Learn how to express how you are feeling correctly through one of three cases
Now Playing: Lesson Audio
Get a breakdown of the dialogue and translations instantly with the Premium line-by-line Audio. Sign up for your Free Lifetime Account Now and get 7 Days of Premium Access including this feature.
Get this lesson’s key vocab, their translations and pronunciations. Sign up for your Free Lifetime Account Now and get 7 Days of Premium Access including this feature.
Unlock Lesson Notes and Transcripts for every single lesson. Sign Up for a Free Lifetime Account and Get 7 Days of Premium Access.
| INTRODUCTION |
| Yura: Hello everyone, welcome to RussianPod101.com. Intermediate Season 1 , Lesson 2 - A Russian Medical Emergency. I'm Yura. |
| Svetlana: Всем привет, с вами Svetlana. |
| Yura: In this lesson you'll learn how about health conditions and pharmacy vocabulary. |
| Svetlana: This conversation takes place in a pharmacy. |
| Yura: The conversation is between a pharmacist and a customer. |
| Svetlana: The speakers are strangers, therefore the speakers will be speaking relatively formal Russian. |
| Yura: Let’s listen to the conversation. |
| DIALOGUE |
| Аптекарь: Что Вам? |
| Покупатель: Дайте, пожалуйста, аспирин... И побольше... |
| Аптекарь: Вы неважно выглядите, Вам плохо? |
| Покупатель: Да...У меня болит живот, раскалывается голова, и меня ужасно тошнит... |
| Аптекарь: Похоже на отравление. Вам нужен не аспирин, а активированный уголь. Выпейте 6 таблеток сразу, а потом просто пейте как можно больше воды. |
| Покупатель: Спасибо, попробую... |
| Yura: Ok, let’s listen to the conversation one time, slowly. |
| Аптекарь: Что Вам? |
| Покупатель: Дайте, пожалуйста, аспирин... И побольше... |
| Аптекарь: Вы неважно выглядите, Вам плохо? |
| Покупатель: Да...У меня болит живот, раскалывается голова, и меня ужасно тошнит... |
| Аптекарь: Похоже на отравление. Вам нужен не аспирин, а активированный уголь. Выпейте 6 таблеток сразу, а потом просто пейте как можно больше воды. |
| Покупатель: Спасибо, попробую... |
| Yura: Let’s listen to the conversation with English translation. |
| Аптекарь: Что Вам? |
| Yura: What would you like? |
| Покупатель: Дайте, пожалуйста, аспирин... И побольше... |
| Yura: Please give me aspirin... The more the better... |
| Аптекарь: Вы неважно выглядите, Вам плохо? |
| Yura: You don't look so well, are you okay? |
| Покупатель: Да...У меня болит живот, раскалывается голова, и меня ужасно тошнит... |
| Yura: No...I have a stomachache, a splitting headache, and I feel terribly sick... |
| Аптекарь: Похоже на отравление. Вам нужен не аспирин, а активированный уголь. Выпейте 6 таблеток сразу, а потом просто пейте как можно больше воды. |
| Yura: Looks like food poisoning. You don't need aspirin, you need activated charcoal. Take six tablets at once, and then just drink as much water as possible. |
| Покупатель: Спасибо, попробую... |
| Yura: Thanks, I'll try... |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Yura: Looks like our guy had something bad for dinner. Or just different from what he's used to – it can cause problems, too. Are all pharmacists so helpful in Russia? |
| Svetlana: I wouldn't say they are always enthusiastic about helping customers. But they must know what they are selling and must be able to give advice on what to take. So you can just come in there and ask them to recommend something for your problem. |
| Yura: I see. What about the prescriptions, are pharmacies strict about them? |
| Svetlana: You know... they are supposed to be now. There are still a lot of meds you can get without a prescription though. Of course if you need some strong antidepressants or painkillers you will need one. |
| Yura: Can it be one from another country? |
| Svetlana: No, it must be a local one. But really, you can get a lot of meds without prescription in Russia, even those that are not sold off the counter in other countries. Be careful taking them on the plane though! |
| Yura: I'll ship them, haha. |
| Svetlana: No, shipping any meds from Russia is prohibited, so don't even try. I'm sure they'll let you ship aspirin! |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Yura: Let's take a look at the vocabulary for this lesson. The first word we have is, |
| Svetlana: побольше [natural native speed] |
| Yura: more |
| Svetlana: побольше [slowly - broken down by syllable] побольше [natural native speed] |
| Yura: Next |
| Svetlana: неважно [natural native speed] |
| Yura: poorly |
| Svetlana: неважно [slowly - broken down by syllable] неважно [natural native speed] |
| Yura: Next |
| Svetlana: выглядеть [natural native speed] |
| Yura: to look, to look like |
| Svetlana: выглядеть [slowly - broken down by syllable] выглядеть [natural native speed] |
| Yura: Next |
| Svetlana: раскалываться [natural native speed] |
| Yura: to split, crack |
