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Today, a few Bulgarian tourists asked me about the most basic expressions in Hungarian, so I decided it may be a good idea to give you, dear reader, a basic lesson in the beautiful language of Hungary.
Many languages deal with greetings and expressing gratitude in a simple way. In English, you could say “hello” and “bye” mostly regardless of age, gender, and your relationship with the person you are greeting. In Hungarian, it is a bit different: you could say “hello” in most cases, and people will forgive you when, or if, they see that you are a tourist. But in fact, Hungarians use a wide variety of greetings. Like many languages, Hungarian has a formal speech intended to use among people who you do not know. In shops, public offices, etc., according to this formal speech, it is more proper to choose a greeting based on the time of day. Hungarians most commonly use “jó reggelt” (good morning), “jó napot” (good day, for any time of day), and “jó estét” (good evening). When you are leaving, or departing from people you are not familiar with, you could just say “viszontlátásra” (meaning “see you!”) For friends, or people who are of similar age, if that is not too old, you could just say “hello,” or the Hungarian version, “szia” (or, in plural, “sziasztok”), which is good for both meeting with and departing from people. There are many other forms of greetings, for example the ones children say to adults or adults to their elders, “csókolom” I doubt it has an equivalent in English (it means “kiss you,” it does not even make sense), and it is less and less used, but still acceptable, and under appropriate circumstances, it is considered very polite. You must use “csókolom” when greeting the mother of one of your friends, or, more importantly, the mother of your girlfriend. Another basic thing foreigners might want to know is how to express gratitude. It is more simple than greetings. “Thank you” directly translates to “köszönöm”, while “thanks” translates to “köszi” (be careful though, “köszi” is informal). Although, as I stated in another article, the majority of Hungarians do not speak foreign languages, in public offices, shops, bars, restaurants, etc., the employees are likely to understand English, and, in some places, German too. On the other hand, Hungarians are usually impressed by foreigners who care to learn a few words (or even one) in Hungarian, so if you intend to make your Hungarian friends, acquaintances, or hosts very happy, you could just learn some of the above expressions. Accommodation in Budapest Private accommodation in downtown Budapest next to the Parliament. If you have questions, please email us at marta@logoi.com. |
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