Learn how to talk about periods of time
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Becky: Hello and welcome back to BulgarianPod101.com. This is Lower Beginner, season 1, lesson 22 How Long Are You Staying in Bulgaria? My name is Becky. |
| Iva: Zdravei I’m Iva! |
| Becky: In this lesson you'll learn how to talk about periods of time in Bulgarian. |
| Iva: The conversation takes place on the street. |
| Becky: It’s between Maria and James. |
| Iva: As we know already, they are friends, so their speech is informal. |
| Becky: Let’s listen to the conversation. |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Becky: So James and Maria are talking about getting home on public transport. |
| Iva: But since we’ve talked in a previous lesson about public transport in Sofia, let’s look at taxi companies and fares and so on instead. |
| Becky: Here are also some tips about using taxis in Bulgaria. |
| Iva: Taxis can be found at taxi ranks in towns and resorts, or ordered by phone. |
| Becky: At Sofia airport and other places there are a number of ‘unofficial’ taxis operating, normally using unmarked vehicles. |
| Iva: You will know who they are because they’re more proactive in approaching you, just as you leave the terminal rather than you having to beckon them. |
| Becky: They will also normally charge more! |
| Iva: All official taxi cabs in Bulgaria are painted yellow with an official fare meter installed. |
| Becky: They operate with daytime and nighttime rates –from 6.00 a.m. to 10.00 p.m. (daytime) and from 10.00 p.m. to 6.00 a.m. (night time). |
| Iva: You also have to pay an additional fee if you order one on the phone. The average rate is BGN 0.30 – BGN 0.45 per kilometer. |
| Becky : Remember also to always check the table of fares before you get in the cab. Now let’s move on to the vocab. |
| KEY VOCAB AND PHRASES |
| Becky: Let’s take a closer look at the usage of some of the words and phrases from this lesson. |
| Iva: The first one is “Късно”. |
| Becky: It’s a Bulgarian adverb meaning “late”. |
| Iva: If you want to say “It’s too late” in Bulgarian, it’s “Твърде късно е.” |
| Becky: The opposite adverb, “early” is… |
| Iva: “рано”. |
| Becky: Can you repeat them again for our listeners, please? |
| Iva: “Късно” [pause]. And “рано”[pause]. |
| Becky: OK. What’s important to remember here? |
| Iva: Note that the adjective for “early” has a slightly different form: “ранен” for the masculine, “ранна” for the feminine, “ранно” for the neuter and “ранни” for the plural. |
| Becky: Ah, we have double “n” there! |
| Iva: Yes. Our next word is “Искам”. |
| Becky: This is a Bulgarian verb meaning “to want”. |
| Iva: Here’s how you conjugate it: “искам” - “I want”; “искаш” - “you want”; “иска” - “he/she/it wants”; “искаме” - “we want”; “искате” - “you want”; “искат” - “they want”. |
| Becky: OK. What’s the last word? |
| Iva: “Скъп” |
| Becky: An adjective meaning “expensive”. |
| Iva: That’s right. “Inexpensive” is “не скъп” - we just add one “no”, “не” at the front of the word - and “cheap” is “евтин”. |
| Becky: Please note here that the word “darling” for men and women comes from the same adjective as “expensive”. |
| Iva: Yes. So “скъпи” (for men) and “скъпа” (for women) are also commonly used in Bulgarian. |
| Becky: That’s interesting! Now let’s move on to the grammar. |
| GRAMMAR POINT |
| Becky: In this lesson, you’ll learn how to ask about durations or periods of time in Bulgarian. In the same way as in other languages, Bulgarian has specific expressions for talking about periods of time. |
| Iva: One of them is this: “За колко време ~” and then an action or process. |
| Becky: This means “(For) how long ~” and then an action or process. |
| Iva: For example, “За колко време стигаш до работа?” which means “How long does it take (you) to go to work?” |
| Becky: Can you repeat that for our listeners, Iva? |
| Iva: “За колко време стигаш до работа?”[pause] |
| Becky: “How long does it take (you) to go to work?” |
| Iva: In this question, we have the preposition “за” first, which means “for”, “to”, “of”, “about”, “towards”, and so on. But in this case, it basically means “for” as in “for how long”. |
| Becky: Then we have the adverb “колко” meaning “how”, “how much”, “how far”, and so on. |
| Iva: After that we add the noun “време” which in this case means “time”. |
| Becky: Its other meaning is “weather”, which of course is not correct here. |
| Iva: Finally, we add the action we are asking about. As in the example “стигаш до работа”, in English, “(you) go to work”. |
| Becky: We had this question in the dialogue, right Iva? |
| Iva: Yes. Maria asked James “за колко време ще останеш в София?” |
| Becky: This sentence means “How long are you staying in Sofia?” Now this was how to ask in an informal way. If you need to ask your boss, or an elderly person, or many people, you have to use the plural form of the verb in the last part of this sentence. |
| Iva: So for example “За колко време ще останете в града?” is a polite way to ask the question… |
| Becky: In English that’s “For how long are you going to stay in the city?” |
| Iva: That’s right. |
| Becky: When you ask this type of question about periods of time, you usually have answers like “two weeks” or “several days” or “a few hours”. |
| Iva: These examples in Bulgarian are “две седмици”, “няколко дни”, “няколко часа” respectively. |
| Becky: OK. Listeners, repeat the examples after Iva! |
| Iva: “две седмици” “two weeks” [pause], “няколко дни” “several days” [pause], “няколко часа”; “a few hours” [pause]. |
| Becky: What should we remember here? |
| Iva: There is one common word, “няколко” which means “few”, “a couple of”, “several”. |
| Becky: Yes. You can remember it as a useful vocabulary word to reply to this question. |
| Iva: And as always, checking the lesson notes will also help. |
Outro |
|---|
| Becky: OK, That’s it for this lesson! |
| Becky: Thanks for listening, everyone! |
| Iva: See you next time! Bye-bye! |
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