| Svetlana: раскалываться [slowly - broken down by syllable] раскалываться [natural native speed] |
| Yura: Next |
| Svetlana: ужасно [natural native speed] |
| Yura: horribly, terribly |
| Svetlana: ужасно [slowly - broken down by syllable] ужасно [natural native speed] |
| Yura: Next |
| Svetlana: активированный уголь [natural native speed] |
| Yura: activated charcoal |
| Svetlana: активированный уголь [slowly - broken down by syllable] активированный уголь [natural native speed] |
| Yura: Next |
| Svetlana: таблетка [natural native speed] |
| Yura: a pill, tablet |
| Svetlana: таблетка [slowly - broken down by syllable] таблетка [natural native speed] |
| Yura: Next |
| Svetlana: как можно... [natural native speed] |
| Yura: the more the... |
| Svetlana: как можно... [slowly - broken down by syllable] как можно... [natural native speed] |
| Yura: Next |
| Svetlana: сразу [natural native speed] |
| Yura :at once , right away |
| Svetlana: сразу [slowly - broken down by syllable] сразу [natural native speed] |
| Yura: Next |
| Svetlana: попробовать [natural native speed] |
| Yura: try |
| Svetlana: попробовать [slowly - broken down by syllable] попробовать [natural native speed] |
| VOCAB AND PHRASE USAGE |
| Yura: Let’s have a closer look at the usage of some of the words and phrases from this lesson. |
| Svetlana: Ok, let's take a look at the vocabulary for today's lesson. The first word is "побольше", which means "more" with the implication of the more the better. |
| Yura: It's a comparative form of the word "много", "a lot". It's simple version is "больше", which just means "more". But by adding the prefix "по-" we give the word some sense of urgency, like "I could really use some more of it, the more would be the better for me". |
| Svetlana: You can add this "по-" prefix to a lot of comparative adjectives. For example, |
| "быстрее", "faster" – "побыстрее", which implies some urgency. Basically this form stands somewhere in between of "faster" and "the fastest" and expresses the urgent need for something. |
| Yura: Ok, the second word we'll look at is "неважно". Maybe you are familiar with the word "важно", which means "important", and accordingly, "не важно", spelled separately, would mean "not important". |
| Svetlana: But if it's one word, "неважно", it's often used to express some dissatisfactory condition in a colloquial way. For example, "неважно себя чувствовать" – to feel not so well. |
| Yura: Or "отчёт написан неважно" – the report is written poorly. Not critically bad, but not good either. |
| Svetlana: Right. Next we have "выглядить", which is "to look" in the meaning of "to look nice" or "to look tired" |
| Yura: B, ты прекрасно выглядишь сегодня! |
| Svetlana: Oh, I look wonderful? Thank you, ты тоже! |
| Yura: Next we have the word "раскалываться", which literally means "to split", "to crack". It's a reflexive verb, so you can use it only in the context of an object experiencing this action himself, or itself. For example, арбуз раскалывается – the watermelon is cracking, and it's not you who's doing it. |
| Svetlana: We use this word pretty often to indicate a severe headache, so might as well remember it as a set phrase – голова раскалывается. |
| Yura: And if you feel like you are just dying from your headache you can say "голова УЖАСНО раскалывается", where "ужасно" means "terribly" or "horribly". |
| Svetlana: So yeah, maybe in English this phrase won't make much sense, "my head is terribly cracking", but in Russian everyone will understand that you are really suffering from |
| your headache. |
| Yura: We hope you won't! Next phrase is the name of the medicine Russians so love to take when they have a stomachache, especially the one accompanied with diarrhea. Активированный уголь. |
| Svetlana: It literally means "activated charcoal", where "уголь" is the word for simple charcoal. It's totally organic so Russians like taking it for digestive effects. It really helps for upset stomach absorbing all the poisons you might have. |
| Yura: Just don't be scared when you get it in the Russian pharmacy. It's not in capsules like in the majority of the countries. It's still mostly in tablets, so when you open a pack your hands might be dirty from the charcoal powder. |
| Svetlana: Right. By the way, what's the word for a pill? |
| Yura: таблетка, like "tablet". In Russia most people don't specify whether the medicine is a pill or a capsule, they just say "таблетка" to any hard meds. |
| Svetlana: And the last word we have for today, which is actually a phrase, is "как можно". |
| Yura: This phrase can be translated as "as...as possible". Unlike in English, where you put a simple adjective or adverb in between the two "as", the Russian phrase "как можно..." requires adjectives in their comparative forms (i.e. faster, larger etc). |
