"Когда я далеко от дома, я о нём думаю."
Translation:When I am far from home, I think about it.
187 CommentsThis discussion is locked.
Ive been crying over this language for 10 years. It doesnt get better. I love it anyway.
Yes. Theoretically «о нём» can refer to another masculine noun mentioned before (probably even to some male person), but since we don't have much context it's most likely «дом» 'home'.
It could, but that depends on the context. As the sentence stands is not the case.
Has it just me or has this section just dumped a load of new stuff on us from nowhere??
Not just you, I feel the same. There was a nice flow of new words that was easy to retain up until around this point. I think a lot of the words should have been introduced in basic form earlier (ie basics 3,4,5 and so on).
It did. Try taking the Korean course though, right from the start they dump five different ways to say several different phrases all at once, it's a nightmare.
Couldn't ней be used too? "When I am far from home, I think about her"? It's kind of impossible to know when you need to translate it.
"Дом" can't be feminine but we can say "я думаю о ней" when we mention a feminine person/animal left in home. For example, "у меня дома маленькая дочь, когда я ухожу далеко от дома, я всегда думаю о ней".
Ah, I thought that it referred to a different object than the home, such as a cat (When I'm far from home, I think about her (the cat, mum, grandmother). Thanks a lot!
In english the stuff that have genders is usally limited to people. It is not rare tho, that you can put a gender on a thing like a house or a ship and refer to it by it, like "she is fast" referring to an specific ship. But in other languages there is already a gender for all words, house дом is masculine, so you can't refer to it as she. In russian you have masculine, femenine and neutral genders.
«О» is used with prepositional when it means 'about, concerning, on, of'.
When it means 'against, (up)on' (би́ться голово́й о сте́ну 'bang one's head against the wall', опере́ться о сте́ну 'lean against the wall'), it requires accusative.
«О» can be used with both prepositional case and accusative case. The case changes the meaning:
- «О» + prepositional case means 'about, concerning, on'.
- «О» + accusative means 'against'.
Please see my comment here for examples: https://www.duolingo.com/comment/11680483$12529243
I think he means that you accidentally said "accusative" twice in your first post, even for the 'about,concerning, on, of' usage.
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Ah, the lead with the сюки вспомнил о нацумэ sentence. Intriguing examples stick to the memory.
In this sentence, "дом" is in the prepositional case. Why then doesn't it have the ending ~e?
It is genitive, not prepositive. Genitive of masculine nouns ending in consonant ends with -a.
I answered the English as "When I am far from home, I think about HIM." and the app accepts it as correct. I noticed его is either him or it...
Becuase is a gendered language. All words have a gender, which in english is not the case. его, is only referring to him, but as english doesn't use gender for things the correct translation should be it, not him. But since this is meant to be educative is not wrong to also refer as to him although in English it doesn't make a lot of sense.
- о чём = about what, it's either interrogative (О чём ты думаешь? What are you thinking of?) or relative pronoun (Я думаю, о чём тебе рассказать. I'm thinking about what I should tell you.),
- о нём = about him (it not neccessarily refers to a living person, it can refer to any masculine noun).
You must have confused "от" with "о/об". "От"(= 'from') is a classical case where the Genitive case is required. No exceptions.
It sucks that duolingo doesn't always kbow that you dont have to say я думаю. Думаю means the same
Yes and no. In this particular case, omitting "я" puts an emphasis on "о нём". Thus the sentence without the second я means "It is him who I think about when I am far from home".
It won't work. The stove = плита (она), so, in that case, я думаю о ней.
Two reasons are possible: (1) in your sentence, 'it' does not necessarily refer to your home, and (2) there should be no comma before 'when'
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Yeah I did the same and it felt kind of harsh but reading more here I feel like it was fair enough
Right here in this sentence? Duo introduces lots of words like that - they don't put them all in the tips & notes, they introduce them using a Russian sentence and expect you to use the hints the first time.
Well in this case it was one of several choices, and I'd never seen this one before...and in this format there were no pull-down hints, so of course I got it wrong. Introducing words this way, with no help or preparation from the T&N has been a main complaint of mine.
