# Pronunciation



## MadameT

ok marcilanamus so let's start it. 
do you think romanian sounds like russian?


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## Marcilanamus

I will be brutally honest : at first, yes.  Shortly after : NO WAY ! It depends very much on the speaker though.  Some speak with the musicality of Italia, and others with the harshness of Slavic Languages.  One thing I really can't stand is the î sound.


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## MadameT

Can someone tell me where "a pune botul" comes from? Marcilanamus- do you have any idea?


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## Leopold

Does that "ï" sound like the Russian "ы"?


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## MadameT

I do not know how "bl" sounds in russian. 
Speaking of sounds...it would be very nice if we could load sound files to this site/in our postings.


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## Leopold

I would not know how to describe it. But sounds would be a great thing! Suggest it to Cuchuflète.


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## MadameT

I discovered just now that they already have this option when posting a msg. 
So maybe if you have a recording software ...you could send me a "bl".


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## Leopold

I have not a mic, but i found this link

http://www.vor.ru/Spanish/Russian_lessons/Alfavit.html

 (it's near the end) I cannot attach a .ram file.

 Anyway, having the pronounciation of the languages of the forum would be a great help, i think.


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## MadameT

That is it  however I think it sounds softer in romanian I might be subjective so we should ask Marcilanamus to listen to it as well and tell us what he thinks.


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## Lems

MadameT said:
			
		

> I discovered just now that they already have this option when posting a msg.
> So maybe if you have a recording software ...you could send me a "bl".


Hi MadameT

For your information, the sound files are limited in size to upload here as follows:  .WAV  200,000 Bytes;   .MP3 50,000 Bytes

Hope it helps.

Lems
__________________________
43% of all statistics are useless.


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## Doina

Hi everybody! So glad you started the Romanian forum, Marci... thanks. 

Leopold, I'm not too sure about this, but the Romanian î is not exactly like the Russian bl. I just called a colleague of mine, teacher of Russian, to ask her. She's not at home right now, but I'll tell you when she comes and tells me aaaaaaallllll about it...

Boy, I'm glad about this!

Doina


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## Leopold

Thanks Doina.  Bou it's not worth such a bother! I don't think i'll start studying Romanian by now... unfortunately.


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## Doina

It's not a bother, Leo, I'm curious myself... And you never know when you'll start studying something. You know what they say, "never say never"?


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## Leopold

Sure.  Thanks, doina


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## MadameT

Hey Marcilanamus you started the thread right? say something you are so silent

Alina


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## Marcilanamus

Leopold, I am sorry but I can't listen to the russian sound you spoke of because I don't have speakers ! Madame T, I have no idea where pune botul is derived from, sorry


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## Doina

I did listen to the sounds in the link Leopold told us about and also spoke to a colleague of mine who is a teacher of Russian. The Romanian sound is relatively close to the first two variants. The difference is that the Russian sound is usually pronounced more in the back of the mouth, while the Romanian one is pronounced closer to the lips. The same sound is pronounced differently depending on the neighbouring sounds. The old story of the allophones, like in every language.

Hope this helps at least a bit.  

Doina


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## Leopold

Yes. Thanks to both of you.

L.


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## Doina

As for "a pune botul", my guess is that it derives from the analogy with the way dogs eat. You know how happy they are when they come wagging the tail and stuff their muzzle in the pot. Just the same, when someone "pune botul", he's tricked into "swallowing" something which is not always what it seems to be.

Just my guess. No harm done if it's wrong, ok?


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## marco_bcn

Hi everybody,


I lived in Spain for one year and I used to get very angry when people mistook us for Russians. No way! For an untrained ear it may even sound like Chinese, but untrained ears are either bad ears, or ignorant ones, which is even worse.
A Romanian forum would be nice and I'm eager to help.


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## Doina

Hi, Marco, welcome!!!

Nice to see our Romanian "community" is growing around here. Think we'll just have to wait for people interested in learning some Romanian or things about Romania. Or just think of how we can interest them in that   . Any ideas?


