"Enter the first door!"

Translation: Kaingie mlango wa kwanza!

[vitoreiji]

I was under the impression that ka- as a command would only come after normal commands. Is that not the case?

[Ernst557459]

They are two different uses of the same -ka- morpheme, with different meanings and different constructions.

Nilifika na nikaingia mlango wa kwanza: I arrived and (then) entered the first door.

Kaingie mlango wa kwanza!: Enter the first door!

In the first sentence it is the so-called narrative tense: I did 'this' and then I did 'this' and then... In the second sentence it is used as an imperative tense (using the subjunctive): this is stronger (and less polite) than just saying Ingia mlango wa kwanza.

[StevePepper_Oslo]

Typo, Ernst (subjective > subjunctive). Fix it and I'll delete this comment :-)

[giraffe__]

i think you're right, but this might be in the context of having said things that were done previously already using -li-

[AGreatUserName]

Ingia

Ingieni

[willynam]

Would "kaingie mlango kwanza" work? If not, why not?

[machieng]

no, that translates to 'enter the door first'

[AGreatUserName]

The ordinal numbers, when referring to something, always start with -a (wa, ya, la, cha, vya, za etc.). Moja "one" and mbili "two" have the unique forms -a kwanza "first" and -a pili "second", but all the others are shown only by adding the -a before the normal number.

[DieBorg]

(... and then) enter the first door.

[jemef]

You cannot enter (i.e. go in) a door; you go in (i.e enter) THROUGH a door if it is open!