This is really just to help clarify the sentence and show proper word order. You might think that when we use modals in German sentences, we would need zu. I know, I know—this is a little confusing, especially in comparison to the infinitive clauses with zu that we discussed above. The sentence above reflects proper German word order, as indirect objects come before direct objects.
No zu is needed. If you liked this post, something tells me that you'll love FluentU, the best way to learn German with real-world videos. Experience German immersion online! Topics cover a lot of ground as you can see here: Vocabulary and phrases are learned with the help of interactive subtitles and full transcripts.
This way, you have a truly personalized learning experience. Enter your e-mail address to get your free PDF! Example two Wir warten auf den Bus. Drop the subject wir in the second sentence. Replace the verb in the second sentence - here the first person plural form fahren - with the infinitive. The infinitive form fahren happens to look the same in this particular case. Use a comma to separate the two separate ideas. This now gives us the following sentence: Wir warten auf den Bus, um in die Stadt zu fahren.
The comma matters, as it separates the two ideas. As we have seen, both zu and nach can be used in many ways, and "to" in German is not always expressed with these two words. Look at these "to" examples in English and German :. However, if you follow the simple rules on this page for nach and zu , you can avoid making obvious mistakes with those two prepositions when you want to say "to. All of the following prepositions mean several other things besides "to":. Note that German also uses nouns or pronouns in the dative case to express "to": mir to me , meiner Mutter to my mother , ihm to him.
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Select personalised ads. Just like in English, German modal verbs also take other verbs directly, so without zu or um zu. What matters is if you have a German modal verb. Those are not the only ones that can take another verb directly. All the other verbs either need zu or um zu. The difference between zu and um zu is the role the element plays in the sentence. And the key to finding a role is often to understand what question it answers.
In this example, the question the to-part answers is… drumroll … what? The element has the role of an object. Just like the first example, the infinite-element has the role of the direct object here. It can also be a prepositional object. The corresponding question is still what , but it would use the same preposition….
Now, infinitve-elements can also fill this role, and the twist is that the preposition actually disappears. But you can see that it has the same role as the prepositional element, and you can ask for it the same way…. But I can totally understand if these prepositional objects are a little confusing. The um-zu -element is completely different. Which question would you use to ask for the to -element here?
I think intuitively, all of you would ask why? Why are you reading this. Or more precisely: for what purpose? It gives us information about the goal of an action, and often, we can replace it with in order to. So… zu-elements have the role of an object. They give us information about [ what? Um-zu-elements have the role of a goal, a purpose.
They give us information about [ why? And because they have different roles, they can totally come together in one sentence. What am I trying? To speak German. Why, for what purpos e am I trying that? Ultimately, the goal is of course to get a feeling for zu and um zu , but for a start, using these two questions what and why is a great test to get to that feeling. There are definitely sentences where it gets tricky. Or shitty. We just have to live with that.
And the perfect example are what I will call too-to -phrasing. Welcome them with open arms and love in our hearts. Welcome, dear exception. Thank you for making German less boring and predictable. Thank you for surprising me and for challenging me to leave my comfort zo… gee, what am I saying.
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