New to Russian..

Hello!

I'm fifteen and I only speak english and some basic german. I'm interested in learning russian because I'm very much interested in russian history and literature.

For anyone who taught themselves, or at least learned russian after english, how did you teach yourself the alphabet? When I look at the letters that look similar to english letters I keep expecting them to sound similar. How do I break myself of this? Also, I'm not quite sure how to write the letters. In english and german, I'm able to write quickly because there's a certain way most people write the letters-- and I'm not quite sure how one writes the russian alphabet once you get into letters such as д or ж.

Thanks for the advice :)

I taught myself the alphabet before I started classes so I would be ahead. First I used flashcards to get used to the way they look and which is which. For getting rid of your roman alphabet habits, I suggest practicing with cognates.

http://www.departments.bucknell.edu/rus ... habet.html

This website really helped me! :D

http://www.learningrussian.com/alphabet.htm

This shows handwritten Russian, which looks hard to learn, but gets to be second nature fairly quickly.

~dUcK!

Start here!! It's a great place to teach yourself the Cryllic alphabit, and learn some Russian words! http://langintro.com/rintro/first.htm

Thanks for the links :)

I used an inexpensive book -- Teach Yourself Beginner's Russian Script. Only takes a few hours to work through the exercises and at the end of it you will have the ability to read and write the script (understanding it is, of course, a different matter). If you haven't already realized this, Russian handwritten script is quite different from pritned Russian script -- some of the letters are completely different.

I also used the "langintro" website, posted above. If you do it right, you can learn the alphabet in a few hours.

I am 17 and in a very similar situation to you and, like TexasMark, have also been using a Teach Yourself book, except I recommend the 'Beginner's Russian' for something a bit more speech based - it goes through the alphabet bit by bit along with various exercises which I found quite useful.
Good luck with your Russian!
:D
Bonz

P.S: I can now say 'I don't understand pancakes' and 'where's the piano?'. :o I still can't roll my Rs, though...

what are pancakes? i mean in russian

Блины (bliny) - I think this is the plural version, so I'm guessing the singular would be something like Блинa.

Блин ! How can you forget the singular of Блин ! Блин забыл уже ? Не верится ! надо отдохнуть блин!

lol ok i think i proved my point Блин !

How do you write the letters when a form says "Please print only."?

TAK...

TAK... "ya ne ponimayu bliny"?

TAK... "ya ne ponimayu bliny"?

hm...<wonders how that happened> :oops:

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Originally Posted by Dogboy182

Блин ! How can you forget the singular of Блин ! Блин забыл уже ? Не верится ! надо отдохнуть блин!

lol ok i think i proved my point Блин !

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Err... I've only just started learning so that was kinda lost on me... :? Do you mean that the singular for Блин is Блин?

Blinchies!!! One of my favourite foods in Russia. Never had them in UK... ok, we had pancakes (even have a pancake day in UK) but nothing like russian ones. Filled with meat, or potato, or jam and many other fillings. Splendid.

In fact i like most russian meals as they tend to be based on meat and potato. Wife cooked me gortoshka (sorry for the spelling) yesterday and in the past she has done be borsch and many other traditional dishes as well as georgean and other stuff. The one thing i cant bring myself to touch is kvass. You see people everywhere selling it (and buying it!) but no way will i go near it.

Anyone like kvass?

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Originally Posted by Loki

Wife cooked me gortoshka (sorry for the spelling) yesterday...

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Maybe okroshka? The root is -krosh- "to cut into small pieces" - it is a cold soop made of kvas, vegetables and meet. Or kartoshka - cooked potatos.

Anyone like kvass?[/quote]
I do. BTW in my town they start to sell it again, but speaking frankly this kvas is not so good as it was in the USSR. The wrong technology, I think. :)

Yeah, I like kvass. I just think that $2.98 a bottle is too much and that's what they want for it around here.

I like kvas very much. But most of kvas sold in bottles has nothing to do with real Russian homemade kvas. Good kvas can be also made out of квасное сусло and it comes out much cheaper.

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Originally Posted by JJ

...but speaking frankly this kvas is not so good as it was in the USSR.

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Yes, when I was a little girl, kvas from cisterns was very tasty, but when I tried some last year that was awful. Probably there are some factories that make good kvas but you have to find them first.

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Originally Posted by Friendy

Yes, when I was a little girl, kvas from cisterns was very tasty...

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Yes, indeed. I prefered it for drinking, :) but not for okroshka it was very sweet. Yeah, a "small" glass of kvas cost only 3 copecks then, a "big" one cost 6 copecks...

The singular of Блины is блин. but блин also means like "Crap" or "damn". So i was playing with words there.

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Блин ! How can you forget the singular of Блин ! Блин забыл уже ? Не верится ! надо отдохнуть блин!

lol ok i think i proved my point Блин !

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"Damn ! i mean crap! How can u forget the singular of pancake ? I don't believe it ! Crap i need to rest!""


Is how it would roughly translate.

