# Here! (answer to roll call)



## Encolpius

Hello, it's difficult to find the translation of the set phrase in dictionaries. What is the idiomatic translation of *here *in your language (roll call in the Army, etc). Thanks. 

*Hungarian *--- Jelen! (it means present; here does not work in Hungarian)
*Chinese *--- 到! dào (it means have arrived)
*Czech *--- Zde! (here)


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## apmoy70

In Greek:


*«Παρών!»* [paˈɾon] (present tense masc. participle), *«παρούσα!»* [paˈɾusa] (present tense fem. participle) --> _present, at hand, in attendance_ < Classical verb *«πάρειμι» pắreimĭ* --> _to be present, stand by, be near_ < compound; Classical adverb, preposition, and prefix *«παρά» părắ* --> _besides, by, from, next to, alongside, against_ (PIE *preh₂-, _beside, by_) + Classical v. *«εἰμί» eimί* --> _to be_ (PIE *h₁es-, _to be_ old athematic root present with exact correspondences in several IE languages e.g. Skr. अस्ति (ásti), _to be_; Lat. esse; OCS єстъ; OArmenian եմ (em) etc).
Although the verb *«πάρειμι» pắreimĭ* itself hasn't survived in MoGr (except perhaps for the learned and rare impersonal *«πάρεστι»* [ˈpaɾesti] --> _it's possible_), its participles *«παρών»* [paˈɾon] (masc.), *«παρούσα»* [paˈɾusa] (fem.), *«παρόν»* [paˈɾon] (neut.), are alive and kicking (somehow).


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## ger4

In German: _Hier! _('here') is mainly used in the army, I think. At school we were usually expected to say _Ja! _('yes').


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## marco_2

In Poland we say *obecny* /  _f. _*obecna* (=present) or *jestem *(=I am).


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## 涼宮

In Spanish you use both 'presente' like Hungarian and 'here' (aquí), presente is much more common, especially at school, but aquí is more common at university though some people still say presente. 

Japanese has the most interesting way to answer a roll call at school I've seen, you have both はい元気です _hai genki desu _(yes, I am fine) or just はい _hai_ (yes).

I don't know how in the army the roll call is answered in neither language.


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## Encolpius

Wow, Suzumiya, the Japanese version is really really interesting. Too bad there are no more members knowing some other "exotic" languages with exotic idioms here...
You have mentioned school, in Hungarian Jelen! works in schools as well..


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## 810senior

涼宮 said:


> Japanese has the most interesting way to answer a roll call at school I've seen, you have both はい元気です _hai genki desu _(yes, I am fine) or just はい _hai_ (yes).
> I don't know how in the army the roll call is answered in neither language.



I'm afraid I haven't ever heard of someone saying _hai genki desu_ to answer a roll call, we would simply say はいhai (yes), of course it's the most general, used in school or somewhere.




Encolpius said:


> Wow, Suzumiya, the Japanese version is really really interesting. Too bad there are no more members knowing some other "exotic" languages with exotic idioms here...
> You have mentioned school, in Hungarian Jelen! works in schools as well..



I have the same feeling here all the time. 
Especially, European languages seem like the languages in the fantasy world.


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## DearPrudence

I haven't done the army, but I would say in general, at school at least, the typical answer in *French* is the adjective:
"*présent*" (for a man), "*présente*" (for a woman)

Informally, I guess answer with "*oui*" (_yes_) would do as well.


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## Maroseika

*Russian *reply on roll call in army is the shortest possible:
Я! (I!).

In schools usual reply is Здесь. (Here).


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## apmoy70

Maroseika said:


> *Russian *reply on roll call in army is the shortest possible:
> Я! (I!).
> 
> In schools usual reply is Здесь. (Here).


Greek reply on army roll call is the participle *«παρών!»* [paˈɾon] (masc.) --> _present!_, and in case of females, *«παρούσα!»* [paˈɾusa].
In school I replied as I recall with a simple *«εδώ!»* [eˈðo] (adv.) --> _here!_


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## 涼宮

810senior said:


> I'm afraid I haven't ever heard of someone saying _hai genki desu_ to answer a roll call, we would simply say はいhai (yes), of course it's the most general, used in school or somewhere.




That's the one I know, though . Though some Japanese also told me it depends on where you are in Japan. A neighbor of him had answered, too, お休みです, though that perhaps was in jest. I also remember having watched a vid on youtube, a former student of a teacher wanted to pay tribute to his teacher, he blindfolded her and took her to school, and she had all her former students in front of her. She got all emotional and happy seeing how all her former students, already very adult and all gathering together to thank her for being their teacher. Then, she roll called them and all answered はい元気です！ Then everybody proceeded to read their letters, their messages thanking her and what they thought of her. 



> I have the same feeling here all the time.
> Especially, European languages seem like the languages in the fantasy world.



Well indeed . You have no idea how strange Japan and Japanese are for people, but of course it's the same for Japanese, how strange the rest of the world is.


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## 810senior

This topic is so interesting that I'd like to take them in some categories.

