Turkish/I am...

You want to describe yourself but you don't know how? Well then, learn! Beginning Can you understand the following passage? Benim adım Bob. Ben İngiltereli bir mimarım. Kısa boylu ve biraz şişman bir adamım. Kızıl saçlı ve mavi gözlüyüm. Benim hobilerim okumak, basketbol oynamak ve uyumak. Any idea what he said? No? Well, then, let's get cracking! There's a translation at the bottom of the page, but please wait until the end of the lesson! Learning how to describe yourself The only way you can really do this is to learn the appropriate vocabulary you could use to describe yourself. Let's start learning! Physical traits The colors With the modern-day conveniences of hair dye and colored contact lenses, we can now have all sorts of different hair and eye colours. Therefore, we need to learn how to say the colors in Turkish before we can start describing physical aspects of ourselves. Let's start with the most common hair colors. If you are having any trouble reading them, highlight them with your mouse: kahverengi – brown açık kahverengi – light brown koyu kahverengi – dark brown siyah – black Ben siyah saçlıyım – I am black-haired Benim siyah saçlarım var – I have black hair sarı – yellow sarışın – blond(e) (person) kır – gray (Note: kır would only be used to describe hair or eye colors, otherwise you would use gri (grey)) kırmızı – red ...and eye colors: All of the above, plus: açık kahverengi – hazel (Lit. light brown) mavi – blue Ben mavi gözlüyüm Benim mavi gözlerim var – I have blue eyes yeşil – green kehribar – amber menekşe – violet siyah – black karagöz – an expression (more like a compliment) used to describe someone with dark eyes Now let's learn a bunch of random colors: turuncu – orange (color) pembe – pink mor – purple beyaz – white Please note: yüz – face, göz – eye, and saç – hair. Grammar note Forming plurals From the examples above, you may have noticed the word gözler. Well, this is the plural form of the word göz. It's actually very easy to form plurals in Turkish. All you have to do is add lar or ler (depending on the vowel harmony) to a singular noun in order to pluralize it. There are some examples below: Turkish singular nounEnglish translationTurkish pluralized formEnglish translationçocukchildçocuklarchildrenbalonballoonbalonlarballoonsçiçekflowerçiçeklerflowerskalempenkalemlerpens The genitive case In other words, the grammatical form of saying something belongs to someone. In Turkish, it's slightly different from English, but if you think about it, actually quite a bit easier. Let's take a look at the following phrase: Benim topum – My ball To construct this phrase, you take ben (meaning I or me) and add -im to it. The second part of this is to take the object (in this case top) and add one of the following to the end of it: -m (e.g. çantam – my bag, lalem – my tulip) -ım (e.g. sırtım – my back) -im (e.g. kalemim – my pen) -um (e.g. okulum – my school) -üm (e.g. gülüm – my rose) PersonlaleBenimlalemSeninlalenOnunlalesiBizimlalemizSizinlalenizOnlarınlalesi Now that we know these two things, let's carry on! Your body Here are some basic phrases to describe your or someone else's looks and physique. boy – height uzun (boylu) – tall (Note: Uzun can also mean long. If the person you're talking to understands the context of the conversation, then you can just say uzun. However, if they don't, it would be a good idea to say uzun boylu). kısa (boylu) – short Ben kısa boyluyum – I am short orta (boylu) – average (height) form – figure şişman – fat Ben şişmanım. – I am fat. zayıf – thin Jobs Unfortunately due to the massive number of jobs out there, we can't go through the entire list. Instead, I will just list the most common. doktor – doctor Ben doktorum – I am a doctor mühendis – engineer öğretmen – teacher hemşire – nurse tesisatçı – plumber kapıcı – janitor Lit. doorman sekreter – secretary borsa tellalı – stockbroker garson – waiter bayan garson – waitress bayan means woman dilbilimci – linguist dil means tongue or language avukat – lawyer politikacı – politician öğrenci – student emekli olmak – to be retired işsiz olmak – to be unemployed Cultural note I put doctor and engineer on the list first for a specific reason. In Turkey, particularly amongst poor families, parents attempt to raise their offspring to be either doctors or engineers, as doctors and engineers in Turkey earn a lot of money (I