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Here's a small thing that unsettles English speakers early on: in the Russian past tense, the verb tells you the gender of whoever did it.
Take читать, to read. Drop the -ть, add an ending:
читал — a man read читала — a woman read читало — an it read читали — they read, or a group of any kind
So «я читал» and «я читала» are both "I was reading." The difference is who's speaking. The good news is that this is easier than what English does, not harder. Russian past tense has no я/ты/он conjugation at all — you don't change the verb for person. One form covers я, ты and он. Compare that to present tense, where every pronoun gets its own ending.
Two things worth knowing.
Вы always takes the plural form, even when you're speaking to one person politely. «Вы читали?» — whether that's a room full of people or your professor.And gender agreement follows the noun, not the meaning. Письмо пришло, because письмо is neuter. Книга лежала на столе, because книга is feminine. The object doesn't have a gender in any real sense — the word does.
Small test: if a woman says «я устала» and a man says «я устал», they're both saying "I'm tired." Which one would you use?
Take читать, to read. Drop the -ть, add an ending:
читал — a man read читала — a woman read читало — an it read читали — they read, or a group of any kind
So «я читал» and «я читала» are both "I was reading." The difference is who's speaking. The good news is that this is easier than what English does, not harder. Russian past tense has no я/ты/он conjugation at all — you don't change the verb for person. One form covers я, ты and он. Compare that to present tense, where every pronoun gets its own ending.
Two things worth knowing.
Вы always takes the plural form, even when you're speaking to one person politely. «Вы читали?» — whether that's a room full of people or your professor.And gender agreement follows the noun, not the meaning. Письмо пришло, because письмо is neuter. Книга лежала на столе, because книга is feminine. The object doesn't have a gender in any real sense — the word does.
Small test: if a woman says «я устала» and a man says «я устал», they're both saying "I'm tired." Which one would you use?
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23 August 1943 marks the end of the Battle of Kursk. Both sides knew it was coming: the front line had left a huge Soviet-held bulge pushing westwards, some 250 kilometres wide, and it was the obvious place for a German offensive. So instead of striking first, Soviet command chose to dig in, building eight successive defensive belts, thousands of kilometres of trenches, and minefields laid several times denser than standard.
Around 300,000 civilians built those defences, mostly women and teenagers from the surrounding villages, digging by hand through the spring. Some of them were still there when the offensive began on 5 July. The fighting lasted fifty days, and by the end the Soviet side had lost well over 800,000 men killed, wounded or missing, more in under two months than Britain lost in the entire war. Kursk itself, and the towns around it, were left with barely a roof standing.
That's why the date carries what it carries. Before Kursk the initiative on the Eastern Front had shifted back and forth. After it never returned to the German side. Nearly every Russian family has someone in those two months, a name, a photograph, a letter that stopped arriving, and that's what people are thinking about today, rather than the maps and the tank counts.
Around 300,000 civilians built those defences, mostly women and teenagers from the surrounding villages, digging by hand through the spring. Some of them were still there when the offensive began on 5 July. The fighting lasted fifty days, and by the end the Soviet side had lost well over 800,000 men killed, wounded or missing, more in under two months than Britain lost in the entire war. Kursk itself, and the towns around it, were left with barely a roof standing.
That's why the date carries what it carries. Before Kursk the initiative on the Eastern Front had shifted back and forth. After it never returned to the German side. Nearly every Russian family has someone in those two months, a name, a photograph, a letter that stopped arriving, and that's what people are thinking about today, rather than the maps and the tank counts.
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Peterhof sits on the Gulf of Finland, about 30 kilometres west of St Petersburg, and it was Peter the Great’s answer to Versailles. Built from 1714, it does something Versailles doesn’t: the Grand Cascade below the palace runs on no pumps at all. Water arrives by gravity through a canal system engineered three hundred years ago, and it has been working ever since.
There are around 150 fountains across the park, and the ones people remember are the ones that misbehave. Peter installed trick fountains that soak you when you step on the wrong stone, and they still catch visitors out. Come in mid May for the ceremonial switching on, when the water is turned on for the season and crowds gather to watch it start.
Go once if you can. It was almost completely destroyed in the war and rebuilt from photographs and memory over decades, which means what you’re looking at is not only Peter’s ambition but the stubbornness of everyone who put it back.
