EasyCroatian_r47.an

Easy Croaan (rev. 47b) / 44 Genive Plural 260 / 600
• Examples
The song Potraži me u predgrađu Look for me in the suburbia is a well-known ‘old
school’ Croatian pop song. It has not too complicated grammar. The form potraži is
not yet explained – it’s called imperative, and it’s used to form commands:
Potraži me A u predgrađu DL
Na ulici DL , na raskršću DL
Look for me in the suburbia
On the street, in the intersection
1
Gdje ti DL je jorgovan N rasuo perle A
Gdje nam DL je proljeće N dotaklo usne A
i pobjeglo
Where the lilac scattered your beads
Where the spring touched our lips
and ran away
2
2pl
The third and fourth line contain possessive DL, one time for perle beads (not
pearls), another time for usne lips. In the last three verses, perfective verbs from
these difficult pairs are used:
rasipati ~ rasuti (raspe, rasuo) scatter
doticati (dotiče) ~ dotaći (dotakne, dotakao, dotakla) touch
bježati (bježi) ~ pobjeći (pobjegne, pobjegao, pobjegla) run away
(You probably see now the case endings are not the most complex feature in
Croatian.)
Note that suburbia – especially at the time the song was written – was the poorer
outer part of cities in Croatia, with narrow, sometimes unpaved streets, and small
houses.
Potraži me A u predgrađu DL
Look for me in the suburbia
1
Kraj vlakova G što prolaze
Beside the passing trains
Bit ćemo sami N u svitanje DL dana G We’ll be alone in the dawn of the day
Bit ćemo sami N u pjesmama DL ptica G
ko nekada
We’ll be alone in songs of the birds
like long ago
The word kraj means beside when used with a noun in G; the same can be expressed
with pokraj. The construction vlakovi što prolaze means passing trains, literally
trains that are passing. The third and fourth line is of course the future tense. The
word ko is a colloquially shortened form of kao like, as.
The first line uses nouns rublje clothes, underwear and cvijeće flowers: they are socalled
collective nouns – they stand for a whole heap of things, but are in singular
(they will be explained in #47 Of Flowers, Thorns and Counting Children):
Drijemaju jedra N od rublja G i cvijeća G Sails of cloth and flowers nap
Čekaju vjetar A da nekuda plove They wait for the wind to sail somewhere
Čuješ li, naše N nas A predgrađe N zove Do you hear, our suburbia is calling us
1pl
Traže te A kuće DL i ulice stare N Old houses and streets are looking for you
2