Slade&Natasha

Yes, I have a good dictionary, and I bought a better lesson book. Using the Rosetta Stone software was really helpful to me. I also use google translate and I know enough to understand when it's a good translation and when it's bad.

Sounds like you're doing well to me - don't let someone's 'fml' mindset and negativity make you think otherwise. Some people just have a tendency to assume they know better than anyone, about anything, all the time.

I'm sure that once your wife moves to the US, especially given that you guys will be teaching your daughter two languages, you'll be surprised when you notice yourself learning something or other in the process too, same for your wife I bet.

Please excuse me for pointing that out and giving tips and suggestions that're based on real-world success stories instead of the theory of your newlywed hopes and dreams.

You're excused! Lol @ at your 'real world' (that's adorable!) success stories, may as well be MTV, for all I care.

Get off your petting zoo pony, dude.

Most of the time I've seen you around in posts that require actual input, if you do opt to give yours, it's relatively negative and often rude.

Who's making the assumptions now?

So how did you come up with those aforementioned beauties then?

You're implying that my "improper transliteration" somehow indicates I have no grammatical concepts of Russian (or any other language for that matter) when in reality nobody's ever corrected me so I feel I've "done quite well."

I'm hardly implying anything here - I'm stating it. I've just corrected you twice in this thread, oh.. and your signature is wrong too.. thus, three times.

Kanyeshna, da! Ti nee cheetayish?

Then why did you get confused by a simple letter change in кафе to make the word кофе? A and O confuse you? You've lived all this time, succeeding excellently in your Russian-learning, never having been corrected, not knowing how to pronounce the word 'coffee' properly? Who's talking rainbows and unicorns now, dear?

Конечно, читаю - и тебе советую.

I spent not a lot of time immersed in russian culture. I spent maybe a total of two months in Russia. I've studied every day for 30 minutes to an hour every day, as well as using what I learned to communicate with my (now) wife for a few hours a day as well.

Transliteration of words is awful, I bought a book about russian (the for dummies book) and they have no Cyrillic in it at all. It's a shame really, I can't believe they sell a book like that. Not only is it transliterated, you have to memorize not the standard transliteration, but their own 'translation method' where they simply replace a single cyrillic character with a single latin character.

I'd suggest you get a good dictionary, then you'd just have to get used to the transcription. Most of my foreign acquaintances in Moscow had quick results with that

Transliteration of words such as kafe/kofe rarely leads to accuracy in pronunciation and that was my point with learning to read Cyrillic.

Do you read Cyrillic?

The poll will show that men who ordered their wives off the internet had very little success with formal training. However, those who concentrated on informal training tended to do quite well.

You ever considered the notion that they feel they've 'done quite well' because nobody corrects them?

Such as your 'spasiba bolshoy' or 'dorbre ootra' - which you are trying to pass off as a transliteration issue, but in reality, you have no idea what declensions or conjugations are, clearly. Why? Because most likely, all you've done is repeat phrases you've heard; yet you never really bothered to take a look at the grammatical aspect for one reason or other, in turn, you make yourself look ridiculous when you're trying to argue in a debate such as this.

Nobody ever disputed the importance of culture immersion. So what's the rant for?

I must note - all you ever seem to do, is spew negative feedback at everybody and anybody. What's up with that, slim?

Transliterated one way... pronounced another. And incorrectly by Americans in both instances. Whether talking about a small business to purchase hot beverages or the hot beverages themselves, it always sounds more like KAH-fee than KOH-fye or Ka-fye.

What are you on about? 'Kah-fee'? Who taught you that? The difference in pronunciation and transliteration is very evident and true. "Coffee Shop" - Кафе, and "Coffee" - кофе, are written and pronounced differently - nothing like 'Kah-fee', I assure you.