| Svetlana: Do you remember how to form comparatives in Russian? You Drop the ending from a normal adjective and add "e" or "ee" instead. For example, быстрый, fast. You drop the ending (ый) and get "быстр". Then you add "ee" and get быстрее, which is "faster". |
| Yura: Here are the examples of the phrases we can form using "как можно" and adding the comparative forms of the adjectives to it. |
| Svetlana: как можно сложнее |
| Yura: as difficult as possible |
| Svetlana: как можно холоднее |
| Yura: as cold as possible |
| Svetlana: как можно проще |
| Yura: As easy as possible. In this case, we added just one “e”. Great, that's it with the vocab! Let's get to the Grammar. |
Lesson focus |
|---|
| Yura: The focus of this lesson is dedicated to the health problems today, therefore in the grammar part we will keep learning how to talk about some conditions, symptoms and feelings. |
| Svetlana: Health conditions, as well as a person's mood, state of mind or physical senses and feelings, are described with the help of nouns and pronouns mainly in 3 Cases – Davite, Genitive and Accusative. |
| Yura: For example, in the phrases мне плохо, Саше хорошо – I feel bad or Sasha feels good, the pronoun "I" and the name "Sasha" are used in the Dative case, sounding like "мне" and "Саше". So how do we know what Case out of those 3 to use when I want to say that... well, I'm cold, for example? Or I'm sick? |
| Svetlana: There are certain clues you can use to identify what Case to put your noun/pronoun in when talking about the conditions. Well, 3 Cases – 3 rules. If the condition is an adverb (ends in "о"), like "холодно" or "хорошо", you use them with the noun/pronoun in the Dative Case. |
| Yura: I'll give some examples, in which you can also review the pronouns in the Dative Case. Мне холодно – I am cold (lit. To me it's cold) |
| Ему жарко – He is hot (lit. to him it's hot) |
| Ей грустно – She is sad |
| Нам весело – We are having fun (to us it's fun) |
| Оле тяжело – it's hard for Marina |
| Александру легко – it's easy for Alexander |
| Svetlana: Great. Next, if the condition is a noun (or a verb with a noun, usually with the verb "болеть" – to hurt), you should use it with the Genitive Case, because it indicates possession of this noun. |
| Yura: Here are some examples with the pronouns and nouns in the Genitive case. |
| У меня кашель – I have a cough |
| У него насморк – He has a runny nose |
| У неё болит голова – She has a headache |
| У нас температура – We have a fever |
| У Оли болит живот – Olya has a stomachache |
| У Александра болит спина – Alexander's back is sore |
| Svetlana: As you've noticed, in 3 examples we had the nouns as the conditions (cough, runny nose and a fever) and in another 3 we used the nouns with the verb to hurt. So, the conditions that are nouns or verbs with nouns require the object that possesses them to be in Genitive with the preposition "y", like у Оли or у меня. |
| Yura: And the last rule. If the condition is a verb, a verb alone, we usually use it with the nouns/pronouns in the Accusative Case. Here are some examples. |
| Svetlana: Меня тошнит – I feel sick (lit. It sickens me) Его знобит – he feels feverish, he is shivering (lit. It shivers him) Её рвёт – she is vomiting (lit. It "vomits" her, something does this to her) |
| Yura: I guess it would be useful to memorize those phrases, they are all quite widely used. |
| Svetlana: Right. Actually, it's not it for the grammar. I also wanted to touch a bit the conjunction "a" in the contradictory construction "не... а...". |
| Yura: Like "не аспирин, а активированный уголь" in the dialog. |
| Svetlana: Right. This conjunction "a" can have several meanings in Russian. In the previous seasons we learned it in the connecting meaning, which could be translated as "and" into English. |
| Yura: For example, Я приду в 8, а Лена – в 9. I will come at 8, and Lena will come at 9. |
| Svetlana: Yes, it is also used to ask counter questions or make smooth transitions in a conversation. Can you give us an example of that? |
| Yura: Sure. I'll give you a couple of short dialog. Ты любишь теннис? – Do you like tennis? |
| Да, а ты? – Yes, and you? or,Это твой телефон? – Is this your phone? |
| Да. – Yes. А какой это бренд? – (And) what brand is it? |
| Svetlana: Right, so as you could hear "a" was just used for transition from one thing to another. But "a" in Russian can also have a meaning of "but" to either contrast the information, or show the contradiction, like in the English phrase "not this but that". |
| Yura: I'll give you some examples. |
| Авокадо – не овощ, а фрукт. Avocado is not a vegetable, but a fruit. |
| Это не твои деньги, а мои. This is not your money, but mine. |
| Yura: Great, I think we covered a lot this lesson, time for a break! See you next time! |
| Svetlana: До свидания! |
Outro |
Comments
Hide