Breakdown of Gölde yüzüyordum, az kalsın bacağıma kramp giriyordu.
yüzmek
to swim
girmek
to enter
göl
lake
bacak
leg
Questions & Answers about Gölde yüzüyordum, az kalsın bacağıma kramp giriyordu.
Why does the second half of the sentence use giriyordu (past continuous) when the English translation says 'almost got' (simple past)?
In Turkish, when you want to express that something almost happened but was averted, you pair az kalsın or neredeyse with the past continuous tense (-yordu). It shows that the event was on the verge of happening. While English uses the simple past for this, Turkish needs the continuous tense to capture that 'almost happened' state.
Why do we use the verb girmek (to enter) for getting a cramp?
In Turkish, cramps 'enter' the body rather than you 'getting' them. Because the cramp is moving into a specific place, the targeted body part takes the dative case (direction towards). This is why 'my leg' translates to bacağıma (to my leg).
As a quick refresher, why did the 'k' in bacak change to 'ğ' in bacağıma?
This is consonant mutation. When you add a suffix starting with a vowel to a noun ending in 'k', the consonant softens to 'ğ'. Here, bacak (leg) gets the first-person possessive -ım to become bacağım, and then the dative suffix -a is added.
Could I use neredeyse instead of az kalsın in this sentence?
Yes, absolutely. Both az kalsın and neredeyse mean 'almost' or 'nearly'. They are completely interchangeable here and both work perfectly with the past continuous tense to express an action that was narrowly averted.