"He is at home at half past three."
Translation:वह साढ़े तीन बजे घर पर होता है।
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what is the difference between ' वह घर पर साढे तीन बजे होता है ' and 'वह साढ़े तीन बजे घर पर होता है '? both seems same and make equal meaning
They both mean the same. The first is used mostly in colloquial speech though.
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I have given this translation again and it has been marked wrong even though I reported it last time.
There's no difference. I hear both all the time. It depends on whether you want to put emphasis on the fact that he is at home at a certain time or at a certain time he is at home.
In my book it says that both is the correct rendering of the English 'at'. Even if somebody is on the roof, you can still say, घर में है
I've always heard घर पर and never घर में, but it could be one of those things that varies regionally or from person to person.
I don't really know how to interpret this English phrase - its pretty unusual construction. "Is" suggests a continuous present action, where as a specific time suggests a singular event at a time which is not the present time. What does the Hindi phrase suggest? Does it suggest that he is 'usually' or 'always at home at that time? Does it imply a future event that he will arrive at or by that time?
Yes. The word 'होता' indicates that it is a generalization or presumption. So, the sentence menas 'He is usually at home at half past three'.
I don't know where the translations are supposed to land between literal and natural, but I think a good natural translation would be 'gets' instead of 'is at'; it has a more habitual ring to it.
They mean different things though. He may get home from somewhere else daily long before half-past three. The sentence is just saying that he is likely to be home at that time.
I see, thanks. I didn't get that vibe from the given translation, I think if I were trying to convey that in English I'd say something like 'At X, he's usually home', with 'usually', 'tends to be', or similar substituting for the lack of habitual.
As it is it sounds like the answer to the question 'When's he [getting] home?', in which the verb getting would often be omitted, colloquially, so that's how I understood it.
Thank you. Shouldn't they mark both correct then, and just mention that it would also be correct with '"होता"? I know what you mean that it would be more common to mean this as a general expectation, but it could also be interpreted literally.
I think it only looks weird because it's written "he is" instead of "he's".
Think of it like, "is now a good time to cal Steve?" "Yeah, he's off work/at home on Thursdays".
Notice the "he is".
साढ़े is used to mean half plus a certain number. So, साढ़े तीन is three and a half. Eg: दूकान से साढ़े चार किलो चावल लाओ। (Get 4.5 kilos of rice from the shop)
When talking about time, साढ़े तीन बजे would thus mean 3:30 (half past three).
Similarly, सवा is a quarter plus a certain number and पौने is a certain number minus a quarter. So, सवा तीन is 3.25 and पौने तीन is 2.75.
When talking about time, सवा तीन बजे is 3:15 ( quarter past three) and पौने तीन बजे is 2:45 (quarter to three).
I'm confused about something. Why is it saadhE and paunE as opposed to saadhA and paunA? Is it oblique?
No. That's just the regular forms of the words. They have no other form.
I was curious about this, seems they do (and are oblique here - 'quarter to') but it's hard to imagine how the direct or vocative forms might ever be used.
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%E0%A4%AA%E0%A5%8C%E0%A4%A8%E0%A4%BE#Hindi
Thanks for the correction. Now that I think about it, 'pauna' is used in the direct case when it means 3/4 (eg: pauna ghanta - 45 minutes).
I don't know about saadhe though. (1/2 has its own word - aadha).
साढ़े is from a (Sanskrit) compound of सा + आर्ध (i.e. Hindi आधा) apparently, which is nicely logical - 'with half [more]', well, quite like 'half past' I suppose. (And र्ध somewhere became ढ़।)
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%E0%A4%B8%E0%A4%BE%E0%A4%A2%E0%A4%BC%E0%A5%87#Etymology
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why do we use "hota" while there is no "usually" in the english sentence. I understood it like "today he is at home [...]" and not "usually / every day he is at home [...]"