Breakdown of Saat altıda uyanamadık, bu yüzden trene yetişemedik.
altı
six
tren
train
saat
hour / o'clock
uyanmak
to wake up
bu yüzden
that's why / therefore
yetişmek
to catch (in time) / to make it to
Questions & Answers about Saat altıda uyanamadık, bu yüzden trene yetişemedik.
How do we get 'we could not wake up' from uyanamadık?
Let's break it down! The root verb is uyanmak (to wake up). We drop the -mak and add -ama- which shows inability (cannot). Then we add the past tense -dı and the 'we' ending -k. Put it all together: uyan-ama-dı-k (we could not wake up).
Why does uyanamadık use -ama- but yetişemedik uses -eme-?
This happens because of A-type vowel harmony. The inability suffix has two forms: -ama- and -eme-. Because the last vowel in uyan- is a back vowel (a), we use -ama-. The last vowel in yetiş- (to reach/catch) is a front vowel (i), so it takes -eme-, making it yetiş-eme-di-k.
In English we say we catch 'the train', so why does tren have the 'to' ending in trene?
In Turkish, the verb yetişmek means 'to reach', 'to arrive in time for', or 'to catch up with'. Because you are moving towards the train to catch it, this verb requires the dative case (the 'to/towards' ending). That is why we say trene yetişmek (literally 'to reach to the train').
What is the literal translation of bu yüzden?
It literally means 'from this face' or 'from this reason' (bu = this, yüz = face/reason, -den = from). In everyday Turkish, it is a very common set phrase that means 'therefore', 'so', or 'because of this'.
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