Alphabet 1

Tips and notes

We'll start with some simple sentences right away(inmediatamente). Russian does not have articles, nor
does(tampoco) it normally use the verb to be in the Present tense.
An em-dash(guion largo) is used instead of "the verb to be between the two nouns:
("A mocha is coffee").
Russian uses a version of the Cyrillic Alphabet. Many letters look(parece) similar to their Latin
counterparts(contrapartes). As Cyrillic typography was remodeled around(alrededor) 300 years ago,
both(ambos) alphabets have a similar style.
For information on how to install a Russian keyboard layout(diseo), please click here.
To switch Duolingo from Latin transliterations(transcripciones) to Cyrillic, click the little Aa-
switch near the top(parte superior) of the screen during a lesson.

Letters and Sounds

, , , , sound similar to their Latin counterparts (to be more precise, "" is the sound in
"more"). However(sin embargo), in handwriting(escritura) and typed italics(tipo de letra cursiva), the
letter can look rather(mas bien) like a lower case(minuscula) 'm' in the Latin alphabet. E.g. in the
verb (to ask for, to request), = t.
actually sounds more like "ye", as in "yell", not as in "Hear ye, hear ye!" (this will work for now; it's
more complicated after a consonant).
sounds like 'v', sounds like 'b'. is "n" and is "i" ('eeh'). The remaining(restantes) letters are
included in the table below(abajo):

 The umlaut-like double dots(dieresis es similar a puntos dobles) are optional in writing. Syllables
containing this letter are always stressed(acentuado).
, , , are pronounced near(cerca) your teeth(dientes)
('kh') is somewhat(algo) similar to the H in "hue". It is like making the "sh" sound, only it is
pronounced where you make the "K" sound.
has no equivalent in English. It is an "eeh"-like sound(como el sonido), but less
distinct(menos distinto), sounds closer(cerca) to "e" in "lover", and has your tongue(lengua)
deeper(mas adentro) that in "heat" or "hit".
for and your tongue is lower(mas abajo) than in English and slightly bent
back(ligeramente doblado hacia atras). has all your tongue raised(alzada)it is a longer and
more hissy(silbante) sound. corresponds to (i.e.(es decir) a bit(un poco) different than
"ch")
and are separators and have no sound.
can have a flat top(superficie plana), like , or a pointy top like(la parte superior puntiaguda como)
(it comes from the Greek ). and have a similar top in many fonts(tipos de letra),
though(aunque) it's up to(depende) the designer. Handwritten(escrito) looks like D, and like a g or
a (the last two affect the italic shapes(formas cursivas)).
An Italic(cursiva) in lower case(minuscula) usually looks this: .

That's it(Eso es) with the introduction! We will discuss reading words in more detail in later skills.

Basics 1
Tips and notes
Welcome to our course!
Now you are ready to proceed to the main part of the tree!
We are happy that you have chosen our Russian course. Just to make it clear, we are using American
English in this coursebut don't worry, we will accept all versions of English where appropriate. Just
be careful around expressions like "bathroom" or "1st floor", because these may mean different things
than what you are used to.
As for Russian, we teach the standard language, which is based on the variation spoken around
Moscow and Saint Petersburg, and we stick to the usage typical of these cities. Do not worry, though:
for more than one reason Russian is rather uniform over the territory of Russian (still, there is some
variation in pronunciation and a few items of everyday vocabulary). We try to stay neutral in style, with
occasional trips into formal and informal language.

Cases and word order

Russian is an inflected language, so the forms of nouns and modifying adjectives correspond to their
role in the sentence.
These forms are called cases. Russian has 6 cases: Nominative, Accusative, Genitive, Prepositonal,
Dative and Instrumental. The Nominative is the dictionary form; as for the others, we are going to
cover them gradually, one by one.
This allows for a more loose word order. But not random! A typical word order is subjectverb
object. Old information (the things you tell about) is normally closer to the beginning of the sentence
which is probably why pronouns are often found closer to the beginning of a sentence than a noun
would be :
I know him. .
I know Maria. .
That includes words like here, in this way, then and so on.
Unlike English, adverbs are NOT universally grouped at the end. So pay attention to the typical
positions for the expressions of time, place and manner. Eg. very much is typically in the endposition in English, but in Russian it is just before the thing that is "very" or very much:
She likes to read very much =
Good luck!

Vowel reduction
Like in English, vowel letters aren't all pronounced just like in the alphabet. In Russian, unstressed

syllables have vowels reduced:

and become the same uh-sound
and () become the same sound similar to "i" in "hit"
actually becomes an i-like sound, not an uh-like (except in a few words). This also affects ""
after ,,, or in many words (sadly, not all).
So, when a vowel is not stressed, it becomes weaker, somewhat shorter, and also some vowels become
indistinguishable.
The unstressed syllable is strongest just before the stress. In all other places it is even weaker than that
(though, some long words, especially compounds, may acquire a secondary stress). This makes the
system different from the English one, where stronger and weaker syllables tend to alternate.

More on the case system

For now, we only study simple sentences that either use the dictionary form, the Nominative case, or
use the Accusative (direct object of an action), which has the same form for many classes of nouns.
The case is defined by its use. Nevertheless, these forms have names, usually calques from Latin that
reflect some typical use (but not the only one):

Nominative (subject)
Accusative (direct object)
Genitive ("of" something)
Prepositional (place or topic)
Dative (recipient, "indirect" object)
Instrumental (means of action)

As you can see, these names are of little use until you know what sentence, verb or preposition requires
that you use that particular form.
some nouns of foreign origin are indeclinable, i.e. all their forms are the same. This includes
words like , or .

Phrases 1
Tips and notes
Hello
Russian has a more informal greeting and a more formal (). Here, we
focus on the first, since it is the shorter one.
When on phone, use ().
(please) has another popular position in the sentencenamely, after the verb (more on
that later).
you can also use as a reply to "thanks", meaning "You are welcome!"

How are you?

The phrase for "How are you?" literally means "How are your affairs (the stuff you do)?"
No one uses it as a greeting, i.e. you are not expected to use it with people you barely know (or those
you know, for that matter). And be prepared for a person to actually tell you how they've been doing. ;)

Good morning!
Morning typically starts at 4 or 5 a.m., afternoon at noon, evening at 5 p.m. (at 6 for some) and night at
11 or at midnight.
You only use "Good night" ( ) when parting before sleep (or saying your goodbyes
really late, so it is implied you or the listener are going to bed soon after).
If you are advanced enough to have noticed oblique forms used in some phrasesyou are right!
Greetings and other similar expressions are often shortened versions of longer phrases, where words
still retain their forms. For example, probably replaces the longer
! (I wish you a peaceful night). Needless to say, the full version is never used.

Basics 2
Tips and notes
I have a cat
English prefers to express ownership and possession with the verb have. In Russian existence is
almost universally used instead (in the official/academic style to have is OK to use).
Use it like that:
A X ~ by A there is an X A has an X
The owner is in the Genitive case (more on that later) while X is formally the subject. For now we will
only study the Genitive form for some pronouns.

You have wonderful eyes!

Omit if the existence of the object is obvious or not the point very typical for describing
traits or a number of objects (Tom has a beautiful smile/large eyes, She has a very fat cat). This
also applies to expressing temporary states and illnesses (She has a migraine).

I eat/ She eats

In English, the only way a verb changes in the present tense is that you add -s for the 3rd person
singular. In Russian, all 6 forms are different and fit two regular patterns.
However, eat and want are two of the four verbs that are irregular (that is, do not
strictly follow any of the 2 patterns).
Note that the "present" tense is formed from one stem and the "past" and infinitive from the second

one. In general, these two are slightly different. For now, don't worry about the infinitive stem.

Hard and soft

Russian consonants are split into two groups of 15, which are pronounced in two different ways,
palatalized (aka "soft") and non-palatalized (aka "hard"). We'll stick to the shorter "soft" and "hard"
(sorry).
When a consonant is "soft" it means than you pronounce it with you tongue raised high; for "nonpalatalized" consonants it stays low. Russian orthography has its history but, long story short, you can
tell the "softness" of a consonant from a vowel letter spelled afterwards:
, , , , follow "hard" consonants
, , , , follow palatalized ones
If there is nothing after a consonant, the soft sign is used to show the softness. In consonant clusters
palatalization is predictable from the softness of the last consonant. We aren't teaching it here. These
days the trend is to only "soften" the last consonant in most clusters, while a hundred years ago some
clusters were palatalized even without any obvious reason.
To show you how it works, here is an example, using an ad-hoc transcription:
= []
= [] or []
There are dictionaries ( ) that show the recommended pronunciation of
words and contain general pronunciation rules, too.

Voicing
Some consonants let your voice come out immediately (voiced) while others wait for the release of the
consonant and only then let your voice escape (unvoiced). In Russian there are 6 pairs of such
consonants: /, /, /, /, /, /.
whenever one of these consonants (except ) follows another, the second overrides or reverses
the voicing of the first: = [], = []
the end of the phrase is unvoiced: []
rules apply between the word boundaries, too
, , , also play this game, even though Russian lacks letters for their voiced partners ([],
['], [], ['']). They will devoice the preceding consonant or become voiced themselves.

Unlike Ukrainian, Russian only uses [], ['] and [] as voiced variants of , , . Ukrainian
has them as full-fledged consonantsthe ones that are an intrinsic part of a word and can appear
anywhere.

Name and polite "You"

Tips and notes
Thou art
Russian makes a distinction between , singular "you", and , plural "you" (y'all). The latter also
doubles for "polite" you, with verbs also in plural. And don't forget that the "excuse" in "Excuse me" is
a verb!
Use with friends and your family members
Use with adult strangers, your teachers and in other formal interactions (at the store, the
doctor's, the airport etc.)
People use with those who are much older
Nobody is "polite" toward kids
Contrary to what many native speakers have come to believe in the last ten or fifteen years, the
polite "you" is not automatically capitalized in Russian, and never was. Such capitalization is
used in some formal styles.

Grandson, son of Grand

As you might know if you ever read any Russian literature, Russians have three names; their first name
and their surnamejust like you haveand a patronymic (), which is based on their father's
name ( = father). A very common 'polite' pattern is to use a person's first name and a patronymic:
, ? = Ivan Ivanovich, are you busy?
In this course, name+patronymic are always used with the polite -form.

What is your name?

? is literally "How (do) they call you?"
Russian has a casual diminutive form for many common names, : , ,
( ) , ( ) , , ,
. Needless to say, there's no "politeness" with these, but they are often used with some
degree of affection.

Excuse me...
Russian has two very common polite patterns for questions that English does not:
negative questions give a shade of "by any chance": , ? =
Excuse me, do you happen to know Mikhail?

 "Please tell" when asking for information: , , ? = Excuse

me, where is the museum?

Thank you
is the word. A fancier option would be ! (a form of the verb ,
"to thank"), though quite a number of people use it, if only for variety.

Plurals
Tips and notes
Here is how the Nominative Plural is formed.

(so, the plural is actually an uncommon way of doing it)

There are some irregular plurals too.

Spelling Rules
Or maybe not. Sometimes Russian forces your choice of vowel to spell or pronounce after a certain
letter.
The 7-letter rule: Whenever you make any form of a word, and you need to write or , check this:
after , , and , , , always use
These are velars ("back" consonants) and hushes. For hushes, it is merely a spelling convention, owing
to their former "soft" status. For velars, it is true to their pronunciation i.e., these consonants always
use the palatalized where another consonant would use :


Of these seven consonants, should be your main concern for now. A lot of nouns have it as a suffix
or a part of their suffix, forcing you to remember this rule.

The 8-letter rule: Whenever you make any form of a word, and you need to write , or , after a
consonant, follow the rule:
after , , , , , , and , always use or

Where is it?
Tips and notes
Russian words take different forms depending on their role in the sentence. These forms are called
cases. A few forms may look the same (cf.(comparar) "frequent(frecuente) rains" vs. "It rains often").
These forms have names (mostly calques(calcos) from Latin) that describe some
"prototypal(prototipico)" use of such case: Nominative, Accusative, Genitive, Prepositional, Dative and
Instrumental. For you, these are just tags(etiquetas): the use is what defines a case.
As of now, you know the NOMINATIVE case: the dictionary form of a word. This form acts as the
grammatical subject of the sentence, the "doer(hacedor)". It is also used for both nouns in "A is B"
structure:
.
.
You also know a few Genitive forms ( ) but that's it. For now, we will tackle(abordar) something
easier.

Prepositional case
When we talk about things being somewhere, we typically use (in) or (on) with the Prepositional
form of the noun. It doesn't work when you mean motion to that place!
The Prepositional case (a.k.a.(tambien conocido como) Locative) is the only case that is never used on
its own without a preposition, even though(aunque) only four or five prepositions ever use it:
. = I am at a concert.
. = I am at (in) school.
= a video about school
Unlike English (at/in school), in Russian each "place" is associated with just one preposition. The
rough(aspera) overall(en general) rule is: use (in, at) when talking about buildings and places with
certain(ciertos) boundaries(limites) and use (on, at) when talking about open spaces or events:
(at home), (at school), (in the room), (in the theater),
(at the cinema), (at the university)
(in the street, outdoors), (at the square), (at the concert),
(at the lesson), (on a ship)
When you mean physically being inside/on top of some object, there is little ambiguity. "Places",
unfortunately, require memorization.

