Learn a few phrases you can use to understand the culture better
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Eddie: Welcome to Basic Bootcamp. This five-part series will help you ease your way into Russian. |
| Oksana: We’ll go over all the basics that will get you on the right track to learning Russian quickly. |
| Eddie: Including today’s lesson! You will learn several essential phrases to help you learn Russian. |
| Oksana: Yep, you can use today’s phrases when you are at a loss for words or caught in a confusing situation. |
| Eddie: Yes, these phrases will help you avoid or resolve misunderstandings whenever and wherever you are in Russia. |
| Oksana: Using Russian to learn Russian can help you improve much faster! |
| Eddie: Okay, here we have a little Russian dream sequence for you. |
| Oksana: Yes, it’s a really common situation a learner will be in. |
| Eddie: Yes, the case of "lacking the right word". |
| Oksana: You want to say something, but don’t have the vocabulary word. |
| Eddie: For some of us it’s not just a dream…maybe more like a recurring nightmare. |
| Oksana: But the nightmare is over now! |
| Eddie: Yes! So listen to Oksana and me and try to overcome some language difficulties by asking simple but very useful phrases and try to keep up! Ok, let`s listen to the conversation! |
| DIALOGUE |
| Oksana: Извините, как сказать по-русски __________? |
| Eddie: Извините, я не понял. Повторите, пожалуйста. |
| Oksana: Пожалуйста, говорите медленнее. |
| Eddie: Напишите мне это по-русски, пожалуйста. |
| Eddie: Let`s say that once again, slowly. |
| Oksana: Ещё раз, медленнее. |
| Oksana: Извините, как сказать по-русски __________? |
| Eddie: Извините, я не понял. Повторите, пожалуйста. |
| Oksana: Пожалуйста, говорите медленнее. |
| Eddie: Напишите мне это по-русски, пожалуйста. |
| Eddie: Once again with the translation. |
| Oksana: Ещё раз с переводом. |
| Oksana: Извините, как сказать по-русски __________? |
| Eddie: Excuse me, how do you say __________ in Russian? |
| Oksana: Извините, я не понял. Повторите, пожалуйста. |
| Eddie: I'm sorry, I didn't understand. Say it once again, please. |
| Oksana: Пожалуйста, говорите медленнее. |
| Eddie: Please, speak slower. |
| Oksana: Напишите мне это по-русски, пожалуйста. |
| Eddie: Write this down in Russian for me, please. |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Eddie: Now you will never be at a loss for words again. |
| Oksana: That`s right. |
| Eddie: So, what exactly were all these words? Let’s break them down. The first phrase we had was: |
| Oksana: Извините, как сказать по-русски __________? |
| Eddie: Excuse me, how do you say __________ in Russian? The first word is “извините” which means “excuse me”, if you put it in the beginning of the question sentence. It can also mean “I am sorry”, if you use it in the context of the English “sorry”. In this lesson, we have two phrases with “извините” in them, and we’ll learn the usage of this word in each of them. |
| VOCAB AND PHRASE USAGE |
| Oksana: So, the first phrase we have expresses the request for help; therefore, we use “извините” in the meaning of "excuse me." |
| Eddie: Let’s say it again. |
| Oksana: Извините |
| Eddie: slowly |
| Oksana: Из-ви-ни-те. Извините |
| Eddie: Excuse me; I’m sorry. The next word is... |
| Oksana: как |
| Eddie: Which means "how". |
| Oksana: We’ve mentioned this word before in the first Basic Bootcamp lesson in the phrase “Как вас зовут?”. "What’s your name?" Remember? |
| Eddie: Oh, that’s right. Well, the good new is, this word hasn’t changed its meaning since. And it never will! |
| Oksana: Easy, hmm? Как! |
| Eddie: Okay, and the next word we have is... |
| Oksana: сказать, ска-зать, сказать |
| Eddie: Means "to say". There’s no particle "to" in Russian to mark a verb as an infinitive. Instead, there’s a very easy to remember ending “-ть”. Whenever you hear a verb that ends with “-ть” (делать, читать), you can translate it as "TO" do something. So here, we have… |
| Oksana: Как сказать…. |
| Eddie: Which literally means "how to say". And the following word is... |
| Oksana: по-русски, по-рус-ки, по-русски |
| Eddie: We can translate this as "in Russian", and it refers to the language in our case, although the function word “по-” doesn’t mean the English "in". “По-” indicates the way something is done. So literally we can translate “по-русски” as "in a Russian way". |
| Oksana: That`s right. You can also say, "Let’s have a party, по-русски” and it will mean to have fun in some special Russian way! |
| Eddie: And the last word you will need in this sentence is the word in English that you want to be translated into Russian. And all you need here is to hope that your companion speaks enough English to understand and say it in Russian for you! Now, let’s make a short dialogue using the words we’ve just learned. Извините, как сказать по-русски “ticket”? |
| Oksana: Билет |
| Eddie: Okay, let’s move to the second phrase. |
| Oksana: Извините, я не понял. Повторите, пожалуйста. |
| Eddie: We’ve just learned “извините”, and we know “я” from the previous bootcamp lessons. So the next new word will be... |
| Oksana: Не. Не. |
| Eddie: "He" literally means "not". You’ve probably heard the word “нет” already, which means "no". So, to make it less confusing to you, we have a little hint to remember these words. |
| Oksana: Remember them as the opposite sounds of the English words. |
| No - нет |
| Not - не |
| Eddie: "He" ("not") will also be translated later as "don’t", "doesn’t", "didn’t", "won’t", etc., because we express genders and tenses in Russian by modifying the verbs with suffixes, prefixes, and endings, but not by the variations of the verb "to do" like in English. |