I agree. But that's not my point. My point is when the average dude learning a few Russian words and phrases to get by while on sex vacation with his perspective new trophy wife goes to learn a language he may have issues because he's learned too formal a program. Instead of concentrating on the things he will need ("Where is the hotel?") He learns things that have absolutely nothing to do with his trip. ("When using infinitive forms in future-perfect, always use an indirect object in the accusative. - Not a real example, just illustrating the different approaches. And when someone like the dude aforementioned goes to learn the language, chances are he'll give it up before he even gets a good hold on it. All because he's concentrating on the wrong things.)

That's a subjective point of view - what you find difficult and useless, others fully well may not. In general, in language learning, one should only speak for himself.

Why are you jumping to sudden conclusions about Derek, do you know him well enough to judge what level his Russian is currently at, and whether the approach he's taken towards learning it is efficient or inefficient? How exactly are you able to judge this?

I have no idea what ESL programs include.

Then why deem them not useful in language learning due to lack of similarity in how native speakers talk? You just said so yourself, you have no idea what ESL programs include.

Transliteration as opposed to improper vocabulary.

Uh.. Kah-fee, you say?

You really should get your own screen name. (Or kick Slade off yours!)

Why bother?

Not disagreeing (with either of you) simply illustrating a formal approach to learning "survival" Russian isn't going to bode well with the average dude that wife shops on the interwebz.

How exactly are you illustrating this? Just by saying it? And actually, being that we're talking about 'formal' language learning, which seems to have sparked such a debate; how much 'formal' Russian language learning have you had yourself? For how long?

I don't think the importance of a solid grammatical foundation can be denied. Even when you're dealing with mat or something, you still need grammar. The ideal would be some excellent teachers and then a lot of on-the-ground time. Just one or the other isn't very good on its own if you really want to become fluent.

I concur.

My point is if you're using words/phrases that're "out of the book" they may not be applicable to the current situation. Big thanks is the same as thanks big but it sounds funny when you say it one way and the person in line behind you says it the other.

I think this is subjectively funny to you, but I wouldn't even notice or care - they're literally the exact, same thing. Better to use something cliche and out of the book rather than to get all single-handedly 'artistic' with a new language, in turn only getting into awkward predicaments.

All too often with formal learning of a language the subtle nuances and details are scrapped in favor of grammatical rules or useless vocabulary. My personal favorite is "Do you speak English?" in the target language. That's the dumbest question ever (because you could ask in English) yet every language program has that as one of the questions you learn very early on.

With immersion it's possible to learn the things books/classes/etc., wouldn't teach and the student more quickly sounds like a native speaker as opposed to a formally trained foreign student.

Do you happen to be at all familiar with modern ESL resources, to name a few, such as what Cambridge or Longman provide?

It's not an equivalent of having American or British buddies at your disposal, but English-learning resources are modern, cohesive and much different to the old-fashioned resources people have when learning Russian, being a former Business English teacher, I can vouch for this from a lot of personal experience and countless student success stories.

'Formal' language learning certainly scraps street slang in favour or grammar exercises.. but when's having proper grammar ever bad? Exposure to both, in an ideal world, is a great combination whilst learning a language.

What is the Russian word for coffee?

As I said in my previous post:

'Kofe' = Coffee

'Kafe', which you used = coffee shop

~Natasha

My point is if you're using words/phrases that're "out of the book" they may not be applicable to the current situation. Big thanks is the same as thanks big but it sounds funny when you say it one way and the person in line behind you says it the other.

Valid point, but you chose a bad example. In the "spasibo bol'shoe" case, as my wife and other native speakers already said, it really makes little to no difference - "many thanks" vs "thanks much". But it does crack me up when Russians write "Thanks a lot!" in email, as it always comes across as sounding sarcastic (though that was never their intent).

My personal favorite is "Do you speak English?" in the target language. That's the dumbest question ever (because you could ask in English) yet every language program has that as one of the questions you learn very early on.

Yeah, that always struck me as an odd thing to learn too. Though I have used it on occasion since I prefer to speak in English, but I want to give them a clue that I do in fact speak Russian okay.

With immersion it's possible to learn the things books/classes/etc., wouldn't teach and the student more quickly sounds like a native speaker as opposed to a formally trained foreign student.

