"Ő hátul vár egy autót."

Translation: She is waiting for a car in the back.

[George344103]

Well I'm English speaking British and I dont understand this sentence. She is waiting for a car in the back? In her back? To hit her? Or we might say at the back, meaning behind the building/house/office whatever. Its frustrating that sometimes duolingo teaches you a literal translation and sometimes it only allows the meaning rather than the literal translation.

[guinneal]

The sentance is a very unlikely one in English......is the intention to say something like "She is in the back (ie, yard or something) waiting for a car"?

[kenguruhu]

"in the back" always implies where the person is waiting (back of the building, back seat of the car, etc) while "behind" needs a clearer object (behind the building, behind the car). So if you say "waiting in the back for a car" you can assume the back of the building/lot/room but you wouldn't say "waiting behind for a car".

[Patricia460976]

You might if you were trying to say that one of your party remained waiting for the car while the rest decided to walk on.

[deactivated user]

Would it be right to say that the object is at the front of a sentence when it is a person e.g. a judge, and that the object is at the back of a sentence when it is not e.g. a car?

[Arcaeca]

I put "He's waiting behind a car", but that was wrong... so would that be "Ő vár hátul egy autót"?

[linguafiqari]

"Behind" is simply "Mögött" - "He's waiting behind a car" would be "(Ő) Egy autó mögött vár".

[Kathy979841]

What does in back mean? I am australian and we don't have that terminology I don't think.

[DavidMille421913]

It's literal, like if you go into a shop and there's a room "in the back". Or if you're visiting someone and they're in the backyard, etc..

[Judy653281]

In English 'in back' and 'behind' are synonyms and both can be used in this sentence.

[George344103]

The more I do this course, the mire more convinced I become that in this sentence hatúl would translate into at the back rather than in the back

[George344103]

*more

[deactivated user]

I agree. In English I would expect 'in the back' to be defined e.g. in the back of the restaurant, in the back of the building. I would regard 'at the back' as being less definite, i.e. back being the place where she was waiting.

[George344103]

And in the midlands and north of England we would just say "at back", rather than "at the back"