4 ms·

That is a great quote, though I have a minor quibble about alcohol being necessary as some of the Russians I befriended were former alcoholics and sober for yea

That is a great quote, though I have a minor quibble about alcohol being necessary as some of the Russians I befriended were former alcoholics and sober for years. Though others drank beer at dawn. I found I made deep friendships more easily after speaking even a bit of Russian. If you can say "My name is X" and "awesome" and a couple other small phrases it helps. That said, it wasn't until I had put in around 1000 hours of practice until things really opened up. It's such a hard language and I'm below average in my ability to learn human languages. But I did make steady progress with Verbling and I even met up with my tutor when I was in Ukraine. One of the things that learning Russian clears up is why they sound so angry to English ears. The language doesn't use tone for emphasis as much as English. It uses word order because the grammar is more flexible so they're able to put the important stuff at the end. Plus the sounds are more constant based. So once your ears get used to the language, you don't really hear Russian (or a Russian accented English) the same anymore. It sounds more human. Plus you learn so many words, you end up finding some of the endearing / superior to the English translation.

mycologos 5y ago
Interesting. Do you have a recommended method for learning Russian?
nwb 5y ago
Could you give some examples of some Russian words that are more enduring than English words? I've always been fascinated by this.
- davidgh 5y ago
  Молодец, нельзя, фу, тоска, почемучка. When learning Russian these are just a few of the words I found myself saying even when speaking English. Which gives a hint that a good direct translation maybe isn’t quite there.
  - cperciva 5y ago
    There's a rule in linguistics, that the more often a word is used, the shorter it will be -- almost like Huffman coding. In that light, comparing the one-syllable English "Why?" to the three-syllable Russian "почему?" says something about the safety of asking questions in different countries.
    - bradrn 5y ago
      > There's a rule in linguistics, that the more often a word is used, the shorter it will be I’m really interested in linguistics, but I’ve never heard of such a rule. Could you give a source please? I’d be curious to know if this is true. (A striking counterexample I ran into just yesterday: the Urim word for ‘head’ is tukŋunakŋ, and ‘we (incl.)’ is mentepm-. I don’t think this is because Urim people avoid talking about heads or groups of people. That being said, it’s tricky concluding anything from a sample size of n=1.)
      - cperciva 5y ago
        https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brevity_law https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brevity_law
        bradrn 5y ago
        Interesting — I’ll have to look into this. Thank you!
        foldr 5y ago
        This is just a statistical tendency. It doesn’t license the inference that any given long word is rarely used.
      - waldrews 5y ago
        Hence Russian has a concise word for elephant, slon, and a three-syllable word for hen, kuritza.
    - dTal 5y ago
      It is no surprise that the English word is shorter, as - unlike English - Russian has two words for "why". "почему" asks - how did things come to be this way? "зачем" asks - what is the purpose of things being this way? Note the difference in implication if I ask you "why" you were late for work. "почему" allows room for circumstances beyond your control, while "зачем" places the blame squarely on your shoulders. English speakers may be completely unconscious of the overloaded nature of "why" - such is the value of learning other languages.
  - codesnik 5y ago
    fun. did you happen to learn those words from some dog-owner, by chance?
    - funny_falcon 5y ago
      There is single word from dog-owner - фу
      - to1y 5y ago
        all except тоска could be used easily in some way
YeGoblynQueenne 5y ago
>> One of the things that learning Russian clears up is why they sound so angry to English ears. Funny. To me (I'm Greek) Russians sound like they're always complaining about something. It's Germans that sound angry. Edit: I wonder what Greek sounds like to foreign ears. The closes I've come to understanding it is hearing Spanish people talk, who sound a lot like Greek -that I don't understand.
- theshrike79 5y ago
  Both Spanish (The Spain-version, not the Mexico-version) and Greek have a bunch of S sounds _everywhere_. That's what makes them sound similar to people who don't speak the language that much.

mycologos 5y ago

Interesting. Do you have a recommended method for learning Russian?

nwb 5y ago

Could you give some examples of some Russian words that are more enduring than English words? I've always been fascinated by this.

davidgh 5y ago
Молодец, нельзя, фу, тоска, почемучка. When learning Russian these are just a few of the words I found myself saying even when speaking English. Which gives a hint that a good direct translation maybe isn’t quite there.
- cperciva 5y ago
  There's a rule in linguistics, that the more often a word is used, the shorter it will be -- almost like Huffman coding. In that light, comparing the one-syllable English "Why?" to the three-syllable Russian "почему?" says something about the safety of asking questions in different countries.
  - bradrn 5y ago
    > There's a rule in linguistics, that the more often a word is used, the shorter it will be I’m really interested in linguistics, but I’ve never heard of such a rule. Could you give a source please? I’d be curious to know if this is true. (A striking counterexample I ran into just yesterday: the Urim word for ‘head’ is tukŋunakŋ, and ‘we (incl.)’ is mentepm-. I don’t think this is because Urim people avoid talking about heads or groups of people. That being said, it’s tricky concluding anything from a sample size of n=1.)
    - cperciva 5y ago
      https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brevity_law https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brevity_law
      - bradrn 5y ago
        Interesting — I’ll have to look into this. Thank you!
      - foldr 5y ago
        This is just a statistical tendency. It doesn’t license the inference that any given long word is rarely used.
    - waldrews 5y ago
      Hence Russian has a concise word for elephant, slon, and a three-syllable word for hen, kuritza.
  - dTal 5y ago
    It is no surprise that the English word is shorter, as - unlike English - Russian has two words for "why". "почему" asks - how did things come to be this way? "зачем" asks - what is the purpose of things being this way? Note the difference in implication if I ask you "why" you were late for work. "почему" allows room for circumstances beyond your control, while "зачем" places the blame squarely on your shoulders. English speakers may be completely unconscious of the overloaded nature of "why" - such is the value of learning other languages.
- codesnik 5y ago
  fun. did you happen to learn those words from some dog-owner, by chance?
  - funny_falcon 5y ago
    There is single word from dog-owner - фу
    - to1y 5y ago
      all except тоска could be used easily in some way

YeGoblynQueenne 5y ago

>> One of the things that learning Russian clears up is why they sound so angry to English ears. Funny. To me (I'm Greek) Russians sound like they're always complaining about something. It's Germans that sound angry. Edit: I wonder what Greek sounds like to foreign ears. The closes I've come to understanding it is hearing Spanish people talk, who sound a lot like Greek -that I don't understand.

theshrike79 5y ago
Both Spanish (The Spain-version, not the Mexico-version) and Greek have a bunch of S sounds _everywhere_. That's what makes them sound similar to people who don't speak the language that much.