Learn how to use the verbs "to like" and "to love"
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| Hei, minun nimeni on Paula. Hi everybody! I’m Paula. |
| Welcome to FinnishPod101.com’s “Suomea kolmessa minuutissa”. The fastest, easiest, and most fun way to learn Finnish. |
| In the last lesson, we learned how to use the verb tehdä which means "to do" in Finnish. |
| In this lesson, we will learn how to use pitää, the third verb in our series dedicated to commonly used Finnish verbs. |
| Pitää actually has two completely different meanings. It can either mean “to hold”, or the one we are going to learn about now, “to like”. |
| Let’s see how to conjugate it! |
| Minä pidän, “I like”, sinä pidät, “you like”, hän pitää, “he likes”, me pidämme, “we like”, te pidätte, “you like”, and he pitävät, “they like”. |
| Here is a question that Finns often like to ask: |
| Pidätkö sinä salmiakista? |
| Salmiakki is a salty liquorice candy that some people love, and others hate. So if you happen to like salmiakki, you would reply |
| Kyllä, minä pidän salmiakista. |
| [slowly] Kyllä, minä pidän salmiakista. |
| So let’s break down the answer. |
| First we had- |
| Kyllä, which is simply "Yes." |
| Then minä which is "I" in Finnish. After which we have pidän, which is the conjugated form of the verb pitää. |
| And finally the word salmiakki. |
| Because salmiakki is the object of the liking, it gets the grammatical case ending -sta. And as it has a double K consonant, one of them must be removed, so the final form is salmiakista. |
| Kyllä, minä pidän salmiakista. |
| You can use this verb together with other verbs as well, to express that you like performing an action. For example, if you like ice skating, you would say minä pidän luistelusta. |
| [slowly] Minä pidän luistelusta. |
| Luistelu means “ice skating”, and here you also have to add the ending -sta, so it becomes luistelusta. |
| You can also use this verb when talking about a person. The same way as in English you would say “I like you”, in Finnish you can say |
| Minä pidän sinusta. |
| [slowly] Minä pidän sinusta. |
| This is a verb you can casually use when you want to show affection towards someone, whether it was a friend, boyfriend, or family member. When you want to indicate deeper feelings, you can use the verb rakastaa, “to love”. |
| The usage of rakastaa is the same as in English. Even if you didn’t feel completely comfortable using it towards a person, you can very casually use it about other things you like a lot. For example, the same way as in English you could say “I love ice cream”, in Finnish you would say |
| Minä rakastan jäätelöä. |
| Now it’s time for Paula’s Points. |
| I’d also like to introduce another verb very commonly used for saying “to like”. It is tykätä. The meaning and usage are the same as for the verb pitää, but tykätä is slightly more casual, and used when talking with friends. |
| So when a friend asks you about your interests, you could answer |
| Minä tykkään jalkapallosta, which means I like football. |
| If your teacher asks you the same question, you might want to answer |
| Minä pidän jalkapallosta, which is just slightly more polite. |
| However, they are both commonly used so you don’t have to feel pressure about which one to use! |
| In this lesson, we learned how to use the verb pitää and more! |
| Next time we’ll learn another very useful verb, tulla. |
| Do you have any idea what it might mean? You’ll find out in the next Suomea kolmessa minuutissa lesson. |
| Nähdään pian! |
Comments
HideWhat Finnish food do you like the most?
Hello Dayana,
Thank you for your question! If you are coming from somewhere you will use the elative form. Example. Tulen Suomesta or olen kotoisin Suomesta. Hope this helps.
Let us know if you have any question.
Cheers,
Aarni
Team FinnishPod101.com
Moi! I don't understand. The elative case sta/stä is supposed to be used when you are talking about places.... Why using it here?
Hei Natasha,
Thank you for your comment! Yes, Finnish is a language of many many conjugations, so just learn basics first and then move on to the bit more difficult conjugations. Good luck with your studies and have fun! 😄
Let us know if you have any question.
Cheers,
Aarni
Team FinnishPod101.com
Hei Aarni,
It's good to know that I got some right :)
It's sometimes difficult to know which word to use when more than one word comes up in the dictionary for a searched word. Some words have quite a few different options!
Paljon kiitos,
Natasha
Hei Natasha,
Nice sentences! Most of your sentences are correct! Well done.
I like Finnish chocolate = Pidän suomalaisesta suklaasta.
Pidän vierailusta Suomessa would be good translation for I like visiting Finland.
Let us know if you have any question.
Cheers,
Aarni
Team FinnishPod101.com
Hei Aarni,
:)
A few attempts at saying what I like!
