# byla na dovolené v Kanadě



## OzziBoy

I received this in an email from a Czech friend recently. She doesn't use diacritical marks (much to my own dismay) so apologies for the lack of them here.

_Ted jsem s rodici a za chvili jdu s Adela ven, byla ted na dovolene v Kanade, tak ji jdu vyzpovidat._

My translation is:
_Now I am with my family and will soon go out with Adela, ... was now on vacation in Canada, so I will confess it._

I just can't work out who actually went to Canada. Is it Adela, the person writing this or both of them?

Thanks,
Oz


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## ilocas2

Teď jsem s rodiči a za chvíli jdu s Adélou ven, byla teď na dovolené v Kanadě, tak ji jdu vyzpovídat.

It means:

Now I am with my parents and will soon go out with Adela, she (Adela) was now on vacation in Canada, so I'm going to interview her.

I'm not sure, what's the most exact English equivalent of "vyzpovídat", but in this sentence it just means that she's going to talk with Adela about her vacation in Canada, she's going to ask her about how was the vacation.


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## OzziBoy

Fantastic. Thank you very much for that ilocas2. 

I know that povídat means to babble or talk so that makes sense to me.

Moc děkuji.


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## winpoj

"I just can't work out who actually went to Canada. Is it Adela, the person writing this or both of them?"

To make it clear: if the writer had gone to Canada, it would have read: ..._byla *jsem* ted na dovolene v Kanade...; _if both women had, the form would have been: ..._byl*y* *jsme* ted na dovolene v Kanade..._


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## OzziBoy

Excellent. Thanks to you too winpoj.


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## NoTraducer

Hi, great to see someone from Australia learning Czech. Btw, you were sort of right about the word "confess", at least to the best of my knowledge. Vyzpovídat used to mean, and still means, I think, in the Christian Church, "to confess" in the transitive sense, i.e. "to receive the confession of." And I guess it grew (or rather "shrank") to mean "to get all the possible and impossible juicy gossip from".
One other thing: the first comma in the Czech sentence (after VEN) represents a rather common but, to me, confusing comma usage in Czech. It should really be a colon.... That might have thrown you a little....


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## OzziBoy

Thank you very much NoTraducer. Very useful information there.

This person is from Brno/Moravia so there may be some dialectical differences there too. I know some Praguers make fun of the Moravian dialect.


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## ilocas2

In this sentence it means that she will ask a lot. I think that "all possible and impossible juicy gossip" is too strong and it's not primarly contained in the meaning of the word. And there are no dialectal differences in this case.


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## NoTraducer

You're welcome, OzziBoy. It could be that Moravians use the verb vyzpovídat more often than we do in Prague. But I'm not sure about that. Btw, ilocas2 is correct in saying that I did not give you a dictionary definition, but rather a tongue-in-cheek explanation meant to convey the spirit, if not the letter, of the kind of meaning it conveys..... Because if you use the verb vyzpovídat in the context we have here, it's with tongue firmly planted in cheek.


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## Enquiring Mind

" ... byla teď na dovolené v Kanadě, tak ji jdu vyzpovídat."

Some English equivalents in this general context are: "She's just been to Canada, 
...so I'm going to sound her out about it."
...so I'm going to find out what she has to say about it."
...so I'm going to hear all about it."
...so I'm going to get the lowdown (about it)."


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## ilocas2

NoTraducer said:


> Because if you use the verb vyzpovídat in the context we have here, it's with tongue firmly planted in cheek.



Yes, you are right. There's tongue-in-cheek felt in it.


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## NoTraducer

Enquiring Mind said:


> " ... byla teď na dovolené v Kanadě, tak ji jdu vyzpovídat."
> 
> Some English equivalents in this general context are: "She's just been to Canada,
> ...so I'm going to sound her out about it."
> ...so I'm going to find out what she has to say about it."
> ...so I'm going to hear all about it."
> ...so I'm going to get the lowdown (about it)."



...so I'm going to debrief her."


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