Learn how to ask where someone is from
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Eric: Eric here. Beginner Series Season 1, Lesson 3 – “So are you from this part of Russia?” Hi, my name is Eric and I’m joined here by… |
| Anna: Anna. [Привет Эрик, как дела?] Hi, Eric, how are you? |
| Eric: [Отлично!] I’m great. [А как ты?] And how are you? |
| Anna: [Супер, спасибо!] Cool, thanks. |
| Eric: Anna, this is not cool. |
| Anna: Why not? |
| Eric: Only special people say that their super, like superman. |
| Anna: So you think I'm not special, right? Ok. |
| Eric: Oh, that hurts. That hurt, Anna. Welcome back to the beginner series. |
| Anna: Hello everyone and welcome back to RussianPod101.com. With us, you’ll learn to speak Russian like a native. We’ll also provide you with cultural insights and tips you won’t find in a textbook. |
| Eric: In a previous lesson, James and Natasha met on a plane and were talking about. |
| Anna: Nationalities and languages. |
| Eric: Alright. |
| Anna: The focus of today’s conversation is… |
| Eric: The genitive case. The genders of adjectives. |
| Anna: And this conversation takes place on a flight from… |
| Eric: New York to Moscow. |
| Anna: And the conversation is between… |
| Eric: Jimmy Johnson and… |
| Anna: [Наташа Нечаева]. |
| Eric: Now they’re friends, in less than three, they became really good… It’s a long flight, isn’t it? |
| Anna: Oh, that’s true. Like 12 hours? |
| Eric: Ok. Best of buds, so they’ll be speaking informally, right? |
| Anna: Right. |
| Eric: So let’s listen to today’s conversation. |
| DIALOGUE |
| Eric: [Наташа, вы из Москвы?] |
| Anna: [Нет, я из Санкт-Петербурга.] |
| Eric: [Санкт-Петербург - красивый город.] |
| Anna: [Это правда.] |
| -- |
| Eric: Once again, slowly. |
| Anna: Еще раз, медленнее. |
| Eric: [Наташа, вы из Москвы?] |
| Anna: [Нет, я из Санкт-Петербурга.] |
| Eric: [Санкт-Петербург - красивый город.] |
| Anna: [Это правда.] |
| -- |
| Eric: One time, natural native speed, with the translation. |
| Anna: Еще раз, с переводом. |
| Anna: [Наташа, вы из Москвы?] |
| Eric: Natasha, are you from Moscow? |
| Anna: [Нет, я из Санкт-Петербурга.] |
| Eric: No, I’m from Saint Petersburg. |
| Anna: [Санкт-Петербург - красивый город.] |
| Eric: Saint Petersburg is a beautiful city. |
| Anna: [Это правда.] |
| Eric: That’s true. |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Anna: Tell me, Eric, how often have you been asked a similar question in Russian? |
| Eric: [Мне нужно несколько дней, чтоб посчитать] I need a few days to count how many times. Every time I met a new person, they’d ask me “Where are you from?” or [Вы откуда?]. Notice that [вы] for formal you. Sometimes they would even ask me [Вы из Америки?] or “Are you from America?” Usually when I was wearing my American flag shoes. |
| Anna: Oh, really? But you know, Eric, I know what you mean. I think I asked you the same question when we met for the first time. |
| Eric: Very common. Be honest, Anna, do I really look like I'm from America? |
| Anna: You don’t. I think you look like Russian. |
| Eric: Oh, wow. That’s great actually. |
| Anna: You have your picture on the website, right? |
| Eric: Ah, yes. I guess the listeners can be the ultimate judge if I look Russian or not. |
| Anna: Yeah, that would be nice to know what they think. |
| Eric: When I was in Siberia, I could pass for Russian usually until after the second sentence. |
| Anna: See… |
| Eric: I could say one, maybe one question or one sentence in Russian and they go, “Oh, he’s from Kirghizstan,” because I would say I'm from Kirghizstan so “Ah, that’s where the accent is from.” And then they went, “Wait a minute, something’s not right.” But if I wear the Russian clothes and shoes, especially shoes give it away, I think. |
| Anna: Yeah, I think so. |
