mennä

Mennä is a Finnish verb meaning to go or to move from one place to another. It is used for literal travel as well as for broader senses of going somewhere to do something, and it appears in many common expressions such as mennä kotiin (to go home), mennä töihin (to go to work), mennä ulos (to go outside), and mennä nukkumaan (to go to bed). The verb also features in everyday phrases indicating intention or future plans, for example kyllä mennä katsomaan something later.

Conjugation in Finnish varies by person and number. In the present indicative, the forms are minä menen, sinä menet, hän menee, me menemme, te menette, he menevät. The imperfect (past) indicative is minä menin, sinä menit, hän meni, me menimme, te menitte, he menivät. The negative present uses en mene, et mene, ei mene, emme mene, ette mene, eivät mene. The imperative forms are mene! for singular and menkää! for plural, with the negative imperative Älä mene! / Älkää menkö! for “do not go.”

The past participle of mennä is mennyt, used with the auxiliary olla to form perfect tenses (for example, olen mennyt, olemme menneet). The present participle form menossa marks ongoing movement (for instance, Olen menossa kaupungille = I am on my way to the city). Finnish also employs mood variations such as the conditional (menisin, menisit, menisi, menisimme, menisitte, menisivät) and the occasional jussive form (menköön) in more formal or archaic contexts.