Lesson Notes

Unlock In-Depth Explanations & Exclusive Takeaways with Printable Lesson Notes

Unlock Lesson Notes and Transcripts for every single lesson. Sign Up for a Free Lifetime Account and Get 7 Days of Premium Access.

Or sign up using Facebook
By clicking Join Now, you agree to our Terms of Use, Privacy Policy, and to receive our email communications, which you may opt out at any time.
Already a Member?

Lesson Transcript

Здрасти, аз съм Ива. Hi everybody! I’m Iva.
Welcome to BulgarianPod101.com’s “Български в три минути”. The fastest, easiest, and most fun way to learn Bulgarian.
In our previous lessons, we learned how to use the verbs съм and имам. In this lesson, we’re going to learn how to turn these two verbs into their negative forms in order to say "I'm not" and "I don't have."
So let's take an example. Imagine you are about to go to a party with a Bulgarian friend. You ask him if he is ready, and he answers Не, не съм готов, “No, I'm not ready.”
Then, you ask him if he has a car to use to go to the party and he says Не, нямам кола, which means “No, I don't have a car.”
Let’s look at these two negative sentences-
Не, не съм готов.
Не, нямам кола.
[slowly] Не, не съм готов./Не, нямам кола.
Did you catch some similar words in these two sentences?
Right! In each sentence, you have two words starting with н, first не and then ня in нямам. These are the special words used to make negative verb forms in Bulgarian.
So let's have a look at the way to switch from affirmative to negative.
First with the verb съм. If your friend *were* ready, he would say Готов съм, “I am ready.” But he actually said Не съм готов.
So basically, you just have to put the word не before the verb. Adding a Не at the beginning of the sentence is necessary because it’s the way Bulgarian people answer yes or no questions. So all together, it means “No, I am not ready”.
Now let's look at an example with the verb имам, "to have":
"I have a car" is Имам кола, and "I don't have a car" is Нямам кола.
But wait, this is a little different from the last version! The negation word не changes to ня and becomes attached to the verb. So имам becomes нямам.
But keep in mind – this is a specific case for this verb. Usually, Bulgarian verbs get the negative form by adding a simple не before the verb.
So now, how would you say "I don't like this restaurant?" For reference, “I like this restaurant.” is Харесвам този ресторант. Put не in front of харесвам and you have it! So the negative answer will be Не харесвам този ресторант.
[slowly] Не харесвам този ресторант.
And since it is a question, we would say “No, I don’t like this restaurant” which is the more natural way in Bulgarian and it sounds like this- Не, не харесвам този ресторант.
[slowly] Не, не харесвам този ресторант.
Easy, don't you think? So now you can turn many sentences into negative form just by adding the two little letters НЕ to the beginning of the sentence and in front of the verb.
Now it’s time for Iva’s Insights.
If you want to answer negatively but without being too direct, you can add the word много after the verb. This will mean "I don't really...."
So if you want to say "I don't really like cars," it will be Не харесвам много коли.
Do you know how to describe something you like or don’t like in Bulgarian? You will have to use adjectives! Get ready for the next lesson because we are going to study this really important part of the Bulgarian language - adjectives.
I’ll be waiting for you in the next Български в три минути.
До скоро!

Comments

Hide