Learn about the various uses of the question word hol, meaning "where," from an informal conversation between two friends on the street
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Simone: Hello everyone and welcome to Absolute Beginner, Season 1, Lesson 15: Do You Have any Brothers or Sisters in Hungary? I’m Simone. |
| Gergo: And I am Gergo. |
| Simone: In this lesson we’re going to learn “where”, “where to” and “where from.” |
| Gergo: The conversation takes place on the street. |
| Simone: And it is between Anne and Balázs. |
| Gergo: Since they are good friends now, they use the informal speech. |
| Simone: Please listen to the dialogue now. |
Lesson conversation |
|---|
| Balázs: Van testvéred? |
| Anne: Van egy nővérem és egy bátyám. És neked? |
| Balázs: Két húgom van. |
| Anne: Ők diákok? |
| Balázs: Az egyik diák, a másik dolgozik. |
| Anne: Hol dolgozik? |
| Balázs: Angliában. |
| English Host: Let's listen to the conversation one time slowly. |
| Balázs: Van testvéred? |
| Anne: Van egy nővérem és egy bátyám. És neked? |
| Balázs: Két húgom van. |
| Anne: Ők diákok? |
| Balázs: Az egyik diák, a másik dolgozik. |
| Anne: Hol dolgozik? |
| Balázs: Angliában. |
| With Translation |
| Balázs: Van testvéred? |
| Balázs: “Do you have any siblings?” |
| Anne: Van egy nővérem és egy bátyám. És neked? |
| Anne: “I have an older sister and an older brother. How about you?” |
| Balázs: Két húgom van. |
| Balázs: “I have two younger sisters.” |
| Anne: Ők diákok? |
| Anne: “Are they students?” |
| Balázs: Az egyik diák, a másik dolgozik. |
| Balázs: “One is a student, the other one works.” |
| Anne: Hol dolgozik? |
| Anne: “Where does she work?” |
| Balázs: Angliában. |
| Balázs: “In England?” |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Simone: I hear this conversation about working in England more often every year from my Hungarian friends. |
| Gergo: England and Ireland, certainly. These countries have relatively lax immigration policies towards Eastern Europeans. Hungarians have been going there since the country joined the EU in 2004. |
| Simone: Otherwise you don’t hear much about Hungarian immigrants. |
| Gergo: No, it seems that Hungarians aren’t too keen on leaving the country. There was of course a huge emigration during the two world wars and later during the communist era, but nothing like the number of Irish or Polish immigrants. |
| Simone: This seems to have changed though. There is someone in England from every family nowadays. |
| Gergo: Right. A lot of young people will do any kind of work, if they have a chance to learn English and enjoy higher salaries. Also, the economic hardships hit Hungary hard in the past decade. |
| Simone: Think of it this way: our listeners can bump into Hungarians in more places now. All right, let’s do the vocab list. |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Gergo: testvér |
| Simone: “sibling” |
| Gergo: test-vér |
| Gergo: testvér |
| Gergo: nővér |
| Simone: “older sister” |
| Gergo: nő-vér |
| Gergo: nővér |
| Gergo: báty |
| Simone: “older brother” |
| Gergo: báty |
| Gergo: báty |
| Gergo: húg |
| Simone: “younger sister” |
| Gergo: húg |
| Gergo: húg |
| Gergo: diák |
| Simone: “student” |
| Gergo: di-ák |
| Gergo: diák |
| Gergo: egyik |
| Simone: “one” |
| Gergo: e-gyik |
| Gergo: egyik |
| Gergo: másik |
| Simone: “the other” |
| Gergo: má-sik |
| Gergo: másik |
| Gergo: dolgozik |
| Simone: “work” |
| Gergo: dol-go-zik |
| Gergo: dolgozik |
| Gergo: neked |
| Simone: “to you, for you, as far as you’re concerned” |
| Gergo: ne-ked |
| Gergo: neked |
| KEY VOCABULARY AND PHRASES |
| Simone: What are we talking about first? |
| Gergo: Siblings. We’ve heard four words, which cover all genders and ages, but the very word “sibling” or testvér is also often used. Van testvéred? |
| Simone: “Do you have any brothers or sisters? / Do you have a sibling?” Repeat please. |
| Gergo: Van testvéred? |
| Simone: Let’s hear all the possible siblings now. First “older brother.” Please repeat. |
| Gergo: Báty. 2X |
| Simone: “Younger brother.” |
| Gergo: Öccs. 2X |
| Simone: “Older sister.” |
| Gergo: Nővér. 2X |
| Simone: “Younger sister.” |
| Gergo: Húg. 2X |
| Simone: All right, I hope you guys will remember all of these. |