Prepositional endings
Here is the rule that covers most nouns:
feminine nouns ending in take -
nouns ending in -, - or - also take - (so that they end in - instead)
all other nouns take -

What about me and my friends?

Use + Genitive when talking about being at some persons place: , = Yeah, I am at my
friends place.

WC
The room with a toilet is . In this course, we stick(adherir) to the North American "bathroom",
even though a room with a bath(baera) is, technically (it has , "a bath"). Still, in Russian
you would not ask for a "bath-room" unless you really mean it.

And what if I gotta go away?

Well deal(negociar) with that later. But the pattern is consistent. When you are somewhere, going to
that place and going away from that place, use the following triplets:

For example, if the place is used with , the correct prepositions for the three uses are .

Animals 1
Tips and notes
"Spelling rules"
Note how plurals of and end in : , , even though you might expect
to turn into .
There are some restrictions on which consonants are used with which vowels when making word
forms. Here are the rules for , , vs. , , :
use only , not , after , , / , , ,
use only , after , , / , , , and (and never use , after them)

, , are called velar consonants (i.e. made in the back) and , , , are often called hushes.
The latter do not show palatalized/non-palatalized pairs in modern Russian, so the spelling rule does
not affect pronunciation anyhow. It's just a convention.

Fleeting vowels
It is not too important for you at the moment, but you may notice how and sometimes appear in
consonant clusters or disappear from them. For example:
. = This is a lion.
. = There isn't a lion at the zoo.
Later you will encounter the Genitive plural (often used with numbers and words like "many" or
"few"), which shows a simple pattern for --suffixed feminine nouns that do not have a vowel before "":

= many cats
= many girls
= many ducks
= many plates

As you can see, the vowel ( or ) depends on whether the previous consonant is palatalized or not.
Hushes behave as if they were palatalzed, despite and having lost this quality in the modern
language.

Genitive Case - 1
Tips and notes
In Russian I have is expressed by () structure. The owner is in the Genitive case.

Genitive
"The of-case". It is one of the most universal cases. How do you make the forms? Here is the regular
pattern:

A zero ending means that the word ends in a consonant or a soft sign (which is just a way to show the
final consonant is "soft"). In the Nominative singular, a Russian word can only have the following
endings: , , , , or nothing ("zero ending").

Genitive of Negation
If you use to say that there is "no" something or you do not have it, the object is always in
Genitive:

.

Major uses
"of" (possession): = mom's apple
"of" (amount): , = a cup of tea, a lot of tea
A huge number of prepositions requires this case. Yes, , only use
and because wants Genitive.
For , and Genitive doubles as a non-changing possessive "his", "her", "their": , , .
initial is used for him/her/them with the majority of prepositions (doesn't affect possessives)

Indeclinable nouns
A little side note: some nouns of foreign origin are indeclinable. It means that all their forms are the
same. Foreign nouns that end in / become like that (, , , ), as well as all
nouns that do not fit into Russian declension patterns (see above).
This includes female names that end in anything other than or . A few --ending names are an
exception ( and Biblical names like ).
So, all of the following names are automatically indeclinable: , , , ,
, , , , , .

I am away
Russian also uses the Genitive to state that someone is "away", "not there": . In
English such use would correspond to "There is no mom at the moment", or even "There is no me
now". We are not hard on that particular construction in the course, but it is important to know it all the
same.
Added bonus: when a verb directly acts on a noun, the noun is called a direct object and is in
Accusative. In Russian, only -/- feminine nouns have a unique form for it. Others just reuse Genitive
or don't change the word at all (Nominative)

Nothing
Russian uses.... let's call it "consistent" negation. It means that in negative sentences you are required to
use "nothing" instead of "anything", "nowhere" instead of "somewhere" and so on. Let's meet the first
of these pronouns:

 . = I don't have anything.

. = She doesn't eat anything.
You'll also notice that, unlike standard English, Russian has no rule against using double negatives.

Possessives and Gender

Tips and notes
Russian possessives
There isn't much to say about words like "my" or "your" in Russian.
his/her/their do not change: , , (and they don't get an initial after prepositions!)
my/your/our roughly follow an adjectival pattern, i.e. they copy the gender and the case of the
noun they describe. Just like :
//
//
Unlike English, no distinction is made between my and mine, her and hers etc.
Pronunciation: in , as well as in adjective endings and "" the letter is pronounced . It
is a historical spelling.

Grammatical gender
Nouns in Russian belong to one of three genders: feminine, masculine or neuter. If a noun means a
person of a certain gender, use that one. For all other nouns look at the end of the word:

If there's a soft sign, it isn't possible to predict the gender, at least, not accurately(precisamente).
However, about 65-70% of the most used nouns that end in - are feminine. Also, you can learn
the common suffixes ending in a soft sign that produce a word of a predictable gender. They are:
-/-, - feminine
-, -, - masculine

All nouns with -, , -, - at the end are feminine. The convention is to spell feminine nouns
with a soft sign and masculine ones without one: , , , . It doesn't affect
pronunciation, anyway.

Partitive
Tips and notes
As you know, the Genitive case has lots of uses in Russian.
One of them expresses an amount of something:
= a cup of tea
= a plate of rice
= a basket of apples
With mass nouns it is also used to express "some" unspecified amount of that stuff when used instead
of the Accusative:
= I want (some) water.
, , . = Could I have some rice, please? (literally, "Give me, please, some
rice").
? = Want some juice?
Note that this usage is only characteristic for situations when you ask or hypothesize about using "some
or other amount" of a substance. You cannot actually say that you are drinking "" right nowbut
you can say that you want some (or that you sipped some in the pastwith a perfective, of course).

has an alternative Partitive form :
? = Want cup of tea?
It is optional. Actually, many short masculine nouns that denote substances used to have such form.
However, is, probably, the only one where the form is immensely popular in spoken speech and
does not sound old-fashioned or downright archaic.

Russian differentiates between a number of drinking vessels. is what you call a "glass" in
English: typically, a cylindrical vessel made of glass, with no handle. However, if you mean a

measurement unit (quite popular in cooking), it corresponds to the English word "cup". In Russian you
use not a cup or rice or flour but a "glass" of rice or flower.
a beer or a wine glass is
a smaller wine glass is

Perfective is an aspect. Russian has verbs of two flavors: those that denote "processes" and
those that mean "events" (events are never used in the present). I would argue that aspect is the
main culprit for consumption verbs here. You can want "" forever, but you aren't
"drinking" it at any specific moment. Semantically, "some" water only becomes a real amount
when you are done, not while you are still at it.

The Accusative: the Direct Object

Tips and notes
Accusative
Until now, you've been using the base form of the word in sentence like .
Actually, whenever a verb, like "read", "cut" or "want" acts directly on some noun, the latter is a direct
object. Such nouns take the Accusative case.

Formation
Only feminine nouns ending in - / - have a separate form. is a good example of this class :

Neuter nouns and feminine nouns with a final - (e.g., ) use the Nominative form.
Now we are left with masculine nouns ending in a consonant (, , ). They use the same
form as in Nominative or Genitive:
living beings ("animate") copy the Genitive
objects ("inanimate") stay Nominative
in plural this rule applies to all types of nouns

With "substances"(mass nouns) Genitive may be used instead to convey a meaning of "some" quantity.

Verbs that take a direct object are called transitive. Unfortunately, some verbs that are transitive
in Russian are not transitive in English ("wait") and vice versa ("like").

I want some
Russian has two main verb form patterns, which we are going to introduce soon. Unfortunately, the
verb (to want) is irregular and mixes both. On a brighter note, it is a very common verb, so
you'll memorize it eventually.
The other notable thing is that it does not have a strong connotation of 'need', unlike the English verb
'"want". Similarly, the Russian verb for "give"( ) is totally OK for polite requests. Just use it with
.
the one the 'giving' is directed towards is NOT a direct object in Russian. It is called an indirect
object and takes the Dative. We'll deal with it later.

Verbs in the Present 1

Tips and notes
- and - conjugation
The verbs in Russian change according to person and number. Each form has a different ending. There
are only two patterns (apart from some phonetic changes).

We will learn these one by one. There are only four irregular stems. The verbs , , ,
and all their derivatives do not strictly follow any of the 2.
Note that if the endings are stressed, replaces . Fortunately, a non-past form has only 2 options:
fixed stress on the stem ( , , , ) or on the ending (, ,
)
""-form is has a stressed ending ( ). The stress is on the stem in the other forms (

 , ..)
A verb uses one stem to form Infinitive and Past tense forms. It uses the 2nd one, similar, for non-past
and imperative. Thus, as a rule you cannot predict all forms from the infinitive. You can make a guess,
though.

Meals
In this course we use the American English definitions:
= breakfast, a morning meal
= lunch, a midday meal
= dinner, an evening meal

The Infinitive, Likes and Dislikes

Tips and notes
I like/I love ?
In Russian, you can express liking things and activities pretty much the same way as in English, with
similar verbs. The usage differs a bit, though.
A a rule of thumb, means "I love" only when directed at a single person (or animal).
Otherwise, it's just "I like".
"LOVE" means a stable, lasting feeling (note the phonetic change for the 1st person
singular: ""). A normal, transitive verb, i.e. used with the Accusative. Use it for loving an
individual or liking some things/people/activity in general (verbs take infinitive). Very much
preferred in negations of such activities (i.e. "don't like to wait")
"LIKE" means moderate "liking" something or someone, often something specific.
Not transitive! The thing liked is the subject, acting indirectly on a person:
= I like the table.
note that works in a similar way to the English verb "to seem": "The
table seems good to me". The sentence is built as though the table "transmits" the feeling
towards you. While rare in English, in Russian, this is pretty typical for feelings and experience
to be expressed that way ( ).
Infinitive and 3rd person singular are pronounced exactly the same,
however, for the sake of consistency they are spelt differently (most infinitives end in -, so -
+ = -, naturally)
When you refer to generic things and activities, both verbs can be used but is mildly more
useful.

May I?
Possibility and/or permission are often expressed with words and .

 . = One may live here.

. = One cannot/should not eat here.
The English translation may vary. You can specify the person for whom the permission or
recommendation applies, in the Dative (but you do not have to):
. = I should not sleep.
. = We should not eat a lot.
P.S. the - at the end of " " is a reflexive particle and comes after the ending (in verbs, use
- after a vowel, - after a consonant) . Technically, a reflexive verb is one where the subject of the
verb acts on itself. As you can see, often this is not always reflected clearly in the meaning.
is one of those verbs that are reflexive "just because".
Don't worry about it too much for now, as we'll be tackling reflexives in more detail further down the
tree.

Food
Tips and notes
Yummy(sabroso)
(for) always takes Genitive nouns
Food offers(ofrece) a delicious intake(consumo) of mass nouns(sustantivos de masas). Russian has
them massed up(hecho un desastre) even where English does not!
so (potatoes), (onions), are mass nouns in Russian
and you may recall(recordar) that mass nouns may be used in Gen. instead of Acc. if you
mean(si te refieres a) "some quantity": /. = Buy some cheese/potatoes.

'Taters(potatoes)
The formal word for potato is (German speakers, rejoice(alegrarse)), but it's hardly
ever(casi nunca) used in speech(habla). Use instead.
The word for tomato(jitomate) is . There is also the word , but it is
the plant's name, pretty formal; look on pricetags(etiquetas de precios)
the base stem for derivative products: = tomato paste
is a word for different containers used for(usado para) cooking , consuming and
further(posterior) storage(almacenamiento) of food. English, sadly, does not have the exact
equivalent. However, it is obviously "dishes" that you wash and "cookware(utensilios de
cocina)/tableware(vajilla o traste)" that you buy.

Verbal wisdom(sabiduria)
In this skill, we used perfective verbs for "cook", "cut", "wash". The reason is simple: that's the verb
you'd use when you want a single specific action, often with a resultrather than(antes que) referring

to "activity" (activity may be fun but, in some cases, pointless(inutil)).

More on that later. For now, just go with the flow(flujo).

Adjectives Basics and Spelling

Tips and notes
In Russian adjectives agree with the nouns they modify in gender/number and case. Out of 24
combinations only 12 forms are different. This system is completely regular, with no change of stress.
The endings have hard and soft variants depending on the stem (for example, / or /).
Here is the Nominative and Genitive for classic hard- and soft-stem adjectives ("new"/"blue"):

note that masculine and neuter merge(unir) in all their forms different from the Nominative one (their
Accusative will be the same as the Gen. or the Nom. depending on animacy). In the Nominative there
is also - masculine ending: (big). Only for ending-stressed adjectives.
/ are historical spellings: actually sounds like []
unstressed -() /- () sound identical in standard Russian: and have no
difference in pronunciation.
The following universal rules of Russian spelling will give you the rest of the endings for any adjective
you ever meet (there exist 4 patterns at most):
After -- (velars) and --- (hushes) use and never
After , -- (velars) and --- (hushes) use , and never ,
After and --- (hushes) use when unstressed and never .

Conjunctions
Tips and notes
vs.
In Russian, is used to show similarity. Otherwise you should use , which shows contrast. To be
more specific, here are the typical patterns:

, . = I am a boy and you are a girl.

, . = I work in a cafe, and you (work) in a school.
, . = I like sleeping, and you don't.
? = And you? often used to indicate a question.

(negative, positive)
A conjunction used for "compensating" for something unpleasant with something that, you imply, is
good:
, = We don't have milk but we do have bread.
, . = The boy cannot write yet but he reads
well.
Not exactly the best thing to translate into English ("on the other hand"? "but at least"? "thankfully?"),
so it is not often used in this course.

