Beginner Sinhala – Lesson 5 – Present tense.

The present tense in spoken Sinhala ends in -නවා “nawaa” (which is also the dictionary form of all the verbs in sinhala). The Sinhala verb is composed of the root plus a suffix which denotes tense and aspect. In written Sinhala the verb also agrees in number and person, but for the spoken Sinhala present tense, there is only one common marker.

Below is a list of some common verbs in Sinhala.

Verb Present	Verb root
එනවා enawaa “comes”	එ e
යනවා yanawaa “goes”	ය ya
දෙනවා denawaa “gives”	දෙ de
ගහනවා gahawaa “beats”	ගහ gaha
අරිනවා arinawaa “opens”	අරි ari
අහනවා Ahanawaa “listens”,”asks”	අහ aha
වහනවා wahanawaa “closes”	වහ waha
නානවා naanawa “bathe”	නා naa
බලනවා balanawaa “watches”	බල bala
කරනවා karanawaa “does”	කර kara
කතා කරනවා katha karanava “talks”	(කතා) කර kathaa kara

Sinhala is basically a Subject – Object – Verb (SOV) language (compared to English which is SVO) but the order can change freely – unlike in English. The basic sentence structure is demonstrated below and show the function of the present tense marker (නවා).

මම ටී වී එක බලනවා
mama tee vee eka balanawaa
I watch television

ඔයා මට පොතක් දෙනවා
oyaa mata pothak denawaa
You give me a book

මගේ මල්ලී එනවා
magee malii enawaa
My younger brother comes

එයාල ගෙදර යනවා
eyaala gedara yanawaa
They are going home

මම එයාගෙන් අහනවා
mama eyaagen ahanawa
I ask them (lit, I ask from them)

මගේ අම්මා දොර අරිනවා
magee ammaa dora arinawaa
My Mum opens the door

තාත්ත නානවා
thaaththa naanawaa
Father bathes

එයා කොටුවෙන් ඔයාට ගහනවා
eyaa kotuwen oyaata gahanawaa
He beats you with the stick

The verb “to be” is translated by two seperate verbs in Sinhala – according to whether the subject is living or non-living.
For a living subject, ඉන්නවා “innawaa” is used to express that something “is” For example: මම ගෙදර ඉන්නවා “mama gedara innawa” “I am home”.

For a non living subject, තියෙනවා “thiyenawaa” is used. For example: පොත මෙසේ උඩ තියෙනවා , “potha mesee uda thiyenawa” “The book is on the table”. Here the posposition උඩ, uda is employed to mean on. We will cover this in a later lesson. When a subject and තියෙනවා “thiyenawaa” is expressed without a locational object it is best translated to mean “there is” for example: කාර් එකක් තියෙනවා   “kaar ekak thiyenava” – there is a car.

Examples:

මම ගහේ ඉන්නවා
mama gahee innawaa
I am in the tree

එයා කාර් එකේ ඉන්නවා
eyaa kaar ekee innawa
She is in the car

අපි ගෙදර ඉන්නවා
api gedara innawaa
We are home

ගස් තියෙනවා
gas thiyenawaa
There are trees

මෙහෙ කාර් තියෙනවා
mehe kaar thiyenawaa
There are cars here