Ye à kɛla = bɛ à kɛ?

Continuing the discussion from Baake:

Tele baa bɔ baakɛ , i ye a kɛla di?

In the second sentence of the discussion, would ‘ye’ be ‘’ in Bambara as the sentence is in the present?

And what’s going on with kɛla? Isn’t an transitive verb, which is why there is a before it, but why la after.

Is it there because it is a progressive sentence? I am confused because I am pretty sure in Bambara we would not use and rather say something like: ‘N bɛ dumuni de la’ (I’m eating), ‘N bɛ kumana’ (I’m speaking), or So bɛ jenina (The house is burning).

Simplified answer is that ye + VERB-la is the equivalent of in Bambara

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