| Oksana: That’s right and our next verb is clear evidence to that. |
| понял |
| по-нял, понял |
| Eddie: “Понял” literally means, "understood", and we use it in masculine gender. See, "he" stays the same, but the verb “понял” itself is used in the past tense. Would it sound different for a woman, Oksana? |
| Oksana: Yes, feminine gender requires the ending "a" in the end. |
| поняла, по-ня-ла, поняла. |
| Я не поняла. |
| Eddie: "I didn’t understand". And the next word is... |
| Oksana: повторите |
| по-вто-рите, повторите |
| Eddie: We translate it as "say it once again", although literally it means "repeat". |
| Oksana: We use it in an imperative mood, and without the following “пожалуйста” ("please"), it would sound rather impolite. |
| Eddie: Oksana, could you repeat how to say "please" in Russian? |
| Oksana: Only if you ask me in Russian! |
| Eddie: Повторите! |
| Oksana: Okay, so "please" would be пожалуйста |
| по-жа-луй-ста, пожалуйста |
| Eddie: Great. Let’s repeat the whole phrase again. |
| Oksana:Извините, я не понял. Повторите, пожалуйста. Извините, я не понялa. Повторите, пожалуйста. |
| Eddie: Let’s move to sentence number three. |
| Oksana: Пожалуйста, говорите медленнее. |
| Eddie: “Пожалуйста” is the word we’ve just learned, "please." The next word is... |
| Oksana: говорите |
| го-во-ри-те, говорите |
| Eddie: It means "speak". You might have noticed the pattern; it ends with “-те”, the same as “повторите”; therefore, we use it in a command form. |
| Oksana: And in order not to sound rude, we put “пожалуйста” before it. "Please, speak". |
| Eddie: The next word is... |
| Oksana: медленнее |
| ме-длен-не-е медленнее |
| Eddie: Which means "slower". In case you wonder how to say "slow" in Russian... |
| Oksana: медленнo |
| Eddie: So “медленнее” is a comparative adjective and means "slower". Let’s say phrase one again. |
| Oksana: Пожалуйста, говорите медленнее. |
| Eddie: And finally, the last phrase for this lesson… |
| Oksana: Напишите мне это по-русски, пожалуйста. |
| "Write this down in Russian for me, please". |
| Eddie: The third verb in an imperative form in this lesson…. |
| Oksana: Напишите |
| На-пи-ши-те Напишите |
| Eddie: It literally means "write down" and sounds like a command. Have you noticed the ending “-те” again? The distinctive mark of imperative mood. Next word. |
| Oksana: мне |
| Eddie: This is a modification of the pronoun “я”, ("I"). Literally, it means "to me" or "for me". We’ve learned this in the first lesson of Bootcamp in the context - "nice to meet you too", “мне тоже”, where literally we translated it as "to me too". The next word is... |
| Oksana: это |
| Eddie: Very easy and useful word. It means "this". |
| Oksana: Yeah, it’s really useful. Even in the shops when foreigners don’t know the name for something they want to buy, they just point at it and say “это”. |
| Eddie: What’s next? |
| Oksana: “по-русски” and “пожалуйста”. These mean "in Russian" and "please", but we’ve already covered them, so let’s just repeat everything we’ve learned today. |
| Eddie: Okay, let’s make a dialogue. Извините, как сказать по-русски “ticket”? |
| Oksana: Билет. |
| Eddie: Я не понял. Повторите, пожалуйста. |
| Oksana: Билет! |
| Eddie: Пожалуйста, говорите медленнее. |
| Oksana: Би-лет. |
| Eddie: Напишите мне это по-русски, пожалуйста. |
| Oksana: Пожалуйста. |
| Eddie: And here is translation. Excuse me, how do you say ticket in Russian? |
| Oksana: Билет. |
| Eddie: I didn't understand, say it once again, please. |
| Oksana: Билет! |
| Eddie: Please, speak slower. |
| Oksana: Би-лет. |
| Eddie: Write this down in Russian for me, please. |
| Oksana: Here you are. |
Lesson focus |
|---|
| Eddie: Well, we covered all the words, and now we are supposed to explain their usage. But it’s so easy because most of them have the same usage as in English! |
| Oksana: Yes, with small exceptions like “извините”, which we can use both as "excuse me" and "I’m sorry". But again, its meaning is defined by its usage! |
| Eddie: Can you tell us why you used the word “пожалуйста”, or "please", at the end of the dialogue? Don’t you have a word for "here" or "here you go"? |
| Oksana: We do, of course, but “пожалуйста” is a polite way to say "here you go", so I recommend that everyone use it when giving something to or doing a favor for someone. |
| Eddie: So we have equipped you with all the necessary words and phrases for resolving misunderstandings. |
| Oksana: If you didn't understand the word the first time, you know the phrase for "repeat, please". |
| Eddie: And if you still have problems understanding your companion, you know how to ask them to speak slower. |
| Oksana: And if you think the word is useful for you, you can ask someone to show you how to write the word, or to help you with your Russian writing. |
| Eddie: I used to carry a notebook. Once I had the word and its English equivalent, I would just open the book any time I had a moment—on the bus, whatever—and study the words. |
| Oksana: Yes, a very good tactic. |
| Eddie: Once the word is somewhere in your brain, you just need to give yourself the chance to meet it a few times in different circumstances. |
| Oksana: Yes, this writing down method is great because once you introduce yourself to the word and write it down, you are giving yourself a chance to hear it again, and use it again. |
Outro |
| Eddie: Thank you for listening. See you next time. |
| Oksana: До свидания и до встречи! Bye and see you soon! |
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