('though')
Much like the English though/even though/although. It is often combined with "" before the predicate
(which is sometimes directly after ):
, () .= , () . = He is here,
even though he doesn't know anything.

This conjunction has a rather interesting use, to show when someone perceives someone else's action:
, . = I see her dancing.
, . = They listen to the musician playing.
For , there is also "narrative" contrast pattern, largely absent from this course (but not from real-life
Russian):
, . = There is a cup on the table, and the cup has tea in it.
, . = He is here, and that means there's no water.
, . = A taxi is a car, and cars do
not always work well. (here, you are making your point by introducing a new thought
"unexpected" by a listener)

There is
Tips and notes
Word order
To say "there is/are" in Russian, do the following:

 say THE PLACE

then the verb (if any)
then THE OBJECT
is not used, unless the sentence really has to emphasize the existence of the object. Some
examples:

. = There is a spoon on the table.

. = There is a boy on the chair.
. = There is no one in the house.
. = A cat is lying on the table.

In the Present tense no verb is necessary; in the past, you would at least need a form of "to be". Note
that even in the present Russian still uses verbs like "is situated", "stands", "lies" way more often than
would be considered normal in English.
The most natural translation into English is a structure like "There is an apple on the table" or "An
apple is on the table". The emphasis is on the object, not on the place.
Actually, such a sentence answers the question of WHAT is in the said place. For out-of-theblue(inesperadamente) sentences about objects that have nothing unique(unico) about them it
matches(iguala) what English THERE-IS sentences are for. So this is what we have in this course.

Actions
The initial position of a "place" inside the sentence holds(mantiene) for many other structures, too.
Whenever the place is not a part of the "message" of your sentence, it is usually somewhere at the
beginning (that is, if the place frames(encuadra) your description of an action rather than providing
crucial information).
If the whole point of uttering(expresar) a sentence is telling someone about the place then, naturally, it
takes the sentence-final position:
- . = I am in New York tomorrow. (not somewhere else)

lies/stands
You don't have to translate verbs like "to stand" and "to lie" literally when they refer to objects. Such
use is not, by a wide margin, nearly as standard in English as it is in Russian:
. = A cup is ("stands") on the table.
In English "to be" is perfectly fine, so we accept that.

Questions
Tips and notes
Where
Russian makes a distinction between being somewhere (/, ) , going there (, ) and

coming from there (, )so naturally question words follow suit(seguir el ejemplo):
? = Where (at)?
? = Where to?
? = Where from?

What or what are you?

Russian uses (who) when asking about identity and occupation and is used for objects
rather than people. Since Russian nouns have cases, and also change depending on their role
in the implied(implicada) sentence. As you will discover a little bit(un poco) further down(mas abajo)
the tree, behaves rather like a masculine adjective.

? and ?
is used when asking a question about a cause of some event or action. It is a question
that looks back at the past.
starts a question about the purpose of some action or some event that can have one. It is
a question that looks towards a desired future.
In a few regions of Russia (Tatarstan, for example) people may use for both questions if their
usage of Russian is influenced by a major local language that makes no distinction between the two. In
Standard Russian these are two clearly separate entities.

People 1
Tips and notes
Vocabulary
is usually the main boss, akin(parecido) to CEO in English. Also the
Principal(director) or Head Teacher(profesor principal) of a school.
is a school student or a "follower" or "disciple" of some "teacher" in a more spiritual
sense. AmE speakers may confuse it with "", which is strictly a college-level student.
is your first word of common gender, i.e. its gender depends on who you are referring
to.

Around you
Tips and notes
Do that the English way
To express the idea of speaking some language, or something being written in that language, Russian
has adverbs literally meaning "Russian-ly", "English-ly" etc.. :
- . = I do not speak Russian.
- . = Do you speak English?
They are formed from - adjectives by attaching - and changing the tail(cola) to bare(justo)
-: - , - , - , - , - , -
and so on.
And remember, these words actually mean something done "in a certain way", so (American-style sushi) should not surprise you!

Locative 2
A relatively small group of short masculine nouns have an accented - ending with / in the meaning
of place (and only then):
. = We are at the airport.
. = I sleep on the floor.
Our course has about a dozen of them (there are about 100 in the language). Also, there exists a very
small group of feminine nouns, all "-"-ending, that have a stressed Locative-2 ending:
. = Your sweater is covered in blood.
All these nouns use their normal Prepositional form with "" and "".

This word is used with qualities that manifest "totally" usually with negatives:
. = He doesn't work at all.
. = Tom doesn't eat at all.
. = We are really close (i.e. almost there).

It comes from + , i.e. "between"+"peoples", which is quite literally "international".

The loanword(palabra tomada de otro idioma) means the same but has quite
limited use in certain combinations like "international team" or "international deb(deuda)t" (mostly
these are from political contexts). This course largely avoids(evita) this word.
Probably, "international team/orchestra" etc. is the context where you must use
).


The word for an "animal" is a nominalised neuter adjective, and its case forms follow adjectival
pattern. Of course, its gender is fixed(fijo):
. = These are animals.
. = I like animals.

Prepositions and Places

Tips and notes
Verbs of motion
Russian distinguishes between "going" on foot and by some sort of vehicle. If you aren't moving within
the city, use a 'vehicle verb' (one-way movement) or (repeated, round trip or in general).
More on that later, in "Motion verbs".

Into/onto... at-to?
Once again, with and you use Prepositional for location, and Accusative for direction:
. ~ I live in London.
. ~ I am going (by vehicle) to London.
Here is a 'cheat sheet' of forms you'll need for places (no living beings, sothe easy Accusative for
masculine):

Word choice
For "outdoors" Russians use (literally, "on the street").
The preposition () means "about" only as in the sense of "thinking/writing about". Don't use it for
"approximately". With a special form is used, .
The contraction "USA" or "the U.S." is (--, with the stress on the last vowel).
There is no difference drawn between "city" and "town".

In Russian it is typical to describe objects as "standing", "lying", "being situated", "hanging". This is
rare in English, and often sounds unnatural, therefore in this course it is perfectly OK to translate a
"whereabouts"-verb with a simple "is", "was" etc.

Here and there, and here

For "here", the words and are almost completely interchangeable in any imaginable context.
is considered a bit more informal, and is used in set expressions ( ~right away, ).
is somewhat less suitable for figurative meanings (when by "here" you mean the current
situation rather than a place). In this course, they are completely interchangeable when not being used
in a set expression.
is a verb to denote the whereabouts of things, and, sometimes of people (when the
emphasis is on exactly where they are). It could be translated as "to be situated" or "to be located", but
as these verbs usually sound rather formal in English, so you can just use "to be".
is almost the same as . It can also be used in the sense of "about"(=approximately).

Verbs Present 2
Tips and notes
and
There are two options for verbs of going: a specific 1-directional verb and also repeated motion, multidirectional verb. For now, stick(adherirse) to this rule for / :

Asking
to ask for/beg for(rogar por)/request(pedir) something
to ask a question (i.e. ask for information)
In other words, when using , one wants to be given something (or for something to be done).
He who wants an answer.
By the way, "to ask a question" is, actually, / . Those who speak German
may recall eine Frage stellen, which works in a similar way (apparently, "to ask an asking" is no good
in German, either).

Negative sentences
Remember that Russian sort(ordena) of uses double and triple negatives. To be more precise, it is
coordinated negation: when the sentence is negative, you should automatically negate every pronoun
referring to someone, anywhere, some time, anything, in some way and so on:
= We never go anywhere with anyone (Literally, "We
never to nowhere with nobody don't go").
They all change to nobody, nowhere, never, nothing, by no means and so on. No one and nothing will
have the correct case (though, "nothing" is virtually always , not )

Adverbs
The typical position for -(-)-ending adverbs is before the verb. For example:
="He sees well".
="Tom left quickly"

Consonant mutation.
You might have noticed that the consonant before the ending is sometimes different in the infinitive
than in the personal forms. It is called mutation and is quite similar to the process that makes "tense"
into "tension" (where an "s" turns into a "sh"). Here are the patterns you might encounter:

, , , , adding ( / )
, becoming ( / )
, becoming ( / )
, becoming ( / )
, becoming ( / )

If there is alteration, there is a rule:

-conjugation verbs only have 1st person singular mutated. It is normal (e.g. / )
-conjugation verbs have mutation in ALL personal forms (if any). It is non-productive
behaviour, which in practice means that a lot of popular verb stems still have this behavior (e.g.
, ). However, new -conjugation verbs do not get this pattern.
, on the other hand, is a regular transformation of -/- verbs

Playing
The verb is used as follows:
+ Accusative for games
+ Prepositional for musical instruments
For example, / .

Time and Numbers

Tips and notes
Using numbers with nouns
Let's focus on the Nominative for now (this also works when Acc.=Nom). Russian numbers may seem
a bit weird. The case of the noun depends on the last word of the number:

Just like English, Russian has words for eleven through nineteen, so they fall into the "larger" category.
Genitive plural has a rather bizarre set of patterns, so a separate skill later on will teach you how to
make it for most nouns.

Expressions
I am 10 (years old) = () Note the Dative "" and the number in the
Nominative. The Genitive plural "" is irregular.
The Dative forms of , and are , , respectively.
at 9 o'clock = the Accusative here (same as the Nominative)
at 2 in the morning = ( ) (in Russian 'morning' starts at about 4-5 a.m.)
in January, June. etc. = , ... (Prepositional). Note that all the month names are
masculine nouns.
the beginning/end of July = /
Why are Russian numbers so strange? Well, for 2-3-4 these are the remnants(residuos) of Dual number
(which is between the singular and the plural). As for the larger numbers, they are essentially "nouns":
a heap of cats, a lot of cats, a thousand... of cats.

Russian uses two words for "now". One is , which means "now, at the moment", and

describes the current moment in a neutral manner, often implying that things change and the state
described is attributed to this particular moment. It can change soon:
. = No one is home (right) now.
. = It is 5 a.m. now.
is the "now" you use when things are different from "before". You imply(insinuas) that the
situation has changed. It is also associated with a more prolonged period of time, i.e. the state of
affairs(asuntos) is different from before, and will stay so for now:
. = We now work at the main office. (We did not, but
now we are, and things are going to stay like that for some time)

The noun ("time") belongs to a really small class of neuter nouns. Its Genitive form is
, and all other oblique forms also retain the - part.

Family
Tips and notes
Not much to say here, except that Russian does not have a special word for siblings or grandparents.
Unlike English, Russians rarely say "my mother", "my grandfather"; usually they omit "my".

~ one's own
...And when they don't, it is more natural to use reflexive "" (one's own). English does not have
anything quite like that. Essentially, it is a substitute for my, your, his, her etc. that you use when it
refers to the person (or thing) that is the subject of the sentence or, at least, the clause you are in. A few
typical examples:
= The cat is eating out of its bowl.
() = We are at our parents' place. (here you can omit "")
, = I think he's at his parents' place.
Forms of follow the same mostly-adjectival pattern that ,, , and
use: , , , , , ...
Since describes something belonging to the subject of the sentence, it cannot be used with the
subject of the sentence itself. The exception is made when you are making generalisations, e.g. "One's
(own) reputation is always more important"~ .
Pay attention to what the grammatical subject is. Sentences like are
sort-of-OK sometimes, but you are really treading on thin ice here(pisando sobre hielo delgado aqui).
This one sounds almost normal, while some others would immediately look unnatural.

Mister!
In spoken Russian (uncle) and (aunt) are often used to refer to some adult "guy" or

"woman". A special case is children's use, since they often use it even as a form of address ("
!").
This course doesn't cover this. But it's still useful to know.

People 2
Tips and notes
A student
Russian has different words for a school student (aka a pupil, BrE) and a college-level student, which
both have masculine and feminine versions:
/ a school student or a student/apprentice in general, especially in spiritual
sense
/ a college or university-level student (attends a corresponding
institution)
is a word you use when someone "did a good job". It comes with a patronizing(protector)
shade, so ideally you use it towards your friends or actual students/ subordinates (but not towards
people whose work you are in no position to judge).

5 men
When you are counting people, use " " for numbers that end in (5) or more. Anywhere
else use the normal Genitive plural " " (with and both are possible, but I'd
stick(adherirse) to ).

Learning and studying

OK, Russian has a number of ways to express learning, but in this course we have ,
, and . The 1st verb, , is introduced in this skill. Here is a bit more:

Doctor
The usual word for a (medical) doctor is . Then you have , which is also OK but
informal. However, a "doctor" as a person with this level of post-graduate qualification is
with no alternatives.

Weather and Nature

Tips and notes
It's raining
"To go" is the verb used for precipitation in Russian:
= It is raining.
. = It is snowing.
. = it is hailing(granizando) (we don't have it in the course).

in summer/winter
Russian has adverbs for "in spring", "in summer" etc. They are formed as the Instrumental case of a
corresponding noun.
We'll cover Intrumental in detail later. Right now just get used to the words themselves:

. = It's wet in spring

= It's good/nice in winter.
. = It's muddy(fangoso) in the fall.
. = It is sunny in summer.

Russians usually assign each season 3 months, i.e. winter is December through February and
spring is March through May (even if you have snow well into April).