| Gergo: Some of these are also used outside the context of family. For example, try repeating this: Öcsém! |
| Simone: “My God!” |
| Gergo: Öcsém! This means something like “my god is this good/terrible.” The actual literal translation is “my younger brother.” |
| Simone: A very useful phrase to have. |
| Gergo: Hungarians don’t use the other siblings to refer to anyone else but the actual siblings. Calling each other those sounds weird, even if your intentions are good and even if you call good friends brothers or sisters in your culture. |
| Simone: However there is one exception. |
| Gergo: True. The abbreviated form of testvér, or “sibling” is often used between males nowadays. |
| Simone: Please repeat. |
| Gergo: Tesó. Tesó. |
| Simone: This is similar to guys calling each other “‘bro” in English. Please repeat. |
| Gergo: Szevasz tesó. Szevasz tesó. |
| Simone: “Hi, ‘bro.” |
| Gergo: One more word we learn from the vocab list. Neked. It can be used in several ways. One is the meaning “for you, to you.” |
| Simone: How do you say: “I’ll give you a present.” |
| Gergo: That’s a good example to convey this meaning. Please repeat: Adok neked egy ajándékot. Adok is “I’ll give” and egy ajándékot is “a present.” |
| Simone: All right. Repeat please. |
| Gergo: Adok neked egy ajándékot. In our lesson, it was used in a different way. It is sometimes used to give extra emphasis to the changed subject of the similar question. |
| Simone: What? |
| Gergo: Balázs said: Neked van testvéred? This means: “Do YOU have any siblings?” You asked me before, now I’m asking you. |
| Simone: Repeat, please. |
| Gergo: Neked van testvéred? |
| Simone: And if we don’t want to give emphasis to this? |
| Gergo: Than you go back to the previous pattern: Van testvéred? |
| Simone: “Do you have any siblings?” |
| Gergo: Van testvéred? |
| Simone: All right, let’s do some grammar. |
Lesson focus |
| Simone: In this lesson, we’re going to learn how to ank questions that can help you find out the location of something. |
| Gergo: We start by repeating the sentence: Hol dolgozik? |
| Simone: “Where does she work?” Repeat. |
| Gergo: Hol dolgozik? |
| Simone: Give us another useful example. “Where is my wallet?” |
| Gergo: Hol van a pénztárcám? Pénztárcám is “my wallet.” |
| Simone: Repeat please. |
| Gergo: Hol van a pénztárcám? |
| Simone: So hol is where. |
| Gergo: Right. But Hungarian question words have more than one form. For example, there is a different one for “where from?” |
| Simone: I remember that: honnan? Please repeat after Gergo. |
| Gergo: Let’s do a whole sentence. Sometimes Hungarians like to ask “where are you coming from?” when they bump into you on the street. Please repeat: Honnan jössz? |
| Simone: This also means “where are you from?” |
| Gergo: Yes, although this is asked less often in Hungarian, as you remember from our first lesson. I’ll repeat it anyway. Honnan jössz? |
| Simone: Give us another example, please. |
| Gergo: It is also customary to ask about other people’s personal items using “where is it from” if you like. |
| Simone: Like in English. “I like your bag. Where is it from?” |
| Gergo: Tetszik a táskád. Honnan van? |
| Simone: “I like your bag. Where is it from?” |
| Gergo: Tetszik a táskád. Honnan van? |
| Simone: There is one last now, if I guess right, “where to?” |
| Gergo: Hmm. Hova or hová. The two pronunciations make no difference. |
| Simone: We’ve heard a few examples with hová before, but let’s hear a few more ready-made sentences. |
| Gergo: Hová megy ez a busz? |
| Simone: “Where is this bus going to?” |
| Gergo: Hová megy ez a busz? |
| Simone: Nice, I’ve wanted to ask this countless times before. |
| Gergo: It’s good to know where you’re going. |
| Simone: SO the three question words we had today were “where from?” Gergo will say them twice, you should do the same too. |
| Gergo: Honnan? 2X |
| Simone: “Where?” |
| Gergo: Hol? 2X |
| Simone: And “Where to?” |
| Gergo: Hova/ Hová? 2X |
| Simone: All right, that’s it for this lesson then. |
| Gergo: Make sure you check out our lesson notes online as well. |
| Simone: And please come back next time. Bye. |
| Gergo: Sziasztok. |
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