Tetun Translator

The horse is very quiet. Even we touch her head, she isn’t savage towards us. in Tetun

Kuda ne'e maus loos. Ita bá kaer nia ulun mós, la si'ak ita ida.

English → Tetun phrasebook

Grammar in this phrase

Intensifiers
Intensifiers (loos, tebes, demais, laduun)
loos
Position matters. 'loos' / 'tebes' / 'demais' follow the adjective ('barak loos' = very many). 'laduun' PRECEDES the adjective ('laduun diak' = not very good). 'liu tan' = even more.
Negation
la — 'not' (general negation)
la
Placed before verbs and adjectives to negate them. For contrastive 'not X but Y' use 'laós'; for 'not yet' use 'seidauk'; for 'no longer' wrap 'la ... ona' around the verb.
Possession
nia / nian — possession
nia
'nia' goes BEFORE the thing possessed; 'nian' goes AFTER. Both function the same way; position decides which form. 'nia' is also the 3rd-person pronoun (he / she / it) — disambiguate by position.

More patterns like these in the Tetun grammar guide.

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