would know this, because my family friend is married to a wealthy engineer). I'm not saying that to be wealthy in Turkey, you must be either a doctor or an engineer (Turkey's billionaires aren't, either), I'm merely explaining a common stereotype. Where are you from ... Here is a short list of the countries of the world and how to say someone is from a certain country. For a longer list see here. Country name (EN)Country name (TR)Demonym (EN)Demonym (TR)20pxTurkeyTürkiyeTurkishTürk20pxAustraliaAvustralyaAustralianAvustralyalı20pxCanadaKanadaCanadianKanadalı20pxEnglandİngiltereEnglishİngiliz20pxGermanyAlmanyaGermanAlman20pxIndiaHindistanIndianHintli20pxIrelandİrlandaIrishİrlandalı20pxNew ZealandYeni ZelandaNew ZealandYeni Zelandalı20pxPakistanPakistanPakistaniPakistanlı20pxPhilippinesFilipinlerFilipinoFilipinli20pxScotlandİskoçyaScottishİskoç20pxUnited KingdomBirleşik KrallıkBritishBritanyalı20pxUnited States of America (USA)Amerika Birleşik Devletleri (ABD)AmericanAmerikalı20pxWalesGallerWelshGalli (Siz) nerelisiniz? – Where are you from? (Ben) Avustralyalıyım. – I am from Australia. See? Simple! Hobbies Sports Use oynamak (to play): futbol – soccer (Yup, just like the other Europeans!) Amerikan futbolu – American football beyzbol – baseball basketbol – basketball tenis – tennis eskrim – fencing voleybol – volleyball golf – golf Use yapmak (to do/make): boks – boxing karate – karate judo – judo tekvando – taekwondo Use kullanmak (to use): bisiklet – bicycle Use etmek (to do): dans – to dance Other: yüzmek – to swim halter yapmak – to lift weights Grammar note Before you can use the set of words above, you need to know their auxiliary verbs. Unlike French, auxiliary verbs are used almost all of the time. However, there are only a couple you will need to learn, and in most cases you will be able to tell which one to use. In this case, they are the following: oynamak (to play), yapmak (to do/make), kullanmak (to use), and etmek (to do). Try not to get yapmak and etmek confused. Below are their verb conjugations: to play 20px20px oynamakI playBen oynuyorumYou (sing.) playSen oynuyorsunHe/she playsO oynuyorWe playBiz oynuyoruzYou (pl.) playSiz oynuyorsunuzThey playOnlar oynuyorlarto do 20px20px yapmakI doBen yapıyorumYou (sing.) doSen yapıyorsunHe/she doesO yapıyorWe doBiz yapıyoruzYou (pl.) doSiz yapıyorsunuzThey doOnlar yapıyorlarto use 20px20px kullanmakI useBen kullanıyorumYou (sing.) useSen kullanıyorsunHe/she usesO kullanıyorWe useBiz kullanıyoruzYou (pl.) useSiz kullanıyorsunuzThey useOnlar kullanıyorlarto do 20px20px etmekI doBen ediyorumYou (pl.) doSen ediyorsunHe/she doesO ediyorWe doBiz ediyoruzYou (pl.) doSiz ediyorsunuzThey doOnlar ediyorlar Hopefully you will have noticed a pattern amongst these verbs. This is true of all verbs in Turkish, as unlike in most other languages, there are no irregular verbs. They all follow the same pattern. All that really matters is that you recognize the vowel harmony. I have color-coded those verbs in accordance to the above vocab. For example, futbol and oynamak are both red, therefore to say "to play football" in Turkish, you say "futbol oynamak". The sentence structure is as follows: Ben futbol oynuyorum – I play football. Turkish is a S-O-V (Subject-Object-Verb) language. So, in this case, Ben, which is the subject, goes first, then the object, futbol, goes second, and lastly the verb, oynuyorum, goes last. This is true in all cases, no exceptions. Ah, by the way, yes, there is something strange with etmek. You will see why it is like this below. Non-sportive activities televizyon izlemek/seyretmek – to watch television okumak – to read film izlemek/seyretmek – to watch movies dışarı çıkmak – to go out fotoğraf çekmek – to take photos Benim hobim fotoğraf çekmek. – My hobby is to take photos. alışveriş yapmak – to go shopping Grammar note Although I have already given you the verbs for the non-sporting activities, let's conjugate them just in case you still haven't worked out the verb patterns. to watch 20px20px izlemekI watchBen izliyorumYou (sing.) watchSen izliyorsunHe/she watchesO izliyorWe watchBiz izliyoruzYou (pl.) watchSiz izliyorsunuzThey watchOnlar izliyorlarto watch 20px20px seyretmekI watchBen seyrediyorumYou (sing.) watchSen seyrediyorsunHe/she watchesO seyrediyorWe watchBiz seyrediyoruzYou (pl.) watchSiz seyrediyorsunuzThey watchOnlar seyrediyorlarto read 20px20px okumakI readBen