 I Eat, Therefore I Am By John MARONE |
Literally! The word is Есть (yest'), and it means both "to eat" and "to be." So how do Russian speakers distinguish, say, between the thoughts "I want to be you" and "I want to eat you"? All sexual connotations aside with regard to the latter statement, which is more specific in English, no such confusion exists in the lands of the east Slavs, because Есть is more accurately translated as "there are" or "there is," rather than "to be," which is rendered by the word Быть (Byt').
However, theoretically, if you have asked a friend to drop by your flat and she sends an e-mail to you at work inquiring: "Есть ли хлеб?" ("Yest’ li khleb?"), she could be asking if there is any bread in the fridge, or if she can eat the bread in the fridge.
Again, there are also half a dozen ways for native speakers to avoid such confusion, and ten times as many pitfalls for the foreigner with a less-than-expert knowledge of the language.
One of the biggest problems the student will encounter is recognition of the so-called "soft sign" (ь), a tiny letter placed after consonants to give them a gentler intonation. If you don't hear it, you could miss the whole point. For example, Он есть (On yest') means "he is" while Он ест (On yest) - the little diacritic mark at the end of the word being a soft sign - means he eats or he is eating.
I'll leave it to the reader to speculate on possible misunderstandings here. However, it should be noted at this point that Russian rarely uses the verb "to be" in conjugated form. Thus, "He is cool" comes out as "He cool" and "I am Tarzan" as "I Tarzan" (and of course, "You Jane").
Another difficulty with "eat" words is presented by the three meals in a day. Завтрак, обед and ужин (Zavtrak, Obed and Uzhin), which mean simply breakfast, lunch and dinner.
Anyway, it would be that simple if it weren't for the fact that no one sat down a couple of thousand years ago to designate what means what in English and Russian. Not everything translates nicely, and the gray areas provide the most insight into cultural differences.
On the whole, Russian has a lot more leftovers from a traditional society. Thus, обед - the second meal of the day - doesn't really mean lunch (anything from a brown bag to a trip to the company cafeteria), although the distinction gets grayer every day, as Russian-language society changes.
If you take a look in your dictionary, you will see обед translated dinner, which most Americans think of as the last (and usually largest) meal of the day. However, this raises the question of supper. Most of my compatriots would say the words are synonyms, but dinner used to be the afternoon or large meal, and supper the evening and slightly smaller one.
Russian still more or less hangs on to this distinction - at least they don't have two words for the evening meal and traditionally don't eat sandwiches at noon.
But you'd be hard-pressed to find the word "lunch" in any 19th century English texts. And unfortunately, most of the people who write bilingual dictionaries don't feel it necessary to draw attention to this.
The reader may argue: "Wait a minute, here. I see just as many Igors and Tanyas at McDonald's as Daves and Tinas. Surely, lunch is lunch." Maybe, but every other basement joint from Obolon to Khreschatyk has a бизнес ланч (biznes lanch), but not a бизнес обед (biznes obed'). Which words are translated and which are borrowed tells you a lot about languages and perceptions.
Like many European languages, Russian can say "to have breakfast", "to have lunch" and "to have dinner" using single verbs. To dine doesn't count because in English it has usually come to mean getting dressed up and going out. However, a dictionary written in 1605 might include phrases like "break fast," which has nothing to do with morning jogs or unexpected flatulence. What it does mean is that people didn't usually gorge themselves late at night while watching television. They supped, then fasted overnight until they broke, or stopped, the fast the next morning.
While, again, things are changing fast, Russian translates much more neatly into older English than into contemporary English.
Having said that, don't fool yourself into believing that Russian speakers speak like Shakespearean actors. There are lots of other ways of expressing "eat," which one wouldn't say in polite company: хавать (khavat') (pig out) or жрать (Zhrat') (stuff your face). Питаться (pitat'sya) sounds medical or dietary, while лопать (lopat') is almost for kids.
Oddly enough, however, there really isn't an equivalent in Russian to the English "meal" - as opposed to just food on a plate. Maybe because they take it for granted that food on a plate should be a meal and not just something from a brown bag.
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Read also previous issue' articles:
Neither a Borrower
Just Don't
In a Word
Hot or Not
Animal Farm
Hi on Health!
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