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(Unfortunately the bigger size text looks good on the website but does not look right when people get it in their email. I will have to research it some more and try something different. Back to the letters words for now…)

Today we are going to look at the consonants and vowels in Hindi.

क (ka) ख (kha) ग (ga) घ (gha) ङ (ng)

च (cha) छ (chha) ज (ja) झ (jha) ञ (na)

ट (ta) ठ (tha) ड (da) ढ (dha) ण (na)

त (ta) थ (tha) द (da) ध (dha) न (na)

प (pa) फ (pha) ब (ba) भ (bha) म (ma)

य (ya) र (ra) ल (la) व (va) श (sha)

ष (sha) स (sa) ह (ha)

क्ष (ksha) त्र (tra) ज्ञ (jna)

Vowels:

अ (a) आ (aa)

इ (i) ई (ii)

उ (u) ऊ (uu)

ए (e) ऐ (ei)

ओ (o) औ (ou)

अं (an)

Notice that there are several Hindi characters that have the same English letters associated with them. These do NOT make the same sound. There are subtle differences between these characters that are difficult to represent in the English letters. I would strongly recommend that you learn the Hindi characters to avoid confusion caused by trying to write Hindi letters using the English script.

You will be able to understand these lessons more if you have the Kid’s Primer. We are giving this book to people that donate $25 or more to support the site. To find out more read http://www.ispeakhindi.com/2008/06/26/260-kids-primer-intro/

 

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One of the most often requested improvements of the site has been the size of the Hindi letters. (My wife suggests this to me daily )I have tried many different ways to increase it. Those of you that know about HTML and creating web pages, know how easy it is to do this. But the techniques that I have tried to date had bad interactions with WordPress (the software I use to run the website) and the styles of the theme I am using. But today I have figured out an acceptable technique. Please let me know if it is acceptable.

Also, I have found that you can increase the font size in Firefox and Internet Explorer by pressing “+” (Hold down the alt key and press the plus symbol “+”). And you can decrease the fonts by pressing “-”. But in the future, I hope to have the Hindi characters about the size you see below.

Today we finish up writing the names of the English letters in the Hindi script.

Notice that “Z” is written above with the British pronunciation of “zed” instead of the American pronounciation of “zee”.

You will be able to understand these lessons more if you have the Kid’s Primer. We are giving this book to people that donate $25 or more to support the site. To find out more read http://www.ispeakhindi.com/2008/06/26/260-kids-primer-intro/

 

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today we continue to look at the English alphabet as it is written in Hindi.

I - आय (aay)
J - जे (je)
K - के (ke)
L - एल (el)
M - एम (em)
N - एन (en)
O - ओ (o)
P - पी (pii)

You will be able to understand these lessons more if you have the Kid’s Primer. We are giving this book to people that donate $25 or more to support the site. To find out more read http://www.ispeakhindi.com/2008/06/26/260-kids-primer-intro/

There are a large number of visitors to the site that are trying to learn Hindi, but their mother tongue is not English. A lot of these listeners are know Spanish as their first language. However, it seems there are not many resources available for Spanish speakers to learn Hindi.

We are working with one of our listeners, Sara, from Venezuela to produce a Hindi word of the day targeted at Spanish speakers. As we get better at working together, and get a process down, we will probably take the majority of the content and put it on the Spanish site as well. We are still working on what to call it, but for now it is at http://www.espanol.ispeakhindi.com/

Take a look and let us know what you think.  And thank you Sara for helping us do this!

You can see the other words of the day in Spanish on our wiki:  http://www.ispeakhindi.com/wiki/index.php?title=En_Espanol

 

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Today we start to cover how the Hindi alphabet is represented in the Hindi letters. Today we cover A-H which is also covered on pg. 4-5 in the Kid’s Primer (http://www.ispeakhindi.com/2008/06/26/260-kids-primer-intro260-kids-primer-intro/.

Below is each of the English alphabet letters and how to write the letter name in Hindi. It should make more sense after you listen to the podcast.

