Learn how to use the neuter gender in Modern Greek nouns
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Fay: Hello, and welcome back to GreekPod101.com, Beginner Season 1, Lesson 5 - Oh, This Is Greek Lunch! Fay here. |
| Chrissi: And I’m Chrissi. |
| Fay: What are we learning in this lesson? |
| Chrissi: We are looking at the neuter gender and see how it is used with Greek nouns. |
| Fay: The conversation takes place at Kostas and Danai’s house. |
| Chrissi: It’s between Petra, Danai, and Eleni, Kostas, and Danai’s teenage daughter. |
| Fay: Since the characters are friends, the conversation is in informal language. |
| Chrissi: Let’s listen. |
Lesson conversation |
|---|
| Πέτρα Γκόρντον: Ω, όλα αυτά για μένα; |
| Δανάη Παπαδοπούλου: Μπα, δεν είναι τίποτα. Είναι το κανονικό μας φαγητό. |
| Ελένη Παπαδοπούλου: Ναι, καλά. Δύο σαλάτες, τρία κύρια πιάτα και τέσσερα διαφορετικά ορεκτικά! Αυτό δεν είναι το κανονικό μας φαγητό! |
| Δανάη Παπαδόπουλου: Δε σου αρέσει, Ελένη; |
| Ελένη Παπαδοπούλου: Όχι, όχι μου αρέσει. Απλώς λέω... |
| Fay: Now for the slow version. |
| Πέτρα Γκόρντον: Ω, όλα αυτά για μένα; |
| Δανάη Παπαδοπούλου: Μπα, δεν είναι τίποτα. Είναι το κανονικό μας φαγητό. |
| Ελένη Παπαδοπούλου: Ναι, καλά. Δύο σαλάτες, τρία κύρια πιάτα και τέσσερα διαφορετικά ορεκτικά! Αυτό δεν είναι το κανονικό μας φαγητό! |
| Δανάη Παπαδόπουλου: Δε σου αρέσει, Ελένη; |
| Ελένη Παπαδοπούλου: Όχι, όχι μου αρέσει. Απλώς λέω... |
| Fay: Now with the English translation. |
| Πέτρα Γκόρντον: Ω, όλα αυτά για μένα; |
| Fay: Oh, all this for me? |
| Δανάη Παπαδοπούλου: Μπα, δεν είναι τίποτα. Είναι το κανονικό μας φαγητό. |
| Fay: Oh, this is nothing. It's our regular meal. |
| Ελένη Παπαδοπούλου: Ναι, καλά. Δύο σαλάτες, τρία κύρια πιάτα και τέσσερα διαφορετικά ορεκτικά! Αυτό δεν είναι το κανονικό μας φαγητό! |
| Fay: Yeah, right – two salads, three main dishes, and four different appetizers. This is not our regular meal! |
| Δανάη Παπαδόπουλου: Δε σου αρέσει, Ελένη; |
| Fay: You don't like it, Eleni? |
| Ελένη Παπαδοπούλου: Όχι, όχι μου αρέσει. Απλώς λέω... |
| Fay: No, no, I like it. I'm just saying... |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Fay: Oh, come on! This can’t be “a regular meal”! |
| Chrissi: You will be surprised at the lengths a Greek family will go to for a guest. |
| Fay: So if I get invited to a Greek home for dinner… |
| Chrissi: …expect to leave with a severe case of dyspepsia! There will probably be some meat, much bread and a huge choriatiki salad with tomatoes, feta cheese, olives, onion, cucumber olive oil and oregano. And probably french fries (tiganites patates). |
| Fay: But people don’t eat like that every day, do they? |
| Chrissi: Not as a rule. And families don’t eat all together anymore—except on Sundays or holidays. |
| Fay: What time do Greeks eat lunch? |
| Chrissi: Pretty late; even on Sundays most families eat at about two or three in the afternoon. |
| Fay: Wow! And dinner? |
| Chrissi: Not before ten. |
| Fay: I already feel hungry! Shall we move on to our vocabulary? |
| Chrissi: Of course! |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Fay: First, we have… |
| Chrissi: τίποτα [natural native speed]. |
| Fay: Nothing. |
| Chrissi: τίποτα [slowly - broken down by syllable]. τίποτα [natural native speed]. |
| Fay: Next… |
| Chrissi: κανονικό [natural native speed]. |
| Fay: Regular, normal. |
| Chrissi: κανονικό [slowly - broken down by syllable]. κανονικό [natural native speed]. |
| Fay: Next… |
| Chrissi: φαγητό [natural native speed]. |
| Fay: Food; meal. |
| Chrissi: φαγητό [slowly - broken down by syllable]. φαγητό [natural native speed]. |
| Fay: Next… |
| Chrissi: καλά [natural native speed]. |
| Fay: Well; good. |
| Chrissi: καλά [slowly - broken down by syllable]. καλά [natural native speed]. |
| Fay: Next… |
| Chrissi: σαλάτα [natural native speed]. |
| Fay: Salad. |
| Chrissi: σαλάτα [slowly - broken down by syllable]. σαλάτα [natural native speed]. |
| Fay: Next… |
| Chrissi: διαφορετικά [natural native speed]. |
| Fay: Different. |
