Learn several new Russian verbs and words to help make your language experience successfully
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Natalia: Здравствуйте, с Вами Natalia. |
| Eura: Eura here, absolute beginner season one, lesson eight, yummy Russian appetizer, yucky Russian mystery meal. |
| Natalia: Eura, what are we going to study in this lesson? |
| Eura: In this lesson you will learn how to say what you like. |
| Natalia: And this conversation takes place in a restaurant. |
| Eura: The conversation is between Ben and Nica, who are having lunch together. |
| Natalia: The speakers are friends, therefore, they will be speaking informal Russian. |
| Eura: Let’s listen in. |
| DIALOGUES |
| Natalia: Бен, ты любишь пельмени? |
| Eura: Что такое "пельмени"? Скажи по-английски. |
| Natalia: Ммм… Я не знаю, как это сказать по-английски. Девушка, извините, как сказать по-английски "пельмени"? |
| Natalia: Meat dumplings. |
| Eura: Аа! Да, я очень люблю пельмени! Давай закажем. |
| Eura: One time slowly. |
| Natalia: Бен, ты любишь пельмени? |
| Eura: Что такое "пельмени"? Скажи по-английски. |
| Natalia: Ммм… Я не знаю, как это сказать по-английски. Девушка, извините, как сказать по-английски "пельмени"? |
| Natalia: Meat dumplings. |
| Eura: Аа! Да, я очень люблю пельмени! Давай закажем. |
| Eura: One time natural native speed with the translation. |
| Natalia: Бен, ты любишь пельмени? |
| Eura: Ben, do you like Pelmeni? |
| Natalia: Что такое "пельмени"? Скажи по-английски. |
| Eura: What is Pelmeni? Say it in English. |
| Natalia: Ммм… Я не знаю, как это сказать по-английски. Девушка, извините, как сказать по-английски "пельмени"? |
| Eura: I don’t know how to say it in English. Excuse me, waitress, how do you say Pelmeni in English? |
| Natalia: Meat dumplings. |
| Eura: Meat dumplings. |
| Natalia: Аа! Да, я очень люблю пельмени! Давай закажем. |
| Eura: Oh, yes, I love dumplings a lot, let’s order some. |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Eura: Is Pelmeni a real traditional Russian food Natalia? As far as I know, about half the culture in the world have dumplings, they call their national food. |
| Natalia: Yes, you are right. And Pelmeni is not really Russian. Pelmeni is a dish originated from Tatarstan in Siberia. But today, it’s already considered part of Russian and Ukrainian cuisine. |
| Eura: What type of filling do those dumplings usually have? |
| Natalia: It can be minced meat, pork, clam, beef or any other kind of meat, fish, and mushrooms. In Ukraine, they have much bigger variety of fillings. But those dumplings are called vareniki. Pelmeni are usually of those with meat. |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Eura: I see. Okay, let’s take a look at the vocabulary for this lesson. |
| The first word we have is. |
| Natalia: любить |
| Eura: To love, to like, to be fun of. |
| Natalia: любить |
| Eura: And the next word is? |
| Natalia: пельмени |
| Eura: Meat dumplings. |
| Natalia: пельмени |
| Eura: And the next word? |
| Natalia: что такое... |
| Eura: What is. |
| Natalia: что такое... |
| Eura: And the next word? |
| Natalia: сказать |
| Eura: To say. |
| Natalia: сказать |
| Eura: And the next one? |
| Natalia: девушка |
| Eura: Young lady, girlfriend, waitress. |
| Natalia: девушка |
| Eura: And the next word? |
| Natalia: очень |
| Eura: Very, very much, really. |
| Natalia: очень |
| Eura: And the next word? |
| Natalia: давай |
| Eura: Let’s. |
| Natalia: давай |
| Eura: And the last word on our list? |
| Natalia: заказать |
| Eura: To order, to book. |
| Natalia: заказать |
| KEY VOCAB AND PHRASES |
| Eura: Okay, let’s have a closer look at the usage for some of the words and phrases from this lesson. Actually, there is not too many words. So the lesson shouldn’t be too difficult. First, Nica asked Ben, whether he likes pelmeni. It’s such a popular dish in Russia that Nica thinks everyone in the world should know about it. |
| Natalia: Right. She asks "ты любишь пельмени?" “Do you like pelmeni?” The word "любишь" comes from the word, "любить", “to love.” |
| Eura: Well, when it’s used in reference to a person, it obviously means to love. But when you talk about food or different things other than people, it will most probably be translated as "like" in English. |
| Natalia: With food, we always use “to love” "любить". |
| Eura: I think we should also conjugate it now. How would you say I like or I love for example? |
| Natalia: Я люблю “you like,” ты любишь “you like” formal, would be "вы любите" and “he, she like” would sound as "он" or "она" любит. |
| Eura: Great. Natalia, ты любишь пельмени? |
| Natalia: Да, я очень люблю пельмени. |
| Eura: I like them too. But our American friend doesn’t even know what it is, luckily he’s not afraid to ask. |
| Natalia: Right. He asked "что такое пельмени"? |
| Eura: What is pelmeni? This phrase "что такое" is quite useful even when you don’t understand the word in Russian, the first question to ask will be “what is” and that’s something that you didn’t understand. This is where "что такое" comes in handy. |
