Lesson 1: Greetings
You just arrived in Slovakia, and checked into a hotel. You meet some fellow travelers, and get in a little conversation with them…
Mišo: Ahoj! Vy ste američan?
You: Yes, I am American. And you, are you Slovak?
Mišo: Áno, ja som Slovák. Volám sa Mišo.
You: Hi Mišo. My name is also Michael.
Mišo: No tak ahoj Michael! A tu je Lucia. Ona je tiež slovenka.
You: Hi Lucia! My name is Michael.
Lucia: Ahoj Michael! Tam je Bob, on je tiež američan.
Lucia: Bob, vy ste američan, že?
Bob: Áno, som. Prečo?
Lucia: Tu je Michael, on je tiež američan.
Bob: Oh, hi Michael, nice to meet you!
You: Nice to meet you, Bob!
Notes
Let’s go over this dialog. You are approached by a Slovak guy named Mišo. This is a very common Slovak name. It’s the short form of Michal, just like Mike is the short form of Michael. He says hi (ahoj), and asks if you are American. Vy ste means you are. Note that you don’t have to reverse the verb and the noun as is done in English. Instead, the fact you are asking a question is indicated by your intonation.
Mišo next tells you that he is Slovak. Áno mean yes and ja som is i am. To say my name is … you say volám sa …. Literally this phrase means (I) call myself …. Neat, you guys have the same first names! No tak ahoj is a little embellishment which the Slovak language is full off. It means, roughly, well, in that case, hi. Mišo next introduces his (female) friend Lucia. A tu je is and here is. Ona je tiež Slovenka means She is also Slovak. Note that the female form of “Slovak” (slovenka) is different from the male one (slovák). This is very common in our language. The endings of most words change based on whether they are referring to male, female or neuter items, and also based on what form they serve in the sentence. This behavior is called conjugation.
Lucia next introduces her friend Bob. Tam je means there is. Bob has been living in Slovakia for a while, and speaks good Slovak. Lucia double checks his origin. The že added to the end of the sentence serves the same role as right in you are American, right?. Bob confirms. Note that he just says som, and not ja som. You will notice that the pronouns (ja, on, ona, my, vy, etc…) are not used very often. This is because the form of the verb indicates which pronoun it refers to. This is just as if you were saying “Am Slovak” instead of “I am Slovak”. You could do this in English with the verb “to be” (but it would sound strange) . In Slovak, you can get away with not using the pronoun with ANY verb. Pretty neat, right? Finally, prečo simply means why.
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This is my first lesson. Please let me know what you think. What I have in mind is to create a series of lessons, following an American traveler as he makes his way around Slovakia. Let me know if you would like to see a lesson a certain specific topping. Thanks!
Lubos, There are only a couple sentence my father taught me when I was little- please feel free to correct me, as I’m only going on memory and pronunciation, not reading. One is, “Yit doma spots” and was told it was, “Lets go home” and the other was, “Yits, nya hla doi ak doma” whas supposed to mean, “Eat, don’t starve like you do at home”, like a hospitality invitation type of thing. I was spelling as it had been pronounced to me. I’m curious if these are common sayings, and how they’re really said and spelled?
Thank you,
Hehe, took me few seconds to figure these out!
The first one is probably “Jiď domov späť”, which is “Go home back” (go back home). The first word is a slang (I thinks it’s from Czech) for “to go”. You could say “Jiďme” for “lets go”. But the correct way is “Poďme”. So to say “let’s go home” you can say “poďme domov”, and to say “let’s go back home” you would say “poďme späť domov”.
The second one was easier: “Jedz, nehladuj ako doma”, which means just what you remember: “eat, don’t starve yourself like at home”. This is a really common saying! My grandma says something along these lines, while offering me a plate full of assorted goodies, whenever I visit her.
I remember Dzedo teaching me to count in Slovak when I was just 3 years old. It was so cool. Do you have the numbers here at this website? Can’t find them if you do.
Nope, not yet. I’ll probably introduce numbers in lesson 3. But here you go: jeden, dva, tri, štyri, päť, šesť, sedem, osem, deväť, desať (that’s one through ten)
lubos, I did not paid too much attention to language lessons (as I went through school in Slovakia all the way to post graduate level)
I just want to say, that you have talent to do this “stuff”.
Je to vyborne a dufam ze sa toho nevzdas, aj keď len ako na “na čiastočný úväzok
Ahoj Lubos! Love the language lessons… only one slight correction from an teacher
…you conjugate verbs and decline nouns! So when the noun or adverb changes endings thats declension, when the verb changes person, thats conjugation. No big deal, but thought I’d throw that in there!
I had no idea there was a difference between the two. Thank you!
Hi, all, Lubos, great idea, all this website, I can help you with anything if you wish, I have a little experience with teaching Slovak to foreigners and designing my own lectures.
And cooking is my great passion. I have a recipe for “mačanka”. Great day to everyone,
Xenia
Please post the macanka recipe as soon as you can!
