55 Comments
It literally asks "where do the groceries lie?", right?
edit: grammar edit2: grammar again
66
Sorry, friend, but you are confusing the verb "to lay" with the verb "to lie." To lay is a transitive verb, meaning to put something down, and requires a direct object, as in, the chicken lays a egg. To lie, meaning how something is situated, is an intransitive verb and does not use a direct object. The proper usage here would be, "...where do the groceries lie?" Confusing lie and lay is probably the most common English usage error to be found today. But better usage here would be simply... where are the groceries?
And to make things even more confusing, "lay" can also be the past tense of "to lie," as in, "When I lay down last night..." And this is not to be confused with "laid" as in "I laid the groceries on the table."
In fact, I can't think of a situation where I'd prefer to say "Где лежат продукты?". I think I'd always say just "Где продукты?".
- 262
Depends on the situation. In general, both phrases are interchangeable, but "Где продукты?" has a wider meaning. For example, if you came home and found all food are eaten (by somebody), you can wonder "где продукты?", or "где все продукты?". But if you just can't find them, you also might ask "где продукты?", or "где лежат продукты"?
In another example I saw лежит instead of лежат. What is the difference? Or is this simply a glitch in the course?
- 745
'Goods' should be accepted too. This is only one sentence and it's hard to find the right translation, because 'продукты' are not only groceries, they can also be fruits, vegetables, materials, any kind of products, I suppose.
I agree with olimo. In this context 'goods' and 'products' are not interchangeable. 'Goods' are more like "товары", "продукция" (which is different from "products"), "материалы".
In other words, in Russian if the word "Продукт" is not specified (i.e. "продукт производства", "продукт переработки" etc), it's almost always a grocery product.
- 1738
Opposite to "produce" (as a noun), "merchandise" is more broad than "groceries". "Groceries" refers to food items while "merchandise" includes goods that are not food items (such as clothing or electronics). Also, "merchandise" isn't really used outside of a business context, and not generally when someone is speaking of their shopping.
- 1738
No, "produce" as a noun in English is more specific than groceries. There is a produce section in large grocery stores that sells food items that are perishable. (See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Produce for a longer explanation.) Groceries also include non-perishable food items.
Someone refresh me...Is there a spelling rule against the plural of продукт ending with и, or is this just how it's spelled?
- 816
For the nominative plural, words ending in a consonant (masculine) most commonly take ы to be plural.
Words ending in a consonant can also take а or я, but I have in my cheater chart, "Less common." As far as I know, I have yet to encounter a masculine consonant-end noun in the Duolingo course which has taken а or я to be plural.
However, words ending in г, к, х, ж, ч, ш, or щ always take и to be plural.
Do not worry, you will certainly encounter masculine nouns taking a stressed -а/-я as the ending. From the top of my head, I can name a few:
- дом → дома́ "houses
- а́дрес → адреса́ "addresses"
- лес → леса́ "forests"
- учи́тель → учителя́ "teachers"
- до́ктор → доктора́ "doctors"
- профе́ссор → профессора́ "professors"
- про́вод → провода́ "wires"
- по́езд → поезда́ "trains"
- дире́ктор → директора́ "directors, heads of companies"
- глаз → глаза́ "eyes", рог → рога́ "horns", берег→берега́ "shores, banks" (has to do with former dual number forms)
In professional speech, ве́ктор→вектора́ is common (for science guys), you can encounter до́говор→договора́ (in the speech of lawyers and accountants; до́говор is itself non-standard—догово́р is the usual form people use). Also, бухгалтер→бухгалтера́, тре́нер→тренера́.
Much as I know what the standard form is, it is hard for me to use векторы as the plural because I never heard anyone use it—and I heard so many who use вектора!
Друг, брат, стул, муж, сын are sort of irregular and also end in -я in plural: друзья́, бра́тья, сту́лья, мужья́, сыновья́ (note that the stress is not on the ending for some of them).