Without a doubt, there is no substitute for learning a language by living abroad. I'm living proof of that!

What is the Russian word for coffee?

кофе = kofe = "KOH-fye"

Yes, that's my point. She won't be starting work immediately - we have a 3 month old kid, and she is going to be staying home with her until she is old enough to go to pre-school. That whole time she will be living here with me, going to movies, watching tv, shopping. She'll get chances to practice, and I plan on getting her into some ESL courses before she gets out in the real world and gets a job.

She'll figure it out, she's a grown woman and I'm certain she knows what's best for her!

My husband speaks French infinitely better than I do. Should he get transferred to live and work in Europe, hypothetically speaking - to France, I would, indeed, hurl myself off the Eiffel tower if he wanted to speak to me in a language I don't like, much less understand, under the pretense that it'll help me learn, I'd just develop a total disdain for life.

You guys will do perfectly fine, I'm sure. I've had countless Russian friends adjust to life abroad just fine, not just Russian mind you - I know lots of Brits and Australians who ended up moving to Argentina, the Emirates, Quebec .. they somehow made do, people do this all the time, not just Russian fiance/es, wives/husbands ..

True, I think English has an advantage since most words have less syllables than Russian, mostly.

Interesting theory though about first words. I will of course teach her both languages, and maybe Spanish, Italian, French, or Chinese, whichever she wants. Hmm, maybe even German.

Fewer syllables isn't really a concept that infants who are learning to speak at say, 10/12 months understand, they.. for lack of a better expression, don't care.

They'll choose which ever word sounds more phonetically attractive to them. In that respect, you can have your kid naming platonic solids by the age of 18 months if you make the experience interesting for them.

If you do the majority of your communication in Russian, she WILL have problems communicating with folks once she's here.

There are a lot of guys who bring their wives over and they get all the Russian channels on their cable. Is that wrong? Not necessarily. But, if she has no Russian channels to watch, she HAS TO learn English. She may be doing ESL, she may be studying, she may be working hard at it. Hell, she may even be an English teacher. But, that's nowhere near the same level of intensity and immersion someone will need to communicate effectively in their new language.

People here don't talk like people on the book and tape sets or YouTube videos. They talk like hillbillies or hood rats.

Even if Derek talks to Rita predominantly in Russian, that alone in itself is not going to help her or hinder her from learning English in the long run, especially if she's taking measures in order to improve.

Seriously, slim, you said it yourself - she'll be engulfed and overwhelmed by the change, the culture and the language regardless, and it'll be frustrating and undoubtedly upsetting. I believe that if talking in Russian eludes misunderstanding and arguments for them, then so be it.

If there's a will - there's a way, she'll learn English sooner or later, she's got no choice, it's only a question of how dedicated she's going to be about it, and in turn that will determine how well or not well she ends up speaking the language.

If Derek now switches to only English, it'll cause problems in the short term and won't ultimately help in the long run because it's not his manner of speech alone that she has to get used to, it's the rest of the world she's moving to.

No. I'm saying that many language programs will tell you "Thank you very much" is translated as "Bolshoi Spasiba" or "Spasiba Bolshoi." Neither of which are too formal or wrong... but in the differences between our languages it's not an exact translation. It's "close enough" and it'll work, but you could sound funny saying "Bolshoi spasiba" when everyone there says "spasiba bolshoi."

I really disagree with you here, slim. You don't -really- expect any two languages to translate word for word perfectly - even Slavic, directly related languages sometimes don't. Wouldn't that make life amusingly easy?

As for this 'thank you' business, that's silly, at least with this particular example - nobody would look funny at anyone for using 'bolshoe spasibo' in lieu of 'spasibo bolshoe' or vice versa, I guarantee that. Maybe there'd be a funny look because it's not 'bolshoi' it's 'bol-sho-ye', but that's all.

Ps.. if you had said 'kafe?' to that woman, you'd get an even bigger grunt - 'kafe' = 'coffee shop?' (like Starbucks or something), so she'd presume that you're inviting her out to a morning date or you want her to go get you coffee..that would have been without a doubt, quite awkward 'kofe' = 'coffee?'