Minä pidän käydästä suomesta, tai, minä pidän käydä suomesta. (I'm not confident on this one.)
Pidän kävelystä
Pidän kävelystä suomessa
Pidän suomesta suklaasta
Pidän tummasta suklaasta
They are supposed to say:
I like visiting Finland.
I like walking.
I like walking in Finland.
I like Finnish chocolate.
I like dark chocolate.
How did I do?
Kiitos,
Natasha
Hello Natasha,
Thank you for your comment! Oh! That's great you are going again to Finland. it is surely motivating your studies even more. 😄
Great to have you with us!
Let us know if you have any question.
Cheers,
Aarni
Team FinnishPod101.com
Hei Aarni,
It is definitely a challenge! I learned a tiny bit in the past, before visiting Finland. As I'm thinking of a visit in the near future it's time to pick it back up and remind myself and hopefully progress a bit! It's an interesting language, so no giving up!!!
Natasha
Hello Natasha,
Thank you for your posting. No problem! Sometimes accidents happen. 😄
Happy to know you are back on track again. 👍
Yes, Finnish grammar has its challenges but no giving up, right?
Let us know if you have any question.
Cheers,
Aarni
Team FinnishPod101.com
Hei Aarni,
Not sure where I got Antti from before!
Kiitos paljon. That now makes more sense.
I have a long way to go with Finnish grammar!!! But hopefully bit by bit I will get there :)
Natasha
Hello Natasha,
Thank you for your question.
"Uiminen" is a kind of synonym and the long-form for the word "uinti". This form means a bit more actual doing in my opinion. So, a very slight difference between these two words. It has -nen ending. Other similar words which have -en ending are for example: "ajaminen" driving, "kilpaileminen" competing. These all have -nen ending.
When we want to conjugate "uiminen" into another form, in this case, elative form, we replace the -nen with -se- before the -sta/- stä.
As this comment section is not suitable for large scale grammar teaching, please contact your Finnish teacher to get more info about the elative case. I hope this helps a bit. 😄
Let us know if you have any question.
Cheers,
Aarni
Team FinnishPod101.com
Hei Antti,
Thank you for getting back to me.
I see how the first version works, uinti goes to uinnista. Consonant graduation means the nt changes to nn and add sta.
But I don't understand how uiminen becomes uimisesta as given in the PDF.
In the examples given in the video it's like uinti to uinnista. Luistelu = ice skating, it's the word in the same format with sta on the end. Salmiakki requires consonant graduation but is the same principle, just add sta to the end.
I'm still confused!
Natasha
Hello Natasha,
Thank you for your question.
The basic werb for a word "uimisesta" is "uinti" or "uiminen" "Uinti" is the more formal word. The correct elative form would be "uinnista" or "uimisesta"
Hope this helps a bit. 😄
Let us know if you have any question.
Cheers,
Aarni
Team FinnishPod101.com
On the, Learning Finnish pdf, I found on this page: https://www.finnishpod101.com/learn-with-pdf/ there is the following information:
I like [noun]. Minä pidän [noun]-sta/stä.
Example: I like swimming. Minä pidän uimisesta.
Going by the above logic the Finnish noun for swimming is uimise. But uimise isn't a word. So how does it work? How do I construct the last word of the statement?
I looked at this because I’d like to say what I like to do, for example: I like walking.
I’m sure this isn’t as difficult as I’m making it out to be!!! Or I hope not! Where am I going wrong? Many thanks.
Minä pidän salmiakista!
(Although I haven't had it since my last trip to Finland in 2012!)
Hello Erik,
Thank you for your question.
Minä pidän salmiakista?? Great, Erik, it is correct.
When you like something in Finnish, you can choose between two verbs, tykätä and pitää.
So, in Finnish, you use the verb pitää "to be fond of" to say you like something.
This verb is always followed by the -sta/-stä ending.
Let us know if you have any question.
Cheers,
Aarni
Team FinnishPod101.com
Can someone tell me what grammatical case the direct object(salmiakki) is in here? What case does salmiakki takes after the verb pitää??
Minä pidän salmiakista??
I would think it is the genitive case, but this does not seem to be the case as
Hei Robert, mahtavaa! ? ?
Päivi
Team FinnishPod101.com
Hei, minä pidän salmiakista :)
Moi, Päivi!
Ah, okay. I think the one I went to would be "messut." There were a lot of people there selling things. Shirts, jacuzzis, quilts, jewelry, lots of stuff. :smile: And food. :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:
Ahh, okay, that makes sense. :grin: I just saw it once and was a little confused.