Learn how to talk about what you want or ask others what they might want
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Eric: Eric here. Beginner Series Season 1, Lesson 12 – “How much does it cost to get privacy in Russia?” |
| Anna: Thanks again for being here with us for this lesson in our beginner series. |
| Eric: In our previous lesson, we focused on how to say “You need something” and how to say “You don’t have something” in Russian. |
| Anna: The focus of today’s lesson is interacting with a vendor at a market. |
| Eric: This conversation takes place at a clothing bazar. |
| Anna: The conversation is between James and a vendor. |
| Eric: The speakers are in a professional setting so they’ll be speaking formal Russian. |
| Anna: Ok, so let’s listen to today’s conversation. This time I’ll be playing a vendor. |
| Eric: And I’ll still be James. Ok, here we go. |
| DIALOGUE |
| Eric: [Почём эта шапка?] |
| Anna: [Тысяча рублей. Очень тёплая. Хотите померить?] |
| Eric: [Да, пожалуйста.] |
| -- |
| Eric: Once again, slowly. |
| Anna: Еще раз, медленнее. |
| Eric: [Почём эта шапка?] |
| Anna: [Тысяча рублей. Очень тёплая. Хотите померить?] |
| Eric: [Да, пожалуйста.] |
| Eric: One time, natural native speed with translation. |
| Anna: Еще раз, с переводом. |
| Anna: [Почём эта шапка?] |
| Eric: How much is the hat? |
| Anna: [Тысяча рублей. Очень тёплая. Хотите померить?] |
| Eric: 1000 rubles. It’s very warm. Would you like to try it on? |
| Anna: [Да, пожалуйста.] |
| Eric: Yes, please. |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Anna: Eric, have you ever been to bazar in Russia? |
| Eric: Yes, I’ve been to outdoor markets to buy food in Russia and in Central Asia I’ve been to many bazaars where I bought everything from DVD player to a suit. |
| Anna: I know what you mean. |
| Eric: I remember trying on the suit in the bazar, behind a little curtain. |
| Anna: I know. |
| Eric: Is this ok? There are so many stalls with everything you could think of. I'm sure you have similar experiences, Anna. |
| Anna: Yes, I do. And you know, it’s very usual to go for a big grocery shop into bazaars on weekends. There you can negotiate the price and it’s always so nice to get something cheaper. |
| Eric: Absolutely. Are you pretty good at bargaining? |
| Anna: I couldn’t say so. |
| Eric: I’m not very good, that’s for sure. I don’t like asking people to lower their prices. I don’t know why, I feel guilty. “No, I won’t accept that price.” |
| Anna: But actually you should bargain in Russia or in bazaars in Central Asia. It’s a very good way to discount the price. |
| Eric: Do you think shopkeepers expect that? |
| Anna: Yes, they do, they do. So you should do this. |
| Eric: Ok. So then this dialogue is pretty important if you want to try and interact with shop keepers, right? |
| Anna: Yeah, that’s very important. |
| Eric: Let’s take a look at the vocabulary for this lesson. |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Eric: Our first word is… |
| Anna: [померять] |
| Eric: To try on. |
| Anna: [померять] |
| Eric: Next. |
| Anna: [хотеть] |
| Eric: To want. |
| Anna: [хотеть] |
| Eric: Next. |
| Anna: [теплый] |
| Eric: Warm. |
| Anna: [теплый] |
| Eric: Next. |
| Anna: [тысяча] |
| Eric: 1,000. |
| Anna: [тысяча] |
| Eric: Next. |
| Anna: [почём] |
| Eric: How much? |
| Anna: [почём] |
| VOCAB AND PHRASE USAGE |
| Eric: Ok, let’s have a closer look at the usage for some of the words and phrases from this lesson. |
| Anna: The first phrase is [почём]. |