There are around 150 fountains across the park, and the ones people remember are the ones that misbehave. Peter installed trick fountains that soak you when you step on the wrong stone, and they still catch visitors out. Come in mid May for the ceremonial switching on, when the water is turned on for the season and crowds gather to watch it start.
Go once if you can. It was almost completely destroyed in the war and rebuilt from photographs and memory over decades, which means what you’re looking at is not only Peter’s ambition but the stubbornness of everyone who put it back.
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Most people begin learning Russian by opening a grammar table and closing it again a week later. Here’s an order that works better.
1. The alphabet, three days, nothing else. Not words yet. Just until you can read a street sign slowly.
2. Read everything you see, badly. Shop names, metro stations, food labels. Understanding nothing is fine. You’re teaching your eyes that Cyrillic isn’t decoration.
3. Whole phrases before rules. «Меня зовут», «я не понимаю», «сколько стоит». Don’t ask why the endings look like that yet.
4. Pick your first 100 words from your own life. Textbooks give you «aunt» and «pencil». Yours should match why you’re actually learning.
5. Only now touch the cases. Start with two, not six. Six at once is what makes people quit.
6. Speak far earlier than feels comfortable. Three broken sentences with a real person beats an hour of flashcards.
Step six is the one nobody manages alone, which is where a teacher earns their keep. Ours do this every week with people starting from zero, so if you’d rather not guess at the order yourself, come and start with us.
1. The alphabet, three days, nothing else. Not words yet. Just until you can read a street sign slowly.
2. Read everything you see, badly. Shop names, metro stations, food labels. Understanding nothing is fine. You’re teaching your eyes that Cyrillic isn’t decoration.
3. Whole phrases before rules. «Меня зовут», «я не понимаю», «сколько стоит». Don’t ask why the endings look like that yet.
4. Pick your first 100 words from your own life. Textbooks give you «aunt» and «pencil». Yours should match why you’re actually learning.
5. Only now touch the cases. Start with two, not six. Six at once is what makes people quit.
6. Speak far earlier than feels comfortable. Three broken sentences with a real person beats an hour of flashcards.
Step six is the one nobody manages alone, which is where a teacher earns their keep. Ours do this every week with people starting from zero, so if you’d rather not guess at the order yourself, come and start with us.
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Have you ever noticed that you sound much better in your head than you do in real life?🧐
When you’re learning a foreign language, you can sometimes imagine yourself speaking fluently, using the right words and forming perfect sentences. Then you actually start talking, and suddenly there are pauses, missing words, strange grammar and a lot of «uhm… »
It happens because speaking in your head is much easier than speaking out loud. Your brain already knows what you want to say, so it fills in the gaps and makes everything sound smoother. But real conversation requires you to find the words, build the sentence and pronounce everything at the same time.
So if your spoken language doesn’t sound as good as it does in your head, it doesn’t mean you’re bad at the language. Your speaking skills just need time to catch up with the version of you that already exists in your head.
🇷🇺 Join the new group for beginners to feel more confident in yourself and your Russian! We start on September 28th! Click here to sign up!
When you’re learning a foreign language, you can sometimes imagine yourself speaking fluently, using the right words and forming perfect sentences. Then you actually start talking, and suddenly there are pauses, missing words, strange grammar and a lot of «uhm… »
It happens because speaking in your head is much easier than speaking out loud. Your brain already knows what you want to say, so it fills in the gaps and makes everything sound smoother. But real conversation requires you to find the words, build the sentence and pronounce everything at the same time.
So if your spoken language doesn’t sound as good as it does in your head, it doesn’t mean you’re bad at the language. Your speaking skills just need time to catch up with the version of you that already exists in your head.
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🐐«Любовь зла, полюбишь и козла» is a funny Russian proverb about how love can make us overlook someone’s flaws.
The literal meaning is something like “Love is blind, you might even fall for a goat.” The “goat” is not really about the animal. It is a humorous way of saying that when you fall in love, even a person with plenty of flaws can suddenly seem wonderful.
Russians usually say this phrase jokingly, when someone falls for a person others don’t quite understand. It can be teasing, affectionate, or slightly ironic depending on the situation.
The literal meaning is something like “Love is blind, you might even fall for a goat.” The “goat” is not really about the animal. It is a humorous way of saying that when you fall in love, even a person with plenty of flaws can suddenly seem wonderful.
Russians usually say this phrase jokingly, when someone falls for a person others don’t quite understand. It can be teasing, affectionate, or slightly ironic depending on the situation.
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