HaloBahasa

Days, months and dates in Indonesian

The months are almost free. The days take ten minutes. The date order is not the American one.

a1Lesson 33 of 435 min

By the end of this lesson

  • Name any day or month
  • Say and read a date correctly

The days

hari Senin ‘Monday’
hari Selasa ‘Tuesday’
hari Rabu ‘Wednesday’
hari Kamis ‘Thursday’
hari Jumat ‘Friday’
hari Sabtu ‘Saturday’
hari Minggu ‘Sunday’

The word hari ‘day’ usually comes in front, though it is dropped in casual speech. Most of these come from Arabic, which is why they resemble nothing in English.

Jumat is worth noting: it is Friday prayers, and in much of Indonesia the working day is shorter because of it.

The Minggu problem

Minggu means both Sunday and week.

hari Minggu ‘Sunday’
seminggu ‘one week’
minggu depan ‘next week’

Capital M for the day, lower case for the week, but nobody is consistent in writing and speech has no capitals at all. Context does the work.

The months

Januari, Februari, Maret, April, Mei, Juni, Juli, Agustus, September, Oktober, November, Desember

Borrowed and near-identical to English. This is the cheapest vocabulary in the language.

Dates

Indonesian puts the day first, then the month, then the year. No ordinal numbers, no of.

tanggal tujuh belas Agustus ‘17 August’
17 Agustus 1945 the independence date, and one every Indonesian knows.

Asking:

Tanggal berapa hari ini? ‘What’s the date today?’

Note berapa ‘how much’ again, doing the same job it does with prices and with the time.

Putting a day and a date together

hari Senin, tanggal lima Mei ‘Monday the fifth of May’

The day comes before the date, which is the reverse of the usual English order.

Words from this lesson

haridayGoes in front of the day name: hari Senin.
MingguSunday, weekHari Minggu is Sunday. Seminggu is a week.
bulanmonth, moon
tanggaldate
tahunyear