| Eric: It’s used a lot in spoken Russian, right, Anna? |
| Anna: Right. |
| Eric: Anna, what does [почём] mean? |
| Anna: It means “how much”. |
| Eric: Is this a rude expression? |
| Anna: No, it’s not rude, it’s very common. |
| Eric: So there’s also another question I remember. [сколько стоит] |
| Anna: Right. |
| Eric: We had this question in a previous lesson. What’s the difference between [сколько стоит] “how much” and [почём] which is also “how much”? |
| Anna: I would say it’s only a length. |
| Eric: If you go to the bazar and you’re standing at a stall and you see a whole bunch of fruit. Let’s say [яблоки], “apples”, what would you ask if you wanted to know the price? |
| Anna: [почём] |
| Eric: [почём] |
| Anna: Or [сколько стоит]. |
| Eric: What would you ask though? |
| Anna: Ok, it’s a nice one. It’s very good, Eric. I would ask [почём]. |
| Eric: [почём] So this is maybe more common in a bazaar setting? So now let’s say you’re in a boutique and you see a very nice dress. Would you say [почём]? |
| Anna: No, I would say [сколько стоит]. |
| Eric: Here’s the… |
| Anna: So wise, Eric. |
| Eric: Ok, so [почём] is maybe in a bargaining, negotiating, bazar setting. And [сколько стоит] is maybe a more formal? I wouldn’t say formal but if you want to sounds more… |
| Anna: Sophisticated. |
| Eric: Sophisticated, good word, Anna. Let’s just recap for one second. How would you say “How much are the apples?” or “How much do the apples go for?” |
| Anna: [Почём яблоки] |
| Eric: Ok, great. Can you say “apples” again? |
| Anna: Ok. [яблоки] |
| Eric: [яблоки] is the plural noun, right? |
| Anna: Right. |
| Eric: If you want to just say “apple”, how would you say? |
| Anna: [яблоко] |
| Eric: So what would be more common? [почём яблоки] or [почём яблоко]? |
| Anna: [почём яблоки] because you buy apples in kilograms. |
| Eric: I see, thanks, Anna. |
| Anna: [пожалуйста, Эрик], Eric. |
| Eric: Ok, Anna, now let’s look at the word [тясяча]. Hey, I know a song with this word. [Ты узнаешь её из тысячи] |
| Anna: Wow, Eric. |
| Eric: [по словами] Do you know this? |
| Anna: I know. |
| Eric: Yeah. |
| Anna: But it’s too hard for me, I can’t… |
| Eric: [по глазам, по голосу] Right? |
| Anna: Right. |
| Eric: [Ты узнаешь её из тысячи] which means what, Anna? |
| Anna: “You will recognize her from 1,000 people, 1,000 girls.” |
| Eric: I love this song. She’s so special that you could spot her out of 1,000 girls or 1,000 people actually. |
| Anna: Yeah, it’s a very nice song. |
| Eric: Alright. So how would you say 1,000 rubles? |
| Anna: [тысяча рублей] |
| Eric: [тысяча рублей] How about 2,000? |
| Anna: [две тысячи рублей] |
| Eric: Ok, great. The last word we’ll look at is [тёплый]. We learned in our previous lesson about the word for cold. Do you remember? |
| Anna: Of course, Eric. [холодно] |
| Eric: Anna, I wasn’t talking to you, silly. I know you know. How would you say “It’s cold today”? |
| Anna: I would say [Сегодня холодно] |
| Eric: [Сегодня холодно] How would you say “It’s a warm day”? |
| Anna: [Тёплый день] |
| Eric: Or how about “Today, it’s warm”? |
| Anna: [Сегодня тепло] |
Lesson focus |
|---|
| Eric: Ok, great. Alright, Anna, it’s time for grammar. The first thing we’ll look at is the verb [хотеть] or “to want”. This verb is quite common in Russian. Unlike in English, you can use it to make polite requests with [вы]. |
| Anna: [Вы хотите попробовать торт?] |
| Eric: “Would you like to taste the cake?” Could you say that one more time a little slower, Anna? |
