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Recently, I chanced upon the sentence 友達の家に泊まってくれてしたり... or was it 泊まってもらってしたり...　(Couldn't really recall, but they would translate to the same thing) which translates to "do things like me staying at my friend's house, etc". But from what I understand, when a te-form verb is used with もらった or くれた, the other party, and not myself is the one that does the verb, for example, ペンを貸してくれた/ペンを貸してもらった - (someone) lent me a pen. Using this intuition, wouldn't 友達の家に泊まってくれてしたり mean my friend (and not me) stayed at my friend's house (ignoring the したり part as the sentence wouldn't make sense otherwise)? Two (more accurate?) ways that I know of to say that I stayed at my friends house would be 友達の家に泊まってさせてもらってしたり or 友達の家に泊まらせた.

Any help would be highly appreciated

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I'll try to explain this by giving some examples. I'll assume that the person staying over / letting someone stay over is the speaker (unless otherwise specified) to make this easier to read.

I assume that by「～てしたり」you mean「～たりした」, i.e. the past tense of「～たりする」. As you say, the「～たりする」corresponds to something like 'and stuff like that'.

In this context「泊める」means "to have/let someone stay (at one's house etc)" while similarly,「泊まる」means "to stay (at someone's house, a hotel etc)". The basic forms for these with「～くれたりした」and「～もらったりした」are:

  • 「友達の家に（自分を）泊めてもらったりした」

Normal interpretation: "A friend let me stay over and stuff" or more lit. "I had a friend let me stay over at their place and stuff".

  • 「友達が家に泊めてくれたりした」

Normal interpretation: "A friend let me stay over and stuff".

  • 「友達に家に泊まってもらったりした」

Normal interpretation: "I had a friend stay over at my place and stuff".

  • 「友達が家に泊まってくれたりした」

Normal interpretation: "A friend stayed over at my place and stuff".

As for the other forms that you mentioned, I assume you meant (some of) the following (without the「～たりした」/ "and stuff like that"):

  • 「友達の家に泊まらせてもらった」

Normal interpretation: "I had a friend let me stay over at their house".

Alternative: "I stayed at a friend's house (without their permission)".

  • 「友達の家に泊めさせてもらった」

Normal interpretation (although weird): "I let (someone) stay at a friend's house (either with the friend's permission or without, depending on context)".

  • 「友達に家に泊まらせた」

Normal interpretation e.g.: "I made ("forced") a friend to let me stay at their house"

Alternative: "I made a friend let (someone) stay at that friend's house" etc.

  • 「友達の家に泊まらせた」

Normal interpretation: e.g. "I made (someone) stay at my friend's house".

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  • Thanks for the answer. I was under the impression that 泊める translates to "to stay" instead of "to let someone stay", and hence the confusion. I'd thought that the only way to say "let" would be the causative させる/せる. Turns out there are words (in its normal form) that already imply this "let" without needing causation. Is this the only word out there, or are there a whole lot of other words that already implies the "let" in its basic form? – Newbie May 27 '19 at 4:57
  • @Newbie Yes. E.g. 止まる = stop (one's movement etc), 止める = stop (someone else/something); 閉まる = to close (of something; e.g. "the window closed on its own"), 閉める = to close (something); 縮まる = to shrink (in size), 縮める = to make (something) shrink; 被さる = to go over/atop something, 被せる = to put (something) on top of something etc. This is quite common. – VVayfarer May 27 '19 at 6:24
  • @Newbie Oh, right, these don't actually denote "let". The まる, さる etc forms in general denote that the action happens to the person/object itself; the める, せる etc forms instead denote that the action is directed to something else. In the case of 泊まる and 泊める, you could interpret this as "to stay" and "to make/have/let (something else) stay", but in the case of 泊める, this almost always means "let stay" or "have stay" due to the context, instead of "to make/force to stay". – VVayfarer May 27 '19 at 17:23
  • Now it makes sense. This boils back down to the causation of transitive and intransitive verbs, which have different meanings. Thanks for the heads up – Newbie May 28 '19 at 0:26

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