You don't get a hint when you hover over нём with the mouse? If not that's not a problem with the course, but it's definitely a problem...
I think the way Duo introduces words is fine. With the way Duo works, it's no big deal if you get a word wrong the first time through. You just learn the first time and get it right the next time through.
Well I was on the phone app, so hovering wasn't an option - and even on a desktop it's not always, as in exercises like this that are multiple-choice. But I seem to part company with most users as I like knowing what to expect, rather than being blind-sided and then penalized for what I haven't learned yet. Kind of like getting a pop quiz at the beginning of class on material to be covered that day.
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Well, when you arrive in a country with a partially learned version of its language, you can expect to run into lots of examples of hitting a new word or usage for the first time in almost every conversation. Sometimes you guess right, sometimes not. It isn't such a bad thing to get this experience sometimes in the learning process, and once you get your mind adapted to it, it is particularly less stressful when you realize it is just a computer seeing your confusion and not even a roomful of classmates. I also found it a little annoying when first starting with DuoLingo (and it does seem to happen much more often in Russian than in the Swedish which I started on earlier), but have come to think of it as actually pedagogically pretty useful.
I use a phone. I can coubt on hints being there cirrectkt at the begunning if a kessin. They mix them up or give wrong unusable ones to challenge you later. Ive used them later and git them wrong. I didnt die. Instead, u made sure to read the comments in this section by people who can explain it. You wont find thus kind of help sentence for sentence anywhere else. You get grammar tables listing an unmemorizable lists of endings. Many are irregular anyway. I have learned so much frim this section! ( no guarantee i wont forget it tomorrow). So i write it down if its tough. Russian isnt hard; its impossible . Suck it up, have fun and do your best!
Его (accusative case) refers to a direct object of a verb when the object is of masculine or neuter gender. In that case, it matches 'him' or 'it' (or even 'her' if 'she' is a ship). Его (genetive case) is a posessive adjective like 'his', 'its' or 'her', which means 'belonging to a living thing or an object of masculine or neuter gender'. Нём is the preposional case form of 'он'. It is only used after preposions 'о', 'в' and 'на'. 'о нём'= 'about him/it/her', 'в нём' mostly translates as 'in him/it/her' (less often as 'on him/it/her' or 'at it'), 'на нём' mostly translates as 'on him/it/her' (less often as 'in him/it').
the use "нём" is not covered by the current lesson (Questions 3) at all - can someone add a conjugation pattern note for this?
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Duo just rejected "I think about him when I am far from home." Is this Duo being militant about word order over natural speech again, or is it bugging out?
Would "When I am far from home, I think about him" be an acceptable translation?
No, it wouldn’t as the object in this sentence is a home.
So it has to be “about it” not him
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So in this context, the speaker is thinking about their house?
"When I am far from home, I think about [the home]", as opposed to "When I am far from home, I think about [something contextual from the rest of the conversation]"?
So in this context, the speaker is thinking about their house?
That's the default interpretation. "О нём" could technically mean "about him" but that would require a context that would establish that beforehand.
Technically both are correct, but we need more context here.
Read this comment, please:
https://forum.duolingo.com/comment/11836165?comment_id=44932599
Well, they are two completely different words. «Нам» is 'to us'. «Нём» is only used about prepisitions, «о нём» is 'about him'.
Thanks! Is there a place where I can find all these words and usage? Like нём нам неё её его него, etc..., I get really confused when to use what...
http://www.russianlessons.net/grammar/pronouns.php <-- This website has a lot of useful grammar tables. This link is for Russian pronouns :)
О plus accusative is related to movement, isn't it? (I am italian, sometimes I try to think latin, and sometimes it works!)
Couldn't this mean "about him"? Referring to a person rather than the house. Then "о неё" would fit as well wouldn't it?
I think about her = я думаю о ней (not "o неё" - this phrase simply doesn't exist)
not "o неё" - this phrase simply doesn't exist
It does. Here's an example: «Прикладываясь к иконе Богоматери, Кличко ударился о нее головой» (http://www.vesti.ru/doc.html?id=2020799).
Of course, it's more common to use «об» in this context.