| Anna: Ok. [Вы хотите попробовать торт?] |
| Eric: Ok. [Вы хотите] is “do you want” and that’s the formal. And [попробовать] is “to try”, right? |
| Anna: Right. |
| Eric: Ok. And [торт] is…? |
| Anna: Cake. |
| Eric: Cake. “Do you want to try the cake?” |
| Anna: Exactly. |
| Eric: Ok, great. After [хотеть] we use a noun or the infinitive form of the verb. |
| Anna: [Ты хочешь вина?] “Do you want some wine”? |
| Eric: Ok, here we’re using informal [ты хочешь вина]. “Do you want wine?” And I would say [Я хочу пить.] |
| Anna: I’m thirsty. |
| Eric: “I’m thirsty.” Here, in our example, we have [ты хочешь вина] so after the verb [хочешь] we have the noun “wine”. And the other example, [Я хочу пить.] we have the infinitive form of the verb, right? |
| Anna: Right. |
| Eric: Ok. If we use [хотеть] in a question, we sometimes omit the pronoun. |
| Anna: For example, [Хотите потанцевать?]. “Would you like to dance?” |
| Eric: So here we don’t have the [вы] or the [ты], right? |
| Anna: Right. |
| Eric: We can just say the verb without the you. We can just say [Хотите потанцевать?]. |
| Anna: Right. |
| Eric: Anna, [Хотите потанцевать?]? |
| Anna: [Хочу] |
| Eric: [Ну-ка давай] |
| Anna: Ok, but if you say [хотите], it means that you refer to me by using [вы], the formal pronoun. |
| Eric: Good point, so if I wanted to use informal, I would say [Хочешь?]. [Хочешь потанцевать?] |
| Anna: And I would say [хочу]. |
| Eric: [Отлично] Alright. Let’s go over the conjugation for [хотеть]. It’s an irregular verb, so it’s probably good to go over it. |
| Anna: I agree, Eric. It’s a very important point. |
| Eric: Why don’t you give the Russian and I will the English. |
| Anna: Ok. [Я хочу] |
| Eric: I want. |
| Anna: [Ты хочешь] |
| Eric: You want. |
| Anna: [Он, она хочет] |
| Eric: He, she wants. |
| Anna: [Мы хотим] |
| Eric: We want. |
| Anna: [Вы хотите] |
| Eric: You want – formal. |
| Anna: [Они хотят] |
| Eric: “They want.” Ok, if you would like to see how this verb is written, please check out our PDF file for this lesson. So our next word we already talked about in the vocabulary section, but it’s good to mention one point about this word, [почём], Anna? |
| Anna: Ok. So the point is we don’t a verb after [почём]. |
| Eric: In our previous example, we had [Почём яблоки?]. |
| Anna: Right. |
| Eric: “How much are the apples?” in English, but we don’t need the “are” in Russian. We just say “How much apples?” |
| Anna: Right. |
| Eric: [Почём яблоки?] Ok, great. |
| Anna: Perfect. |
| Eric: Ok, Anna. Great lesson. Thank you very much. [Спасибо большое] |
| Anna: [Спасибо тебе Эрик] |
Outro |
| Eric: So check out RussianPod101.com for the accompanying PDF for this lesson. |
| Anna: It has the transcript of the conversation in Cyrillic, it`s romanized form and the translation. |
| Eric: It also has vocabulary, sample sentences, a grammar explanation and a cultural insight section. |
| Anna: The cultural insight is actually my favorite. |
| Eric: Really? You read those? |
| Anna: Come on, Eric. Of course I read those. Believe it or not, I learn a lot from that section. It’s so interesting. |
| Eric: Anna, once again you are right, it is good. But don’t take our word for it, please have a look for yourself and let us know what you think. |
| Anna: Yes, and please stop by and leave us a comment. |
| Eric: It’s your favorite line, Anna. |
| Anna: Yes, it is. |
| Eric: Ok, until next time. |
| Anna: [До встречи] |
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