Want to improve your conversational Russian skills? Check out this list of need to know Russian conversational phrases.
Разговорный Словарь – Conversational Dictionary
One of the great things about studying Russian in Russia is that you have plenty of chances to meet with native speakers and practice the language outside the classroom. This is both a great opportunity and a great problem. Informal spoken Russian differs a lot from the Russian you can learn from a book, so you might find your new friends using more than a few phrases you’re unfamiliar with. With that in mind take a look at this list of common conversational phrases so you can be two steps ahead in your next conversation.
Обидно
Did someone not say thank you when you opened the door for them? Did they tell you that your handwriting is messy? Maybe someone hung up on you unexpectedly or maybe the vending machine ate your money and then gave the next person in line a free can of coke. In all these situations there’s just one thing you need to say to explain the perfect storm of negative emotions bursting in your head – “обидно”. Basically anytime that someone treats you impolitely or you feel that something or someone is treating you unfairly this word should be your go to response.
- “Я пришла в ресторан и сделала заказ по-русски. Я знаю, что никаких ошибок не было в моей речи, но всё равно офицант, услышав мой акцент, решил говорить со мной только на английсском! Обидно!”
- I went to a restaurant and ordered in Russian. I know that I didn’t make any mistakes when I spoke but as soon as the waiter heard my accent, he decided he would only speak with me in English. Rude much?!
- “Мне было бы всё равно, если бы ты просто опоздал, но то, что ты вообще не пришёл, вот это обидно.”
- I wouldn’t care if you’d just come late, but the fact that you didn’t come at all really hurts.
- “Целую неделю, пока я роботала, погода была хорошая, но так только наступили выходные, пошёл дождь. Обидно!”
- The whole week while I was working the weather has been good, but now that the weekend comes around it starts raining! Typical!
Круто
In English there are many words for cool, new ones come old ones go but the word cool always sticks around. Круто is the same in Russian. You might hear people using “класс”, “супер”, and “клёво” now, but years from now, when they’ll most likely have passed on into the linguistic afterlife of ironic retro slang, круто will still be hanging about. You can use круто in all same ways that you can use English cool, there’s even an adjectival form.
- “Я купил новую машину.” “Круто.”
- “I bought a new car.” “Cool.”
- •“Зайди в новый бар на Рубинштейна, там круто.”
- Check out that new bar on Rubenstein, it’s cool.”
- “Крутые парни не смотрят на взрывы.”
- “Cool guys don’t look at explosions.”
Прикольно
Having just one word for expressing “cool” isn’t very cool though; people might start getting annoyed after you’ve used it for the 15th time in a row. As such it’s good to know a synonym for “круто”, preferably one that’s just as timeless. Enter “прикольно”. You can think of this as the Russian equivalent of awesome, and you can use it in every situation where you might use “круто”. If someone tells you about how they went deep sea diving at the weekend or about how a new cinema just opened feel free to use either круто or прикольно.
- “Вчера мы были в джаз клубе!” “Прикольно.”
- “Yesterday we went to a Jazz bar.” “Awesome.”
- “Ого, есть музей советских игровых автоматов, прикольно”
- “Oh wow, there’s a museum of soviet arcade games, awesome.”
- “Как прикольно играют эти музыканты!”
- “These musicians are awesome!”
Забавно
The literal translation of this word is “amusing”, it even has a noun form “забава” which is just like the English word “amusement/pastime”. It’s used in the same way as “смешно” (funny), and can be employed when slightly amused, very amused, or not amused at all. It’s a good word to know so that you have more than one phrase to turn to when you find something worthy of a laugh.
- “А потом чайка украла его еду, было забавно.”
- “And then a seagull stole his food, it was funny.”
- “Вчера я был на шоу одного комика, было очень забавно!”
- “I went to watch a comedy show yesterday, it was so funny!”
- “Спасибо, что опять положил резинового паука на моё лицо пока я спал. Было так же забавно, как в последный раз, и как в другой раз до этого.”
- “Thank you for putting a rubber spider on my face while I was sleeping again. It was just as amusing as the last time you did it, and the time before that.”
Тусоваться
If you spend a lot of time just hanging out with your friends then you’ll want to remember this word. “Тусоваться” means both hang out and chill out at the same time; you use it when you’re just sitting around, talking, maybe watching some videos on the internet, maybe playing games, but in general doing nothing useful in particular. You can “тусоваться” with friends or alone. You can do it at home, at someone else’s place, or even in public if you want.
- “Я люблю тусоваться дома на выходных.”
- “I love chilling out at home at the weekend.”
- “Мы тусовались у Саши.”
- “We hung out at Sasha’s place.”
- “Мы с друзьями обычно тусуемся в парке.”
- “Me and friends usually hang out in the park.”