Category of State
Easier than it sounds. When expressing a "state", some modality or one's opinion on the situation,
Russian often uses these impersonal words, saying that such and such state is observed:

. = I'm (feeling) cold.

. = It is warm outside.
, . = It is good you are here.
. = It is hard to say.

Many are homonymous with adverbs and short-form adjectives. So we'll study them later with
adjectives. For now, we' only have a handful of such words useful when discussing the weather.
Needless to say, these do not use any grammatical subject and are quite useful with verbs like "to be"
and "to become" ("It's getting warmer").
The concept of "category of state" is not even taught to native speakers. However, it does have a
distinctive pattern of use. Makes it easier to learn when you know why you say .

Sport
Tips and notes
win/lose
Here you encounter two perfective verbs; these two very obviously refer to a specific result:
! = You lost!
. = We need to win.
Note the formation of the past. If you remember , all Russian past forms are essentially
formed the same way. The endings correspond to gender and number:

We'll be practising many more past forms in the skill in the next row.

Reflexive
As a reminder, if a verb has - at the end, you stick it after the usual ending (- is used after a
vowel):
= to ski
= I ski.

 , to run
In this skill, we introduce the one-way verb "to run". You may not remember but it has one of the four
irregular stems:

Adjectives 1
Tips and notes
In Russian the adjective agrees with the noun it modifies in gender(number) and case. Fortunately, the
system is completely regular and the stress stays the same. The forms for the cases you know are:

The plural ending in the Nominative is - (). We will address the oblique forms later in the course.
(we are not teaching possessive adjectives for now, )
A few examples:
. (Prep.,masc.)
. (Acc.,masc.)
. (Acc.,fem)

velars and hushes

Adjectives with the stem on -, -, -, -, -, -, - will use "", "", "" instead of "", "", "" so
watch carefully ("", for instance).
We will tackle(abordar) the endings one at a time.

 vs.
In Russian the idea of "the whole" of something can be expressed by either or . The
former is used when implying the unexpectedly "large" amount; it is the one we're teaching in this skill:
. (normally, a person should have been awake(despierto) for a long time)

Past & Infinitive

Tips and notes
The infinitive stem
In Russian the Past tense and the Infinitive are formed from the same stem.
The forms are actually much easier than in the Present because there are only four forms in total for
masculine/feminine/neuter + plural, similar to adjectives (the forms were participles once).

and all its derivatives ( , , ..) has a strange, irregular past stem:
walked, went: , , ,
For the masculine form, there is a phonetic simplification for verbs with infinitives in -,-/-,
-/-. For example (can), (crawl) and (climb): , , no
final here.
This skill mostly covers the past form of imperfective verbs (only and are
perfective). What it means for you is that when 2 or more such actions are mentioned, they were all
happening at the same time or in no particular order. Why? Imperfective verbs like , ,
are by nature unspecific about their exact time frame.
they express repeated or prolonged action
they express action in progress
they can also express the fact that an action has or has not occured (with or without details on
"when" it took place).

What about the present form?

For some verb types the two stems are nearly identical ( , ). Which is a good thing
for you!

Shopping
Tips and notes
Give me that!
By now, you have probably noticed a surprising lack of "that one" in Russian. The thing is, Russian
mostly uses "" both for "this" and "that", unless you need to make a contrast between "this one
here" and "that one there".
However, when you are really pointing at things, use whatever you like!
~right here; ~ "this one here"
~over there; ~ "that one over there"
("" is acceptable with both)

Clothing
is a mass noun for "clothes", for footwear.
are also "shoes", but a more specific kind: "dress shoes" or the shoes you'd use with a
gown
...a dictionary will say it's a bit higher than a "dress shoe". In reality, especially in
men's speech, the word is often used for shoes, too
is most definitely a boot
is typically a long outer garment
is more generic but usually refers to a shorter outer garmentwith proportions not
much different from a shirt
is the word used for shirt. is a formal word for a shirt that is worn as a
part of a suit (eg. with pants, a jacket and a necktie), but people still use " " anyway.

a bigger/smaller shirt
From the Adjectives skill you might remember and as words for "more/bigger"
and "less/fewer/smaller". Since these work as adverbs, it is problematic to use them with nouns.
Instead, the words / are used AFTER a noun:
/ .
.
This works with some other popular adjectives: , , . When not used with
nouns directly, these have a colloquial quality.
Actually, with adjectives other than / you may resort to .
However, ? No. Just no.

Dative and Plurals

Tips and notes
The Dative Case in Russian
You have already seen that many expressions of feelings and experience use the Dative:
..., , 5 , ... etc.
The Dative introduces an indirect object of an action: usually the person whom the action is directed
towards. An example would be a sentence like I handed a package to my mom: my mom here is a
recipient.
Actually, this depends on the verb, just like in English. Some popular verbs of speech, writing or
giving will use the bare Dative for the recipient: , , , , ,
and so on.

Dative prepositions
: the basic meaning is movement along the surface("covering" it) which may realise as
walking around the park, running down the street, looking for it all over the house etc.
: towards, to. Often used when you are going towards somebody (towards Anna =
)
several bookish prepositional phrases like (thanks to) or (contrary to)
has an additional meaning, apiece or "each" : =They took 3 apples
each.
There is a bookish use of meaning "upon". It goes with Prepositional, and is mostly used in
set prepositional phrases like (upon completion).

Cases in plural
Plurals generally have only one pattern shared by all nouns. The ending only depends on the case, not
the class of a noun:, , , , , .
Only the Nominative and (especially) the Genitive have a number of different plural endings that
depend on the class of a noun.

Speaking 1
Tips and notes
Sequence of tenses in Russian
There is no sequence of tenses in Russian whatsoever.

The information in a subordinate sentence is understood to be relative to the main clause:

, . = He said he didn't know.
So if the piece of information is simply about where things are or what someone does, use present tense
in the subordinate clause.

Use the particle "" in reported questions or situations when you don't know which option is true:
, . = I asked him if he knew Moscow.
, . = We don't know whether he is going to show up in the
office.
The particle is attached to the word that is in doubt. It needn't be a verb, for instance,
, (i.e. whether he is in Moscow or in some other city). The particle
generally attaches to the first stressed word of the clause.

Talk or say?
The verb is used both as "to say, to tell" and as "to talk, to speak". When you report
someone's words, obviously, the 2nd meaning is in action:
, . = She says that she wants to sleep.
Russian has a whole set of perfective verbs. The thing is, usually you arrange verbs neatly into closely
matching pairs of imperfective + perfective. And these are different for the two meanings of
:
to say /
to speak /
Remember , ... ?
Rather than referring to ongoing actions or past(future) actions in general, perfective verbs refer to
actions in a point-wise manner, ignoring the action's inner structure. That is, such "singular" actions
happen at some particular "moment" and can be conveniently arranged in a sequence when telling a
story. This distinction is about to come into focus in one of the following skills.

Perfective Verbs -1
Tips and notes
Aspect in Russian
Verbs in Russian come in two 'flavors' : perfective (eg. ) and imperfective (eg.
).
Let's get this straight right away: most perfectives are made by attaching a prefixand the endings of
the resulting verb change in the same way they changed for the source verb.

Perfective verbs express an action, an "event" linked to a point in time. Sometimes they assert the
presence of a result. You use them for sequences of actions, too.
Imperfective verbs are used for everything else: processes, states, repeated actions and for generic
reference to an action (when the time of occurence is irrelevant).
In this introductory lesson we deal with the most basic pattern of use:
perfective verbs are used to tell stories about successive actions
imperfectives are used for simultaneous processes
perfective verbs are often used to describe single actions that have a specific result, e.g., Give
me that, I bought some food, I have painted many pictures. However, not all of them can
be reliably described like that.
we use imperfective to tell that someone has or has never done something, especially in "out of
the blue" situations. When the action was supposed to be done (which is known by listener), we
use the perfective.

Morphology
Being too lazy to make up many different verbs, we usually make new ones based on the old ones. The
vast majority of unprefixed verbs are imperfective.

Prefixation is the main method to create a perfective verb: , .

a different suffix is sometimes used:
occasionally, the stress changes:
different stems are used for a few verbs:

The last phenomenon is know as suppletion and only happens for a limited number of verbs and their
derivatives. The English verb "to go" is another example of such behavior (its past for is "went").
Note that suffixation is very popular for secondary imperfectives. Usually only one prefixed verb is
considered an "ideal match" for an imperfective verb. Others are somewhat different in meaning (or a
lot different). But you need imperfective partners for these, too, so Russian uses suffixes for that:
= to read (imperf.)
= to reread (perf.) cannot be considered a "natural" perfective for this verb
= to reread (imperf.)

can
The verb is used to talk about the general possibility of something, and also, very oftenabout
your ability to perform something and reach some result. Perfectives are used in the second meaning:
= I can write a book in a month.
? = Can she take a look?
We do not use for skills. Russian has for this.

/
Both mean "again" and are largely interchangeable when they mean that an action from the past occurs
again.
is more popular but it's focused on staying "the same as before". (cf. ) can

also mean action performed "anew, from the beginning".

Only is used in (~"besides").
When asking someone to repeat, use .

What else is there to it?

imperfective verbs
name the action as a whole (I can swim)
describe prolonged states and processes, regular actions
Perfective verbs describe events: singular, definite actions that are viewed as localized in time. They
happened at some moment (I made a video, I slept for some time and then went outside). Or they
describe a certain change of state at some "turning point" (not yet eateneaten, not slept
enoughslept enough and ready to get up).
It is argued in a few works that "a natural" perfective is just a prefixed verb where a prefix's
metaphorical meaning so conveniently overlaps the verb's own meaning, that you cannot feel any
change. So don't be surprised if some vague actions have several perfective matches for a single
imperfective verb.
That also means that sometimes you'd better memorize a pair even if it is technically a "poor" match.
After all, in some contexts it will come in handy:
(to consume something, completely)
(to have a meal, to spend some time eatingregardless of whether you finish
your meal or decide you've had enough half-way)

Instrumental Case
Tips and notes
Fortunately, this is the very last case!
It is used for some very specific meanings, thats why we've put off covering it for so long.
It is used alone for a tool or an agent of an action. English mostly uses with or by
instead: (with hammer), (by wind), (by force)
It is used alone with some verbs of being, becoming, seeming: ~ I
have become a teacher
It is also used with prepositions: - () = with (together with someone/something) note that with
prepositions or even is the most natural way of saying She and I - /
behind/ in front of - / above/under - between (also used with Genitive)

When you tell someone about "you and I" or "my friend and I" etc., it is most idiomatic to use +
your companion in Instrumental.

 . = You and I are friends.

. = Mom and I bought a computer yesterday.
Of course, when translating sentences out of the blue, you cannot (strictly speaking) tell if a speaker
means "I" or "we". This is rarely a source of confusion in real situations (where it is unlikely a speaker
goes on randomly switching between "I" and "we" ).
Sometimes you can interpret a joint action using "and" or "with", whatever sounds more natural:
. = They and I didn't talk yesterday / I didn't talk with (to) them
yesterday.

But wait, there's more!

Actually, Russian also has a handful of inconsistent cases that only exist for some words. They are
(mostly) beyond the scope of this course:
the Locative-2: the most important Why? Because it's obligatory with the nouns that it applies
to. It expresses the meaning of place, with , or both. It exists for over a hundred masculine
nouns: , , , . And for about 20 feminine nouns in :
(the ending is always stressed for both!)
the Neo-vocative: a form of a name used when addressing a person. It exists for common names
and several nouns: ! ! ! ! ! (just the last vowel sound is removed). The
Historical vocative (" ") has been lost in modern Russian.
the Genitive-2for some amount of substance. Increasingly replaced by the usual Genitive
but still can be used for several masculine nouns:
Waiting case: not much of a case, but actually the verb (to wait) would use
Accusative for people and things that can affect their appearance and Genitive for everything
else (an event/thing that does not choose when to arrive).

Body, Life and Death

Tips and notes
You have big eyes
Be careful NOT to use when describing properties of body parts, if their existence is normal
and unlikely to surprise anyone:
= I have a long nose.

A Handy thing to know

The Russian words for limbs and what they have on the end of them can be a little confusing initially.
Depending on the situation, can mean hand or it can mean arm. The same is true for ; it can
be foot or leg. Most of the time the meaning is clear from the context.

Genitive Plural
Tips and notes
The formation of Genitive Plural
All other forms (except the Nominative) are the same for all plural nouns, regardless of gender. The
Genitive is the other exception. Here is how it is formed:
-, -, - nouns: just remove the last vowel sound. Extends to - and - nouns (which
become -). A vowel is inserted if a consonant cluster forms at the end. We will address a few
common cases of fleeting vowels later in the course.
, ,
, ,
, ,

hard consonant: typical masculine nouns ending in hard non-sibilant consonants get the
ending -. Those in - get -, and so do nouns in - when the ending is unstressed (which
won't help you much).
, , , ,

soft consonant: feminine and masculine nouns ending in - or hushes (, , , ) will get
- as the ending. Neuter nouns ending in - also use this pattern.
, ,
, ,

and become , (though, for and it is
and )

Not so easy
be careful around nouns that form plurals irregularly, like . Here are the genitive
plurals of , , , , , , and :
, , ,
, , ,

Adjectives 2
Tips and notes
In this skill, we focus a bit more on adjectives and their case forms

 vs.
As a "problem" in a Math class, is more frequent. Other than that, may be a
problem, a task, an objectivewhile is a task assigned by someone else (again, unless it's
an exercise you randomly encountered in your textbook).

