sisi

Russian — English

• Дом — house

• Комната — room

• Гараж — garage

• Лестница — stairs

• Диван — couch

• Лампа — lamp

• Телевизор — television

• Ванна — bathtub

• Душ — shower

• Раковина — sink

• Мыло — soap

• Туалет — toilet

• Чашка — cup

• Вилка — fork

• Нож — knife

• Микроволновка — microwave

• Тарелка — plate

• Холодильник — refrigerator

• Ложка — spoon

• Кровать — bed

• Одеяло — blanket

• Подушка — pillow

• Стул — chair

• Патио — patio

• Бассейн — pool

• Двор — yard

• Чердак — attic

• Подвал — basement

• Потолок — ceiling

• Стена — wall

• Дверь — door

• Пол — floor

• Крыша — roof

If you’re anything like me (a beginner grasping at straws trying to learn Russian) then the soft vs hard sign concept is very foreign to you. The signs are not sounds of their own— they are clues telling you how to pronounce the consonant that precedes it. Here is a quick overview of soft vs hard signs:

Soft Sign (ь)

When ь is present after a consonant, this is your indication to palatalize the sound (aka soften). The middle of the tongue should rise toward the roof the the mouth.

Example: стиль - style, фильм - film

Hard Sign (ъ)

When ъ is present after a consonant, this indicates a slight break or pause in the word where the hard sign is located.

Example: объект - object

If anyone has any further resources for this, it would be greatly appreciated! I understand the concept of this, but not entirely grasping the pronunciation. Any YouTube videos or audio lessons would be very helpful! Also feel free to comment more tips for me on this topic!

Hello again, Langblrs! It sure has been a minute and a lot has changed since I last logged in! I’ve made a few posts already since I’ve gotten back into studying Russian, but I’m not going to get ahead of myself. Let’s start with the basics:

I’m Sisi (see-see), I’m 25 years old, and I live in the northeast USA. I’ve studied languages in school and autonomously for as long as I can remember. I graduated from college in 2021 with two Bachelors Degrees— one in Political Science and the other in Spanish. During my time at my university, I took classes in Spanish (of course, it was one of my majors), French, Arabic, Italian, and German. Outside of my university, I have studied Russian and Norwegian. I was fortunate enough to study abroad during undergrad as well, so I spent a good portion of 2019 in Granada, Spain perfecting my Spanish to fluency.

Fast forward a few years, I am now a Flight Attendant with the #1 airline in the US and I couldn’t be happier. I have traveled everywhere— North America (I just saw the Aurora Borealis in Alaska!), Central and South America, Africa, Europe, Asia, anywhere you can imagine! I get paid to see the world which has always been a dream of mine. Traveling and interacting with people of various backgrounds, cultures, and languages has been the best experience of my life.

Now more personally, I am vegan! I care deeply about the earth and ALL its inhabitants— every life holds the same value. This sentiment of total equality carries through to my political and world views as well.

Well, that’s pretty much the general gist of who I am. I promise I’m not intimidating so please feel free to pop into my inbox and introduce yourself— I love language-learning buddies! This will be a Russian langblr but I will gladly follow/interact with profiles of any of the languages I’ve mentioned I’ve studied as I can always use more practice!Sorry for the long post, I just wanted to put a persona behind this blog for all of you. I’m happy to be a part of the langblr community!

While reading in Russian, I often find myself wondering how to know which words are verbs, nouns, etc. Through my studies of various other languages, I know that infinitive verbs almost always have the same ending (usually a variation of 1-3 different types). So, here is a quick (very generic) cheat sheet for identifying a verb in a Russian sentence (this is not a conjugation post— that will come soon!)

-ть → example verbs: говорить — to speak, читать — to read, работать —to work

-ти → example verbs: идти — to go, нести — to bring

-чь (not as common) → example verbs: беречь —to protect, лечь —to lie down

Question Words

Кто — Who → Кто она?

Что — What → Что это?

Где — Where → Где собака?

Когда — When → Когда обед?

Как — How → Как дела?

Other Useful Words

Этот — This (masculine) → Этот студент

Эта — This (feminine) → Эта студентка

Эти — These (plural) → Эти собаки

Это — This (neuter), This/that is…, These are… → Это море, Это дом., Это собаки.

