chtít

What it attaches to:
You can use chtít with a noun or pronoun in the accusative case (e.g., chci kávu - I want coffee) or with an infinitive verb (e.g., chci spát - I want to sleep). However, to say you want someone else to do something, you cannot use an infinitive. Instead, you must use the conjunction aby (which conjugates to match the subject of the second clause: abych, abys, aby, abychom, abyste, aby) followed by the verb in the past tense form (l-participle). For example, Chci, abys spal (I want you to sleep), where abys is the "you" form of aby and spal is the past tense of spát. To make the verb negative, simply add the prefix ne- (nechci, nechceš).

Expressing Future Intentions:
In Czech, using chtít with an infinitive in the present tense is a common way to express future intentions or desires, similar to the English "I intend to" or "I mean to". For example, Chci koupit byt translates to "I intend to buy a flat."

Expressing "feeling like" doing something:
Czech uses a special impersonal construction to say you "feel like" or "don't feel like" doing something: chce se mi (I feel like it) or nechce se mi (I don't feel like it). This uses the 3rd person singular form (chce), the reflexive pronoun se, and a dative pronoun (like mi for "to me", ti for "to you"). For example, Nechce se mi pracovat means "I don't feel like working."

Important Social Nuance:
Using chci to order in a restaurant or ask a stranger for something is considered blunt and demanding. For polite requests, it is better to use the conditional chtěl bych (I would like), dal bych si (I would have), or simply state the item in the accusative case with prosím (e.g., Kávu, prosím).

Colloquial vs. Standard:
In casual spoken Czech, the forms vary by region. In Moravia, you will often hear chcu (I want) and chcou (they want). In Bohemia (Common Czech), people typically say chtěj or chtějou (they want). While very common in everyday speech, these regional forms are informal. It is important to remember that the standard written form for "they want" is chtějí, which retains the original cht- stem (as seen in the infinitive chtít), whereas the first five present-tense forms soften the stem to chc-.