"A gyerekeken fekete cipő van."
Translation:The children are wearing black shoes.
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2494
Why not 'cipők vannak'?
Edit: just come across another sentence like this in this lesson—are items of clothing always singular in this turn of phrase even if multiple people are wearing multiple examples of them? Would 'a gyerekeken fekete cipők vannak' give the impression that there are black shoes literally balanced on the children's heads, perhaps?
15
There are two things to remember here.
First, clothing and body parts that come in pairs are always singular in Hungarian, and if you want to refer to one of them, you would say half a pair of something.
- A futón futócipő van. = "There are running shoes on the runner."
- A futókon futócipő van. = "There are running shoes on the runners."
- A futónak hosszú lába van. = "The runner has long legs."
- A futóknak hosszú lábuk van. = "The runners have long legs."
Second, not only do things that come in sets are always singular in Hungarian, they also stay singular even when they belong to multiple owners, and each of them owns one or one set.
- One owner, one set of legs = "Lába"
- One owner, multiple (sets of) legs = "Lábai"
- Multiple owners, one set of legs (each) = "Lábuk"
- Multiple owners, multiple legs = "Lábaik"
To describe possession, you still have match the ending of the word 'láb' (leg) with the multiplicity of the owner. However, possession is going to be another lesson.
129
And "A futónak egy hosszú fél lába van. = "The runner has a long leg" - literally "half leg". Right?
639
Would "A gyerekek fekekte cipöban van." (my phone doesnt have the double accent, sorry) be acceptable? I saw a similar formatting in an earlier question, but since then, it's all been this way, with the person wearing the clothing in the "on" case instead of the clothes in the "in" case. And if it is acceptable, is one used more often or seen as "better"?
Both are correct, there are always two options and they are used just as frequently:
- someone is in some clothing (gyerekek cipő -ben vannak)
- some clothing is on someone (gyerekek -en cipő van)
Maybe the inside version is less preferred when the item of clothing wearable is small, and hence difficult to imagine being inside of it, like contact lenses or a band-aid for example.
655
Does anyone else have trouble hearing the difference between ő and ö?
The word, "cipő" brought this up for me again. I incorrectly spelt it as "cipö" - using the letter O with two dots and not the requisite two accents.
Hopefully over time I will be able to discern the difference between the longer and shorter sounds accurately. At this point, the two sounds are so subtle for me that I can barely pick-out which is which.
Let's see if practice makes for an eventual refined perceptual ability. (And I'm not in fact hard of hearing!)
...the difference between ő and ö?...
------- final o', u', o" and u" are almost always long so there's no hard push to drag 'em out and, the other commonly found long a's (...a'll ) and e's are not really lengthened - the diacritic is there only to change the sound of the letter's pronunciation. i' is essentially never lengthened . . .
Big 5 feb 19
1441
I probably will not like this chapter.
I already hate to say a pair of trousers/jeans although it clearly is just one item. Though for two legs. Totally unnecesary to say it like that.
And now Hungarian removes the plural of objects that are actually not one item. Because it is implied that it must mean more than one, a set.
The centipede is wearing "shoe". It is implied that it must mean dozens. lol
Is:
A gyerekek fekete cipőben vannak.
also a valid translation of "The children are wearing black shoes"?
(I'm slightly confused by when one should use the "(Person) is in (item of clothing)" form and when the "On (person) is (Item of clothing)" one — or are they mostly equivalent?)
Thanks in advance and sorry if this is a stupid question!
An answer to the same / a very similar question in another thread:
https://forum.duolingo.com/comment/18576207#18576208
(In brief, the two are different ways of expressing the same thing, but they work for any clothing.)