Learn how to use the definite article in Bulgarian
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Matt: Hello and welcome back to BulgarianPod101.com. This is Beginner, season 1, lesson 19 - Learning How to Make a Pizza in Bulgaria. My name is Matt. |
| Tina: Hello. And I’m Tina! |
| Matt: In this lesson, you'll learn how to form the definite article in Bulgarian. |
| Tina: The conversation takes place at a pizzeria. |
| Matt: It’s between Kiril and his boss. |
| Tina: They use informal speech, which is typical for a working environment like this. |
| Matt: Okay, let’s listen to the conversation. |
Lesson conversation |
|---|
| Началник: И така, първо слагаш основните съставки... |
| Кирил: Добре... |
| Началник: После добавяш настъргания кашкавал... |
| Кирил: А соста? |
| Началник: Сосът? Сосът се слага най-накрая, по желание на клиента. |
| Кирил: Разбрано. |
| Matt: Let’s hear the conversation one time slowly. |
| Началник: И така, първо слагаш основните съставки... |
| Кирил: Добре... |
| Началник: После добавяш настъргания кашкавал... |
| Кирил: А соста? |
| Началник: Сосът? Сосът се слага най-накрая, по желание на клиента. |
| Кирил: Разбрано. |
| Matt: Now let’s hear it with the English translation. |
| Началник: И така, първо слагаш основните съставки... |
| Matt: So first you put on the main ingredients... |
| Кирил: Добре... |
| Matt: OK... |
| Началник: После добавяш настъргания кашкавал... |
| Matt: Then you add the grated cheese... |
| Кирил: А соста? |
| Matt: And the sauce? |
| Началник: Сосът? Сосът се слага най-накрая, по желание на клиента. |
| Matt: The sauce? The sauce is put on at the end, by the customer's request. |
| Кирил: Разбрано. |
| Matt: Understood. |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Matt: In this dialogue, Kiril and his boss were having a conversation while working. Tina, what are work relationships like in Bulgaria? |
| Tina: For part-timers, these kinds of work relationships are more free than those in a corporate office among full time staff. But on the other hand, there’s less responsibility to the job. |
| Tina: In the conversation, you can sense that Kiril’s boss is quite strict and uses very direct words to describe what Kiril must do. |
| Matt: But they also speak using informal language. |
| Tina: That's right - it’s common in Bulgaria. In a more formal situation, at a big company or a governmental institution, people would usually use formal language and address each other using family names. |
| Matt: Among colleagues who are friends though, first names are usually used. |
| Tina: That’s right. Trust and support are very highly valued among Bulgarians, so work colleagues often hang out together outside of work and go on team-building trips. |
| Matt: Okay, now let’s move on to the vocab. |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Matt: Let's take a look at the vocabulary for this lesson. |
| : The first word we shall see is: |
| Tina: основен [natural native speed] |
| Matt: basic, main |
| Tina: основен [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Tina: основен [natural native speed] |
| : Next: |
| Tina: съставка [natural native speed] |
| Matt: ingredient |
| Tina: съставка [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Tina: съставка [natural native speed] |
| : Next: |
| Tina: добавям [natural native speed] |
| Matt: to add |
| Tina: добавям [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Tina: добавям [natural native speed] |
| : Next: |
| Tina: настърган [natural native speed] |
| Matt: grated |
| Tina: настърган [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Tina: настърган [natural native speed] |
| : Next: |
| Tina: кашкавал [natural native speed] |
| Matt: kashkaval cheese. |
| Tina: кашкавал [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Tina: кашкавал [natural native speed] |
| : Next: |
| Tina: сос [natural native speed] |
| Matt: sauce |
| Tina: сос [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Tina: сос [natural native speed] |
| : Next: |
| Tina: слагам [natural native speed] |
| Matt: to put |
| Tina: слагам [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Tina: слагам [natural native speed] |
| : Next: |
| Tina: клиент [natural native speed] |
| Matt: client |
| Tina: клиент [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Tina: клиент [natural native speed] |