Superlative
When you want to express "the most" strong degree of some quality, Russian will almost always use an
analytical form. Just add the adjective in front:
.
.
There are one-word forms for many adjectives, though few of them are popular. Here are the synthetic
forms, to give you an idea:
, , ,
, ,
, ,
-prefixed versions should be used with extreme care since they will almost always sound too fancy
for spoken language and too emotional for academic writing. Still, a few of most popular may be just
the right thing in written style (eg. , , ).

Predicates and States(+Adverbs)

Tips and notes
Practical Short Adjectives
Adjectives in Russian have a long form and a short one. A long one is used before nouns and as a part
of a predicate. A short "predicative" form can ONLY be used as a predicate (with a "to be" verb).
Usually it looks the same as an adverb.
To be more exact, that typically refers to adjectives that mean qualities that exist on a sliding scale
(good, short, soft etc.) rather than yes/no characteristics (wooden, American).
Their usage depends on the meaning and style and isn't all that easy. It is especially frustrating for a
learner when a short and a long form are interchangeable but modify the overall tone.
Now, from a practical point of view, a number of adjectives are used in a short form very often (or
always) and/or have a distinct meaning then. It is safe to say that the majority of adjectives in the
language aren't much used in short form, so better learn those that are.
That's what we are going to do. And you get adverbs for free.

Other predicative adjectives/adverbs uses

feeling/state: It is cold/I feel cold: . . . Is not
even considered an adjective in most descriptions. Usually linguists define them as a "category
of state"
general judgement of the form "You are wrong"/"It is perfect/bad" .
.
! short sentences like "Good!" or "Magnificent!". Actually, that's where a
huge variety of adjectives with a meaning of "terrific"/"awful" are used in the short form, even
if hardly anywhere else.
when an adjective like "glad" or "similar" has details on what you are glad about or similar to, it
is normally short.

Education
Tips and notes
Ordinal numbers
Russian ordinal numbers behave like adjectives. Also, thankfully, if you have a long number only the
last word is affected when the gender and/or case change:
31st =
on the 31st of December = (it is Genitive here)

High-rise
The floor numbering uses the system common in the U.S., i.e. the floor on the ground level is "the 1st
floor". This is what you are going to see on the elevator buttonsso we try to stick to this "literal"
translation.

University departments
A typical structure of a university::

("department"), ("subdivision")
. ("branch")
If a "department" (a.k.a. "a faculty") is really large, it may have several " " inside, which are
then subdived further into " ".
A university can also have an " " ("institute") inside. Or a number of them. An institute may
have departments of its own.

Grades
The grading system in Russia uses numbers 2 to 5:

2, "fail", an F
3, a "just about satisfactory" mark, something like a C minus
4, a "good" mark, similar to a B
5, an "excellent" mark, an A

In speech we usually call them , , and . (1) is

virtually never assigned (maybe only in the case of particularly mighty failure, combining poor
performance with misdemeanor).
Universitiesofficiallyonly use the words (., ./., ., . when
abbreviated). And yet, the numbers are also widely used in conversation.

Classes
A school lesson is 45 minutes long, followed by a short break ( ).
A class at a university consists of two 45-minute-long periods, often with a 5-minute break in between.
This is why people usually call it ("a pair, a couple"). In the Russian Far East ("a
ribbon") is a more popular termbut do not try your luck using this term anywhere else!
Summer break and shorter breaks during the academic year are . This is a plural-only
noun.

Grades (the other kind)

Finally, a word (or two) about grades/school years. For the sake of convenience, this course assumes
that is the exact equivalent of first grade or year one, etc, which may or may not be the
case depending on where you're from. For the record, Russian schools run from when
you are six or seven years old to when you are seventeen, although the last two
years are not compulsory.

Countries and Places

Tips and notes
Sweden, a Swede, Swedish
In Russian, the name of the country, the name of a person from there and their language are all different
words. They are related, however, and few patterns exist:

It's worth pointing out here (in case you hadn't spotted it already) that while English capitalizes
country/language adjectives, Russian does not.

Simple Future
Describing a "simple" future action (not a process) is rather straightforwardtake a perfective verb and
make its "present" form same as you did with imperfective. The difference is, perfective verbs have no
Present:
, = I think you'll like Tom. (from /)
= I'll come to school. ( is a prefixed perfective variant of )
English, of course, has a number of ways of expressing the future, so use "will" or "is going to" (or
indeed the present continuous/progressive) as you deem appropriate.
-
Since in Russian, ethnicity is described with a noun, they can produce hyphenated compounds (just like
other nouns). We have very few of them in this course.

- = an Italian writer
- = a student who is an artist
- = a Kazakh student
- = an English friend (fem.)

Speak English!
You can use both - (adverb) and ( + Instr.)
is specifically about content in the language or about linguistic ability. is about the way an action is done/ an object is made (does not mean language for objects).
So a book can only be written . And, of course, if you mean "English-style pizza", it

can only be -!

House
Tips and notes
Points of compass

Now you can tell where you live:

= in the south of Berlin (i.e. inside the city)
= to the south of Berlin (i.e. in another settlement outside of the city)

and "courtyard"
The word requires some attention. Technically it can be either yard or courtyard in English
because it means either a piece of land at the house or an area inside a group of buildings.
In this course it is "courtyard". After all, you'll mostly encounter when people refer to the area
enclosed by a group of buildings as opposed to the area by the street. Don't expect it to look idyllic,
though.

Locative
Just a reminder that there are certain short masculine nouns for places which have a stressed - ending
in the Prepositional, instead of the - which you'd expect. Ex.: , , , ,
, , , , .

It is not a variant form, i.e. its use is obligatory, which makes it the strongest "extra" case in
Russian.

the Pseudo-passive
It is very common in Russian to use the 3rd person plural of a verb without any "they" to express
that the action is performed by unspecified "persons":

This particular wording won't work if you describe something that happens "by itself".

Using the impersonal verb is one of the ways to express the idea of having enough of
something. The person is used in Dative while the thing you have or do not have enough of is stated in
Genitive:
. = I do not have enough money.
. = We have enough food.
. = She has enough work.
The perfective counterpart is .

Reflexive
Tips and notes
In theory
The reflexive is used when a subject performs an action "on itself". In English it is generally not stated
explicitly. When you say that someone shaves or stops, it is understood that the action relates to
themselves, unless a different "object" is provided.
These verbs end in - /- in Russian ( after a consonant, after a vowel)
As a rule, these verbs never take a direct object in the Accusative. (to be afraid of) is one of

the few exceptions, in that it can use Accusative for people.

In practice
Russian reflexive verbs may mean a number of things. Here are the most popular meanings:
true reflexive: , . Mostly for verbs like "wash", "shave", "comb your hair".
reciprocal ("each other"): , , "meet/date/go out with", "kiss".
passive (for imperfective verbs only): . "The food is (being)
prepared by the best chefs"
emotional state or some movement/change: , , , ,
, , "to be born", "to be surprised", "to learn", "to be glad", "to change", "to
move".
inclination to do something (in impersonal constructions): = I do not feel like
sleeping.
lexical verbs that are reflexive for no particular reason: , , ,
. Some of these are only used with -. Some also exist in a "bare" form but mean a
completely different thing.
We do not have some of the non-reflexive base verbs in the course (some are rare or just a little
beyond what we could include in the course and not make it overly long). However, some just
don't exist.

is a reflexive object pronoun: it means the same thing as the subject of the verb (or the implied
subject, if the sentence doesn't contain a subject):
! = Look at yourself!
. = We didn't think about ourselves.
. = He is talking to himself ( is just more idiomatic here)
Note that, as usual for pronouns, it is much more natural before the verb. Its declension pattern is,
naturally, the same as for or . Since it can't be the subject of the sentence, it doesn't have
a Nominative form.
It is also used with some verbs:

= to feel (a certain way)

() = to imagine
= to behave
= to take along ("with yourself")
= to lose one's temper

( then is generally used to express having something with you or "on one's person", not only
with "")
Remember the -structures? They work here, too:
. = I am at my place.
. = We are at (our) home.

Other
reflexive verbs for some actions (often harmful) typical of a subject: = The
dog bites.
It often works for animals and people (to scratch, to butt, to swear). However, in a sense, it is also the
meaning in " ", which corresponds to "The book is easy to read", i.e. usually it "is
read" without difficulty (by whoever reads it).

= "to oneself" (as opposed to "aloud")

= on its own
() = "it goes without saying"
. = I feel uneasy/sick/uncomfortable.

Time expressions 2
Tips and notes
More popular time expressions
is the word for "now" when you mean that there is a change from how it was before
("Now I live in Rome", "What do we do now!?", "Now you know Russian"). We are pretty
lenient(tolerante) on the distinction(distincin) in the course, though(aunque)
use + Accusative to express an amount of time that should pass before the event comes
( = in a week, a week later).
use Accusative + to express "X time ago"( = 100 years ago).
means the same thing but this use has been quickly losing its popularity since WWII and
isn't taught here (it is mostly characteristic of people born before 1950).
+ Dative pl. expresses "on Mondays" etc.

, ...
Verbs with suffixes -/- replace it with sound in their present tense stem. The actual endings
will be -, -, - and so on:
, , ,
, ...
There is also an unproductive class of verbs with -, -, - that exhibits(exhibe)
similar behaviour ():
, ,
, .
It's small, but it has some popular imperfective verbs like (get up), (give),
(get tired)(cansarse) and (to learn some piece of information).

Imperative and Adverbs

Tips and notes
Two types of imperative
Not hard at all.
First, look at the 3rd person plural: , , and so on. Remove the ending.
if you are left with a vowel at the end, add
if you are left with a consonant, add after a consonant cluster or "" (otherwise, just ).
Done! , , . To make it plural or polite, just add -: .
This lesson deals with the -pattern plus some irregular forms. However, the pattern described
above(arriba) works for the vast(enorme) majority of the verbs. The irregular stems give you , ,
.

Aspect is imperative
Which aspect to use? Well, if you focus on the process ("Please, slice evenly(corta igualmente)") or
encourage(fomentas) engaging(participacin) in some activity, use imperfective. Otherwise, especially
If you want to get a result or a single specific action, use perfective.
When forbidding(olvides) something, use the imperfective.
You may notice that sometimes when Russians want a specific action (let's call that "simple request"),
they still use imperfective. Why? Here is the prototypal(prototpico) meaning of such usage:
the initial phase of the action is accented (overriden(anulada) for some verbs)
it is a contextually obvious action ("Please, do come in!", "Now, turn(entrega) in your tests")
or else it sounds quite(bastante) assertive may be a desired result
a simple action is expected to be performed immediately
By the way(por cierto), that "obvious" point is why imperfectives are not, as a rule, used for detailed
"simple requests", especially with "please". It is OK for some typical guest-receiving situations
("please, come in", "please sit down"). But IMP. is out of question with clearly non-obvious detailed
requests like "Take my cat from the sofa, please" how can such thing be obvious, and if so(y de ser
asi), why would you ask in such detail? These two contradict each other: appealing(apelando) to the
listener's common sense ('You should obviously do that') while at the same time using 'please' and
giving the details.

Verbs of Motion
Tips and notes
Run: there and back again
Russian verbs of motion come in two varieties:
a one-way, specific verb (like ). They're used for one-way trips(viaje)
strictly(estrictamente) to/from some goal (usually a single instance(instancia))
a multi-directional verb (like )

Multi-directional verbs
They can express three different things:
repeated trips:
a round trip(viaje redondo): ? .
moving with no goal or referring the action/trip in general: .
From a practical point of view, a one-way verb is virtually(practicamente) always a Continuous tense in
English, while a multidirectional verb corresponds with a Simple tense or the Present Perfect (a trip
happened"I've been there - and come back"). Or to a Continuous tense when it is a random
movement.
Pay attention to (to run), which is an irregular verb (though, only a little bit(poco)).

Pairs ( / )
/ movement on foot or within a city; also OK when talking about a public
transportation route
/ movement by vehicle on land, also a generic verb for travelling to other
countries.
/ "to fly", to move though air
/ "to swim", to move by water
/ "to carry" an object, on foot
/ "to carry" a person/object, by some means(medios) of
transportation(transporte)
/ to "lead(llevar)" a person, on foot (also about roads(carreteras) and about
"driving" a vehicle)
Up to(hasta) 14 or 18 verbs of motion are found in Russian, though we only teach 3 to 5 common ones.

Waaait, what about perfectives?

To make a perfective (specific!) verb, add a prefix - to a one-way verb ( ). It gives a
perfective with an implied(implicito) focus(centro) on the initial point ("setting out(exponer)").
other prefixes add their meaning; to get an imperfective verb, attach the same prefix to a multi-

directional verb (/ , / , / etc.) Pay attention to

-.
With "-" the imperfective meaning differs(difiere) (a rather(bastante) typical shade(sombra)
"to perform an action for some time")

City and People

Tips and notes
Stop right there!
What you call a place where some transport stops, that depends on the transport. The trains stop at
while bus and tram(tranvia) stops are (, ,
).
Note the Locative 2 in and (corner): , , .
is a minibus that travels at semi-regular intervals, often trying to take an
adequate(adecuada) amount of passengers(pasajeros) at the starting point. Most will follow the same
route as the regular bus of the same number. Due(debido) to translation difficulties, it is not covered in
this course.
is a large railway(ferrocarril) station with a station building, often a terminus(trmino) but
not necessarily (that's where you would look for an inter-city train).