| Natalia: And knowing these simple structure, you can build another phrase on top of it. What is it? What is this? All you have to do is insert the “this” in between. что это такое? “what is this?” |
| Eura: Next, Ben asked Nica to tell him what this mysterious pelmeni sound like in English. |
| Natalia: He just says, "Скажи по-английски". |
| Eura: Literally, say it in English. |
| Natalia: "Скажи" comes from the word "сказать",“to say.” It’s a command form of to say. |
| Eura: Remember before we learned the polite ending "те"? You can use it here too. If you add it to "скажи", you will get a polite “tell me” "скажите". |
| Natalia: Yes. And we know "по-английски" already. It means “in English.” So "скажите по-английски" “say it in English.” |
| Eura: But Nica can’t say it in English. As we remember, she honestly confessed her command of English wasn’t that great. So says. |
| Natalia: Я не знаю, как это сказать по-английски. "Я не знаю" “I don’t know,” we learned it last time. "как" means “how,” "это" means “this,” "Сказать" is “to say” and "по-английски" is “in English.” |
| Eura: So no new words for us here. So not knowing how to say "pelmeni" in English, Nica is asking a waitress for help. |
| Natalia: She calls her "девушка" which literally means “a girl.” But it’s also the way of addressing waitresses in Russia. So "девушка, извините" |
| Eura: Waitress, excuse me. And then? |
| Natalia: And then the question itself как сказать по-английски "пельмени"? |
| Eura: How do you say "пельмени" in English? Could you please break this phrase down? |
| Natalia: Sure. "Kak" means “how,” we covered that already. "сказать" means “to say” and "по-английски" means “in English.” So basically all together, it sounds as “how to say in English pelmeni?” "как сказать по-английски пельмени". |
| Eura: Waitresses might not speak English in Russia, but they should know the names of the dishes they serve, at least in good restaurants right? |
| Natalia: Oh, yes, they absolutely should. Another question is whether they actually do, but in our dialogue, we got lucky. |
| Eura: Yes. She knows that pelmeni is meat dumplings. Turns out Ben knows what they are and loves them very much. How does he express that in Russian, Natalia? |
| Natalia: я очень люблю пельмени |
| Eura: I like dumplings very much. It would be silly to say, “I like them” and not order. So he says, "давай закажем". |
| Natalia: "Закажем" comes from the word "заказать" “to order.” It can also mean “to book” when you’re talking about hotel rooms for example. Заказать отель |
| Eura: It’s put in the future tense here because that’s what we do with the verbs when we use "давай" with them. |
| GRAMMAR POINT |
| Let’s talk about this "давай", what does it mean exactly? |
| Natalia: It means “let’s” like in “let’s do something.” |
| Eura: Right. In the previous lesson, we learned how to say, “let’s go” using just one word “to go” in the appropriate form. Unfortunately, it’s the only verb that can be used without the actual word “let’s” and still imply the suggestion. In all other cases, we should use the verb "давай". |
| Natalia: Yes. Here are some examples. давай сядем |
| Eura: Let’s sit down. |
| Natalia: давай пообедаем |
| Eura: Let’s have lunch. To make your proposition sound more polite, add "-te" to the end of "davai", just like what you did with "skazhi". This little "-te" in the end of the command forms of the verbs and "davai" is grammatically one of them, indicates that you are speaking to a person in plural number, which in Russian is the indicator of the politeness. |
| Natalia: Right. For example давайте смотреть фильм |
| Eura: Let’s watch a movie. Here’s the thing, to make a proposition properly using the word "давай", we should put the verbs into the first person plural, “we” in the future tense. Sounds a bit complicated right? But there’s another way of forming the proposition. You just say "давай" or "давайте" if you are speaking politely, and then add an infinitive. |
| Natalia: Yes. Grammatically it would still sound right, just maybe not as frequently used as that complicated form Eura just mentioned. But it’s still right. So we can just say for example давай пить “let’s drink.” |
| Eura: Yes. So at this point, maybe it’s easier to remember "давай" with infinitives. But that’s just a privilege for beginners, remember that. So that just about does it for this lesson. |
| Natalia: Dear listeners, ever pressed for time. |
| Eura: Listen to the dialogue lesson recap. |
| Natalia: These audio tracts only contain the target lesson dialogue. |
| Eura: So you can quickly recap a lesson. |
| Natalia: Spend a few minutes learning on days when you don’t have time to study a full lesson. |
| Eura: The audio tracks are just a few minutes long. |
| Natalia: But you will still pick up key Russian phrases along the way. |
| Eura: Go to RussianPod101.com. |
| Natalia: And listen to this lessons dialogue, only audio track. |
Outro |
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| Yura: Bye |
| Natalia: Goodbye. |
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