okuyorumYou (sing.) readSen okuyorsunHe/she readsO okuyorWe readBiz okuyoruzYou (pl.) readSiz okuyorsunuzThey readOnlar okuyorlarto go out 20px20px çıkmakI go outBen çıkıyorumYou (sing.) go outSen çıkıyorsunHe/she goes outO çıkıyorWe go outBiz çıkıyoruzYou (pl.) go outSiz çıkıyorsunuzThey go outOnlar çıkıyorlarto take (a photo) 20px20px (fotoğraf) çekmekI take (a photo)Ben (fotoğraf) çekiyorumYou [sing.] take (a photo)Sen (fotoğraf) çekiyorsunHe/she takes (a photo)O (fotoğraf) çekiyorWe take (a photo)Biz (fotoğraf) çekiyoruzYou [pl.] take (a photo)Siz (fotoğraf) çekiyorsunuzThey take (a photo)Onlar (fotoğraf) çekiyorlar Finding the pattern If you haven't found the pattern already, let me explain it to you: To say, for example, I read, in Turkish, you would take the stem of okumak, which is oku- (the stem is the part of the infinitive preceding -mak or -mek), then add any of the following: -yorum for I -yorsun for you (singular) -yor for he/she -yoruz for we -yorsunuz for you (plural or polite) -yorlar for they In our case, we would pick -yorum. After adding this on, you get okuyorum! See, simple! However, what if the stem ends in a consonant. Let's take an example from the verbs above: seyret-. Seyret- + -yorum doesn't work because it just doesn't sound natural. To remedy the situation, you add an auxiliary vowel after the stem, which depends on the vowel harmony of it (in this case it would be i). So: seyret- + -i- + -yorum = seyretiyorum. This thing about the vowel after the stem applies to all verbs with stems that end in consonants, but remember, the auxiliary vowel always depends on the vowel harmony of the stem. But... Wait a minute. Seems like I have skipped something. Seyretiyorum is not correct! You must have noticed in the verb etmek (to do), that when conjugated, it doesn't exactly follow the whole stem rule. That's because something we call the softening of consonants. Sounds confusing? It's not at all! Now, let's take et-. Add the -i and the -yorum. What do you get? Etiyorum. But that doesn't sound nice! (Yes, according to Turkish speakers.) So in order for it to sound nice, you take the t at the end of "et-" and make it "d". That's because it is followed by a suffix which begins with a vowel. And as a result, our correct conjugation is ediyorum. Sensible, right? Two other verbs like this are tatmak (to taste) and gitmek (to go). Conveniently, they follow exactly the same pattern as etmek, and conjugate to tadiyorum, gidiyorsun, etc. And of course, I have not forgot seyret-. And... It becomes seyrediyorum! By the way, it would be a good idea to know that the verb çekmek on its own means to pull away. Here it goes... So, you've learnt everything you need to both translate that passage and to give a basic description of yourself. Translation The translation of that passage is below: 1px solid #aaaaaa; border-bottom:1px #aaaaaa solid; Translation padding:0.5em 1em; My name is Bob. I am an architect from England. I am a short and slightly fat man. I have red hair and blue eyes. My hobbies are to read, play basketball and sleep. So let's work through it, one step at a time. This is the layout of this translation: Original Turkish phrase – Literal English translation with original sentence structure – Proper English translation OK, let's get translating! Benim adım Bob – My name Bob – My name is Bob Ben İngiltereli bir mimarım – I England-from an architect-am – I am an architect from England Kısa boylu ve biraz şişman bir adamım – Short heighted and slightly fat a man I am – I am a short and slightly fat man. Kızıl saçlı ve mavi gözlüyüm – Red haired and blue eyed I am – I have red hair and blue eyes. Benim hobilerim okumak, basketbol oynamak ve uyumak(-tır). – My hobbies to read, basketball to play and to sleep. – My hobbies are to read, play basketball and sleep. See? It wasn't so hard! You just have to remember that the sentence structure in Turkish (Subject Object Verb) is different from English (Subject Verb Object). Review So, what have we learnt this lesson? Well, we have learnt... ...colors. ...how to form plurals in Turkish. ...the genitive case. ...how to describe one's physique. ...basic jobs. ...the countries of the world, and how to say something belongs to a certain country. ...hobbies (and their auxiliary verbs). ...sentence structures. ...verb patterns. AND MOST IMPORTANTLY ...how to describe yourself! nl:Turks/Les 2