Tim
Ahoj Lubos! This is an absolutely wonderful website! I am 100% Carpatho-Rusyn on both sides of my family. In fact, on my father’s side I have birth certificates dating back to 1750! Even though my name is Molnar (Mylnar in Slovak) and is Hungarian, my paternal grandfather came from a town east of Kosice, Kalsa is the name. My paternal grandfather came from a town south and east of Kalsa, it’s name is Cejkov. That town is very close to the Hungarian border as well as the border with Ukraine. All four of my grandparents were Rusniki. As were their parents, grand parents, etc. I’m from a small coal mining town in Western Pennsylvania, WIndber, which is just south east of Johnstown. My baba on both sides lived very close to me in Windber and I spent most of my time as a child with one baba or another. Although my maternal baba lived near a creek and a playground with swings, sliding boards, etc. Guess which baba I spent more time with? I loved trying to catch the small crawfish in the creek! Rusyn/Slovak was my first language as a kid but I have forgotten so much of it. As I go through these pages it is all coming back to me. I have no problem with the pronunciation because of my childhood, it just seems to roll off the tongue. I was also an altar boy in my church (Greek-Catholic, known as Byzantine Catholic in the U.S.) and weekdays it was usually the priest, me and about eight old ladies (stary babas?) in church, so the liturgy was in Old Slavonic. To this day I love liturgy in Old Slavonic. I have cds of liturgy from Slovakia that are in Rusyn or Slovak or Old Slavonic that a friend gave to me. He recorded them off a Slovak radio station that he could get on the internet.
This site is just wonderful. Thank you so much. Dakujem! I have posted a few times now and can’t wait to see every link. I know you are busy, but keep adding as much as you can. The recipes are great, I am familiar with most of them and can cook them. My son is 12 and loves the traditional recipes. He doesn’t know it, but most of the time he is eating cabbage, which he claims to hate. But I won’t tell him and he will continue to eat the foods! I make my chicken soup as you do and he and my wife thinks it is the best chicken soup in the world. So do I.
Oh, one quick thing. My maternal baba gave me a nickname that my family still uses–Duze moja. I would always be getting into things as a kid-the coal bin, the wood pile, the creek, and she would catch me doing something and say “Duze Moja!” which means “my soul!” of course. But she said it so often that my siblings and mother picked it up. They would say things like “We can get going as soon as “Duze Moja” over there gets changed.” Or “Mom, duze moja is licking the icing off the cake!” Things like that. I call my son that for the same reasons!
Tim
Hi, Tim, Rusyn Boy,
I am from Kosice. I work with Lubos on Macanka recipe, just sent an email to him. I hope it works in US, I never tried making it out of Slovakia, as some ingredients are really local. But I guess you have access to dried mushrooms and sour juice from cabbage. I use no meat or potatoes or cream, but if you browse online, you will find infinite versions of this Slovak magic. I love it and can bath in it.
I must check your chicken soup recipe, I have one specific myself.
If you need anything, just let me know, I hope I can be helpful at least by words.
Greetings from Egypt.
Xenia (Zamrijova) Youssef
Ahoj Xenia! I have to ask…what is someone from Kosice doing in Egypt??!! Mind you, I’m jealous. I have always wanted to go to Egypt and not just for the usual. I think the country is fascinating.
Oh, and am I remembering the “duze moja” correctly? I know it means “my soul” and is also the name of a famous song. But I might be remembering it incorrectly. The gender of things and such. Since she used it as a saying, as in “Good grief” I don’t know if the gender thing matters. Please feel free to correct me, anyone.
Dakujem,
Tim
here you can find the song:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AipE4XH3DIE&feature=related
Did you mean this one? Here is the lyrics:
Anička, dušička, kde si bola, keď si si čižmičky zarosila.
[:Bola som v hájičku, žala som trávičku, duša moja, duša moja.:]
A ja som po tri dni trávu kosil, ja som si čižmičky nezarosil.
[:A ja som hrabala, teba som čakala, duša moja, duša moja.:]
Ahoj, Tim.
Well, I am happily married in Egypt. Took Slovak men awfully long time to notice me, so I gave up and opened the window for international candidates, and boom, there you go !. Now Slovak men notice me, is it not a paradox? Egypt is definitely and I underline “a fascinating, exciting country” worth visiting, exploring, tasting. I never came here as a tourist, I was here as a teacher to meet colleagues in Mansoura first time, and later again, just I met my future husband then and really in a whistle… I live here. Many people have eyes for negative images here, I admit, it’s not perfect, but this land is great to me, in its people mainly. They have shown quite a stuff to the world.
You remember that phrase correctly, let me type how we pronounce it: “dusha moja”
It means as you say – my soul. And yes, there is such song. We used to sing it with my granny. About going to garden and cutting grass. A girl is asking her boyfriend to leave the garden gate open, because she is coming there to him.
I must remember that myself, how the song begins,a dnI can send you the full lyrics, or we try youtube
))))
I often listen to some pieces, I like Jozka Cerny from Morava and many many others.
Gender in Slovak can seem a bit of a trouble, but believe me, with simple steps in learning it’s easy to master this language in no time. You don’t need complicated grammar, first it is good to just learn words, soon they connect so easily and gender comes naturally with. I love when foreigners speak my language, it sounds soooooo cute.
)))))
Any help needed for anyone here, I am open to advice and guide. But Lubos is the boss here.
Ano, Monika, presne tuto myslim!!! Dakujem.
))
Yes, this is exactly the song I mean, thank you so much, really. Enjoy, Tim.
What are all the Slovak Pronouns? I only know theses that you posted, But I need to know all :O can you tell me please?
Never mind I found them <3
Hi, Lubos. I’m living in Slovakia in Zvolen
(that’s south from Lubos’s hometown Banská Bystrica)
I just found a great web side, that you can leard slovak language, for free, and it’s really easy and fun (there are even some games!)
It’s also in, for example, in polish, german, french, lithuanian, and esperanto!
http://www.slovake.eu/en/