- 816
This is helpful; I had not realized that дом becomes дома. Thanks for the list of examples, including the irregular nouns.
- 816
How is, "Where lie the groceries?" wrong
There is nothing technically incorrect with the way you have phrased it. However, it does sound quite archaic, so I would not expect Duolingo to ever accept it.
When forming a question about the location of something or someone, I would recommend something along the lines of, "Where is x [lying]? Where are y [lying]?"
When forming a question about the current state of an object or person (present continuous), I notice that in English, we frequently use "is" and "are" as helping-verbs to the main verb of the sentence. When forming a question about something that habitually occurs (present simple), we frequently use "do" or "does" as helping verbs.
- Present continuous: Where are they going [right now]? Present simple: Where do they go on Mondays/Tuesdays/holidays? Archaic-sounding: Where go they?
- Present continuous: Who are they talking to [right now]? Present simple: Who do they talk to in IT [when they have a question about how to reboot their computers before calling IT]? Archaic-sounding: several possible versions including, Who speak they to?
- Present continuous: Why is she singing [right now while I'm eating?] Present simple: Why does she sing [so often - is she preparing for a career in music]? Archaic-sounding: I can't even mentally form this without disused versions of "you" and "sing."
There will of course be exceptions - sometimes we use "do" and "does" when we refer to something that is occurring or could be hypothetically occurring in this present moment, such as with thought.
"I don't love you anymore." "Gasp! What do you mean?" (Note - I myself would never use the present-continuous verb "meaning" - "What are you meaning?" - this sounds very strange to my ear, and I am struggling to think of an instance where I would ever say that, even when speaking in a rush. For whatever reason, "What do you mean?" is the best-sounding use of this particular verb in a question-sentence. I reserve the word "meaning" for use as a noun, as in, "The meaning of the Russian word щи in English is pure, unadulterated joy in a bowl.")
"What does Mom think about hang-gliding from the kitchen roof? Would I be in trouble?" [Answer for the curious: yes, and she will tell Dad. :( ]
Вопросительное слово - вспомогательный глагол - подлежащее - сказуемое. Where are the groceries lying?
- 1050
How would you say "Where are there groceries?" Is that a synonym? Maybe it's just from the "there is" assumption, but they seem similar, though with slightly different context. Without articles, it's difficult for me to know (yet I suppose) when things are talking about specifics (e.g. "the groceries I know of") and something more open ended ("where can I find groceries?")
This is a good question. Also, how much does inflection change sentences like this? Inflection can make "there are" into "are there?".
Couldn't it be just Где продукты? I'm just asking because I typed in "Where are the groceries?" and it was marked correct.
Он лежит (singular)
Они лежат (plural)
See the complete conjugation below:
http://cooljugator.com/ru/%D0%BB%D0%B5%D0%B6%D0%B0%D1%82%D1%8C
Whats the connotative difference betwedn стоит, лежит, and --- (is or are). They seem somewhat interchangable.
The verbs стоять and лежать are literally "stand" and "lie".
Стоит is generally used for "standing", for vertical position (including an object leaning against something). It is also used for stable, upright position if an objects is designed to have one—basically, if it has a base or legs (e.g., chairs, plates, cups, microphone stands, boxes). So a plate can "stand" on the table and also "stand" vertically in a cupboard.
Лежит is used for "lying", for upset or random orientation. If an object has a stable "preferred" upright orientation but is positioned otherwise, we also use "лежит". For example, a plate or a bowl put upside down can be described as "тарелка/миска лежит" (plates are rather stable even upside down but aren't indended to be used that way). A book can "lie" flat on a desk or "stand" vertically on a shelf.
The verb лежать is often used for objects "kept" somewhere (though, upright orientation will trigger "стоять" for things like milk or cups).
is produce acceptable for produkty?
Anyone else not have audio for this? Other parts to this lesson work just fine, but there seem to be a few where there is no audio. I tried multiple different browsers and two different computers, and I have no audio...