Englishman and Englishwoman

Most popular names for people from different countries or ethnic groups will have a version for males
and another for females. Look for a suffix, since the formation of these kind of nouns is extremely
typical: / , / , /, / ,
/ , / , / ...

Other point of interest

Railway(ferrocarril) is in Russian (lit. 'iron road'). , while
sometimes similar to supermarkets you know, is usually a medium-size self-service(autoservicio) shop
selling primarily(ante todo) groceries(comestibles) and some other essentials, so grocery store is closer
to the definition.

Imperative 2

Tips and notes

Perfective vs. Imperfective
Certainly(ciertamente) use imperfective when specifying the manner in which the action should be
performed.
Use perfective when asking for a simple action without it being really obvious next action.
Certainly, with "Please" and following details, since it is really rare you would politely ask for an
obvious thing to do.
There is also the important permission/denial(negacin) pattern: use imperfective when NOT
letting(permitiendo) something.

Feel yourself at home

Curiously(curiosamente) enough, imperfectives are absolutely polite for a few common motion and
action verbs used when inviting people:
, = Please, sit down,
! = Do come again.
, . = Come in, please. (also , lit(cama). "come
through"(llegar), and )
I guess(supongo) they can be formally(formalmente) classified as obvious but you can also just
memorize the verbs.

There is a distinction in Russian between putting things in a random or "lying flat(acostado)" position
and "setting(colocando)" them into a vertical or upright(vertical) position. The last one is important for
things that by design are supposed to have a "working" orientation even if they are flat(planos) (a plate,
a cup, a box, a bed, a laptop etc.)
use / for a stable or vertical position (as a result, the object )
use / for a flat(plano), upset(alterado) or random orientation (as a result, the
object )

Words
is commonly used as an invitation to sit down. is also very
popular despite(a pesar de) being usually recommended against (literally, it means to perform a
squat(sentadilla) or to sit down for a short while).

Something
Tips and notes

("that/which") is like an adjective, only it takes the gender of whichever(cualquier) object

it "represents", and the case that corresponds to its role in the part of the sentence you use it in:
, ?
, ?

Real or not: - vs. -

- and - mean a "hypothetical" object. A slot(espacio) you have in mind, not
actually filled(lleno) by anything in particular (and maybe you are wrong). Mostly(principalmente)
useless(intil) in statements about the past (if you are sure it happened, then the object did exist)
(remember, is masculine, is neuter)
- and - refer to a specific but "unknown" object. You see/know that something exists (or
you are sure of it) but you don't know its identity.
They are somewhat(algo) interchangeable when you mean there's free choice from a limited number of
options ("OK, have someone call me if Alex comes").
NB: "any-" pronouns have wider(amplio) use in English. When "anyone(cualquiera)" means
"whichever(cualquier) person you want", consider " " or, if you mean everyone(todos),
"". The above(arriba) only applies to cases of an "unknown" object.

I've got something special for you!

- and - are "secret" pronouns. They mean a certain object that you know but are
deliberately(deliberadamente) not mentioning by name. Either(ya sea) you want to keep people
guessing(adivinando) or do not consider the identity important to your point ("Yeah, I have worked
with some people* here").

Special cases
- is used mainly for "ever(alguna vez)" in the past or "one day" in the future. - is
mostly for "once" in the past; almost never used in future.
- is also sometime used to refer to some future moment rather than(antes que)
manner(manera) of action.

- is also used colloquially to mean "approximately*.

- is only an adverb, which either means a job done sloppily(descuidadamente) or an action
performed "barely(dificilmente)", with difficulty.

Technics (Tcnica) and Home

Tips and notes

Here we introduce the prefixed perfective for "to go(walk)" . It is a perfective verb with a
focus(atencin) on "setting out(exponer)" somewhere, just like other verbs of motion with -
( , , , ).

It is completely normal to use when talking about public transportation, i.e. passenger vehicles
that repeatedly follow a prescribed(prescrita) route. These are preferred when talking about routes.
Typically, it is because we treat(tratar) it more like an objective fact(hecho) of a certain trip
taking you somewhere than a particular vehicle going to a certain place (almost as if is not used
as a verb of motion but as a way of stating(indicar) the destination). is also used: for
example, when saying that a bus exists that takes you from one place to another.
When arriving at a terminal station on a subway, you can hear the following:
. . ~ lit. The train goes no further(ms lejos).
Please exit from the car.
A personal vehicle will always use /.
A reminder: you use ONE-WAY verbs when describing motion in one direction, even if repeated. The
verbs cease(paran) being interchangeable when the context of repeated motion implies the "trip back"
cannot be included (like "After school I go to the station and take a train home." here you have a
sequence that makes the return trip absurd). We rarely have such sentences in the course. In real life,
just remember to occasionally take a step back and refresh the basic idea behind the opposition: oneway motion vs. multi-directional trip.

Future & Past with Perfectives

Tips and notes
Formation
Take a perfective verb and do the same thing you do to imperfectives in the Present.
Seriously(Seriamente). The reason is that perfective verbs have no Present form in Russian.

Whenever(cuando) you mean a "simple", single action and/or a specific result, this is THE form you'll
want to use. There is also another way of talking about the future, ""+imperfective infinitive but
we're leaving that for later.

Conditionals
We're introducing the basics of ("if") in this skill. In Russian you use it with the Future when
talking about future events (which is different from English). Compare: If you see (present tense with
future meaning) Jenny, call me = (future perfective of 'to see') , ,
lit. 'If you will see Jenny, call me.'
(let/have) is used with the non-past(no pasado) forms.
Basically, most learners tend to use too many perfective verbs in the Past and too many
imperfectives in the Future. Also, another common mistake is "future projection" of present
tense forms. E.g. "I'm doing that tomorrow morning". In Russian, it does not generally work
that way, though(aunque) sometimes it is OK.

Mutation
That stuff(cosa) with / . In -conjugation it only happens in 1st person
singular, and in -conjugation it happens everywhere.

Being Instrumental
Tips and notes
Working and being
Instrumental, while being a relatively niche(vacio) case, is used for a number of verbs that mean
"being" something (or someone) and "being interested(interesado)" in something. For example, with
when in the Past or the Future.
is a formal verb for "to be" which you must know but you won't necessarily use all that
much. One important use would be somewhat(algo) formal sentences of the model ''A' is a 'B' that is a
'C'.' Imagine something like this:
These days, a school principal(director) is a person who is usually not a teacher ~
, .
A somewhat stilted(artificial) example, but still quite(bastante) good because it would sound strange
here to omit "" (to be) in the 2nd half of this sentence. Fortunately, these sorts(tipos) of
definitions are often "A is a B who does C", so you don't have to worry too much.
is a verb that has no direct equivalent in English and therefore(por lo tanto) can be
tricky(dificil) to translate. It has a general meaning of "being occupied with something", which means
pursuing(perseguir) some activity (cf. "occupation, class", "busy").
Depending on the nature of the activity it can be any of the following:

learning
hobby:
work:
sports:
current(presente) activity or occupation: ~What are you doing/What do
you do?

There is also which is more directly connected to hobbies () which you are
"keen on(estar inclinado a)" or "into" e.g. .

Instrumental for adjectives

Here is a reference table, as well as some examples (words for white, blue, narrow(estrecho), big, the
best)

, , become , ,
Note how after hushes (, , , ), is used for end-stressed adjectives and for stem-stressed
ones. That reflects the pronunciation: after a hush, unstressed / sound the same as an unstressed /
would.

Placing (colocacin) Objects

Tips and notes
Object placement in Russian
This concept is hard to translate but easy to grasp(comprender). Frankly(francamente), Russians (on
average) tend to be more precise about the manner(manera) in which an object "is" somewhere(en
alguna parte) or is "put" somewhere.
"Being" verbs do not have natural perfective counterparts(contrapartes) because they are about a certain
state(estado).

Stand
is used with "vertical" positions:
a vertical orientation of a long or thin(delgado) object (a book, a ski(esqui) leaning(inclinado)
against a wall etc.)
a stable position of an object that has a "base" by design: plates, cups, shoes, boxes,
furniture(muebles) etc.
about buildings, especially large. But not about rooms (offices, for examples).

Lie
is used with "horizontal" orientations:
a flat(plana) position of an object like book, a closed laptop, clothes, sheet(hoja) of paper
a sideways(lateral) position of an object that is "normally" placed in a stable position
("stands(estar)")

Hanging(colgar) about
is used with hanging/clinging(adheribles) objects:
pictures, mirrors, notices(avisos), fridge magnets(imanes)
clothes on a hanger(percha), curtains(cortinas), ropes(cuerdas)
clothes hanging over a chair etc.
That's all. When you place an object into one of these three positions you use ( ),
( ) and ( ) respectively. This also applies if you change an
object's state (eg., it is lying flat(plano), and you want it hung on a wall).
Use a "present-style" set(conjunto) of endings of a perfective verb to make its future form:
/ = I'll hang the picture here.
Mind(preocupate) the / pair, where the imperfective and perfective forms
come from different roots(raices).

Be situated
Better late than never, I guess. There are a few verbs that only ever(siempre) denote position, of which
only is within(dentro) the scope(alcance) of this course. The verb is often used with
large objects like buildings, rooms, cities. However, it is not limited to these kinds of objects (it's just
less not quite(bastante) as common).
can sound overly(demasiado) formal in some situations. Basically, it is a verb that
specifies the whereabouts(paradero) of the subject(sujeto), so it is appropriate when location truly IS in
focus(foco). Do not use it with people much, except in questions regarding(respecto a) the exact
whereabouts(paradero) (e.g., over the phone when you are trying to find your friends:
?) With small objects "lie"/"stand", discussed above(arriba), are probably a better choice.

Kitchen and Food

Tips and notes

The verb (to eat) doesn't have a true perfective partner according(conforme) to some

sources(fuentes). Its perfective counterpart would depend on the meaning:

I ate an apple
I had a bite(bocado) to eat then went to the museum
So, when you mean consuming(consumir) a certain "object", you use to express that the
object is fully(totalmente) eaten (within(dentro) reason(razn), it obviously doesn't have to be the
seeds(semillas), core(nucleo) and all to 'count'!) However, when you are talking about the activity of
eating as replenishing(reposicin) your energy, having a lunch break(pausa) etc., use . In this
skill we teach .
" /" would mean that you ate some soup, focusing on the fact of having a meal
rather than(antes que) full(completo) consumption(consumo). This will sound strange with small
foodstuffs(productos alimenticios) which are typically eaten completely (sandwiches, apples etc.)
If this is the case, it's better to outright(total) state(estado) that you ate a piece or took(tom) a
bite(bocado) of something.

When counting, the Genitive plural form for and may be either(cualquiera de
los dos) of the following:
5 / 5
5 / 5
The zero-ending option is definitely the most popular these days, at least(al menos) in speech(habla) (it
was considered colloquial about 40 years ago).

is a bag made of a durable material. An expendable(reemplazable) plastic or paper bag

typical of supermarkets is . And it is actually (polyethylene), not
(which is usually used for hard(duros) plastics).
is also used for packs(paquetes) of sugar, salt(sal), rice(arroz), milk etc.

Speaking2
Tips and notes
vs.
When expressing your opinion, you may use either(cualquiera de los dos) of the two.
implies that you think so because of your views(puntos de vista), or because that would be your
decision, or because you gave it some thought(idea). can mean a lot of things, a

random(aleatorio), incidental thought(pensamiento) included.

Basically, you just have to know that may mean something other than "to count(contar)",
and as for using it yourself... well, depends on your exposure(exposicin) to Russian.

is a formal verb for "to have" used in business and official language ( - is neutral). However, there are a few set expressions where the verb can be used even in normal
speech.
= "to mean". When a person means something, it is what they wanted to say.
/ = "to have the/a right to(un derecho de)"/ "to have no right
to".
= "to be of great importance(a ser una gran importancia)" (you
may replace "great" with your epithet(descripcin) of choice)
= "to be not unreasonable(no ser razonable)/to have some sense(tener algn
sentido)"
- = "to mind(preocuparse de)" (to be against something(estar en contra
de algo)). Usually in the negative.

Subjunctive and Conditional

Tips and notes
Want me to do it?
The Subjunctive is, basically, when you speak of actions that are not real but rather(mas bien)
desired(deseado), asked to be performed or just actions that might have happened.
One of the important uses of conditional (a.k.a.(tambien conocido como) subjunctive) in Russian is
with ("in order to(a fin de que)") to express the idea of some action being required or asked
for from someone.
1 entity(entidad)infinitive. The sentence is pretty straightforward(sencillo) when you only have one
person:
, . = I get up early so that(para que) I won't be late.
2 entitiespast. When A does something for B to do something, use PAST tense in subjunctive:
, = He wants me to live.
, = Mom asks that you would be home tomorrow.
, . = I get up early so that you would not forget
to have breakfast.
In more formal English it would look like "Mother asks that you be home tomorrow", though(aunque)
English has more idiomatic ways of saying that.
So, use the past to form the subjunctive in any structures like "A told B to do something", "A did X so
that B would do Y", "We need that A do X" etc. The analogy with the English "that" (which(cual) might

come off(salir) as overly(demasiado) formal) is probably a good way to grasp(comprender) all these
structures, since, unfortunately, in more idiomatic English the sentence structures would be quite
different to the Russian.
Pay attention to the use of aspect. When asking someone NOT to do something, imperfective is
normally used.
With verbs of asking, you only use the past form if you do use a subjunctive phrase. If you've
opted(optado) to use a Dative "recipient" instead, the verb is in the infinitive:*
.

