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*
NOTE *

All
phrases intended for translating/listening practice have been
deleted.

Welcome
to Episode 9. You may have noticed that in the last episode we heard
a bunch of phrases that I never actually translated for you. All
these…

Ты
работаешь в кинотеатре?

Нет.
Майкл работает в кинотеатре.

I
didn’t translate because we were simply listening for our verb
patterns:

Tee…something…ish.

Michael…something…et.

Jessica…something…eet.

The
verbs, though, that we heard were all in the top ten most commonly
used verbs in Russian…in any language, really. And today, we’re
going to work with four of them. Can you translate them?

(vege
chopping sounds)

Привет,
Полина. Что ты делаешь?

Я
делаю салат.

“Hi
Polina. What are doing?”

“I’m
making a salad.”

Hmmm..the
same verb—делать can translate as
doing and making? Yup. If I walk into my son’s room and I see
he’s stacking all his furniture against the wall, building a fort or
something, I’d yell…Андрей! Что ты
делаешь!

Andrei,
what are you doing?

He
says: Я делаю
форт.

I’m
making a fort.

Later,
if he’s at the table drawing a picture and putting sprinkles on it
and such, I’d ask again:

Ей
Андрей, что ты делаешь?

What
are you making?

Я
делаю
картинку маме.

I’m
making a picture for mom.

The
translation just depends on context. Imagine I’m putting together
little William’s birthday present. A bicycle. He wants to come into
the room, but Andrei stops him. Listen..

Папа
делает тебе сюрприз.

Dad
is making a surprise for you.

Ask
your friend,who has flour and sugar and butter all over the
place…Are you making a cake?

How
about this next one? Again, one of the most common verbs in any
language…

(sound
of soda can)

Таня,
хочешь колу? Есть Пепси, Спрайт, Кок.

Нет,
спасибо. Я не хочу колу.

Do
you want a cola? (soda)

No.
I don’t want.

I’m
trying to feed our kids, when my wife calls. I tell her…

Андрюша
не хочет суп.

А
что он хочет?

Andrusha
doesn’t want soup.

So,
what does he want?

Try
to say: I don’t want pizza.

–
– –

You’re
eating potato chips when a friend walks in. Jiggle the bag and ask,
with one word: Want?

–
– –

Let’s
do some review, now, from the last episode. Ask a friend, “You
wouldn’t happen to know where my telephone is?” Literally: You
don’t know where my telephone is?

–
– –

Ok,
now let’s review what we’ve worked on so far in today’s episode. Can
you translate the gist of the following phrases?

–
– –

So
far so good? Let’s try two more verbs…again, we heard them in the
last episode, now we’ll take a closer look. Imagine you friend calls
and asks if you’re up for basketball. But that afternoon, you
sprained your ankle. So you say..

Я
не могу играть. Нога болит.

I
can’t play. My leg hurts.

Someone
calls asking to speak to your roommate But he’s in the shower. So you
say…

Он
не может говорить.

He
can’t talk.

Your
mom’s about to head to the store and you’re feeling thirsty for
something sweet. So you ask…

Мама,
ты можешь купить мне лимонад?

Mom,
can you buy me lemonade?

Let’s
try those again. I can. You can. He can.

Я
могу. Ты можешь. Он может.

And
our last verb. Remember, in one of the first episodes, we listened to
my 3 yr old son William using a construction? Well, here’s what he
said…translated into Russian. Listen…

Я
люблю….Маму. /…папу. /…бабушку.
/…дедушку. /…Андрюшу

I
love Mommy, Daddy, Grandma, Grandpa and Andryusha.

And
why all those “u”endings? Mamu, Papu, Babushku? Because
loving something counts as doing something to it

Here’s
the “you” form of the verb. Imagine that, while your
significant other is away, you remodel their
room with bookshelves stacked with books. You explain…

Я
знаю, что ты любишь читать.

I
know, that you love to read.

And
the he/she form. Listen…

Папа
любит смотреть бейсбол.

Dad
loves to watch baseball.

Let’s
hear those again…I love, you love, he loves…

Я
люблю, ты любишь, он любит

So
now…let’s put all four of those verbs together. Again, just try to
get the gist of these phrases. At a minimum, try to get, like, “he
wants” or “Grandma loves”…Ready?

<<tip
of the day>>

A
lot of people have been writing in, asking about additional listening
practice. Obviously, Russian songs are a great place to start. What I
would do is Google “famous Russian singers” and then click
on whoever interests you. In fact, in the next episode—the USR
Midterm—I’ll be playing cuts from a variety of Russian and
Ukrainian singers.

So,
songs are one source. The other obvious choice is Russian
movies…which I don’t really recommend. Oh, it’s a popular
suggestion online, on sites like reddit and Quora…”Watch
Russian movies with subtitles.”

I
appreciate that they’re trying to help, but it’s a thoughtless
suggestion. Russian movies, written, acted, directed by
Russians…use an extremely challenging register of Russian speech.
Moreover, they’re talking about things—aspects of life in
Russia—which would be alien to you. Do you know what ZAGs and Ovir
are? What a podval looks like…to say nothing of a cherdak. Do you
know what it’s like to shop in the центральный
рынок…the old ones, where the stands are barely ten
feet wide and the alleys crammed with shoppers who rode in from the
celo? It’s just…it’s too much.

Instead,
I recommend watching dubbed cartoons. Peppa Pig. Robocar Poli. Super
Wings. Peppa Pig is great because each episode is so short. Five
minutes…maybe seven? But more importantly, it deals with things we
understand well. Going to the store. Cooking dinner. Going to the
playground. A trip to the lake. And to really get your money’s
worth, watch the episode in English first, then the same one in
Russian. And don’t bother with the closed captioning to read
along…its ability to transcribe is laughably bad. Just relax, and
listen.

You
could also watch feature-length cartoons dubbed into Russian. Toy
Story, Frozen, Tangled, Lion King…whatever. Choose whichever
you’ve seen and know well, and then search for the Russian dubbed
version. We do quite a bit of that in my Russian Accelerator podcast,
and it’s fascinating. Whoever Disney and Pixar are using for
translating the scripts…they’re geniuses Really, amazingly good
work. Because especially trying to translate songs? So so hard. And
they always nail it.