:roll: I want to learn russian. because there is opportunity for me to russia in September. And at the same time I want to master another foreign language. Chinese is my mother tongue. But I find it is very difficult for me to begin. Even how to write the Russion elphabet is very difficult for me. How can I begin with Russion?[color=red]

You can start off with the alphabet:
http://www.langintro.com/rintro/

And this article on my Russian learner's FAQ may be of help:
http://www.freewebs.com/pravit/learn.htm

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Originally Posted by Dogboy182

The singular of Блины is блин. but блин also means like "cr@p" or "damn". So i was playing with words there.

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Lol, just as well you told me! :P

hey you guys im also new in learning the russian langauge. i know it will be a challenge for me. but im only interested to learn how to speak it orally.. i was wondering if i still need to learn the alphabet? also, how long did it take for you to learn the alphabet? hoping you guys would reply to my post! :D

If you're going to learn Russian, learning the alphabet would make it a whole lot easier.

i need some help with the alphabet... i tried to look for a good website where they have a column of russian alphabet and the other column is translation of it in english and the other colum to be how it sounds... aaaaaargh! tvoyu mat!

www.langintro.com


have a day.

bratan reminds me of a guy who either

A) Has some russian friends and wants to talk to them in russian.

or
B) Likes a russian girl, wants to talk to her in russian.

In any case. You're going to need to learn the alphabet. You'll never learn how to say words (or whole sentences correctly) without being able to learn them in russian.

hey thanks man i really appreciate it. well, its been a long time since i have been wanting to learn russian. i think the language is very cool.. i often try to speak it over the phone on public places (i say easy phrases like hello, good morning, good bye, etc..) and people turn around and look at me, sometimes they would ask what language i was speaking, etc.. its just a nice language... also now that my sister has a russian boyfriend i would like to know more so me and him (alek) can talk russian 24/7,,, hahaha.. about russian girls, well i still dont know how the average russian girl looks like. do u know any websites where i can look at how russian people look like? dont be mistaken though, alek is pure russian but he looks caucasian.. i mean he has dirty blonde hair, blonde body hair, and everything else thatt would make u think he is caucasian white. but he has green eyes.. are all russian people like this with blonde hair?

I found the best way to learn the Russian alphabet, as with most things is to try to teach somone else. This method helps to reinforce what you can remember as well as show you gaps in your knowledge.

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Originally Posted by Oaky

I found the best way to learn the Russian alphabet, as with most things is to try to teach somone else. This method helps to reinforce what you can remember as well as show you gaps in your knowledge.

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It brings back one anecdote about a teacher and students. The teacher complains to his colleague about his students: they are so stupid! I explained to them once, they didn't understand. I explained to them for the second time, they didn't understand. I explained to them for the third time, I even started to understand myself but they still didn't understand!

Well, i'm caucasion as you put it and i don't have blonde hair...in fact i'm most probably from Scotland or Ireland along with the celts. Russian people will be the same as us, I mean the original English person has dark brown hair and brown eyes but we get all the variation because we've been invaded so many times in the past. Good way to learn the Russian alphabet: the new penguin russian course, it's what i'm using at university. The alphabet isn't hard to learn after a while and already (after only a week) i don't have to think much about it when reading words. Do about two hours study a day, minimum because that's what i have to do extra on top of my seminars. Write it up in a grid on A4 using colours and draw a picture that starts with that letter in English like for geh you could use a goose. Then u've got an easy reference when reading words.

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Originally Posted by Bratan_usa

hey thanks man i really appreciate it. well, its been a long time since i have been wanting to learn russian. i think the language is very cool.. i often try to speak it over the phone on public places (i say easy phrases like hello, good morning, good bye, etc..) and people turn around and look at me, sometimes they would ask what language i was speaking, etc.. its just a nice language... also now that my sister has a russian boyfriend i would like to know more so me and him (alek) can talk russian 24/7,,, hahaha.. about russian girls, well i still dont know how the average russian girl looks like. do u know any websites where i can look at how russian people look like? dont be mistaken though, alek is pure russian but he looks caucasian.. i mean he has dirty blonde hair, blonde body hair, and everything else thatt would make u think he is caucasian white. but he has green eyes.. are all russian people like this with blonde hair?

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Yes. All Russians look exactly alike. This is due to a secret cloning program instituted by Alexei Rykov during his stint as Commissar of the Interior shortly following the Bolshevik takeover. The accusation (which led to Rykov's downfall) that he was involved in a plot to overthrow Stalin was absolutely correct: Rykov's goal was to lead an army of minions with dirty blond hair, blond body hair and green eyes to Moscow and overtake the Kremlin.

Bratan_usa:
All Russian people look differently and we are caucasion.

ROTFL, Линдзи!!!

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Originally Posted by Scorpio

ROTFL, Линдзи!!!

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I do what I can. :)

Hello. I've been studying Russian for five years. How did I learn the alphabet? What worked for me was that I simply looked at each letter and then the sound that went with it and tried to associate the two in my mind. When I did that I went to the next letter like that. Then when I had a group of letters memorized, I covered up the sounds with my hands, looked at the list of letters and repeated the sound that went with each letter. That worked for me, but everyone is different, so it might not work as well for you. anyway, that is how I learned.

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I've been studying Russian for five years.

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Pravit has compitition