Asking and Answering

Questions
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 Asking Questions
• Raised intonation
• Kamu mahasiswa?
• Are you a university student? (Literally: You are a university
student?)
• Anda tinggal di sini?
• Do you live here? (Literally: You live here?)
• Dia sakit?
• Is he/she sick? (Literally: He/She is sick?)
 Using apa(kah)
• Use apakah at the beginning of a sentence. The word apakah like the
word ‘do’ in English when you ask ‘Do you live here?’ does not have
any meaning in itself; it simply tells us that the sentence is a question.
• Apakah anda tinggal di sini?
• Do you live here?
• Apakah dia suka apel?
• Does he/she like apples?
• You can make the questions less formal by dropping the -kah at the
end of this question word.
• Apa anda tinggal di sini?
• Apa dia suka apel?
 Latihan 1
Ask questions using apa(kah) or raised intonation
Apa(kah) ini apel? Ini apel?
 Questions with ‘wh-’ words
• Apa: ‘What’
• Apa is used to ask about objects, concrete or abstract. It means
‘what’ or ‘what kind of’
• Apa nama binatang itu?
• What is the name of that animal?
• Musik apa itu?
• What kind of music is that?
• Nama sekolah itu apa?
• What is the name of that school? (Literally: The name
of the school is what?)
 Questions with ‘wh-’ words
• Siapa: Who
• Siapa is used to ask questions to do with a person, such as a
person’s name, who a person is, or to whom an object belongs.
• Siapa dia?
• Who is he/she?
• Siapa namanya?
• What is his/her name?
• Tas siapa ini?
• Whose bag is this: (The bag associated with the
person who owns it.)
 Questions with ‘wh-’ words
• Berapa: ‘How many’, ‘How much’
• Berapa is used to ask questions to do with numbers and quantity, such as the
number of people, weight and measurements.
• Berapa orang datang ke pesta itu?
• How many people came to that party?
• Halaman berapa?
• What page? (In Indonesian the question literally means ‘Page how
many?’. Berapa is used because the answer has to do with numbers.)
• You can also add ke to this question word to mean ‘what number’ in a
numerical series.
• A: Kamu anak keberapa? (Which child are you?)
• B: Saya anak ke dua (I am the second child.)
 Questions with ‘wh-’ words
• Mana
• Mana is used in questions, not usually by itself, but attached to the
preposition di, ke or dari: di mana (where), ke mana (where to), dari mana
(where from). These expressions can be placed either at the beginning or at
the end of a sentence.
• Di mana kamu tinggal
• Where do you live?
• Mereka pergi ke mana?
• Where are they going?/ Where did they go?
• Dari mana uang ini?
• Where is this money from?
• Mana can also be preceded by the word yang to ask ‘which one’.
Yang mana mobilmu? (Which one is your car?)
Topimu yang mana? (Which one is your hat?)
 Questions with ‘wh-’ words
• Kapan: When
• Kapan is used to ask about a particular point in time or duration.
• Kapan liburan sekolah mulai
• When does the school holiday start?
• Kapan anda akan datang?
• When are you coming?
• Even though kapan translates into English as ‘when’, it is only
used in questions. We cannot use it as a conjunction (to connect
one part of a sentence with another ), as in ‘I was watching
television when she arrived’ or ‘When I was born, my mother was
33’. For expressions like these, we use ketika or waktu.
 Questions using ‘wh-’ words
• Mengapa, kenapa: ‘Why’
• Mengapa and kenapa both mean ‘why’. However, kenapa is
more informal.
• Mengapa anda terlambat?
• Why are you late?
• Kenapa kamu diam saja?
• Why are you quiet? (not saying anything)
 Questions using ‘wh-’ words
• Bagaimana: How
• Bagaimana is used in different situation, from a
simple everyday question, such as ‘how are you?, to
ways of doing something.
• Bagaimana kabarmu? (=Apa kabar?)
• How are you?
• Bagaimana caranya mengupas kelapa?
• How do we open (literally ‘peel’) a coconut?
 Latihan 2
• Ask a question in Indonesian about each of these pictures using
specific question words (‘wh-’ question words).

Who is she?
What page, Miss?

Why is he crying?

Who are you?

 Question Tags
• Using question tags bukan and ya
• Another form of question is with tags, such as bukan and ya. This type
of question is more like seeking confirmation from the person to whom
you are talking. Bukan is formal and is therefore not suitable to use with
friends. Its short version, kan, is more informal and is equivalent to ya
when used in questions. Both tags are widely used in spoken
Indonesian.
• Anda guru, bukan? (You are a teacher aren’t you?)
• Saudara setuju dengan kami, bukan? (You agree with us don’t you?)
• Kamu tinggal di rumah itu, kan? (You live in that house don’t you?)
• Kalian bergurau kan? (You’re joking, aren’t you?)
• Ini kelas bahasa Indonesia ya? (This is Indonesian class, isn’t it?)
• Jill orang Australia ya? (Jill is an Australian, isn’t she?)
Using –kah to form a Question
• In Indonesian a simple question can be asked by
adding the suffix –kah to an auxiliary verb.
• Bisakah dia berenang? Can he swim?
• Haruskah Anda pulang? Must you go home?
• Bolehkah saya pergi ke rumah Lina? May I go to Lina’s
house?
• Maukah Nyoman menjadi pemain gamelan? Does
Nyoman want to become a gamelan player?
• Inginkah Dewi bermain bola basket dengan tim Anda?
Does Dewi wish to play basketball with your team?
 Juga
• The suffix –kah can also be added to an
adjective
• Sakitkah dia? Is she sick?
• Tinggikah Rusli? Is Rusli tall?
• Lucukah Pak Santono? Is Pak Santono funny?
• Pandaikah pemasak itu? Is that chef clever?
• Laparkah dia? Is he hungry?