# Please leave a message at the tone



## cubbettee

Good day fellow members,

Phonetically, how would you say
Please leave a message at the tone
in the Greek Language.

Thanks (Efharisto) in advance


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## ireney

Hello cubettee and welcome to the forums 

Parakalo afiste ena minima meta ton tono.
I would personally go with "meta ton iho" (sound)

a as in apple
o as in rot 
e as in elephant
i as in ink
"iho" ("ήχος" in accusative) sounds almost exactly like "hijo", "son" )
(standard American accent, Mid-western)


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## mroma

Hello! In greek, it is very common to say ¨meta ton haraktiristiko iho¨. I don´t really know how to translate it, but the word ¨haraktiristiko¨ in that case, give us to understand that we talk about the tone of an answering machine.


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## ireney

"Haraktiristiko" (χαρακτηριστικό) is translated (in this case) as "distinctive" I guess.


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## cubbettee

Good day fellow posters,


I want to say in Greek-Please leave a message at the tone.
What is the difference between these two methods?

1.parakalo, afiste *to minima sas meta ton iho*,efharisto
2.Parakalo, afiste *ena minima sto tono*,          efxaristo

I understand that the to and ena can be used intercahngeabley here as "a" or "one" but not sure about the rest of the bolded area


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## Traduita

"To minima sas" or "ena minima" are interchangeable here as "Your message" and "a message".("To" is a definite article", "ena" is indefinite) "Ihos" is sound, a bit more generic than tone, "tonos".
If you say "ston tono" in Greek it sounds somehow as the message should to be simultaneous to the tone. I have never heard it on an answering machine and it sounds strange, even though people would understand you anyway. 
 Number 2 is one of the standard expressions for a greek-speaking answering machine. I would definitely go for solution n.2, personally, but maybe both uses are acceptable, wait to see what other posters may have to say.


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## ateaofimdomar

Definitely not number 2. When you say στο*ν *τόνο (ston tono), it sounds like a literal translation from English and it's not very good Greek (especially since you also use *ένα* μήνυμα, also a sign of a literal translation, as it is one of those cases when the indefinite article is superfluous).

Opt for number 1, Παρακαλώ, αφήστε το μήνυμά σας μετά τον ήχο. It's standard for these cases.


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## Traduita

Uuups! sorry, I think I have written Number 2  when I wanted to write Number 1 in my post above. Anyway,  ateaofimdomar is right, "afiste to mhnyma sas meta ton ixo" is the best option and the other is the strange sounding  one.


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## cubbettee

Now this is getting interesting.
Hmm one of you liked option 2 and one did not.
I had posed this question in another forum as well.
By that time I had a third option which I shall include here
1.parakalo, afiste to minima sas meta ton iho,efharisto
2.Parakalo, afiste ena minima sto tono, efxaristo
3.parakalo, afiste ena minima meta ton haraktiristiko iho

The other forum did not like option 2, but did agree with you that Option 1 is good, what about option 3?


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## ireney

Search function is our friend when memory fails us 
http://forum.wordreference.com/showthread.php?t=1101840&highlight=iho
The threads will be merged soon.


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## ateaofimdomar

cubbettee said:


> Now this is getting interesting.
> Hmm one of you liked option 2 and one did not.
> I had posed this question in another forum as well.
> By that time I had a third option which I shall include here
> 1.parakalo, afiste to minima sas meta ton iho,efharisto
> 2.Parakalo, afiste ena minima sto tono, efxaristo
> 3.parakalo, afiste ena minima meta ton haraktiristiko iho
> 
> The other forum did not like option 2, but did agree with you that Option 1 is good, what about option 3?


Hi,
Traduita corrected herself above; she meant to write number 1. 2 is bad Greek. 3 is just fine, just say parakalo, afiste ena  to minima sas meta ton haraktiristiko iho (_please leave your message after the characteristic sound_, not _one message_ [...])


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## cubbettee

Thanks kids, now who is going to teach me  to speak the language--lol
Ireney, sorry for splitting the topic


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