"How is the afternoon Rehema?"

Translation: Habari za mchana Rehema?

[HuangMeiHua]

What's the difference between "za, zu, (and) ya?"

[Mr.Quizzical]

They both essentially mean the same thing. Za and ya are both prepositions meaning of.

Habari za/ya asubuhi is literally translates into "What news of the morning?" but means "How is the morning".

A dictionary states:

-a is the invariable element, which
combined with a prefix forms the
various prepositions wa, ya, za, cha,
la, pa, kwa, ??iwa. In meaning these
all correspond generally to the English
'of,' and (with the noun following)
to the Genitive Case in the classical
languages, and include all such adjec-
tival relations as ' belonging to, pro-
ceeding from, consisting of, of the
class or kind of, relating to, qualified
by,'

Wikipedia says that ya is used with noun classes 4, 6, and 9. Za is used with noun class 10.

[John M.]

I can't think of an instamce where I would use "zu", but "ya and za" are the difference between singular and plural. "Ya" is singular, "za" is plural.

[Eternulo]

So why would "habari ya mchana" be incorrect?

[John M.]

Technically not, though it's written and spoken as a plural because you don't know how much news there is. Habari meaning news. Mr.Quizzical below this comment has an almost perfect explanation, though I would disagree on a couple of points.

[Mr.Quizzical]

Yes, I probably do have some incorrect info. I am native English and I don't know much Swahili. I'd rather be partly wrong with confidence than correct with a lot of "I think" and "I may be wrong" and other unsure statements where the reader would probably ignore everything I say because they don't know if they can trust me.

[E.Livinus]

Mr.Quizzical is doing a good job,
I am Tanzanian and I agree with his explanation

[JFisher12]

So, is there a certain time I use za instead lf ya like with america you would say mmarekani for 1 american and wamarekani for multiple ?

[JFisher12]

of*