I have heard that language both reflects and affects a culture's way of thinking before, but never really understood what it meant until I tried to teach my husband the Russian language.
My husband once asked me, how you do you say fun in Russian?. I thought I had a brain freeze, because I was not able to translate it even though I knew exactly what "fun" meant. After thinking about it for awhile I realized that there is simply no such word in Russian. The closest phrase to "having fun" which I could translate was "having a good time".
Russians do know how to have a grand time, but the word "fun" is completely a different thing.
One time I was making a joke and my husband smiled at me and mentioned that I was silly. I was very offended (even though I didn't tell him right away). There is no such concept in Russian language as silly. Well, there is but it means stupid and trite. Definitely not something you want to hear from your loving husband. Later I understood that "silly" means some sort of "funny", but I still get uncomfortable when someone calls me or my kids silly. Even though I've lived here for 7 years, I still don't understand why "silly" has a positive meaning, because every dictionary I have translates it as "glupyi", which means "stupid".
Other words which are widely used in English and do not exist in Russian are "privacy", "challenge", "personal check" and "siblings".
Russians don't understand the concept of privacy the way Americans do, so they don't even have a word for it. It is normal for a wife to read her husband's email, or to open his wallet; it is normal in many families to enter each others rooms without knocking or even listen to each others conversations over the phone (I come from such a family).
And to make matters a little more confusing for Westerns, the word "private life" in Russian means your love life.
I am not certain why the words "challenge" and "siblings" do not exist in our Russian language., but "personal check" (even though it can be translated but will not have the same meaning) is hard to translate because for the most part Russians use cash to pay for all their purchases, rarely credit cards, but almost never personal checks.
Although, if you travel to Russia and want to cash personal checks, it can be done. You need to be aware though that it can take you up to several weeks to do it, so unless you are staying in Russia for more than a few months, it is not worth it. International travel checks are a better option. You can also use ATM machines in Russia, but make sure to find out whether or not there are any in the city you are traveling. If you are going to a bigger city, it wouldn't be a problem, but smaller cities and villages may not have any ATM machines or any banks which can help you cash your check.
Another word which is not translatable is "shopping". Until I came to the United States I never thought that shopping could be a hobby. Here, every second female I meet says she loves "shopping". The closest phrase to the word "shopping" in Russian language is a phrase "making purchases" or "going to make purchases" which is used when someone is going shopping.
No doubt there are plenty of words in Russian which don't exist in English (many of which don't exist simply because of the American culture being different), but I will get back to those in my future articles.
My husband once asked me, how you do you say fun in Russian?. I thought I had a brain freeze, because I was not able to translate it even though I knew exactly what "fun" meant. After thinking about it for awhile I realized that there is simply no such word in Russian. The closest phrase to "having fun" which I could translate was "having a good time".
Russians do know how to have a grand time, but the word "fun" is completely a different thing.
One time I was making a joke and my husband smiled at me and mentioned that I was silly. I was very offended (even though I didn't tell him right away). There is no such concept in Russian language as silly. Well, there is but it means stupid and trite. Definitely not something you want to hear from your loving husband. Later I understood that "silly" means some sort of "funny", but I still get uncomfortable when someone calls me or my kids silly. Even though I've lived here for 7 years, I still don't understand why "silly" has a positive meaning, because every dictionary I have translates it as "glupyi", which means "stupid".
Other words which are widely used in English and do not exist in Russian are "privacy", "challenge", "personal check" and "siblings".
Russians don't understand the concept of privacy the way Americans do, so they don't even have a word for it. It is normal for a wife to read her husband's email, or to open his wallet; it is normal in many families to enter each others rooms without knocking or even listen to each others conversations over the phone (I come from such a family).
And to make matters a little more confusing for Westerns, the word "private life" in Russian means your love life.
I am not certain why the words "challenge" and "siblings" do not exist in our Russian language., but "personal check" (even though it can be translated but will not have the same meaning) is hard to translate because for the most part Russians use cash to pay for all their purchases, rarely credit cards, but almost never personal checks.
Although, if you travel to Russia and want to cash personal checks, it can be done. You need to be aware though that it can take you up to several weeks to do it, so unless you are staying in Russia for more than a few months, it is not worth it. International travel checks are a better option. You can also use ATM machines in Russia, but make sure to find out whether or not there are any in the city you are traveling. If you are going to a bigger city, it wouldn't be a problem, but smaller cities and villages may not have any ATM machines or any banks which can help you cash your check.
Another word which is not translatable is "shopping". Until I came to the United States I never thought that shopping could be a hobby. Here, every second female I meet says she loves "shopping". The closest phrase to the word "shopping" in Russian language is a phrase "making purchases" or "going to make purchases" which is used when someone is going shopping.
No doubt there are plenty of words in Russian which don't exist in English (many of which don't exist simply because of the American culture being different), but I will get back to those in my future articles.
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