the passive voice is usually reserved for unpleasant or negative events. By placing โดน (to be subjected to) directly before the verb ขโมย (to steal), it changes the meaning of the action to 'experienced being stolen' or 'was stolen'.
Could I use ถูก instead of โดน in this sentence?
Yes, you can. Both words are used to form this type of negative passive voice. The difference is simply the tone: โดน is much more common in everyday spoken Thai, whereas ถูก sounds a bit more formal and is often found in written news.
I learned before that ขโมย means 'thief'. Why is it used for the action of stealing here?
ขโมย is a very flexible word that can act as both a noun (a thief) and a verb (to steal). Because it comes immediately after the passive marker โดน in this sentence, it is clearly functioning as an action (verb).
Why is it รถยนต์ ของ เขา instead of just 'his car'?
In Thai, possession is shown by putting the owner after the object. The word ของ means 'of' or 'belonging to', so รถยนต์ ของ เขา literally translates to 'car belonging to him'. As you advance, you might hear Thai speakers drop the word ของ in casual speech and just say รถ เขา, but the noun-then-owner word order always remains the same.
Why doesn't the sentence use a past tense word like แล้ว to show the car was stolen?
Thai verbs do not change form to show tense, and you don't always need a past-tense marker like แล้ว (already). The time word เมื่อวาน (yesterday) at the end of the sentence provides enough context to make it perfectly clear that this event happened in the past.
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