| Chrissi: διαφορετικά [slowly - broken down by syllable]. διαφορετικά [natural native speed]. |
| Fay: Next… |
| Chrissi: αρέσει [natural native speed]. |
| Fay: To like. |
| Chrissi: αρέσει [slowly - broken down by syllable]. αρέσει [natural native speed]. |
| Fay: Next… |
| Chrissi: όχι [natural native speed]. |
| Fay: No. |
| Chrissi: όχι [slowly - broken down by syllable]. όχι [natural native speed]. |
| Fay: Next… |
| Chrissi: λέω [natural native speed]. |
| Fay: To say. |
| Chrissi: λέω [slowly - broken down by syllable]. λέω [natural native speed]. |
| KEY VOCABULARY AND PHRASES |
| Fay: Let's have a closer look at words and phrases in this lesson. What does Μπα (Mpa) mean? |
| Chrissi: It doesn’t mean anything; it’s like “nah” in English. But it is used all the time in Greek. |
| Fay: In what situations? |
| Chrissi: When you want to dismiss something, but in a casual way. For example, if you ask me whether I’m doing anything special on Saturday night, I could say Μπα, τίποτα. (Mpa típota). Try it, it’s easy. Μπα, τίποτα. (Mpa típota). |
| Fay: That means “Nah, nothing,” right? |
| Chrissi: Yes. Or if you ask me whether it looks like it will to rain tomorrow, I could say Μπα, δεν πιστεύω (Mpa, den pisteuo). You guys listening, try this too. Μπα, δεν πιστεύω (Mpa, den pisteuo). |
| Fay: Which means “Nah, I don’t think so,” yes? |
| Chrissi: Exactly! |
| Fay: Also, I see that in a couple of our sample sentences, we used a future tense. Isn’t that too advanced? |
| Chrissi: It is a little advanced; that’s why we are not going to elaborate on it. But there is one very basic thing to remember about future tenses in Greek. |
| Fay: Right. So let’s go on to our regular grammar. |
Lesson focus |
| Fay: What do we have for the focus of this lesson? |
| Chrissi: We continue with genders, especially… |
| Fay: The neuter gender, which is not only used for objects. |
| Chrissi: No, no, no! It *is* always used for objects. Whenever we hear the definite article το (to) or the indefinite article ένα (ena), we know it is an object we are talking about. |
| Fay: Good! So no problem there? |
| Chrissi: No. |
| Fay: Do we have any other indication that the noun we are talking about belongs to the neuter gender? |
| Chrissi: We can also take a look at the ending. If a word ends in "-o" or "-i" (spelled with the Greek (yota) which is like the English “i” but without the dot), it is probably a neuter noun. |
| Fay: We should remind our listeners that we are talking about the singular nominative case! |
| Chrissi: Right! |
| Fay: Can we give some examples of neuter nouns? |
| Chrissi: Sure! |
| Fay: Let’s start with some common household items: “the table.” |
| Chrissi: Το τραπέζι (To trapezi). Repeat after me. Το τραπέζι (To trapezi). |
| Fay: “The window.” |
| Chrissi: Το παράθυρο (To parathyro.) Το πα-ρά-θυ-ρο (To pa-ra-thy-ro). |
| Fay: “The pencil.” |
| Chrissi: Το μολύβι (To molyvi.) Το μο-λύ-βι (To mo-ly-vi). |
| Fay: “The pen.” |
| Chrissi: Το στυλό (To stilo). Το στυ-λό (To sti-lo). Which is actually a foreign word, but now it’s considered Greek. |
| Fay: “The scissors.” |
| Chrissi: Το ψαλίδι (To psalidi.) This is a little tricky because of the "ps" sound. Το ψα-λί-δι (To psa-li-di). |
| Fay: All these end in "-i" and "-o". |
| Chrissi: Yes. |
| Fay: And you used the definite neuter article το (to). |
| Chrissi: Yes. I can also use the indefinite neuter article ένα (ena). |
| Fay: Some examples would be? |
| Chrissi: Ένα τραπέζι (Ena trapezi) “a table”, ένα παράθυρο (ena parathyro) “a window”, ένα μολύβι (ena molyvi) “a pencil”, ένα στυλό (ena stilo) “a pen”, and ένα ψαλίδι (ena psalidi) “a pair of scissors”. |
| Fay: Nice. Shall we leave it at that for this lesson? |
| Chrissi: I think so, yes. Don’t forget to check our PDF –there are many more examples of neuter nouns and some very interesting points about the Greek language in there! |
| Fay: Yes, be sure to check it out! Bye-bye! |
| Chrissi: Γεια χαρά! (Geia chara!) |
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