| Eric: If you look at somebody’s shoes, you can tell what country they’re… I don’t know. But… |
| Anna: [Это правда] |
| Eric: [Это правда] |
| Anna: That’s true. |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Eric: Let’s take a look at the vocabulary for this lesson. The first word… |
| Anna: [из] |
| Eric: From. |
| Anna: [из] |
| Eric: Next. |
| Anna: [красивый] |
| Eric: Beautiful. |
| Anna: [красивый] |
| Eric: Next. |
| Anna: [город] |
| Eric: A city, a town. |
| Anna: [город] |
| Eric: Next. |
| Anna: [это] |
| Eric: This is, that is, it’s. |
| Anna: [это] |
| Eric: Next. |
| Anna: [правда] |
| Eric: The truth, true. |
| Anna: [правда] |
| VOCAB AND PHRASE USAGE |
| Eric: Now let’s have a closer look at the usage for some of the words and phrases from this lesson. The first word we’ll look at is… |
| Anna: [из] |
| Eric: No, no, no. The first word we’ll look at is… |
| Anna: And the first word we’re looking is [из] |
| Eric: [из] Ah, ok, ok, ok. |
| Anna: Eric, I think it’s your turn for the bad joke. |
| Eric: I freely admit that, Anna. My sense of humor is as cheesy as it gets. Hence, cheesy marketing man. |
| Anna: Ok, cheesy marketing man, the example I would like to give is [Я из Москвы]. |
| Eric: Which means… |
| Anna: I’m from Moscow. |
| Eric: So is that true? Are you from Moscow. |
| Anna: Come on. You know where I'm from, right? |
| Eric: Alright, so how would you say “I’m from Tashkent”? |
| Anna: [Я из Ташкента] |
| Eric: [Ташкента] |
| Anna: Yes. |
| Eric: Ok. In sentences like “I’m from Moscow” we don’t need a verb. We use the genitive case after [из]. So I don’t know why we say in English Moscow and not [Москва]. |
| Anna: I don’t know either. |
| Eric: Isn’t that weird? Cause Russians say [Москва] for Moscow, right? And if you change it to the genitive case, Moscow it’s [Москвы]. |
| Anna: [Москвы] That’s true. |
| Eric: [Москвы] Ok. I always wondered why we changed the names of cities. We could just pronounce them the same way. Anyway… |
| Anna: Yeah. |
| Eric: That has nothing to do with this lesson but thinking aloud. Here we go. Our next word is [красивый]. Oh, I just read your line. |
| Anna: It’s ok. I don’t mind, less work for me. And [красивый] means “beautiful”. It’s an adjective and it changes depending on the gender of the noun it refers to. |
| Eric: That sounds complicated, Anna. |
| Anna: Really? |
| Eric: Yeah. So Russian, unfortunately, can be a little complicated with the nouns especially. |
| Anna: That’s true. |
| Eric: So beautiful is obviously an adjective and the day I realized that adjectives have several different forms was a very sad day for me. |
| Anna: But it’s not that bad. |
| Eric: I guess it’s kind of bad at first. But once we learn some of the rules, it gets a lot better, right? |
| Anna: Right. |
| Eric: Ok. So the feminine form of [красивый] is [красивая]. And if you listen to the Newbie Lesson 5, there’s a word, [девушка]. |
| Anna: Yes. |
| Eric: And if you put those two together, you have… |
| Anna: [красивая девушка] |
| Eric: I think an important phrase. |
| Anna: Yeah, and you remember, we had also “young man”? |
| Eric: [молодой человек] |
| Anna: [красивый молодой человек] |
| Eric: Ok, very good. So [красивая девушка] means “beautiful young lady”. |
| Anna: Yes. |
| Eric: And… |
| Anna: And [красивый молодой человек] means… |
| Eric: Handsome young man. |
| Anna: Don’t look at me like this. It’s not about you, Eric. |
| Eric: Well, I was thinking is it beautiful young man or… because it’s the same word, right? It’s “beautiful”. You can say [красивый]… |
| Anna: [красивый молодой человек] |
| Eric: You can say “beautiful” for woman and man, yeah? |
| Anna: Nice question. Well… |
| Eric: Cause when somebody said that to me, actually this never happened, but when I heard this being said… |
| Anna: So sad. |
| Eric: I know, my sad tale of will. When I heard this being said, it was [красивый молодой человек]. |
