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Indonesian does not have articles, but we have different ways to say 'a/an/some' and 'the' for person/s, thing/s, or animal/s.
The rule is to add 'se' (which means one, a/an) plus a special word.
Person: seorang
Persons: beberapa orang
Thing: sebuah
Things: beberapa buah
Animal: seekor
Animals: beberapa ekor
Kakakku adalah seorang guru - My sister/brother is a teacher
Saya mempunyai beberapa ekor kelinci - I have some rabbits
*Notice: beberapa ekor kelinci >> 'beberapa' showed the plural form, so you don't have to say 'beberapa ekor kelinci-kelinci'
There are several other indefinite articles. They are specialized:
Secarik/selembar kertas a (piece of) paper
Sebutir telur an egg
Sebulir air mata a tear (liquid comes from the eye)
Sepotong roti a (piece of) bread
Setetes air a dip of water
Actually there are still lots of articles like these, but these are the most common.
Indonesian singular and plural nouns are easy to recognize:
buku a book
buku-buku some books
komputer a computer
komputer-komputer some computers
But be careful; repeated words not only express plural form, but they also mean other things. Sometimes, prefixes/suffixes/circumfixes are added, or the letters/sound are changed.
Meaning | Word | Meaning | Note |
look-a-like | mobil-mobilan | not a real car; just a car toy | mobil: car |
frequency | memukul-mukul | to hit a few times | pukul: to hit |
reciprocal | berpandang-pandangan | to gaze at each other | pandang: to gaze |
slightly | kemerah-merahan | nearly red; pink-red | merah: red |
Actually there are some other functions of the repeated words, but since we need more knowledge about the language (even we Indonesians still have to study about these forms), I decided not to give them yet. But if you find any Indonesian sentences that you feel difficult to translate, just send me an e-mail at vremita_desectia [at] yahoo.com and I'll contact you.
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