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## marco_bcn

Hi Doina,

 Talking about suggestions, we would first have to wake them up, to do some advertising for this forum, or something like that. I'm new here myself and I'd been using the English-Spanish one for some weeks until I saw this. I also have some Spanish friends willing to learn Romanian, I'm sure they'll be happy to know about this forum.

 Bye


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## Doina

The idea of advertising the forum among our colleagues and students is brilliant! I'm sure each of them will find interesting things to learn here. If people are willing to know things about the Romanian language and culture, we'll be here to give him a helping hand, right?


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## Doina

to give THEM!!!! a helping hand, sorry........


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## marco_bcn

Right! It's always difficult to reach an advanced level on your own, without a helping hand nearby. Such an interchange could have miraculous results, if you only knew where to search. Furthermore, this forum is highly interactive and I see there is a very helpful membership around here.
 So, keep up the good work, Doina! Let's make this work!


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## viovinti

Hi everybody!
Is this thread dead? No post for almost a month now 
I am new here, I am a native Romanian speaker. 
As for the comparison Russian - Romanian,   I was recently asked by an American if the language I was speaking was Spanish   (I was talking in Romanian to a friend of mine)


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## marco_bcn

Hi Viovinti. Yes, this thread seems to be dead. Unfortunately. Anyway, I'm always here. Let's stop talking about Russian, it almost sounds like an excuse, which it shouldn't be.

Looking forward to hearing from you.


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## Lems

Hi all

The post from kittenkaboodle asking to interview a Romanian was transformed in a new thread with the title "Romanian interview" to facilitate his seeking.

Lems


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## byounie

Hello Everyone!

I know very little about this language, but I do have a pronounciation question: 

How do you pronounce the word: asteptare? I know it means "waiting," but I need to know how to speak it.


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## robbie_SWE

It would be pronounced, something like this (OBS! I'm not that good at phonetics, so I'll be writing it like it would have been an English word  ). 

Asteptare = [ashteptare]

Does this help?? Good Luck!  

/Robbie

+ Think Italian when pronouncing it! It helps if you do!


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## alitza

I think the more accurate way of writing it phonetically would be:
"ash-tep-tah-reh".
Otherwise English speakers might tend to ignore the final "e" and pronounce the final part of the word similarly to "fare".
Cheers.


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## robbie_SWE

You're totally right Alitza. But could [ashteptaré] work too??

 robbie


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## aurette

Doina said:


> As for "a pune botul", my guess is that it derives from the analogy with the way dogs eat. You know how happy they are when they come wagging the tail and stuff their muzzle in the pot. Just the same, when someone "pune botul", he's tricked into "swallowing" something which is not always what it seems to be.
> 
> Just my guess. No harm done if it's wrong, ok?


 
Hello, 
I see nobody has answered your question, so I'll explain it.

It means "to believe someone" "to be naive" or its english equivalent "*to buy it*" as in the example:
-Elephants fly. - I don't buy that. (There's no way i believe you)
In Romanian: *Ai pus botul!* You believed that!

*a pune botul*  means to be stupid enough to believe something which is obviously not true
Pay attention, this is slang, it is somehow harmful to say that to someone

Did this help? 

My mistake, Doina, I didn't carefully read your post before quoting it. Sorry


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## Mallarme

aurette said:


> *a pune botul*  means to be stupid enough to believe something which is obviously not true
> Pay attention, this is slang, it is *somehow harmful* to say that to someone



I learned 'a pune botul' a long time ago but then forgot it.  Now this post has reminded me of it again. 

Your English is excellent, but allow me to tweak it here and there so it's perfect.   It would be better to say: "...it is somewhat insulting to say that to someone."  

I think we normally use "somehow" with a verb, e.g. "I somehow forgot to feed the dog this morning."  (somehow modifies 'forgot' - verb)

Contrast this with: "She is somewhat pretty." (somewhat modifies adjective 'pretty')

"harmful" sounds a little odd here.  Some things that are harmful could be:

Watching violence on TV is harmful to young children.  Too much Vitamin A is harmful to your body.  etc.


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## aurette

Thank you very much for showing me my mistakes. Much appreciated. It is very important to know this.
Once again, thank you!


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