Thread: Да. No.

So apparently да has quite a few more meanings than just yes?
(all taken from a post on another site)

" 'Ключ в столе, да?' - 'The key is in the table, right?'
Also, it can mean 'by the way'

'Да, ещё одна новость.' — 'By the way / Oh yes, (there's) another piece of news.'
It can mean "really?, indeed?"

'Вы знаете, он женился? - Да? А я и не знал.' — 'You know he has got married? - Has he? [Really / Indeed?] I didn't know.'
It can be used for emotional emphasis - "but, oh but; why; well'

'Да не может быть!" — "But it can't be true!' "

Can we elaborate on this topic?

As well as: "Ты не хочешь банан?" - "да(I don't)", а на английском, "Do you not want a banana?" - "no (I don't)", casually I guess we just ignore the negation. Answering "yes" to this question always confuses both people, so we either don't ask questions like that or say something like "no, I don't" or 'yes, I do". Very confusing. But apparently Russian handles this differently?

Ира: Ты не хочешь банан?
Оля: Нет. / Нет, не хочу. / Нет, спасибо. (= Оля не хочет банан.)

Ира: Ты хочешь банан?
Оля: Да. / Давай. / Хочу. (= Оля хочет банан.)

huh. Well, this is the site I was referring to: выбор слова - What does the phrase "Да нет" mean? - Russian Language Stack Exchange

Originally Posted by xXHoax

As well as: "Ты не хочешь банан?" - "да(I don't)", а на английском, "Do you not want a banana?" - "no (I don't)", casually I guess we just ignore the negation. Answering "yes" to this question always confuses both people, so we either don't ask questions like that or say something like "no, I don't" or 'yes, I do". Very confusing. But apparently Russian handles this differently?

As a Russian joke says, at the next presidential election in a certain country all the ballots will only have 1 question in them, which will read, "Вы не против переизбрать текущего президента на следующий срок?" (do you mind just reelecting the current president for the next term?), and the options given will be "Да, не против" and "Нет, не против"