So I’m a huge advocate of immersing yourself in your target language as much as possible and music is one of the easiest ways to do it. Even if you have no idea what the song is saying, just hearing the words, pronunciations, etc., is already helping you improve your auditory comprehension skills! Just put on a song and do your homework with it in the background for the exposure or take it one step further and look up the lyrics and follow along! My target language is Russian, so I’ve compiled a list of some of my favorite Russian songs, even though I have no idea what they’re saying half the time! I use Spotify so these are all available on there, but I’m not sure about other platforms. Check them out and let me know what you think:

Доза by Dati

Принцесса by Babek Mamedrzaev

Sayonara детка by Eldzhey (love this one because half is in English so it makes me feel like I actually know what’s going on lol)

Судный день by PHARAOH

ТЕЛО by GRILLZY

Крепко влип by LUCAVEROS

Кино by MACAN

Нет сердца by PHARAOH

Studying cognates is one of the easiest ways to familiarize yourself with the alphabet of a new language. By comparing words you already know to those that you are just now learning, it’s easier to correlate the new letters to their new sounds. Here’s a list of Russian-English cognates that help me to remember pronunciation:

Акцент - accent

Бюджет - budget

Гитара - guitar

Журналистка - journalist

Комфорт - comfort

Лаборатория - laboratory

Меню - menu

Паспорт - passport

Литература - literature

Парашют - parachute

Университет - university

Яхта - yacht

Хоккей - hockey

Pобот - robot

Зебра - zebra

Принцесса - princess

студент – student

экзамен – exam

идея – idea

центр – center

Пицца - pizza

Фрукт - fruit

баскетбол - basketball

Радио - radio

класс - class

Аквариум - aquarium

Балет- ballet

Thanks for the question! So I’m doing the online group class for Russian through ABC Languages and, like I said, I love it. Usually groups have a minimum of three students but there are only two in my class (it’s probably at the teacher’s discretion). The maximum amount of students per class is 6. I love this because I get time to personally interact with my teacher, which includes speaking! I’ve tried teaching myself Russian before but it never stuck, but as soon as I signed up for ABC Languages, it clicked! My teacher teaches us common conversational words and commonly used phrases that I would find useful (he taught me how to spell my dogs’ names and to say things like “Where are my dogs?”). He expects us to respond with “да” (“yes”) when he asks us a question— he consistently tries to have us speaking as much Russian as possible even though it’s in the beginning stages. I think that for you and the languages you’re studying, it would be a great fit! I’ve always been too intimidated to do a language exchange so the (online) classroom setting of ABC Languages alleviates a lot of the anxiety! I highly recommend! They also offer private courses if you think that would be more beneficial. I’m sorry this is such a long response— if you have any more specific questions or any questions really, feel free to pop into my inbox! I did tons of research about different language schools before I signed up for ABC so I can try to be as helpful as possible!

Masculine ➞ usually ends in a consonant letter or -й — студент, музей

Feminine ➞ usually ends in -а or –я — лампа,станция

Espero que todos estén bien!

So yesterday I had my second Russian class! My teacher is super cool and patient with me (because I’m 100% butchering all the words but he always helps to correct me). He made fun of me because I kept pronouncing things in a Spanish or French accent, both of which I speak, so I’m definitely gonna have to figure out how to fix that. We went over the alphabet for added practice then he introduced us to the Russian words for “my” and “your”. I am having such a hard time pronouncing these words in Russian so I’m gonna have to do a lot of practicing. If you have any tips for how to remember pronounciation, please let me know! Other than that, I think I’m doing really well and I’m really enjoying my time learning Russian. I originally booked it to be an 8-week course but I’m seriously considering extending it indefinitely because I enjoy it so much! We meet every Saturday so unfortunately that falls on the 4th of July next week so there is no class on that day, so I’ll be doing a lot of independent studying. Expect a good amount of posts from me this week!

Russian - Latin Phonetic- English

привет - priVYET - hello (informal)

Меня зовут... - miNYA zaVOOT... - My name is...

очень приятно - Ochin' priYATna - Nice to meet you

Как дела? - kak diLA - How are you doing?

хорошо - haraSHO - Good

очень хорошо - Ochin' haraSHO - Very good

неплохо - nipLOha - Not bad

отлично - atLEEchna - Perfect

Здравствуйте - ZDRAstvooiti - Hello (formal)

пока - pakA - bye (informal)

до свидания - dasviDAniya - goodbye (formal)

Доброе утро - DObraye OOtrah - Good morning

Добрый день - DObry dYEn - Good day

Добрый вечер - DObry VEchir - Good evening

спасибо - spaSEE bah - Thank you

пожалуйста - paZHALsta - You’re welcome/Please

не за что - NYEzashta - Don’t mention it