I see kotori chas as "which hour (is the clock at)".

'kotoriy chas' is basically just another (polite) way of asking 'what's the time/what time is it', I suppose it's considered an expression type of thing and doesn't make sense if translated word for word.

yes, it is. That's my point exactly. And that's why I insist that "kotoriy" should be used as "which" and "kakoy" should be used as "what".

They might be interchangeable in some cases, but not in all cases. That's why to avoid any confusion, I said that it's easier just to use "kotoriy", meaning "which".

There are exceptions, of course, like "What time is it?" is "Kotoriy chas?" (can't be "kakoy chas?"), but in that case we can always say "skol'ko vremeni?" instead, so it works

Yeah I agree with you there, but on the other hand I wouldn't want to confuse the OP because we've no idea what level his Russian is at currently. But I do get what you're saying

I have never used this emoticon before but ....

Way to keep your eye on the prize. I commend you for not letting the power tripping "I take my issues out on the world" Russian lady get to you. You now have you and your daughter's visa and passport to show for it. Have a safe trip and enjoy your life in America

btw You write english "quite well" also. Quite the storyteller you are

Thank you! I really wanted to give a detailed description of what happened to us because I wish I had the opportunity to read something like this before the interview, so I figured I'd write it all up and hopefully it'll be of some use to people going through the same.

We've actually already entered the US which in itself was another hurdle to overcome (dealing with a cancelled flight whilst in transit and you've got a restless 4 year old = not fun) but that's all forgotten now and we're working on getting everything else set up and I'm looking forward to being able to drive.

a Russian clinic does the medical exam. Just like OP dealt with some woman's jealousy/ bad day issues, this can happen at the exam too.

I disagreed with that, based on my experience, people at IOM were genuinely very nice and polite on the phone, at the clerical office and at the clinic itself. IOM is not what you'd typically call a 'Russian' clinic, at all given the stereotype and/or stigma that the adjective 'Russian' tends to carry. The difference between them and a typical Russian government clinic is immense..

When I hear the term 'Russian clinic' I picture one of those cold, rundown government ones with a blue sign on the wall - those are terrible and made me want to shudder, and I didn't want people to get the wrong idea, is all.

Actually "kakoy/kakaya" are typically used for asking about qualitative characteristics, i.e. "what is he/she/it like?"

Kakoy/kakaya might be used in the meaning of "which one" also, but it is not always correct. I would advise to use the word "kotoriy/kotoraya" (который/которая) in that meaning, just to avoid confusion.

Speaking of the original post, I also don't understand why your wife is getting confused... And I am a native Russian speaker too, so it must be a personal characteristic.

Also, I was impressed by the fact that you'd learned Russian for your woman. I wish my husband would learn Russian He lacks motivation though...

Yeah but that example I have to deem 'formal' vs. 'spoken' Russian, the kind of thing Slim was talking about; to be honest, I'd never say 'kotoriy tsvet tvoy lyubimiy?' that's hardly correct, even. You'd say 'Kakoy tvoy lyubimiy tsvet?' --> Which colour is your favourite vs What's your favourite colour is a big difference, imo.. saying 'what's your favourite' colour is far preferable I think, right?

My favorite instances of this are when she calls him a her or her an it. With Russian assigning gender to everything it's no wonder we hear things like, the light isn't burning brightly, "Oh, she not work so good. She try and try and work so very hard but her power so gone."

Cute at home... a possible job killer in the workplace. What's amazing is verbal communication is relatively easy but written communications are harder. It's counterintuitive. Written should translate directly but it doesn't. Spoken is often easier because of context clues, intonation, etc.

And here's the problem with "formal" language learning. Nobody really talks like that!

There are some really good language learning tools out there with software, books, etc., but at the end of the day, they're way too formal. I remember the first time telling a babooshka in Moscow "Zdrastvuite! Dobre Ootra." And she just kind of grunted. Same with "Spasiba bolshoi!" Or, even better, "Bolshoi Spasiba!"

