The word против in Russian means “against” in the sense of being for or against an idea. It can be used adverbially, without an object:

In the above dialog the phrase that is translated “Are you okay with that?” literally means “You aren't against?” This is one of those places where a word for word translation would get the tone of the dialog wrong; instead a good translator will select a phrase in English that matches the emotional content of the original. Another example:

The word против can also be used as a preposition that governs the genitive case:

Hm... what other things have the Russians battled against? Ah, yes, here's a glorious reminder of one of the lesser known battles of World War II:

Can you read the sign? That's right: STALIN VERSUS THE MARTIANS! What, dear reader? You didn't know that Stalin saved the planet from evil aliens while also fighting the Nazis? That is because you have an American education and can't tell the pax romana from the chicken pox. This vital battle is commemorated in an RTS game by BWF/DreamLore/N-Game. In short, it's an übersimplified version of Blitzkrieg II (review here). Do you want to know more? Do you want to see Stalin dancing like a raver kid strung out on Ecstasy? Then you need to view this trailer:

Attentive students will notice that Stalin's Russian is not so great. That's because he was an ethnic Georgian who never really perfected the language. Russians love to poke fun at people what can't talk right.

The Russian word for ‘there’ in the sense of being located ‘there’ is там.

Of course, it's used in much simpler sentences as well.

The one thing we as Americans have to be careful about is not to use the word when talking about going ‘to’ a place. In other words, you can't say in Russian «Я там езжу каждое лето» “I go there every summer.” For that sense we have to use туда, which we will address in the next couple of days.

Russian has a specialized adverb that means “from here,” and that word is отсюда. Sometimes you can find it in extraordinarily short sentences that confound beginners:

The word combines naturally with verbs of departure, although it can often be left out of as well, just as in English:

The old-fashioned word for отсюда in English is hence. Nowadays it is mostly used when discussing the source of a logical conclusion. The Russian word can be used the same way:

The Russian word for “here” in the sense of motion “to here” is сюда. For instance, if your little brother still has trouble tying his shoelaces, you might say:

The word combines fairly naturally with words that indicate bringing things or people somewhere:

It can also combine with verbs of arrival, but just as in English it can be left out of those sentences as well:

When you make a phone call to a location, that's conceived as a motion phrase in Russian, thus in «Я позвонил ей на работу» “I called her at work” the noun работу is in the accusative case, which makes it a motion phrase; thus the prepositional phrase can be replaced by сюда in sentences about phoning:

Russian has two words for “here” in the sense of location “at here”: тут and здесь. They mean exactly the same thing; the only difference is that тут has a more conversational tone, so if you are writing a formal essay, stick to здесь. Sample sentences:

One mistake English speakers make in Russian is to use these words when trying to say “Come here,” and they produce something like «Приходи здесь». The sentence is completely awful in Russian. The first problem is that здесь/тут can only be used to mean location “at” a place, not motion “to” a place. The second problem is that if you are talking to someone in person, then they have already arrived, so приходить/прийти “to arrive/come” just doesn't make sense. The right way to say it is «Иди сюда». We'll discuss сюда in the next few days.