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stelingo Hexaglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5830 days ago 722 posts - 1076 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Portuguese, French, German, Italian Studies: Russian, Czech, Polish, Greek, Mandarin
| Message 97 of 231 27 December 2012 at 2:19pm | IP Logged |
@ Solfrid Cristin Είμαι Ελληνίδα transliteration Eimai Ellinida.
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| Solfrid Cristin Heptaglot Winner TAC 2011 & 2012 Senior Member Norway Joined 5332 days ago 4143 posts - 8864 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, Spanish, Swedish, French, English, German, Italian Studies: Russian
| Message 98 of 231 27 December 2012 at 2:38pm | IP Logged |
stelingo wrote:
@ Solfrid Cristin Είμαι Ελληνίδα transliteration Eimai Ellinida. |
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Thanks! I know that "Ime"/ "Είμαι" is the correct way to say "I am " in Greek - it is just that my brain refuses to come up with anything but the Russian "Ja/ я" when I am supposed to translate it.
Another thing I find puzzling: In principle "Den/then" means not and "Ochi" means no, but in the sentence (Not very well) (After the question "Do you speak Greek") what I hear is "Ochi póli kalá", which in my head translates into "No very good". Can "no" then in Greek sometimes be used in stead of "not"? And is that a rare case, or is it fairly common?
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| ellasevia Super Polyglot Winner TAC 2011 Senior Member Germany Joined 6140 days ago 2150 posts - 3229 votes Speaks: English*, German, Croatian, Greek, French, Spanish, Russian, Swedish, Portuguese, Turkish, Italian Studies: Catalan, Persian, Mandarin, Japanese, Romanian, Ukrainian
| Message 99 of 231 27 December 2012 at 3:02pm | IP Logged |
Solfrid Cristin wrote:
Another thing I find puzzling: In principle "Den/then" means not and "Ochi" means no, but in the sentence (Not very well) (After the question "Do you speak Greek") what I hear is "Ochi póli kalá", which in my head translates into "No very good". Can "no" then in Greek sometimes be used in stead of "not"? And is that a rare case, or is it fairly common? |
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I had to think about it for a few minutes, but I think I've figured out the rule. Δεν can only used to negate verbs, while όχι is used for everything else. That's why you say "δεν μιλώ πολύ καλά" (I don't speak very well), but once you take out the verb it becomes "όχι πολύ καλά" (not very well). Likewise, you could say "δε θέλω αυτό"(I don't want this), or simply "όχι αυτό" (not this).
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| stelingo Hexaglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5830 days ago 722 posts - 1076 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Portuguese, French, German, Italian Studies: Russian, Czech, Polish, Greek, Mandarin
| Message 100 of 231 27 December 2012 at 6:13pm | IP Logged |
If you think that's confusing I cannot get my head round the Greek word for yes, ναι which is pronounced exactly like the Czech word ne, which means.....no(and also not)! I have to constantly remind myself it isn't negative when I hear it. Another confusing thing (please correct me if I'm wrong ellasevia) is that Greeks, instead of nodding their head to indicate yes, shake it from side to side. I believe this is also the case in Turkey.
Oh, and by the way there is another word in Greek for not, which is used to negate the imperative. (There may be other uses, I'm not sure) eg. μη μιλά don't speak.
Isn't Greek wonderful? :-)
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| Crush Tetraglot Senior Member ChinaRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5863 days ago 1622 posts - 2299 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Mandarin, Esperanto Studies: Basque
| Message 101 of 231 28 December 2012 at 8:36am | IP Logged |
I just made a log for the 2013 TAC:
http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=34744
Also, Jack:
I read in another log that problems with the links were due to them using Chrome. Maybe the site has some issues with Chrome that are causing your links to get messed up?
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| renaissancemedi Bilingual Triglot Senior Member Greece Joined 4356 days ago 941 posts - 1309 votes Speaks: Greek*, Ancient Greek*, EnglishC2 Studies: French, Russian, Turkish, Modern Hebrew
| Message 102 of 231 28 December 2012 at 8:51am | IP Logged |
stelingo wrote:
Another confusing thing (please correct me if I'm wrong ellasevia) is that Greeks, instead of nodding their head to indicate yes, shake it from side to side. I believe this is also the case in Turkey.
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If I may say something on this one. I don't know about Turkey, but in Greece we do nod to say yes. We throw our head back to say no, usually lifting the eyebrows and saying "ts" at the same time. Sounds weird when described!
I love your thread, sorry for the intrusion!
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| LanguageSponge Triglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5764 days ago 1197 posts - 1487 votes Speaks: English*, German, French Studies: Welsh, Russian, Japanese, Slovenian, Greek, Italian
| Message 103 of 231 28 December 2012 at 9:23am | IP Logged |
stelingo, Greek is wonderful! Using ναι to mean something positive is something I need to
get used to as well, as most of us do. What renaissancemedi explained above does seem a
bit odd to me written down, and I've just spent ten seconds attempting to imitate it, and
it still seems just as strange.
@ Crush: Thanks for mentioning the problems using Chrome. I do use Chrome so I will
begrudgingly try using something else. I wonder if it'll make a difference?
I will attempt linking to your logs shortly using a different browser.
Jack
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| Solfrid Cristin Heptaglot Winner TAC 2011 & 2012 Senior Member Norway Joined 5332 days ago 4143 posts - 8864 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, Spanish, Swedish, French, English, German, Italian Studies: Russian
| Message 104 of 231 28 December 2012 at 10:49am | IP Logged |
LanguageSponge wrote:
What renaissancemedi explained above does seem a
bit odd to me written down, and I've just spent ten seconds attempting to imitate it, and
it still seems just strange.
Jack |
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I was trying to picture you doing this in public, and thinking about how long you could do that before the men
in the white coats arrived (says the woman who speaks Italian mixed with Russian to herself, gesticulating
like a mad woman while she does that).
I tried it myself, and suddenly realised that this is what we do in Andalucia when we say yes ( except we say
sss and
not ts). So I agree that it looks strange on paper, but it felt quite familiar and normal when I did it. And I now
look forward to hearing from the rest of the members of team Sparta, who will presumably try this 15 seconds
after you have read this, if you have not done it already :-)
Renaissancemedi: You are most welcome at any time! As you probably have seen by now we are a small
group who study Greek just because we love Greece and Greek so much, and in spite of not really having
the time for it, so we are delighted to have more native Greek speakers coming by.
Edit: Realized I got it wrong and read a no for a yes. Andalusians do this to say yes, not no.
Edited by Solfrid Cristin on 29 December 2012 at 1:20am
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