| Anna: [красивый человек] You can say this when the person’s really beautiful. |
| Eric: And even if they’re a man? |
| Anna: Yes, sometimes. |
| Eric: Ok. And the neutral form of [красивый] is… |
| Anna: [красивое] |
| Eric: And the plural form is… |
| Anna: [красивые] |
| Eric: [красивые]? |
| Anna: Yes. |
| Eric: So Anna, just to recap, let’s do all of the forms for the adjective [красивый], which means “beautiful”. Can you break it down for us? |
| Anna: Ok. |
| Eric: Masculine. |
| Anna: [красивый] |
| Eric: Feminine. |
| Anna: [красивая] |
| Eric: Neutral. |
| Anna: [красивое] |
| Eric: And the plural form. |
| Anna: [красивые] |
| Eric: So if you’re a little bit confused here, why don’t you check out our PDF? It has a detailed explanation of this word. Ok, Anna, our favorite part of the lesson - grammar time. |
Lesson focus |
|---|
| Eric: It’s almost like hammer time, but more fun and without the pants. Grammar time! Hit me. Ok, thank you. I actually needed that. What’s our focus today, Anna? |
| Anna: We will look at the construction of some very useful sentences in Russian language. Let’s begin with the phrase “I’m from”. So for example [Я из Америки] |
| Eric: “I’m from America.” Ok, Anna, so again, you don’t need a verb to say “I’m from Moscow”, right? |
| Anna: Right. |
| Eric: You just need [Я] |
| Anna: [из] and the place you’re from. |
| Eric: And the place you’re from. And [я] means “I”, [из] “from”, and, for example, “America” [Америки]. |
| Anna: Yes, that’s true. |
| Eric: Ok, so it literally translates to “I from America”. |
| Anna: Right. |
| Eric: [Анна, ты из Америки?] |
| Anna: [Нет, я из Москвы] Oh, no. I'm not from Moscow, I'm from Tashkent. |
| Eric: [Ты откуда?] |
| Anna: [Я из Ташкента] |
| Eric: [из Ташкента] Ok. Why do we say [Я из Москвы] and not [Я из Москва]? |
| Anna: Oh, the thing is that after the preposition [из] or “from”, we use the genitive case. |
| Eric: Sounds pretty scientific, Anna. If you’re a total beginner, you might be wondering what a case is. Well, it’s a grammatical term to indicate a change in the ending of a noun, an adjective or a pronoun. The choice of the case depends on the grammatical function of the words in the sentence. If you’ve ever studied German or Latin, you’re probably familiar with the concept. If not, it isn’t as… well, it is pretty difficult. I'm not going to lie. It’s pretty difficult. |
| Anna: Ok, but it’s very important. |
| Eric: It’s important if you want to be grammatically correct. |
| Anna: If you want to go to Russia. |
| Eric: If you want to speak in a Russian speaking world. |
| Anna: Yes. |
| Eric: We need to learn this. They really are important. If I have the wrong case, it could change the meaning of the sentence, right? |
| Anna: That’s true. And if you want to look like you’re Russian, you know? |
| Eric: I just want to look like one. I don’t want to sound like one. |
| Anna: Ok. |
| Eric: Alright. Let’s have a couple more examples, Anna. |
| Anna: Ok. |
| Eric: How would you say “Canada” in Russian. |
| Anna: “Canada” would be [Канада]. |
| Eric: Let’s see if we can put this together. “I am from Canada”. |
| Anna: [Я из Канады] |
| Eric: [Канады] |
| Anna: [Канады] |
Outro |
| Eric: Ok. If you’re still wondering how to say “I’m from” such and such place, please log on and leave us a comment and we’ll be happy to help you. |
| Anna: And also if you’re really into grammar and want to learn more about the genitive case, please check out our PDF file. Here you’ll find great examples of masculine, feminine and neutral nouns and their usage in genitive case. |
| Eric: Thanks, Anna. I think that just about does it for today. So please stop by and leave us a comment and we’ll see you next time. |
| Anna: [До встречи] |
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