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- "Do we have rice or tea here?"
"Do we have rice or tea here?"
Translation:Здесь у нас рис или чай?
24 Comments
1663
Is the inclusion of есть an error? Duo says so, but obviously, it's technically not wrong, since it's understood but elided. Are there any rules for inclusion/exclusion, or is it just something we have to pick up on as we learn more?
I'm assuming that Duo began with есть present in the у....есть... format so we would get familiar with it, but is now dropping it to show what actual Russian conversation is like.
Three ideas from https://russian.stackexchange.com/questions/15225/when-can-i-omit-the-word-есть:
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When English would use a definite article, omit есть (and vice versa).
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Keep есть for a statement/ an admission; omit it for a notification/warning. eg у меня есть пистолет and у меня пистолет! Can anyone offer more examples?
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"With numerals the word ectb is generally omitted."
It is not incorrect, but "здесь" is the basic word for "here" in Russian, whereas "тут" is indeed a bit more informal. Besides, in the more literal sense "здесь" means "here" as in this area, and "тут" is more like in this particular spot, but that does not mean that you can't use either in both meanings.
Regarding the position of adverbs in a sentence, my PONS cheatsheet for Russian says tgat, generally,
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Adverbs for determining when and where (time and place) are positioned at the beginning of a sentence.
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Adverbs elaborating on how a verb is carried out (manner) are positioned in front of that verb.
These usage patterns are particular to adverbs. More generally, words that you want to emphasize are put at the end(!) of a sentence.
So I think that if we didn't follow tge general rule of thumb for adverbs, instead pkacing здесь at the end of the sentence, then we'd thus emphasize the the rice is here, rather than elsewhere.
So how would the meaning change if we stuck здесь in the middle of the sentence, eg in front of the verb?
1000
Because the existence of those objects is not the main idea in the sentence. You don't want to know if you have them, you want to know if you have them THERE (that's why здесь goes first)