Learn how to ask "Who?"
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| 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 the last lesson, we learned how to ask "When" questions in Bulgarian. |
| This time, we are going to ask questions with the interrogative word "Who?" |
| Imagine you want to ask your friend who the attractive girl just behind him is. |
| Here, a question you can ask is Кое е това момиче зад теб? |
| [slowly] Кое е това момиче зад теб? This means “Who is this girl behind you?” |
| So let’s break down this answer. |
| First we had - |
| Кое, which is the way we say "Who" in Bulgarian when we are speaking about a subject in neuter, because “girl” in Bulgarian is in neuter. |
| Е which is "is," the 3rd person form of the verb съм, which we have already studied. |
| Това момиче which means "this girl." |
| And finally зад теб which is "behind you." |
| This is the informal pronoun for "you." |
| Altogether, it is Кое е това момиче зад теб? |
| In Bulgarian, when we use "Who" to address a subject in masculine, we say Кой to ask about someone's identity. |
| For example, if you want to ask "Who is this man?" you will say Кой е този мъж? when talking about an unknown male person. |
| As in English, the interrogative word “Who” is placed in the 1st position here, and is followed by the verb and then the subject. |
| Кой only works for subjects in masculine, so if you want to ask information about things or people in feminine, you should use коя. As an interrogative word, коя can be used like this. For example, Коя е тази улица? |
| This means “Which street is this” and is a very useful phrase when you’re trying to find your way in Bulgaria. |
| If you are in a museum, for instance, you can ask Кои са тези хора на картината? This means "Who are those people in the painting?" Here, the interrogative word is in plural because we are talking about a group of people. |
| But if you want to ask "Whose pencil is it?" you will have to say На кого е този молив? |
| If we break down this question, it is - |
| На кого which is "whose", |
| Е which is the verb съм in the 3rd person singular form, |
| And finally, този молив, which means "this pencil." |
| You can also use the word кого from На кого in a slightly different formula to ask "for which person is it?" In Bulgarian, we use the formula За кого? |
| So if you want to know "For which person is this piece of cake?" It will be За кого е това парче торта? |
| Another interrogative formula that is used a lot is Чий? In this case, the meaning can again be translated to "Whose." |
| Now it’s time for Iva’s Insights. |
| If someone that you didn't expect is knocking at your door in Bulgaria, the common question you can ask is Кой е? before opening the door. |
| This literally means "Who is it?" But you have to be very casual in asking Кой е, because it is an informal expression. I recommend you say it with a cheerful tone, otherwise it will sound a bit rude! |
| Before ending this lesson, Let’s go back and look at all the ways to translate "Who" in Bulgarian – |
| - Кой коя кое кои are the basic "Who" as in Кой е този мъж? Коя е тази улица? Кое е това момиче зад теб? Кои са тези хора на картината? |
| - На кого is insisting on the ownership... it is the equivalent of "Whose", as in "Whose pencil is it?" На кого е този молив? |
| - За кого? which is the direct translation of "For whom?" As in "For whom is this piece of cake?" За кого е това парче торта? And... |
| - Чий? which is used in the same way as на кого, and means "Whose". |
| In this lesson, we learned how to correctly use the interrogative word for "Who" which is кой in Bulgarian, but also its variations. |
| Now you can easily know who is whom! And you’ve almost learned all the possible questions in Bulgarian! The next lesson will be our last of this absolute beginner series. And you might be wondering, is there another way to ask questions in Bulgarian? What if your Bulgarian friends ask you why you’re studying Bulgarian? |
| We will deal with this last but not least common interrogative word, защо, next time. I’ll be waiting for you in the next Български в три минути. |
| До скоро! |
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