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- Topic: Russian >
- "У нас нет конфет."
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Vasmer's etymological dictionary:
- Latin "confectum" (cooked, made, prepared) → Italian "confetto" (sugar-coated almond) → конфе́ты (plural)
- German "konfekt" (candy) → конфе́кты (old version, plural)
- Italian "confetti" (plural "confetto", candies, paper imitations) → конфетти́
The small festive pieces of paper that almost everyone calls "confetti" the present day italians call "coriandoli" instead.
Both of the words derive from renaissance Italy where it was customary to throw confectionery in the air during celebrations, especially at the well-to-do's weddings. Common ingredients (to add flavour) in these sugar-coated almond sweets were coriander seeds.
"Confetti" still in Italy means the entire delicacies with their wrappings, not only the paper. ;)
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In German it's Konfekt (with capital K) and I was just wondering if this is what the topic is about :-)
So it's actually конфета (without k) in Russian, good to know, thank you.
You are using the nominative singular form. You need to use the plural genitive. We are talking about candies.
I now realise it is also the nominative form. However, I initially thought 'konfet' was the nominative form and that I would need to add '-a' to make it genitive.
But surely конфет is not the plural genitive form - ? I don't understand why that is used here.
Yes, конфета is nominative singular, it changes to конфеты in genitive singular and конфет in genitive plural.
I don't remember where the sentence occurs in the course... have you not reached the genitive plural skill yet?
I looked back at the Genitive skill and didn't see anything helpful....so, apparently not.
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In the US, "candies" is rarely used. "sweets" almost never, except in sayings like "sweets to the sweet". The collective noun "candy" is encountered almost all the time. If we want to describe different items of candy, then we talk about "pieces of candy" or "a piece of candy".
Same here in NZ, it's very rare for us to say 'candy' so duolingo keeps telling me I'm wrong D:
yes in new zealand anyway. you never hear 'candy' said. 'Lollies ' would be the kids' word, 'sweets' is more adult and 'confectionery ' rather formal.
Interesting. Now I just need to know what you call coffee down there and I'll have everything I need for my trip to New Zealand.... :-)
Конфета is a count noun in Russian. If you mean just this one, it is есть конфета / нет конфеты:
If by "candy" you mean these, it is есть конфеты / нет конфет:
In portuguese we have the word "confeito" with the same meaning. It's awesome!
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Because not enough speakers of British English have consistently reported the same answer to the maintenance team using the flag "My answer should have been accepted." Think of each report as a vote. When a correct answer gets enough votes, it'll (eventually) get added to the database. Don't expect the staff to be familiar with all the various varieties of world English.
Also, check your answer for typos. Handling of typos is a bit inconsistent. Even if your answer is in the database, a misspelled word can still get it rejected, especially if the misspelling is a correct spelling of a different word.
Конфет is plural genitive whereas the singular nominative is конфета. I don't know why it's used in a lesson in which you haven't learned the plurals yet. Russian Grammer is more complex and most of the languages and Duolingo is just making it more confusing.
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Russian is hard! In another course some things were said over and over without any explanation. These were things commonly said without having to learn 10 or 12 changes as a beginner, like у меня , как зовут, до свидания, вот мой паспорт , мне нравится етс. Years later Im grateful, because to me they just sound right. Duo does a combination of this, plus introducing new words slowly with new forms and how to spell them, and recorded practice to hear and say them. For me it's the best at this time. It' still hard. But fun if you like and want to learn it.
This is the most depressing thing I have ever seen. Someone help whoever may have uttered this sad, sad truth. XD