Additional information:
In Korean =예_ye_(politic, yes), 네_ne_(less politic, yes)

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(1) Here: Czech, German, Spanish, Hungarian, Greek, Russian
(2) Present(adjective): Greek, Polish, French, Spanish
(3) I(I am)olish, Russian
(4) Yes: German, Japanese, French, Korean
(5) Arrived: Chinese

*The language having one way to answer*: Czech(1), Hungarian(1), Japanese(4), Korean(4), Chinese(5)
*The language having two ways to answer*: Spanish(1,2), Greek(1,2), Russian(1,3), German(1,4), Polish(2,3), French(2,4)




涼宮 said:


> That's the one I know, though . Though some Japanese also told me it depends on where you are in Japan. A neighbor of him had answered, too, お休みです, though that perhaps was in jest. I also remember having watched a vid on youtube, a former student of a teacher wanted to pay tribute to his teacher, he blindfolded her and took her to school, and she had all her former students in front of her. She got all emotional and happy seeing how all her former students, already very adult and all gathering together to thank her for being their teacher. Then, she rolled coll them and all answered はい元気です！ Then everybody proceeded to read their letters, their messages thanking her and what they thought of her.



I know the expression even in the same language can vary in the frame of the dialect, since I have no idea what to say this in every dialect, maybe some dialect has the different expression for this.
In my opinion, _hai genki desu_ will be possible at times but _genki desu_ is only accompanied by _hai _meaning yes. When we are called our name by teacher in school, we commonly answer to him or her "はい_hai_, yes". Of course, we can add some words after that, as in はい先生hai sensei(yes, teacher). I guess this case can be adaptable to other languages.

So what I wrote is _hai _is the general saying in answering to roll call, end of story.


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## Armas

In the Finnish Army I think the reply is Herra <sotilasarvo>! = Sir <military rank>! Outside Army, we say Paikalla! = At place! or rarely Läsnä = Present. Informally you can say Täällä! = Here! or even Joo! = Yeah!


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## Radioh

Simply say "có" yes
or "có mặt" present


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## SuperXW

Encolpius said:


> *Chinese *--- 到! dào (it means have arrived)


With 到 as the most common way, in some regional troops one could answer 有.
有 "have, exist", implies "you have me here, sir."
Historically, subordinates answered 在.
在 "present".


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## 810senior

SuperXW said:


> With 到 as the most common way, in some regional troops one could answer 有.
> 有 "have, exist", implies "you have me here, sir."
> Historically, subordinates answered 在.
> 在 "present".



Let me ask you a question: doesn't Chinese say 是(yes) in answering to roll call?


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## SuperXW

810senior said:


> Let me ask you a question: doesn't Chinese say 是(yes) in answering to roll call?


No. 是 is for answering a "yes/no" question, or an order.

"Are you Lee?"
"是。" (Yes, I am.)

"Go back to your seat, soldier!"
"是！" (Yes! Will do!)


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## M Mira

In Taiwan, 有(yòu, not the normal yǒu) is the most commonly used way to answer a roll call.


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## SuperXW

M Mira said:


> In Taiwan, 有(yòu, not the normal yǒu) is the most commonly used way to answer a roll call.


Interesting. Do you know why it pronounced yòu instead of yǒu?


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## Perseas

apmoy70 said:


> In school I replied as I recall with a simple *«εδώ!»* [eˈðo] (adv.) --> _here!_


Yes, and at the same time we raised our hand!


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## 810senior

Perseas said:


> Yes, and at the same time we raised our hand!



Same here.
We raise our hand, too.


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## ger4

We were at least  _supposed_ to raise our hands


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## M Mira

SuperXW said:


> Interesting. Do you know why it pronounced yòu instead of yǒu?


Unsatisfactory but the best answer I can find: a high falling tone is "brisker" than a low dipping tone, so people adopted it. It's unsatisfactory because it didn't answer when and where it appeared. But my bet is that it's from the army, since there're also 立正("attention!") and 稍息("at ease") pronounced with funny tones, li(low falling)zheng(high level, long and loud) and shao(low falling)xi(high level, short like a neutral tone but loud). As the army isn't known for being funny, they are either from a certain dialect or invented by some top brass.
-----
We raises our hands while answering too, and by university, we only raises our hands.


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## SuperXW

M Mira said:


> Unsatisfactory but the best answer I can find: a high falling tone is "brisker" than a low dipping tone, so people adopted it. It's unsatisfactory because it didn't answer when and where it appeared. But my bet is that it's from the army, since there're also 立正("attention!") and 稍息("at ease") pronounced with funny tones, li(low falling)zheng(high level, long and loud) and shao(low falling)xi(high level, short like a neutral tone but loud). As the army isn't known for being funny, they are either from a certain dialect or invented by some top brass.


Indeed! I have even heard more strange ways to say "attention" and "at ease" in armies. 

By the way, in some occasions, our students even have to stand up to answer roll calls...


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## zxcvbn

810senior said:


> *The language having two ways to answer*: ..., Russian(1,3), ...


Actually there are more than just two... In schools of various kinds there is no standard, you only have to deliver the meaning. "Здесь" is most usable, but for example присутствует (is present) is fine too.


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