"Sört szeretnék kérni."
Translation:I would like beer, please.
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Both are widely usable. But "szeretnék kérni" is a bit too long, isn't it? Especially after a few.
So, let's cut the suffix "-nék" from "szeretnék" (that is the "would" part), and fix it to the end of the root of "kérni":
"kér-nék"
We can throw away the rest.
Oh, and we need to replace the English "a" with the number "five". Here is the result:
Öt sört kérnék
Much better now.
It is relatively easy. The direct object of a sentence gets the accusative case.
I want beer
I eat bread
I love you
The objects above in bold get the accusative case.
In Hungarian, it means a "-t" suffix. But if the word ends in a consonant, there may be a buffer vowel in-between, that harmonizes with the word. Sometimes the word itself ends in a "t", it still gets one more "t", with a buffer sound:
sör - sört
víz - viz-e-t
bor - bort
szék - szék-e-t
lámpa - lámpát
bot - bot-o-t
láb - láb-a-t
toll - toll-a-t
Stb.
Because it's used with the helping verb szeretnék.
szeretnék - I would like
szeretnék kérni - I would like to ask for
We use the infinitive the same way in English.
It's just being translated idiomatically. The literal meaning is "I would like to ask for a beer", but it's more realistically translated into English as simply "I would like a beer."
259
Thanks for this explanation. Literal translations are sometimes helpful to get a true insight of the meanings :)
This is the most formal way of asking a beer and the translation is not entirely correct. It would be: "I would like to ask for a beer". This can also be expressed more easily and in a beginner course you might just shoot for easier expressions :)
"Sört kérek" (lit.: I ask for beer), "Szeretnék egy sört" (lit: I would like a beer), "Sört kérnék" (lit.: I would ask for a beer)
Generally if you put 'kérek' everything will become acceptable from the politeness point of view :) If you use conditionals it is even more polite.