Sziasztok, Lívia vagyok. Hi everybody! I’m Livia. |
Welcome to HungarianPod101.com’s “Magyar nyelvleckék három percben”. The fastest, easiest, and most fun way to learn Hungarian. |
In the last lesson, we learned how to ask "When" questions in Hungarian. |
This time, we are going to ask "Who" questions. |
Imagine you want to ask your friend who the girl just behind him is. |
Here, the question you can ask is Ki az a lány mögötted? |
[slowly] Ki az a lány mögötted? |
So let’s break down this question. |
First we had: |
Ki, which is the basic translation of "Who" in Hungarian. |
az a lány means "that girl." |
And finally mögötted which is "behind you." |
Altogether, it is Ki az a lány mögötted? |
So in Hungarian, "Who" is mainly translated as Ki . |
However, if you want to ask "Who are these people?" you will have to use the plural kik and say Kik ezek az emberek? |
As in English, the question word “Who” is placed in the 1st position here. |
Ki only works for people, so you can't use it to ask information about animals, things or places. As a question word, Ki can also be used to ask who did something, for example. |
If you are in a museum for instance, you can ask Ki festette ezt a képet? This means "Who painted this painting?" |
Another question formula with Ki that is used a lot is Kié? In this case, the meaning is "Whose." |
So if you want to ask "Whose pencil is this?" you will have to say Kié ez a ceruza? |
If we break down this question, it is- |
Kié, which is "whose", |
and ez a ceruza, which means "this pencil." |
If you want to ask "with whom" in Hungarian, we use the word Kivel? |
So if you want to ask "Whom are you going to the party with?" it will be Kivel mész a buliba? |
Before ending this lesson, let’s go back and look at all the ways to translate "Who" in Hungarian: |
- Ki is the basic "Who" as in "Who is that that girl?" Ki az a lány? |
- Kié is referring the ownership; it is the equivalent of "Whose", as in "Whose pencil is this?" Kié ez a ceruza? |
- Kivel, is the literal translation of “with whom”. As in “Whom are you going to the party with?" Kivel mész a buliba? |
Now it’s time for Livia’s Tips. |
If someone that you didn't expect is knocking at your door in Hungary, the common question you can ask is Ki az? before opening the door. |
This literally means "Who is it?" It’s the most common way to ask, so don’t worry about not sounding polite. |
In this lesson, we learned how to correctly use the word for "Who", which is Ki in Hungarian, and also its variations. |
The next lesson will be our last of this absolute beginner series. |
We will deal with the last but not least common question word Miért, which means “why.” |
Do you know how to inquire about reasons in Hungarian? We’ll be talking about it in the next Magyar nyelvleckék három percben lesson. Sziasztok! |
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