When you learn a foreign language, one of the things that causes problems are false cognates, which are words that sound similar but can have quite different meanings. The classic example for Spanish students is ‘embarazada’ which sounds like the English word ‘embarrassed’ but actually means ‘pregnant.’ If an American woman tries to say that she is embarrassed using ‘embarazada,’ the reaction of her cohorts will teach her her error promptly. She won't make that mistake a second time.

It's a little trickier when the meanings of the false cognates are much closer in the two languages. In that case there is much more likely to be continuing confusion and cross-cultural mis­com­munication, and that miscommunication can be both on the dictionary-meaning level and on the emotional level. A case in point are the words туалет and toilet. In American English toilet means the actual device one sits upon, and in Russian туалет means the room in which the toilet (but usually not the bathtub) is located. Since the Russian word is so similar to the English word, American students of Russian only have to hear it once to remember it forever, and they promptly start producing sentences like:

In terms of grammatical communication it is a perfectly adequate sentence, but the student hasn't said quite what he thinks he has said, and there is a very good chance he has just committed a cultural faux pas. The sentence is a little too direct for polite company, and simply saying you want to go to the toilet summons up unpleasant images of... well, you get the idea. In American English we avoid those images because the word “bathroom” focuses on the ‘bath’ idea; that is, there is a subtle association with cleanliness, not urination or defecation. So to avoid being quite so direct, the Russians have several ways of euphemistically expressing the idea. The one I use most is «помыть руки», which word-for-word means “to wash the hands”:

If you say it that way, there will be a bit of ambiguity to the Russian, who won't necessarily be sure if you need the toilet or the sink, but since in a Russian apartment the room with the toilet is usually right next to the room with the bathtub and sink, they will lead you right to where you need to go for either purpose. Of course, if you are not directly discussing bodily functions, it's perfectly fine to use the word туалет:

The social contexts that affect the direct use of the word туалет are complex. My friend Tanya assures me that if she is at a restaurant with a mixed group of men and women, she never uses the word туалет. Instead she would just stand up, say «Я сейчас приду» “I’ll be right back,” and then leave. But if she is with just her female friends at the restaurant, she might well say «Я пойду в туалет» “I'm going to the bathroom,” and since she is with her friends she might add to one of them «Ты хочешь со мной?» “Do you want to come with me?” Similarly a Russian man in mixed company will use euphemistic phrases like the ones mentioned before or «Я отойду на минутку» “I'll step away for a moment.” (But unlike Russian women, a Russian man won't ask a buddy to go to the bathroom with him.)

Growing up in the US, children commonly say things like "Me and Johnny went to the store." Although it sounds perfectly normal to many people, it is considered terrible written style (and also bad style for public speaking), and grade-school teachers make a great effort to break kids of this habit. The only acceptable written form is "Johnny and I went to the store."¹ If we transform that word-for-word into Russian, we get the sentence «Иван и я ходили в магазин». Although every Russian will understand such a sentence, it is not the most typical way to say it. Instead the more common way is:

The phrase «мы с Иваном» is actually ambiguous. It can mean "John and I" or it can mean "We (a group of two or more people) and also John". The same holds true for the phrase «мы с ним», which can mean "he and I" or "we [two or more people] along with him." For instance, if my wife and I are having pity on our poor, miserable bachelor friend, John, I can say:

Although the second translation is the more natural way to put it in English (and thus the better translation on this occasion), the first translation captures the idea that John is included in the concept of мы in the sentence.

On the other hand, if I go to the movies with John but my wife does not come along, the same construction just means me and John:

The same ambiguity holds for the phrase «вы с Иваном», which can mean "you [one person] and John" or "you [more than one person] and John. For instance, let's say I'm talking to a female friend about her son Женя. If I want to ask whether she often argues with him, I might ask:

Or if I am taking to both her and her husband, I might say the same thing with a different meaning:

The same holds true for phrases with они, which can be interpreted a variety of ways. Let's say I'm talking about my female friend who is feeling sorry for another female friend. This sentence could result:

Of course, if my friend's husband also feels sorry for Vera, we could have a parallel sentence:

The same situation also of course applies if my friend is a man:

To review, the phrases «мы с ним», «вы с ним», «они с ним», «мы с ней», «вы с ней» and «они с ней» are ambiguous in that they can refer to groups of two or more people.