Say it how they say it.

For the OP - I'd be apprehensive of her not speaking English. One of the biggest headaches and hurdles they face coming over here is not being able to communicate and participate in things. I'd encourage you to have her start English classes ASAP. I'd also encourage you to communicate with her in English. Start today!

The particular examples I gave for asking about sleep are actually not formal at all, they're such that you can use in a 'normal' conversation, nothing formal about them in the least bit.

I used to teach English to Russians and I've encountered all sorts of quirks and difficulties with that, and I've also lived in a country where neither English, nor a Slavic language were the primarily used languages - I've witnessed people struggling with learning a language all my life, so I must have some sort of natural empathy in that respect or something, I never roll my eyes or grunt at people making an effort.

Oh and.. just to clarify, you're saying that 'Spasibo Bolshoe' is a 'formal' phrase and never actually used?

In that case, the translation should be "such a beautiful girl!" or perhaps that would be the translation to "takaya krasivaya devushka".... t and k sound alike anyway...

In Russian both are equally usable.. this particular 'girl' example, the intonation and possibly the context would vary but only quite slightly, they're pretty interchangeable.

Anyway, another example: 'kakaya otlichnaya ideya! - 'What a great idea!'

So, I dunno, maybe some confusion stems from that, but again, this is only me guessing.

Hmm, I always thought of Kakaya is kind of like "which one" or something like that.

It's 'which' in female form, but it's also a way of asking 'what's', in different types of questions such as: 'kakaya ona?' meaning what's she like, or 'kakaya problema?' is what's the problem.. not just asking, 'kakaya krasivaya devushka!' is 'what a beautiful girl', that's what I was trying to get across in my other post but my daughter was demanding attention and I didn't get my thoughts across properly before pressing 'post', so maybe that's part of the misunderstanding, possibly?

Well, if you're a Russian and you're telling me that I'm using the pronoun correctly, then it must not be a language specific thing. Yea, I was just giving an example. My question was, how is she sleeping? kak u neeo spala? something like that... Thanks Slade and Natasha!

You'd better ask 'kak ona spit' (how is she sleeping, generally speaking) or 'kak ona spala' (how did she sleep, specifically last night or something)

'kak u neeo spala' = 'how was hers sleeping', not grammatically correct but understandable.

I always thought Chto was "what"... anyway, how else should I say "How is she sleeping?"

You're totally right on that.

I was a suffering a kid-bugging-induced hurry to post, I meant to continue and ask if you could be having a misunderstanding because she could be presuming you are asking 'kakaya ona' (what is she like?) or something of the sort, didn't mean to confuse you with the previous post, apologies!

Also, have you considered that it's the question word 'what' ie 'kak' that is the problem here.

Yep, exactly - 'what', 'kak' = not just 'how' or 'as' but also 'what'. Maybe she gets confused by your asking 'what she?', albeit again, that shouldn't be the case but it could be, I suppose.

No, I am using the correct term. I've been talking Russian this whole time with her since we've met, and my russian has improved tremendously during these 20 months. She doesn't speak english, but she is trying to learn. I learned Russian just for her. I know the pronouns. I know how to say them. This particular instance happened during a text conversation, so I know that pronunciation had nothing to do with it. I just figured it was a cultural issue or something. Sure, I could use her name every time, but just wondered if there was something I wasn't understanding. It just baffles me that pronouns seem to confuse her as to whom I am speaking (or writing, as the case may be) about.

What I can't wait for is when she learns enough english that she starts translating some russian sentences into english, and she makes those mistakes. For example, I can see her saying "and fish and steak" instead of the correct "both fish and steak".

I've got no clue as to why there's such confusion going on there. Being Russian myself..

Maybe it's a person-specific trait in lieu of a language quirk, because personally, I don't see why there's a recurring misunderstanding there from a language perspective. I understand the question 'как она?' just fine, but maybe you should try 'kak u neyo dela' instead, meaning 'how is she doing?' in order to avoid further confusion. (как у нее дела?)

~Natasha (previous reply was from Slade)