Well, when I said it doesn't exist, I meant "думаю/мечтаю/говорю о неё" doesn't exist. Although "о неё" meaning "against it" can be used with verbs such as биться, ударяться, опираться , тереться, this usage is marginal, the standard phrase being "об неё" as you aptly pointed out. By the way, the sentence you gave example is rather poorly worded not only because of "о неё", but also because of the abmiguity it creates - it is not clear whether Klichko "ударился об икону" or "ударился о Богоматерь, изображенную на иконе".
I just translated the sentence with him in it, and it still said I was wrong and did not accept my answer. I need Duo lingo to fix this error.
I'm really not sure it should be accepted. It requires a lot of assumptions about context. Without context it's home that you're thinking about. Maybe it's better to require "it" to make sure people get that.
From the book perspective it does require some assumption, however coming from Russian being my 1st language and speaking it for 15 years. This sentence does not require any assumption for the translation to accept him.
Him cannot be your home in English. It would assume you're talking about a person at your home.
True, but both "about it" and "about him" will be "о нём" in Russian if the preceding verb is думать, говорить, писать or the like. However, in a phrase "there's nothing peculiar about him", "about" corresponds to the Russian preposition "в": "В нем нет ничего странного".
О and от are two different prepositions. "От" means "from" and "о" means "about".
Home is "it" not "her" in English. If you are thinking that "нём" could be a person, it is masculine so would have to be "him".
Even that I think is still incorrect, actually - it would be "I think of him" or "I think about him". "I am thinking" is used for an action going on right now, while "I think" is used for a habitual or repeated action. "When I am far from home" implies the latter.
"I think of home when I am far from it." Is this an acceptable translation?
Duo doesn't generally allow you to reverse the order of clauses like that.
is Russian similar to German with the verbs? I notice in German the verb is at the end of the sentence too
Not really. Russians are flexible with the word order. You can say, я о нем думаю, я думаю о нем, думаю о нем я, думаю я о нем etc. - the choice of word order and intonation depends on which part of the sentence you want to emphasize.
I put when I'm far from home I think about home. In English that would be the same as when I am far from home I think about it. Same thing in English!
For some reason, I keep forgetting objects are gendered here... These sorts of questions always confuse me.
Из means “out of” or “from within”. When it follows an adjective in the superlative degree form, из means “of”: “the easiest of all jobs” = «самое простое из всех дел». It also means “of” in «изготовлен/сделан из» (made of) and in “M of N”, e.g. “one of them”. От is used to translate “from” in most other cases. «Отскочить от»=”bounce off”.
It's quite awful having personal pronouns in prepositional introduced, without a proper description, in a lesson about interrogatives.
"When I am far from home, I think about ---him---"
Why is this wrong? I thought нем can mean "him"
This isn’t wrong: out of context the Russian sentence is ambiguous, so it can be interpreted this way as well.
So true. So when it's out of context I look at the hints. Foe new things, the hints are usually correct. Anyway, it is now the answer accepted.
I'm a little bit confused since house is a feminine noun shouldn't it say I miss her or it instead of him or it?
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"When I am far from home, I think about him." why it is wrong? There is no clue in the sentence about "what" or about "who" it is
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Just to be sure:
нём is the masculine prepositional form of он, not of это, am I right? Either way, how would sound a similar sentence using the other option? Is specifying (my home, for instance) would change it from "it" to "that"?
(I wish there were some explanation in the notes beforehand.)
Нём is the prepositional case form of either он or оно. Given that there is no neuter gender noun or another masculine gender noun between от дома and о нём, the latter cannot refer back to any other thing but дом (but it can refer to a man or boy mentioned earlier on in the conversation). If you specify дом, e.g. say «от её дома» or «от Белого дома» or «от маминого дома», it would be «о нём» just the same. «Об этом» (“about that”) would refer back to the previous sentence as a whole, rather than any particular word. The English “it” can replace any noun which does not denote a human being or a particular animal with a name or a big boat. There is no such multipurpose pronoun in Russian.
I never thought I'd be able to understand a sentence like this in less than 2 months, but it's totally possible today thanks to Duolingo!!
Same thought. Duo wants the sentence and its grammar translated though. If it says far from home, and I think about it, no reason to switch it around uneccesarily.