| : And Last: |
| Tina: разбран [natural native speed] |
| Matt: understood |
| Tina: разбран [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Tina: разбран [natural native speed] |
| KEY VOCAB AND PHRASES |
| Matt: Let’s take a closer look at the usage of some of the words and phrases from this lesson. |
| Tina: We’ll start with “И така”. |
| Matt: This is a Bulgarian conjunction meaning “so” and “now then”. When it’s used as an adverb, it means “thus”, “anyways”, or “accordingly”. |
| Tina: In the dialogue, it’s used at the beginning of a sentence as a conjunction meaning “so”. |
| Matt: Could you repeat it, Tina? |
| Tina: Of course, “И така”. |
| Matt: Ok. What's next? |
| Tina: Next is, “По желание” |
| Matt: This phrase means something like “by client’s request”. Can you break down this phrase, Tina? |
| Tina: The first word, “по”, is a preposition meaning “by” or “on”. And the second word, “желание”, is a noun meaning “wish”, “desire”, or “will”. |
| Matt: Great, so altogether, it means… |
| Tina: “По желание” |
| Matt: And finally, the third word for this lesson is… |
| Tina: “Най-накрая” |
| Matt: This adverb means “finally” or “at the end”. It’s used when we describe the order of some activities like first, second, third, and “finally” |
| Tina: And it’s in the superlative form since it has the prefix “най-“. |
| Matt: Okay, now onto the grammar. |
Lesson focus |
| Matt: In this lesson, you’ll learn how to form definite articles in Bulgarian. |
| Tina: In the dialogue, Kiril and his boss are discussing how to make pizza and what order to put ingredients on it. |
| Matt: But Kiril mistakenly uses the definite article of a noun and then his boss corrects him. |
| Tina: So first, let’s look at how to correctly use the definite article in Bulgarian. |
| Matt: First of all, we should recognize that in Bulgarian, the definite article is a suffix. |
| Tina: It’s added to the end of a word and changes according to the word’s function in the sentence. |
| Matt: And for some genders of nouns, it’s quite easy to make mistakes and use the indefinite article when the definite one is necessary. |
| Tina: But in this dialogue, Kiril uses the wrong gender form for the word “sauce”, which is соста in Bulgarian, and so it sounds quite unnatural. |
| Matt: Let’s take a look at the rules for nouns, their genders, and their definite and indefinite article forms. |
| Tina: For the singular forms, masculine nouns end in “-ът” or “-ят” when they are the subject in the sentence, and end in “-a” or “-я” when they are the object. For example, “клиент”/client turns to “клиентът” or “клиента”. |
| Matt: Alright, so we have to be careful with these. How about the feminine nouns? |
| Tina: In either case, feminine nouns end in “–та.” The neuter too, in either case, will end in “-то.” |
| Matt: I see, what about the plural forms? |
| Tina: The plural forms are actually even easier. Both masculine and feminine nouns always end in “-те”, regardless of the function of the word in the sentence. |
| Matt: I see. That sounds easier than the others. |
| Tina: Neuter words, also regardless of the function of the word in the sentence, end in “-та” in all cases. |
| Matt: Then what was wrong in our dialogue? |
| Tina: When Kiril said “соста”, he turned the originally masculine word “сос” into a feminine-like word, in its definite article form as the subject of the sentence. |
| Matt: So what’s the correct form? |
| Tina: The word “сос” is masculine, so the definite article form for when it’s used as a subject is “сосът”. |
| Matt: Could you repeat that for our listeners? |
| Tina: The original word is “сос”, and it becomes “сосът.” |
| Matt: And another example? |
| Tina: Дъждът донесе дъга. |
| Matt: Which means “The rain brought a rainbow.” |
| Matt: And this uses the definite article form? |
| Tina: That’s right. Дъждът is from the word Дъжд. Дъжд is the word for “rain”, and it’s in the masculine. |
| Tina: There really are endless examples of this usage. |
| Matt: And because we cannot say them all here… |
| Tina: You can check some of them in the lesson notes! |
Outro |
| Matt: Well, that’s all for this lesson everyone! |
| Tina: See you next time, “Чао-чао!” |
| Matt: Thanks for listening, bye! |
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