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- Topic: Vietnamese >
- "Họ mua không những máy tính …
"Họ mua không những máy tính mà còn điện thoại."
Translation:They buy not only computers but also telephones.
10 Comments
using 'mot' would indicate 'a' rather than 'the'. My question is really about why we should assume that computers and phones here are plural, when there is no plural indicator. Usually Duo always wants us to say the+singular unless we have the word 'mot' for one/a or nhung/cac for plurality. Here the nhung is part of a nhung...ma construction, not a plural indicator, so I want to know what indicates plurality here, and therefore why singular nouns with 'a' or 'the' are incorrect. Incidentally, in practice you don't need to say 'mot' to indicate that you mean 'a' instead of 'the', though Duo usually wants you to do that.
828
Computer and phone can be singular or plural - it depends on the situation/context. The Vietnamese sentence does not make the situation clear. But Duolingo accepts only one arbitrary answer. You are playing a guessing game with the application.
618
Could DL, please, consider having the sentences read at different speeds. I have a translator that says it fast, then medium and then slowly. It's very helpful. Thanks