Can someone please explain about this о нём\о ней thing? I just can't figure it out.
Would someone, please (a Russian speaker) translate this sentence:
"When I’m away from home I think about him"???
If you want to say in Russian, “When I am away from home, I think about him” and make sure you don’t sound ambiguous, you must put ‘him’ before ‘home’ like this: «Я всегда думаю о нем, когда нахожусь далеко от дома». In that case, “о нем” will be automatically related to the last masculine noun you mentioned before saying that sentence, and that noun had better be the person you are referring to. If there is more than one masculine noun, than you have no choice but repeat it. For example, «Дома у меня остались маленький сын и муж. Я всегда думаю о сыне, когда нахожусь далеко от дома». Unlike English, Russian rules out the possibility of relating personal pronouns to nouns that occur later in the sentence. For example, in English, it is normal to say, “When she came home, Ann cooked dinner”, whereas, in Russian, the noun (in this case, Ann) should come before “she”: «Когда Энн пришла домой, она приготовила ужин». The best way to say it would be to do without the pronoun: «Придя домой, Энн приготовила ужин».
Very informative
Thank you
But can I say:
“У меня маленький ребёнок. Когда я далеко от дома, я о нём думаю”?
Yes, in this context people are more likely to interpret "о нём" as "about my child". Technically there's still an ambiguity, but people tend to choose an interpretation that makes the most sense to them.
Correct answer is about it, home, a masculine noun. I think about it. If the sentence said he thought about his son, it would also be о нём, and you could translate it about him. But this sentence is about the house.
But DL never gives us the context.
So this exactly my sentence (rejected by DL) and this is what I've been arguing about, grammatically correct sentence should be accepted.
And I do understand the difference between these two contexts, so I know when it would be "it" and when "him" in English. I just chose the "him" context, but as DL doesn't accept it some people may think that "нём" means only "it".
And you have just answered your own question! When duo gives a sentence without complete context, choose the only one there. The only one there is home- his house. You will never go wrong. If your in a real conversation, you may have learned it's about something else, but with this sentence theres nothing except his home.
I absolutely understand that.
What I am saying is that we are talking to an algorithm, to a robot and if my grammatically correct sentence is rejected I am looking for the grammar/vocabulary errors in it.
DL doesn't explain that there is no structural or grammar error, just the context I imply is not the right one (but still possible). I want to know how to say about him, about it, about her...
But they give me a sentence with "about it" using "о нём" which I understand but I consider it not the best way to teach.
Gotcha. You obviously have learned how to use this perfectly in a conversation. Which is the important thing. But as you said, it's a robot, so if you dont want to be hit with incorrect, dont try to reason with one! You usually dont need to "imply" anything in Duo sentences. I got it wrong the first time for the same reason (over) thinking who was he thinking about. Checked the correct translation I saw it was "it." The forum said it was it, the house. I accepted it. Bam, done.
Actually the Russian sentence means both. So it depends on the context.
In this case we use "it" as there is no indication that we are talking about a person.
But if we'd say:
"I have to work for a month in another country, but my husband has to stay at home. When I am far from home, I think about him" (here given by the context "him" makes more sense, but both sentences would be the same in Russian)
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Refer to va-diim's comment below...
"In English, a house is not a him. A house is an it. In Russian, дом is он, declined to нём in the prepositional case."
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Depending on the context, it could also mean "When I am far from home, I think about him." for which Duolingo said I was incorrect.
I wrote while instead of when. It got refused. Is it really a difference here?
It means basically the same. Its a computer, and a translation while is пока. Когда is when. The purpose if specific translations is to translate the words and have correct grammar. The computer doesn't know that word or many similar ways to translate.
With stative verbs like ‘to be’ (which is omitted in the present tense in Russian) and any imperfective verbs, «когда» is a synonym of «всякий раз, когда» (whenever). It is not the same as while for which the Russian word is пока.
Thank you for your answer! And for the time you put into this. Now, I understand the difference. Thanks a lot!
"о нем" - это может быть или о доме, или о ком-то, живом человеке или домашнем животном мужского пола, кто живëт в доме или рядом с домом. Пример некорректный (Russian is my native)
In English, the "it" could potentially also refer to the fact that I am far from home and us, therefore, ambiguous.