If only you were here...

The conditional, unsurprisingly(como era de esperar), is also used in conditional sentences. When you
describe hypothetical (unreal) situations, you always use Past + the particle . This particle(particula)
normally comes right(viene a la derecha) after or after the subject / the verb:
, . = If you knew Physics, you'd have got an 'A'.
. = I'd like to know more languages.
Russian does not distinguish (grammatically) between "would be" and "would have been"; they both
just use past and are distinguished based on what makes sense in a given situation.

Compound Future (futuro compuesto)

Tips and notes
Imperfective future
There is another way of expressing the future in Russian besides(ademas) the perfective covered
earlier, namely(es decir) (you guessed it) the imperfective. Its primary use is to show some prolonged
or repeated activity in the future rather than(antes que) to focus on a single action done at some
particular point in time. (It tends(tiende) to be overused(usado en exceso) by foreign learners).
To form the imperfective future, use the appropriate variation of and an infinitive of an
imperfective verb:

= I'll be sleeping tomorrow

= They are going to be studying all day.
= I'm going to run more in the summer.
? = Will you eat the cake?

It is quite useful for describing what you will generally be occupied with at a certain moment or day
("at 3 p.m. I'll still be working") in the future.

I will not do this!

There is one more important verb to discuss here. (to become) is used with an infinitive in
negative sentences to express a decision not to do something, both in past and in future.:
! = I will not watch this movie!

 . = Yesterday she did not cook lunch (because she chose not
to).
We mostly skip(omitir) the past use because English does not actually distinguish between the past
action that just did not happen and the past actions that were not taken because a person decided not to.
is also used (to a degree(en un grado)) in positive past sentences to mean "started doing the
prolonged activity". Quite a rare thing in future.

Prefixed Verbs of Motion

Tips and notes
Back in Motion
Having covered the basic verbs of motion earlier, it's time to go a bit(poco) deeper.
While English often uses additional words and/or a completely different verb to convey(transmitir)
different nuances(matices) of movement somewhere, Russian typically takes one of the basic verbs of
motion and modifies it with a prefix.
They often come in pairs, so we have:
- expresses approaching(proximo) in a general way. = Ivan arrived
in/came to Russia. - conveys(transmite) going away or leaving. = Jenny
left Moscow.
-/- for movement into an enclosed(cerrado) space. . = He entered the room.
- for movement out of an enclosed space. = I will leave the house.
-/- movement towards. = He walked up(acerco) to me. -/movement away(lejos) from. = She walked away from him.
Also:
- through(mediante) or past. = we drove through the tunnel.
= They walked past(junto) a church.
- across(a traves) / = I crossed the bridge.

A tricky(dificil) aspect
You may have spotted(descubierto) so far(hasta aqui) that the examples have all been the onedirectional versions of 'go' and that they are all past or future. Well, here's where it may get confusing.
When they have a prefix attached, the one- and two- directional versions of 'go' convey(transmite)
aspect rather than(antes que) 'directionality'. This probably makes more sense with an example:
- I am crossing the bridge/I cross the bridge
- I will cross the bridge.

Arts & Entertainment

Tips and notes
Tell us about it
There is another verb in Russian for "to tell", . It covers the situations when what you
tell is quite a bit longer(un poco mas largo) than a single sentence. You may link(enlazar) it to
("a story"). No brick walls here(No hay paredes de ladrillo aqui), only with it is
understood you're passing on(esta de paso en) a rather(mas bien) finished piece of information about
some topic. / is primarily(ante todo) for shorter answers where coverage(reportaje)
of some topic is not the point (also, when reporting someone's words).
When expressing what you are talking "about", you may use + Prepositional or + Accusative.
The meaning is roughly(aproximadamente) the same, especially in the sentences covered in this course,
and they are largely(en gran parte) interchangeable. In most situations only the shade(tono) of meaning
changes:
focuses more on the overall(total) coverage
focuses more on something "specific" and detailed but maybe not as true "in general"
is a lot more frequent than .

Together
Tips and notes
Let's speak Russian
To express the idea of "let's" (a suggestion(sugerencia) or proposal(propuesta) to carry out(llevar
acabo) an action or participate in some activity together) Russian uses the imperative (plural
).
Use it with the infinitive for imperfective verbs:

.
.
.
- .

Use it with non-past "we"-form for perfective verbs:

.
.
.

Each other
The set(conjunto) expression is used to express the action done to "each other". The first
"friend" is always in Nominative, and the second takes the case required by the sentenceand any
prepositions you need:
. = We love each other
. = They think about each other.

Just the two of us

To express doing an action together, Russian may opt(optar) to use words that specify the number of
people as 2, 3 etc: , , , , , , also .
Two to four are used the most. 8, 9 or larger than 10 are virtually(practicamente) never used.
English just uses "together", so, understandably(comprensiblemente), these are useful to know but
boring to translate:
. = They lived there together (the two of them)
Bonus to those who speak languages that have similar adverbs.

Numbers 2
Tips and notes
Ordinal numbers
Ordinal numbers decline exactly like adjectives. Fortunately, only the last word is declined, others are
like in cardinal numbers. And no and's:
1904th =
2015th =
in 2015th =
Actually, declines a bit differently, similar to "animal-possessives" (eg. ):
, , , / , . . . Note the .

Declension of numbers
In Russian, tens and hundreds are compound words with both parts declining ( has an unusual
pattern):
(50)
(60)
(200)

(you might recall that numbers 5-20 and also 30, 50,60,70,80 decline just like a feminine noun, eg.
)
Oblique(indirecto) cases of numbers are madness(dementes) even for native speakers, so they usually
either make mistakes, or think their way around such complicated forms. After all, no one makes you
use convoluted(complejo) sentence structure IRL.
Consequently(por consiguiente), we are not spending much time on these forms.

Use of adjectives with numbers

In Nominative expressions like "2/3/4 big cats" the agreement(acuerdo) of the adjective may not
match(emparejar) the noun.
For masculine and neuter nouns, you use the adjective in Genitive plural. For feminine nouns, there is
variation. Typically, Nominative plural is preferred:
.
.
However, if Gen.sg is different from Nom.plural ( - ) or if the verb is in singular Genitive
plural is better:
.
.
If the adjective modfies the whole number phrase, only the Nominative is used: ,
, .

Adjectives 3
Tips and notes
Russian has a number of adjectives formed from other types of words, for examples, nouns. Where
English might use a noun chain(cadena) or a few nouns stitched(cosida) together ("summer shirt",
"homework"), we often use an adjectiveof course, if the language has one ( ,
).

Adjectival declension
Here is the full table:


is a word for "familiar", also widely used as a noun for "pal(camarada),
acquaintance(conocido)" ( for males, for females)

Plans
Tips and notes

The focus of this skill is just one Russian verb, . It means something between "to be
going to" and "to plan(planificar)/to intend to(tener la intencin de)". The verb means that it is your
intention to perform some action, and you are, most likely(probable), taking some steps (physical or
cognitive) to let it eventually happen:
. = We are planning to go the movies tomorrow.
. = They are planning(going) to wait till(hasta) five.
. = We were going to take a walk through the park.
It also has its plain(evidente) literal meaning of "to gather(recoger)" or "to pack(empacar) your
stuff(cosas), preparing to leave". Interestingly(curiosamente), when talking about going to some place
where some "event" is taking place, its literal and mataphorical meaning work together, so the verb can
be used directly with a place: .
The primary use of is to show preplanned future actions of persons. Things and beings
that do not have consciousness(ingenio) can only use this verb in its literal meaning.

Prepositions 2
Tips and notes
- (+ Gen.) is a Genitive preposition with the meaning of "because of(debido a)". It is mostly
used to name the cause of something unpleasant(desagradable) or time-consuming(perdida de
tiempo) (eg. "They got fired(fueron despedidos) because of you").
(+ Gen.) is a preposition meaning passing by(pasando por) something or missing the
intended(destinado a) destination (target). It is quite(bastante) productive in combination with
verbs of motion having the - prefix, which also works for the for the idea of "passing",
"continuing motion despite(a pesar de) reaching some point".
(+ Gen.) means "instead of", "in place of"for examples, when expressing something
being "replaced" by something else (hence(por lo tanto) the part).

The Same
Tips and notes
/
Consider these two structures:
Ann and Bob are the same (as each other(como el uno al otro)).
Ann and Bob are the same (as you).
English uses "the same" for both. Russian expresses these two relations differently:
.
(, ).

Other similar things

A number of these -words exist:

X = the same X usually the same object

X = the same (kind of) X usually the object with the same characteristics
= in the same way(del mismo modo)
= at the same time(al mismo tiempo)
= at the same place(en el mismo lugar)
= to the same place(al mismo lugar)

NB: has other uses, namely(es decir) to emphasize the information the listener must be
aware(consciente) of but fails(falla) to use ( ).
When comparing to something else, a paired(emparejado) pronoun is used in a relative(familiar)
clause(oracin):

 , . = This is the same person as yesterday.

, . = She lives at the same place where we do.
, . = We work at the same time as you.
Note the "", which makes it a lot more natural.
The usage(uso) of these pronouns is not as obvious. is typically paired(emparejado) with
and with or (for persons).

I don't care
To say that you "don't care(No me importa)", "don't give a (smth(something))" about something, you
use with Dative subject.
, .
You also use it to say that doing something is "essentially the same thing" as something else.

Set expressions
actually means "right away(inmediatamente)".
You can say something is "one and the same" object by using or (the latter
is OK when it's a modifier):
( ) .
.
( as a "noun" is always neuter and cannot be replaced by )
You can say something is the same object as already mentioned before by using :
! = That's the same very article!
, ? = Are you sure that's exactly the same man (as
before)?

Fleeting Vowels (vocales efmeras)

Tips and notes
Sometimes a word gets an extra vowel or loses a vowel when declined to a different form:
1 5
1 2
1 2
It only happens to and and will mostly give you trouble in words having certain suffixes. Such
sounds are called fleeting vowels and appear/disappear quite regularly in some stems.
if a vowel appears, it only happens in Genitive plural
if a vowel vanishes(desaparece), it is everywhere except Nominative singular.
Here, we maily(principalmente) focus on the following words:

 those that have -/ () as a suffix. The vowel disappears in all forms except Nom.sg)
feminine nouns with the suffix -. Usually a vowel appears in Genitive plural. appears after
"soft" consonants or hushes (, ), appears everywhere else ().
some nouns that have vowels appear or disappear in the stem consonant cluster
The existence of these vowels can be traced back(rastrearse) to the time when and used to be short
vowels ("yers"). Back then(en aquel momento), all syllables in Russian had to end in a vowel. Later,
these sounds were lost in weak positions (word-final position or the position before a stressed vowel/a
strong position).
But that's history. Anyway, it is nice to know that in / (a hundred), there is a
good reason for "" to be where it is. The disappearing(desaparecida) vowel in / has the
same origin.

Some of the fleeting vowels in Modern Russian have appeared from an analogy
with other words and have no historical basis in Old East Slavic.

Measure
Tips and notes
Russia uses the metric system. Here are the main units you'll learn in this course:

(meter): a bit(poco) longer than a yard

(kilometer): 1000 meters, or about 0.6 miles(millas)
(kilogram): a bit over 2 pounds(libras)
(tonne): 1000 kilograms, roughly(aproximadamente) equivalent to ton (or about 2205
pounds, to be more exact)

Square () meters and kilometers are used for areas (, ).

For areas of land, (, 10000 ) is often used. In spoken speech people also use
(100 ) for their garden plots(parcelas) in the country (the name comes from the fact
that it is 1/100 of a hectare)

Instrumental
To speak about an object of a certain length/weight etc., the Instrumental form of a quality(calidad) is
used:
2 = a table 2 meters long
30 = a lake 30 meters deep
20 = a house 20 storeys(plantas) tall

-verbs
To express the idea of a certain activity "covering" a certain space or time interval, verbs with the
prefix - are often employed(empleado). Of course, you should consult the dictionary to know if a

certain verb of this structure exists or has that particular meaning.

It is different from verbs of motion like "" because many other verb can have this prefixs:
5 = We walked 5 kilometers
. = I slept the entire day.
. = We stood(estuve) here for two hours.
NOTE about VERBS OF MOTION: some of these derivatives(derivados) will not be verbs of motion
and actually can differ in stress or form ( / ). We are only covering distances here.
You see, when talking about motion, the derivative of the one-way verb is used for distance. For times,
you use just the multidirectional verb, or, if you want to put an emphasis on how extremely long it
took, its -prefixed derivative:
6 .
() .
The , , options are not neutral in style but are encountered in spoken
speech anyway.

Business
Tips and notes

One of the verbs introduced here deserves(merece) special attention.

belongs(pertenece) to a small group of so-called(asi llamado) biaspectual verbs. These verbs work both
as a perfective and an imperfective verbthe interpretation depends on context and common sense:

. = He is attacking(atacando).
. = He will attack in the morning.
. = We organize concerts.
. = They will, surely(seguramente), organize a meeting.

-
"Working on something" is a set expression in Russian too. Use with the Instrumental:
= Engineers and scientist are
already working on a solution to that problem.

