"Shimoni ndimo nyoka aliingia"

Translation: A hole indeed is where a snake entered

[vtopphol]

Can someone please break down the English sentence here for me? I don't see how this could be a correct sentence.

[garpike]

You are right: it is not a complete sentence, but a fragment.

[CarelSchmit]

Should be 'The hole where indeed a snake entered'.

[mulsab]

In English this construction would not be used but I could imagine someone in Swahili giving this as an answer upon being asked 'How did the snake get inside?'

[Judy928846]

I'm just starting this category and wondered what needs to change to translate the idea into "This is indeed a hole where a snake entered." That would seem to make more sense but it may not have been the intent of this example.

[machieng]

the sentence has no demonstrative, so 'this' wouldn't really apply. Your sentence would translate to 'hili ndilo shimo ambalo nyoka aliingia'

[Judy928846]

Thanks for the translation. I recognized there was no demonstrative, but I yearned for one rather than these sentence fragments that leave me unsure of how to construct complete sentence -- especially when still struggling with getting the right noun agreement! It helps to see complete thoughts!

[Katie105911]

That's what i said and it wasn't accepted

[gloucester5]

To help non-English speakers out, the grammar of the English is incorrect and this use of 'indeed' is a little antiquated and quite an idiomatic construction. It needs to read 'a hole is indeed where' to read naturally (if a little poshly) in English. The placement of the 'indeed' before 'is' places the stress un-naturally on 'hole' rather than 'where'.

If you want the stress to fall on 'hole' rather than 'where', you would need to phrase it 'indeed, a hole is where'.

In context, the phrase 'a hole is indeed where a snake entered' would be an affirmative (almost proud) response to someone getting the answer to a puzzling question right. The phrase 'Indeed, a hole is where' would be used if you were saying something about the hole beforehand, wanted to emphasise that the hole is troublesome, and so gave the example of the snake entering.

Either way though, the grammar of the answer is wrong in English. Reported again: 17/7/20