¹ Actually, the teachers do too good a job of breaking us of that habit without explaining the situation more thoroughly. In fact many teachers overgeneralize and just teach their students that any time they are tempted to say "me and you" (or any other combination of "me and..."), they must replace it with "you and I" (or "... and I"). Even very educated people — sad to say that among them are my own mother and sister — thus will say things like, "Just between you and I, I think that is a bad idea." The correct thing to say in that context is "Just between you and me..." But just try to convince them of that... it's a lost cause.

² In this context with the third-person plural pronoun, some native speakers prefer «Ей очень жалко Веру, поэтому она с ней часто ходит в кино», but in rapid speech the «они с ней часто ходят» form is entirely possible.

³ In this context with the third-person plural pronoun, some native speakers prefer «Ему очень жалко Веру, поэтому он с ней часто ходит в кино», but in rapid speech the «они с ней часто ходят» form is entirely possible.

We mentioned the other day that the preposition "с" + the instrumental case means "with." There is another context where it means "with," but we don't translate it as "with," and that is when two nouns are joined together as the subject (or object) of a sentence. In these contexts we must translate "с" as "and." For example:

In this context translating "с" as "with" sounds terrible in English and is a grammatical error.

On Saturday I was sitting just outside the men's section of the place where I get my hair cut here in Kazan, when a guy walked up and asked «Сколько там мастеров?» A second-year student of Russian would probably have translated the sentence "How many masters are there?" and would then have no idea what it meant. Here's the scoop. The word мастер in Russian often bears the meaning "someone qualified in a particular trade." In other words, he wanted to know how many barbers there were there that day.

The word itself is one of those that have a stressed -а in the nominative plural, and thus is end-stressed through the plural instead of stem-stressed:

There is no commonly used word in English that is quite as general as мастер in this sense, so when translating it, it is best to substitute the common name of the tradesman who practices the trade in question. Thus, if you are sitting outside an establishment that cuts men's hair with the old-fashioned standard cuts, the phrase «Сколько там мастеров?» is best translated "How many barbers are there?" The lovely and willowy Розанна who cuts my hair also does women's hair and can color hair as well. She would probably object to the word barber, and in fact someone with all those skills in the States would be better labeled a "hair stylist," so in this case the best translation may be "How many hair stylists are there?" or "How many stylists are there?"

I was in the dormitory of Moscow State University in 1986. My bathroom sink began to come out of the wall. The floor attendant said «Я вызову мастера». In this case she meant the guy who takes care of the dorm's minor maintenance requests, so her sentence would be best translated as "I'll call the handyman" or "I'll call the maintenance man." (BTW, when he showed up, he simply took a look at the sink, shoved it bank into the wall and smeared some cement over the screw and brace that held it in place. The wall was cinderblock. And the sink was anchored to the cinderblock by a screw... The word мастер struck me as completely ridiculous in that context.)

Thus if you summon a мастер to fix the plumbing, translate мастер as plumber. If you summon a мастер to fix your electrical outlet, translate it "handy man" or "electrician," depending on just how qualified the guy is.

In our first years of learning Russian we spend a lot of time learning conjugation and declension, trying to figure out how to weave sentences together with subjects and direct objects and prepositional phrases. It's an amazing grammatical dance that has its own beauty, though perhaps it takes ten years before one really sees the beauty part... Anyhoo, so you take your first trip to Russia, and you are braced to collide with strange cases and unreal conditional clauses and sentences that last longer than Kafka's, and then you are stunned to learn that it's the really short sentences with nothing but the nominative case that entirely floor you.

For instance, yesterday morning I was in my currently favorite eating place, and I heard the following conversation:

I can pretty well guarantee you that right now first- and second-year readers are thinking "What the heck?" The conversation is between a woman customer (blue lines) and the cashier (yellow lines). Spend a minute or two to see if you can figure out what the heck they are talking about, then click 'read more' for a line-by-line explanation.

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