A place called “Seh-Sheh-Ah”

Moving on!

So let’s see: after saying “hello” and introducing yourself, what should you do? Well, one option, as I mentioned before, is to run away as quickly as possible to save yourself from the embarrassment of having a conversation in a language that you’ve only started to learn :)

But there is another way!

First of all, you can tell your Russian friend that you came from a place called “Seh-Sheh-Ah”. This, as you might have already guessed, is a special Russian way of saying “United States of America”. So, remember this little “ya” thing from our previous lesson? Now’s the time to use it!

All you need to say is these three words “ya iz seh-sheh-ah”. At first glance, it seems ok. But if look closely, you might notice something strange. It’s only three words! And we had much more - “I”, “am”, “from”, “the” and “USA”. Well, first of all, they don’t have all those articles in the Russian language. Poor guys. They don’t know what they are missing :)

All right, we are still one word short. And now I’m going to reveal a secret. A secret so horrible and fearful that I will actually give you a moment to make sure that your children are not reading this :)

Are you ready? Brace yourself.

Here we go: Russian language doesn’t have a verb “to be”!!

Yeah, I know it’s scary. Sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat and think about it. How can this be possible? But it’s true.

Well, actually, it’s only half-true. They have “to be”, but they are too lazy to use it :)

So you’re really saying “I from USA!”. Yeah, it sounds like some kind of Indian-talk: “Me heap want see play!”, “Me want play start heap soon”, “Me heap big fan Cicely Courtneidge” :)

And remember: this phrase will be useful only if you are in Russia. Don’t say it to your Russian friends in the USA, or you will sound silly (Imagine saying this to your close friend whom you’ve known for 10 years: “You know, John, I’m actually from the USA!” :).

That’s all for today! And in the next lesson I will teach you how to fake a conversation in Russian.

Hello! My name is...

Hello again!
So, let’s continue with our lessons. Now that we’ve learned how to say “Hello”, it seems only logical to learn how to introduce yourself. Well, if you’re not planning to say “Hello” and then run away all of a sudden :). So let’s move on.

If you look at any Russian language textbook, this phrase will always be the second one. And here’s how it is spelled - “Menya zovut John Smith”. Literally, it means “They call me John Smith”. Who are those mysterious “they”? We’ll never know :). But this is what it means. I didn’t make it up, I swear.

Ad now, how to pronounce it properly? Well, first of all, this “nya” can give you some problems. The “n” is soft, like in Spanish “mañana”. And this “ya” is actually a separate vowel. In Cyrillic alphabet it look like an inverted “R” (Actually, this “ya” is a word by itself and means “I”, but we’ll come back to this later).

So, to pronounce this “menya” you need to say something like “me-ña” in Spanish. And remember - it’s a very soft “n” follower by a very soft “a” , and please, don’t pronounce this “y”. Sometimes I hear how people say “meñ”, then they pause, and then say “ya”. That’s awful! Russian people will laugh at you. They will point their finger at you and say “Hey, look, here comes this American guy who can’t even say ‘menya’ properly!” :).Seriously, guys, don’t do this. Don’t pronounce this “y”.

The next word is “zovut”. It’s simple. There’s only one catch - it is actually “zavut”. Because you see, when there’s an “o” someplace in the syllable, and stress falls on ANOTHER syllable, this “o” is pronounced like “a”. Or, you can pronounce it, if you want to sound like someone from the Deep Russian South.

And by the way, the stress falls on the second syllable in both words.

So, try this in front of the mirror. And don’t forget to say your own name instead of “John Smith” :).

Bye!

How to say ‘hello’ in Russian language

Hello!

Or should I say, zdravstvuyte? Yes, that’s exactly how you say ‘hello’ in Russian language. This whole bunch of letters might look scary at first, but when you look at it closely, you’ll see that they have some kind of inner beauty. So, if you have Russian friends, they will be surprised to hear a greeting in their own language. Actually, all Russians believe that it’s impossible for a foreigner to learn their language, and you can make an impression on them just by saying “hello” in Russian.

So let’s learn to pronounce it properly. There are three syllables in this word. First one (and the hardest) is “zdrav”. Yeah, I know, it’s hard to pronounce that many consonants, but give it a try. And remember, it’s “z-d-r-ah-v”. If you want to sound more “Russian”, you can skip the “v”. Most Russian speakers don’t pronounce it.
Then, there is “stvuy”. It’s a little easier. But you have these consonants again, this time it’s “stv”. Try this in front of the mirror. And remember, this “vuy” is pronounced like VOOY.
The last syllable is “te”. It’s pronounced “tyeh”. And remember, this “eh” has to be very clear.

So, let’s try it. Zdra-stvooy-tyeh. The stress falls on the first syllable. At first, try to pronounce it one syllable at a time. And after that, say it in one word.

Literally, this word means - “I wish you good health” (from the verb “zdravstvovat” - to be healthy). But this word is very formal. If you want to greet your close friend, you might want to say just “zdravstvuy”, without the “te”.

And if want to be casual, you might say “privyet”, which means “hi”.

So, that’s all for today. See you soon!

Hello in Russian

Greetings! Welcome to my blog. It's dedicated to Russian language in general. I've studied this beautiful language for 10 years and I think I have something to share with all of you. But we will start with smaller things. For example, how to say "Hello" in Russian? I will tell you this in my next post. Bye!