Когда я далеко от дома, я думаю о нём, marked wrong. Does о нём necessarily between the subject and the verb ?
Да, я думаю о пить чай пока смотрю какие-то ТВ-шоу потому-что мне не нужно делать ничто
In Russian you cannot say, «думаю о пить чай». The correct phrase would be «думать о том, как было бы хорошо выпить чаю». Also, ничто cannot be used as the subject of a sentence, so the correct form is «потому что мне не нужно ничего делать». As a matter of fact, «потому что у меня нет никаких дел» sounds even better.
Someone from a different question said "Нём" meant both "it" and "him". Is that correct? If so, is there a noticable difference, or purely context?
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Purely context. Even «он» (he) can mean "it" when it is referring to a masculine noun. If it is referring to a person, then it means "him". If it is referring to an object, it means "it".
Redko is right.
If you are talking about a pencil (which is a masculine noun in Russian) you say ”he”, but of course when you translate it into English you have to say ”it” because this is how you say it in English.
The audio for "о нём" is terrible. The words overlap, and are spoken at the same time. The guy that can speak two words at the same time is very talented, but very difficult to understand.
«я о нём» is supposed to be pronounced like yāñom (I am using the ā symbol for the long /a/ vowel formed by merging two /a/‘s — one in я and the other denoted by the letter o, and the Spanish letter ñ for the lack of a better symbol for the palatalized (“soft”) Russian н’ in нём).
Interesting ...the two adjacent vowels are fused into one ? And if the soft palatalized H is like the N in maNana, the sound |-nio| doesn't exist ?
The two adjacent vowels are indeed fused into one, although this feature is optional: one can also pronounce them separately. The combination of letters нё stands for two sounds — the palatalized consonant /н’/ and the vowel /о/ — with no /i/ or /j/ in between. The term “palatalization” stands for raising the back of the tongue to the palate. In most languages it is only done before /i:/ or /i/ (in some languages, also before ü) whereas in Russian it can be done before any vowel except /ы/. Palatization is marked by using я instead of а for /a/, ё instead of о for /o/, ю instead of у for /u/ and е instead of э for /е/, and by ь in the final position. The silent letter ь сan also be used as a palatalization marker after any of the consonants д, т, л or р before another consonant.
This is really new to me, at least put that way, but what dictates that /H/ in нё is palatalized ?
The "ё" does. If it was supposed to be the nonpalatalized "н", then it would be "но".
I wrote: I think about HIM when I am far from home. and I think it should have been accepted. The word order is correct in English. о нём = about him, yes?
No, the translation for any gendered reference is “it”, when you’re talking about inanimate objects in English. As in English inanimate objects don’t have a gender, unless you’re talking figuratively, such as maybe you named your car. Most of us talk about our home as an object, not as a person.
How about:
“I am abroad. I had to leave my home and my husband. I love him so much. (and now the sentence from this exercise)”
Wouldn’t we translate «нём» as him in this context?
You would not say, «Когда я вдали от дома» in this context. And, given that the sentence would sound ambiguous, you would rather say something like, «Вдали от дома я всегда думаю о муже» or «Я всегда думаю о нем, когда мы расстаемся надолго».
It is actually impossible to tell without the context whether it is the home or a male human or an animal. In fact, it is not a very good Russian sentence. We are more likely to say: «Уезжая надолго, я скучаю по дому» or «Уезжая из дома надолго, / Вдали от дома я скучаю по своему мужу/сыну/брату/коту». «думаю о нем» is also an option, but only if the object of thinking is mentioned in the previous sentence.
Sure, but your examples have completely different meaning.
I don’t have to miss someone or love someone in order to think about that person.
We are lacking the context here and Duo doesn’t accept that other option, the force is to use ”it” only.
Without context I would assume нём would reference back to the only masculine noun in the first part of the sentence- дом. In real conversation we need context. Thus is an exercise and Duo doesn't assume we read their mind. It. Дом.
Yeah, you’re right, the home is the most obvious object in this sentence.
I’ve been just playing with adding some content to see if “him” would work here