Thread: Привет!

Originally Posted by волк

Edit- Dimitri: I thought 'Я ем' was more like 'Ya Yem', the Ya part at least. 'Ja' is too much like German 'Ja' for 'Yes'.

That doesn't really make sense. Shall I say Russian Но shouldn't be transliterated as No because it looks like English "No".

J = Y
A = A

Ja = Ya

[quote=Seventh-Monkey]

Originally Posted by "волк":3t4voqmj

Edit- Dimitri: I thought 'Я ем' was more like 'Ya Yem', the Ya part at least. 'Ja' is too much like German 'Ja' for 'Yes'.

That's the problem with transliterations: it depends on the accent you're transliterating it into. All my Sveedish friends write things like "tavarishj", which sounds, obviously, completely wrong in an English accent.[/quote:3t4voqmj]

That's wrong even for a Swede. You don't write an O as an A, even if it sounds like one.

This is transLITeration. LIT = letter.

Hey, they were Swedes! Not Norwegians!

Originally Posted by kalinka_vinnie

Hey, they were Swedes! Not Norwegians!

Bah, you mentioned Norweigans in your post and it confused me.

I do know what the difference is! I am not an American. And I've been to both countries :P

Okay, I have thought of some more:

Where are you?
Good luck!
What are you reading?
What are you doing? (I think I know this one... Shtoh tiy dyelayesh?)
Who called? (on the phone)
I'm happy.
I'm sad.
I'm mad.

Enough for now.

Originally Posted by love.angel

Okay, I have thought of some more:

Where are you?
Good luck!
What are you reading?
What are you doing? (I think I know this one... Shtoh tiy dyelayesh?)
Who called? (on the phone)
I'm happy.
I'm sad.
I'm mad.

Enough for now.

Где ты?
Удачи тебе!
Что ты читаешь?
Что ты делаешь?
Кто позвонил?
Я счастлива.
Я печальна.
Я сержусь.

Originally Posted by basurero

Где ты?
Удачи тебе!
Что ты читаешь?
Что ты делаешь?
Кто позвонил?
Я счастлива.
Я печальна.
Я сержусь.

Thank you. Could I have some English transliteration as well so that I will pronounce them properly?

Originally Posted by love.angel

Okay, I have thought of some more:

Where are you?
Good luck!
What are you reading?
What are you doing? (I think I know this one... Shtoh tiy dyelayesh?)
Who called? (on the phone)
I'm happy.
I'm sad.
I'm mad.

Enough for now.

Where are you? - Где ты? ; Gde ty?
Good luck! - Удачи! / Желаю удачи! ; Udachi! / Zhelaju udachi!
What are you reading? - Что ты читаешь? ; Chto ty chitaesh'?
What are you doing? (I think I know this one... Shtoh tiy dyelayesh?) - right
Who called? (on the phone) - Кто звонил? ; Kto zvonil?
I'm happy - Я счастлив ; Ja schastliv
I'm sad - Мне грустно ; Mne grustno
I'm mad - Я сержусь ; Ja serzhus'

Originally Posted by love.angel

Originally Posted by basurero

Где ты?
Удачи тебе!
Что ты читаешь?
Что ты делаешь?
Кто позвонил?
Я счастлива.
Я печальна.
Я сержусь.

Thank you. Could I have some English transliteration as well so that I will pronounce them properly?

Transliterations don't tell you how to pronounce things.
Here's an idea:


Learn Cyrillic!

Где ты? - gde ty?
Удачи тебе! - udachi tebje
Что ты читаешь? - shto ty chitaesh'
Что ты делаешь? - shto ty delaesh'
Кто позвонил? - kto pozvonil
Я счастлива. - Ja shastliva
Я печальна. - Ja pechal'na
Я сержусь. - Ja serzhus'

Some are wrong probably.

Originally Posted by TATY

Transliterations don't tell you how to pronounce things.

They tell me because I learned the Russian alphabet along with their respective transliterations and pronounciations of the letters. However, it is not always clear whether some letters sound the way they are... sometimes "o" sounds like "a".

Большое спасибо, Димитри и basurero.

TATY: Calm down. Stop being so rude to people who are only learning. By the way, I do know Cyrillic.

Originally Posted by love.angel

Большое спасибо, Димитри и basurero.

TATY: Calm down. Stop being so rude to people who are only learning. By the way, I do know Cyrillic.

Well them why do you need stuff written using English letters then?

Originally Posted by TATY

Originally Posted by love.angel

Большое спасибо, Димитри и basurero.

TATY: Calm down. Stop being so rude to people who are only learning. By the way, I do know Cyrillic.

Well them why do you need stuff written using English letters then?

I explained three posts above.

[quote=love.angel]

Originally Posted by TATY

Originally Posted by "love.angel":1o8u0xhm

Большое спасибо, Димитри и basurero.

TATY: Calm down. Stop being so rude to people who are only learning. By the way, I do know Cyrillic.

Well them why do you need stuff written using English letters then?

I explained three posts above.[/quote:1o8u0xhm]

If you know Cyrillic you don't need transliterations. The Russian letters tell you exactly how to pronounce the word.

Originally Posted by TATY

If you know Cyrillic you don't need transliterations. The Russian letters tell you exactly how to pronounce the word.

спасибо should then be pronounced "spa-see-bO". But we both know it is not.

Originally Posted by love.angel

Originally Posted by TATY

If you know Cyrillic you don't need transliterations. The Russian letters tell you exactly how to pronounce the word.

спасибо should then be pronounced "spa-see-bO". But we both know it is not.

Of course. This is why in Russia all Russian text has the pronunciation written in English letters underneath so Russians know how to pronounce words.


1. Spa-see-ba is NOT a transliteration. Spasibo is a transliteration.

If we tell you where the stress falls, you will know the O reduces to an A.

English letters can't write Russian.

Stay tuned to see if Love Angel will be the one that turns TATY straight!

I tend to side with TATY on this. Let me give you couple of examples.

There is no sound "я" in English. "Я" is usually transliterated with "ya" or "ja". But niether "ya" nor "ja" give sound "я", right? You just have to learn this sound first and then you have to know that "ya" or "ja" in transliteration give you sound "я". Why don't you want to know it about Cyrillic letter "я" instead?

In American English there is no sound that stressed Cyrillic "o" gives. This sound is like sound in British word "talk". Americans pronouns "talk" differently enough to make it another sound. Does it make you to transliterate "повар" like "palvar"? If yes, how would you transliterate "пальма" or "напалм"?

"Повар" is usually transliterated as "povar". If you didn't learn Russian and didn't recognise "povar" as transliteration of "повар", you would read it like "паувэ", almost like "power", right? At list it would have nothing to do with "повар". So, to read "povar" rightly you have to know that it is a trasliterated Russian word. Well, if you have to know it anyway, why don't you want to use Cyrillic?

The first course I took, in CD form, didn't work with cyrillic at all, it just attached a pdf file of the cyrillic alphabet with a way-off 'how to pronounce guide (and it said 'you'll be able to read Russian street signs in no time!' wtf?)

So when I was first learning, and still now because the glossary was quite large, I went through the glossary and translated the words into cyrillic, so I ended up learning it better than I would have just reading it from cyrillic at the start. But I made sure it was the correct spelling and I had heard a proper pronounciation first for each word.

So like she said above, she finds it easier to pronounce and learn them if they are written in her native language's letters first before she translates into cyrillic since she knows the alphabet.

It's a better learning process in my experience. But everyone learns differently.