The adjective "successful" is mostly used with nouns meaning some endeavors(esfuerzos) or
attempts(intentos) to do something; also with nouns like "company(empresa)", "businessman".
Their use with random words for people is also creeping(progresivo) in slowly (as a calque(calco) from
English) but it is going to sound weird(extrao) and awkward(torpe) for quite(bastante) a while.
Unlike(diferente a) English, this usage in Russian is mainly associated with fame and financial success,
so it limits the professions that feel "right(correcto)" and unambiguous(sin ambiguedades) when

described as .

Prefixes
Tips and notes
Though(aunque)English has words like undergo(someterse), ongoing(en marcha) or
rearrange(arreglar de nuevo), making new words from old ones is not a particularly productive way
of building the core(esencia) vocabulary in the English language. Russian has quite a number of
prefixes and suffixes routinely(rutinariamente) used in words, including those in your essential
vocabulary.
Such verbs have natural polysemy(polisemia) (in layman's(inexperto) terms: a handful(puado) of
somewhat(algo) related(relacionado) meanings). For example, means both "to gather(reunir),
to pick up(recoger)" (eg. flowers) and "to assemble(armar)" (eg. an IKEA chair). Both meanings
grow(aumentan) from the parts(partes) that comprise(comprende) the word: is "to take, to
pick(recoger)", and - adds a meaning of "togetherness(unin)".

Some prefixes
- has a rough(aproximado) meaning of re- or over(sobre)-doing, passing some limit or
extensively(extensamente) doing the action.
-/- often expresses action "outward(exterior)", scattering(esparciendo) or
splitting(enloqueciendo) apart(aparte) (physically or metaphorically). It also has a meaning of
inducing(induciendo) an "excited(emocionado)" state.
mimics(imita) its behaviour with verbs of motion and has a rough meaning of an action that
went past its intended(previsto) goal, "thorough(completo)" action or action that goes through(a
traves de) something (e.g. "to check(comprobar)", "to miss(perder); to
let through(dejar pasar)", "to fall though(fracasar) / to fail(fallar)")
It is important to understand that only a few prefixes are like , i.e. have a very focused meaning.
Most Russian prefixes behave similarly to English prepositions when you add them to English verbs as
particles. One's knowledge of English helps one guess what "turn up", "take off" or "run out" may
mean. However, you can never be sure without a dictionary or a context that makes the meaning
obvious (or you can ask someone to explain the word to you).

History & Fantasy

Tips and notes
!
The Russian "Long live the X" structure is an example of the high(elevado)-style 3rd-person
imperative. It sounds solemn(solemne) and is typical of old texts. One more example:
! = Let there be light(hagase la luz)!

 /
"A castle" and "a lock(cerradura)" are spelt(escribe) the same in Russian; only the stress(acento) is
different. Such use is a calque(calco) from German. Or rather WASin Polish. The Russian word for
"castle" is borrowed from Polish, hence(por lo tanto) its penultimate(penltimo) stress:
. = We finally took the castle.

.
Good and evil as concepts are and . If you want to describe a person or a deed(hecho) as
good or evil, use adjectives and .
The former(ex) used to mean "good" as in "not bad"; this is why you have . In modern
Russian this meaning is largely(en gran parte) gone(pasado).

A larger(grande) (in layman's(inexperto) terms) Christian church building is called a , which is

also a word for places of worship(rendir culto) belonging to other religions/belief(creencia) systems.

World War II
The Russian expressions for the two world wars of the 20th century are and
. In less official texts and speech they work just fine without :
. = This movie was filmed before World War II.

An Introduction to Participles
Tips and notes
A participle is a form of a verb used as an adjective:
I see a girl drawing a horse. = , .
Participles behave like adjectives, so they have the same set of endings and grammatical cases. The
difference is, you don't use a full participle as a predicate. Also, a participle phrase can
precede(precede) the noun, though(aunque) a usual position of such phrase is afterwards(despues):
.
They are generally considered characteristic of a bookish(estudioso) or formal style. It is why we are
only covering them briefly(brevemente) to get you familiar enough with the concept that you'll
recognise them when you bump(tropezar) into one when reading a text. This is really just a
glimpse(vislumbre) of what's therethe course would be incomplete without the participles but you
don't have to use them (and, in fact, you're better off not using them, at least when speaking).
Some participles have crystallized(convertido) into adjectives, too:
= a talking parrot(un loro que habla).

How To
Russian verbs have present and past participles, which can be either active or passive (only transitive
verbs can have passive participles, of course). These participles are formed from the verb's present stem
and the verb's past stem.
In the present tense, the suffix(sufijo) used depends on the conjugation. Here is the list of suffixes:

Here are some examples. Try to determine which kind of participle you see: , ,
, , , , , , ,
, , , , .
There are actual rules that cover which verbs get which past suffix. However, teaching the formation of
an arbitrary participle would be an overkill(exageracin) for this particular course. At this level, it is
enough that you are able(capaz) to identify them.
again, try to look at the list above(encima) and make sure you can understand the meaning of
each participle
Note that past passive participles ("a book that has been read") are only formed from perfective verbs
in modern Russian.

Short participles
Passive participles can be short, like adjectives, which is most useful for past participles. The agent, if
needed, is in the Instrumental (such a use sounds quite(bastante) formal):
( ) . = The dress was made in China.
( ) 1999 = This book was written in 1999.
. = The illustration was drawn by me.

Adverbial Participles
Tips and notes
An adverbial participle is a special form of the verb used to turn(convertir) a verb into an adverb, you
describe another action with it:
There are two types of adverbial participles in Russian:
Imperfective: "while doing(mientras se hace)"
Perfective: "having done(habiendo hecho)"
English generally doesn't have these expressions as a one-word form. In Russian participles and

adverbial participles are mostly used in books and when using a more formal style. However, there are
a few popular adverbial participles that get used in speech sometimes.
, . = I drew mountains and forests, thinking about home.
, . = Having entered the room, I switched the light on.

Formation
Not every verb has a participle. Still, here are the rules.
Imperfective adverbial participles are formed by adding the suffix - (or ) to the present stem:
, , , ,

Perfective adverbial participles are formed by adding one of the suffixes -, or -(obligatory for
reflective verbs), - (for stems ending in a consonant) to the infinitive stem:
, , , ,
,
If the stem ends in or , - is used instead:


Adverbial participles behave like adverbs, i.e. they only have one form.

Set expressions
Some of these words have crystallized(convertido) into popular expressions:
= judging by(a juzgar por)
= silently(silenciosamente)
X = X years later (bookish)

Science
Tips and notes
Ready to shoot(fotografiar) for the stars? Get in(entra)! Of course, we cannot teach you all of the
science in a handful(puado) of lessons. This skill focuses(se centra) on popular scientific concepts
like electricity, analysis or atom. It also gives you a taste(muestra) of some words typical of scientific
and educational style, so that you do not feel lost if you ever read an article.

?
This bookish word is often used to ask about the identity of some property(caracterstica):
? = What is the essence of the problem?
? = What is the mass of a proton?
? = What is the size of the universe?

 can be used in some of these sentences with careful rewording(redaccin) but generally it
will sound clumsy(torpe) unless(a no ser que) used for a numeric property:
? ?

"Data(datos)" is a plural-only word in Russian. Moreover(adems), it is a nominalised(nominalizado)
adjective, so its endings are just like the ones adjectives have.

This is, actually, one of the four prepositions normally used with the Prepositional case. It
roughly(aproximadamente) means "in the presence of", which does not have a good match(pareja) in
English. In scientific context we often use it to describe conditions or circumstances:
. = At that temperature, the gas expands
rapidly.
. = If the mass is increased, the pressure will
increase, too.
. = Under normal pressure, the effect is not
noticeable(perceptible).

Short adjectives
Some predicate adjectives are used quite(bastante) often in scientific writing and speech:
. = The Universe is enormous(enorme).
. = The time is very little.
. = The resistance is too large.

Politics and Government

Tips and notes
/
For a long time, had been the word for Russian police. Then, during the 2009-2011
reform(reforma) the name was changed to . The then becomes

Still, expect native speakers to use and in speech for quite a while(durante
bastante tiempo).

"Election(s)" is always plural in Russian.


Russian has a formal verb which means "to be". The verb is reflexive. Its use is
characteristic of formal writing and not necessary even there.
However, there are some contexts where it is hard to do without it. For example, if you have a
subordinate clause(oracin) or a verb phrase where "to be" is the main verb (omitting it does not work
well in this case):
A person that is not a politician, cannot understand this. = ,
, .
Or, well, you can use a participle if you are that formal. Here, you can also use a Dative impersonal
construction, which means about the same (eg.
):
, , .
, , .

-
You can use either - or a more colloquial word (which is
behaves(comporta) as a typical masculine noun)
Officially, Russia has no position under the name of "prime(principal) minister", however, the
Chairman(presidente) of the Government is commonly called a prime minister in speech and in media.
Which is why we teach it.

Spiritual and Supernatural

Tips and notes
A few cultural notes
Russian has two words for church, and .
is a more generic term and is used in contexts where "temple" would usually be used in
English.
(church) is a Christian place of worship(rendir culto), and also means the organization
itself. A smaller church building is more likely(probable) to be called , although(aunque) the
size is not the defining(definicin) factor (this is determined by the number of altars(altares) and what
the building has been traditionally called).
The Orthodox Church in Russia (and a few other countries) still uses the old Julian calendar for some
of its celebrations. As of 2015, there is a 13-day difference between the Julian and the Gregorian
(modern) calendar, so Christmas in Russia falls on January 7.
is pronounced //, which reflects(refleja) the older pronunciation of the letter ''. Its
oblique(indirectas) forms are pronounced normally.
Salat, a Muslim religious practice conducted(llevado a cabo) 5 times a day, is typically in
Russian. It is not a prayer(plegaria), by the way, which would be .

Ghosts
The word for a ghost(fantasma), , can act(actuar) as an animate or inanimate noun.
Ghosts are usually animate when you treat(tratar) them as characters(personajes). When you are talking
about ghosts as a phenomenon or in general, they are just as easily inanimate. The exact choice depends
on the speaker.
If you want to say "a ghost of something", use (it is otherwise a more serious word). In this
use the word is usually treated as inanimate (the word is also inanimate if the ghost is female):
. = I saw the ghost of the king.

Some Spoken Patterns

Tips and notes
This skill gives you a glimpse(vislumbre) of a few constructions common in speech and writing that are
outside formal style.

This word is the same as a predicative , used in constructions of non-existence and not having:
! = We got no time!

/
These are informal versions of affirmative "yes" (yep, yup). uses fricative(fricativo) sound,
similar to uh-huh. is actually pronounced the same way, just with your mouth closed, so its
spelling(ortografa) is just an attempt(intento) to imitate that "mm-hmm" sound.

)
While texting(mensajes de texto), Russian users often use smileys(emoticonos) without the "eyes". If
they are even more friendly than that or something is very funny, the number of brackets(parentesis)
might skyrocket(dispararse) ))))))

There are many ways to say "Crap(mierda)!" or "Jeez(por dios)!" in Russian. is, probably, the
most common in speech while being rather mild(apacible) (it is a substitute for a much stronger word).
is also very common and acceptable in a wide(amplio) range of contexts (and it is not
associated with more obscene words). It is what you will find in many movies and games, even those
aimed(dirigido) at kids.

Nothing Left
Tips and notes
This skill is about saying something like "I have nothing to fear(no tengo nada que temer)" or "There is
nothing to think about(no hay nada que pensar)". Russian has special impersonal constructions to do
just that; they make use of negative predicate pronouns.
They are all formed by adding a stressed(acentuar) to a corresponding question(interrogativa)
word, which should be either(cualquiera de los dos) "who"/"what" or an adverbial question word (e.g.,
"where").
Use Dative to specify a person for whom this applies:

. = I have nothing to read.

. = There is no one to look for here.(no hay nadie a quien buscar aqui)
. = We have nothing to lose.
. = She has nowhere(en ninguna parte) to sleep.
. = Vanya has no one to play with.
, . = I had thought such a problem has nowhere to
arise(surgir) from.

Note how the prepositions split(dividen) pronouns formed from and . Only a few "simple"
prepositions can do this, however:

. = I have no one to communicate with.

. = Nothing to worry about.
. = Nothing to wear to go out (about clothing).
. = Nothing to sleep on.

It is also useful(util) to stress(acentuar) that such pronouns are only formed from oblique(indirectas)
forms of and , since they never act(actuar) as a sentence subject. Words and
are not in this list; they actually behave as analogues of "-" and "-" in their base
forms, just of a higher style.
P.S.(posdata) does not produce such a pronoun. Neither do and

Crime and Justice

Tips and notes
proof(prueba) and evidence
Usually when we are talking about a body of evidence proving(demostrando) something, it is plural
(mathematical proof is still )
A piece of (material) evidence, a clue(pista) is also . We do not teach it here but a useful word
to know nonetheless(sin embargo).


The verb is the one you use to say someone "commited(cometio)" a crime. In general
language, it is also used in certain combinations like "to make a breakthrough(progreso)" or "to make a
discovery".

After a criminal has been found guilty(culpable), he or she is often sent to or put in jail as a
punishment(castigo). Russian uses the verb . Incidentally(incidentalmente), this is the same
verb that is used to say that you've planted a tree. Where English uses the verb 'to be', in Russian, a
person , literally 'sits in jail'.