learning Estonian through advertising 1
Lase oma sisemine sportlane v�lja. - Release your inner athlete.
oma � reflexive poss. adj. (refers back to preceding pronun).
cf. �petaja �tles �pilasele, et ta loeks oma raamatut. The teacher told the student to read his own [the students] book.
�petaja �tles �pilasele, et ta loeks tema raamatut. The teacher told the student to read his [the teachers] book.
Ma loen oma raamatut! - I am reading (some of) my book. Sa loed oma raamatut! - You are reading (some of) your book.
sisemine � adj. inner (ending mine should not be confused with suffix -mine, the latter signifying act of doing, as in luge+mine reading (from lugema read), s��+mine eating (s��ma eat), etc. You know -mine attaches to the stem of the ma-infinitive and not the da-infinitive, because its s��mine and not s��mine* (da-infinitive is s��a)). The breakdown of sisemine is actually sisemi+ne, -ne being an adjectival ending, with sg. genitive -se and sg. partitive -st.
sportlane � n. sportsperson. It can stand for both male sportsman and female sportswoman, though if one wishes to specify sportswoman one can use the female form of the suffix -lane (sg. gen. -lase, sg. part. -last), which is -lanna (sg. gen. -lanna, sg. part. -lannat). However, it must be said that this is a rare usage, especially in the singular. A female athlete would call herself sportlane, just like in English where more and more actresses refer to themselves as actor.
Where I have most heard the use of the -lanna suffix is in the word s�branna female friend, what straight women in English call a girlfriend. It can also be used with nationalities: cf. eestlane, eestlased Estonian person, Estonians; eestlanna, eestlannad Estonian woman, Estonian women. The stand alone noun maa (land) used in compound nouns and the suffix -lane are very productive. Ex. Iiri+maa, iir+lane Ireland, Irish person, Vene+maa, vene+lane Russia, Russian person, etc. (Be careful of the dropped final vowel in the first part of iirlane - not iirilane*. Cf. Soome, soomlane Finland, Finn and Eesti, eestlane Estonian, Estonian person).
v�lja � adv. out as in Lind lendas aknast v�lja. The bird flew out through (lit. from) the window and v�ljap��s exit (p��s escape < p��semine/p��sema escape n./vb. ; way, passage. Cf. sisep��s entrance as in sisep��s kaubamajja entrance to the department store. The double j here is not a mistake, majja is the sg. illative case form of maja house, building � the illative is often expressed by a lengthening of a vowel or consonant of the word, and may not be indicated in the orthography. For example kool school (nom. long o), kooli of the school (gen., long o), but kooli to the school (ill., overlong o in speech, but not in orthography)).
Not to be confused with the orthographically identical, but phonetically different v�lja, the genitive form of the noun v�li field, empty space, expanse. The latter has a long l, which you will notice is not indicated by the orthography. Estonian has a few nice, little, juicy gems like this. For example, take the two orthographically identical words palk wage and palk log. The latter has a palatalised l. Their genitive and partitive forms are also different: wage: palk, palga, palka ; log: palk, palgi, palki. And so you know, the palatalised l continues also through the case forms of log. There is also the partitive case form of v�li, which is also v�lja, but with a short l.
Handy reminder of the above: v�lja (short l) = 1) adverb meaning out ; 2) partitive case form of v�li field, empty space, expanse. v�lja (long l) = genitive case form of v�li.