I came to Romania, and I don’t know anything about the language. My natural language is Turkmen, and while Turkmens use a Latin-based alphabet, the languages are entirely different. I can’t even properly read the letters. So, I don’t know anything about the Romanian language or even the alphabet. It will be a really good challenge learning Romanian.
I am creating these tutorials because I believe there are lots of people who want to learn the Romanian language and understand its culture, traditions, and art. I will discuss the kinds of problems I face and how I overcome those challenges. At the end of the challenge, we will see how far we have come. Perhaps finding a Romanian mate for myself will be an interesting aspect of this journey.
So, on the first day, I tackled the alphabet. I compared every letter to mine and noticed some similarities. Romanian, being a Latin-origin language, reads its letters as they are written, much like Russian. The Romanian alphabet comprises 31 letters, with 27 used for native words. The remaining 4 letters (K, Q, W, and Y) are exclusively found in words borrowed from other languages, such as Kilogram, Kilometru, Quinet, watt, Washington, yoga, and New York.
Similar to English, Romanian exhibits various sound pronunciations for combinations of letters. For instance, ‘ce’ is pronounced as ‘che,’ ‘ci’ becomes ‘chi,’ ‘ghe’ turns into ‘ge,’ ‘ghi’ transforms into ‘gi,’ ‘che’ is pronounced as ‘ke,’ ‘chi’ as ‘ki,’ ‘ge’ as ‘je,’ and ‘gi’ as ‘ji.’ There seems to be a magical quality in vowels like ‘e’ and ‘i’ in Romanian. Isn’t it?
Exploring further, I discovered the presence of diphthongs in the Romanian language. No need to worry — I counted them. There are 22 diphthongs. But hold on, we’re not done yet. There are also triphthongs, though not many — only 6 of them. The intricacies of the Romanian language continue to unfold!
So, the words come into play. I’ve picked up a few essentials like hello and goodbye:). “Buna dimineața” — “Good morning,” “Buna ziua” — “Good afternoon,” “Buna seara” — “Good evening,” and “La revedere.” These are the words we need in daily life.
After that, I delved into Subject Pronouns and “A Fi” — the verb “to be.” In Romanian, ‘to be’ has forms similar to English, depending on the pronoun. However, additional forms come into play based on whom you are referring to. In Romanian, “eu, tu, el, ea, noi, voi, ei, ele” correspond to “I, you, he, she, we, you (plural), they (referring to a crowd of men, and men and women), they (referring only to women)” in English. The form of “a fi” changes according to the pronoun, like “I am, you are, he is, she is, we are, you are, they are” -> “eu sunt, tu ești, el este, ea este, noi suntem, voi sunteți, ei sunt, ele sunt.”
In the Romanian language, there are also polite forms for nearly every word. For instance, when addressing someone politely, “tu” is replaced with “domnul/dna” (Mr./Ms.) or “domnișoară” (Miss), as mentioned earlier. This change extends to the form of “a fi,” becoming “sunteți.” Similar to English, to form a negative sentence, we add “nu” to the beginning. However, note that “nu” is used differently than in English.
Afterward, I delved into Subject Pronouns and “A Fi,” the verb “to be.” In Romanian, ‘to be’ takes forms similar to English, depending on the pronoun. However, there are additional variations based on the reference. In Romanian, “eu, tu, el, ea, noi, voi, ei, ele” correspond to “I, you, he, she, we, you (plural), they (referring to a crowd of men and men and women), they (referring only to women)” in English. The form of “a fi” changes based on the pronoun, like “I am, you are, he is, she is, we are, you are, they are” -> “eu sunt, tu eshti, el este, ea este, noi suntem, voi sintetsi, ei synt, ele synt.”
In Romanian, polite forms are prevalent for almost every word. For instance, when addressing someone politely, “tu” is replaced with “domnvoastre.” As mentioned earlier, the form of “a fi” adapts to “suntetsi.” Just like in English, to form negative sentences, we simply add “nu” to the beginning, with “nu” translating to ‘not’ in English.
After learning pronouns, I discovered that Romanians don’t use subject pronouns in normal daily sentences. So sad :-(. You can understand this from the verb forms, I think, though I haven’t mastered it yet. In the Romanian language, there’s also gender differentiation in words, making the language quite challenging. Depending on the gender, the forms of nouns and verbs change. There are three genders in the Romanian language: Masculine, Feminine, and Neuter, resembling Russian. Why is this language so complex? It’s okay; we don’t judge. This is their language, their culture, their tradition. We will focus on learning the language only.
Furthermore, depending on the gender, singular and plural forms of words also change — another piece of bad news. So keep your mind fresh and clean. We have a lot of work and a lot of words to remember.
I also learned numbers, which are not similar to English, but we can handle it. “1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10” is “[un (masculine), o (feminine)], [doi (masculine), două (feminine)], trei, patru, cinci, șase, șapte, opt, nouă, zece.” Pretty good, right? :-). Now, here comes the tricky part: numbers bigger than 10 follow a rule. “11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19” are “unsp rezece, [doisprezece (masculine), douăsprezece (feminine)], treisprezece, paisprezece, cincisprezece, șaisprezece, șaptesprezece, optsprezece, nouăsprezece.” As grammar suggests, there is a rule for making numbers bigger than 10: “cardinal number + SPRE + ZECHE,” but in 14 and 16, the rule breaks because it does not sound good, I have read. Maybe it is the reason Romanian people speak fast, I don’t know. Just remember :).
The best way to learn numbers is by writing them down a few more times to get the hang of it. So, these are the things I have learned today. I listened to the sounds several times to get them right. For me, it was challenging, which is why I asked my friend to read them for me and check if my spelling was correct or not. After that, I made her mad :-). I wrote down the grammar and differentiated the types. Learning in this way is easy for me. Most of you are visual learners or auditory learners, but I am most likely a kinesthetic learner, which is why I love writing down and then practicing. This is all for today. Thanks for your attention and your valuable time. See you on Day #2.