A = ए
B = बी (this is ब + ई: ब = ba and ई = E. When the vowel ई is combined with a consonant, it is written as ी. So बी is pronounced “be”; we will use “i” as a long “E”, so you sill see ई written “ii”. so you will see बी written as “bii”)
C = सी (स = sa, but when you add ई (ii) it becomes सी (sii) which is pronounced (see))
D = डी (ड = da, but when you add ई (ii) it becomes डी (dii) which is pronounced (dee))
E = ई
F = एफ (ए is pronounced as a long “A”, and we will write it as “e”. फ is “pha” pronounced as “fa”. But the last vowel sound is dropped unless specifically written. so this becomes “A-ph”)
G = जी (ज = “ja”; जी = “jii” pronounced like “gee”)
H = एच (च = cha. and the last “default” vowel is dropped so एच becomes “e-ch”)

 

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Today we do not cover any Hindi. We just talk about the plan for the next month, which is to cover the type of content that is in the Kid’s Primer book that we are giving away as a gift for people that donate $25 or more. Over the next few weeks, we will cover the Hindi sounds and some basic vocabulary. We will also talk about people names in Hindi. You can see all the sessions that are planned on our wiki: http://www.ispeakhindi.com/wiki/index.php?title=June_2008_-_Daily_Learn_Hindi_Podcasts

$25
$50
$100
$150
$200
$250
$10

 

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#259 - Past Tense - Regular Transitive Verbs

Today we are going to cover the perfect past tense for transitive verbs. This tense refers to actions that are completed. For example: I read. I wrote. I ate. etc.

This tense is fairly easy to make. Take the stem of the verb, which is found by removing the - ना  (na) ending. And then add -आ  (aa)

Let us review the list of verbs that we used for the present tense:

(See July 12, 2008 - Present Tense masculine and June 13, 2008 - Present Tense feminine. Also, you can see other examples of form the present tense using the verbs “to write” and “to say” in the July 14, 2008 podcast. We also covered the present tense of “to eat”, “to go”, and “to come” in the July 15, 2008 podcast)

We will cover “to read” and leave the other verbs for an exercise to be reviewed at a future point.

पढ़ना (pardnaa) - to read (transitive)

लिखना (likhanaa) - to write (transitive)

कहना (kahanaa) - to say (transitive)

खाना (khaanaa) - to eat (transitive)

सीखना (siikhana) - to learn (transitive)

When using a transitive verb, the subject has “ने (ne)” after it.

The perfect past tense of पढ़ना (pardnaa) - to read is as follows for both the masculine and feminine forms:

I read - मैं ने पढ़ा  (main ne pardaa)

We read - हम ने पढ़ा (ham ne pardaa)

You read - The are three version. A very informal one तू ने पढ़ा  (tuu ne pardaa)

An two more that are actually grammatically plural. तुम ने पढ़ा  (tum ne pardaa) and the most formal which is आप ने पढ़ा  (aap ne pardaa)

He/She/It read - उस ने पढ़ा  (us ne pardaa)

They read - उन्होंने पढ़ा  (unhone pardaa)

 

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#258 - Do you have a different one?

1) Do you have a cheaper one?

क्या आपके पास इससे सस्ता है ?

kya aapke paas isase sastaa hai?

2) Do you have a smaller one?

क्या आपके पास इससे छोटा है ?

kya aapke paas isase chhotaa hai?

3) Do you have a bigger one?

क्या आपके पास इससे बड़ा है ?

kya aapke paas isase bardaa hai?

4) Do you have red one?

क्या आपके पास लाल रंग है ?

kya aapke paas lal rang hai?

5) Do you have a better one?

क्या आपके पास इससे और अच्छा है ?

kya aapke paas isase aur achchhaa hai?

 

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#257 - How much is this?

1) How much is this?

यह कितने का है ?

yah kitne kaa hai

2) How much is that?

वह कितने का है ?

vah kitne kaa hai?

3) It is expensive.

यह महँगा है।

vah mahangaa hai.

4) It is cheap.

यह सस्ता है।

vah sasta hai.

5) Is that your final price?

क्या यह आपकी आखिरी कीमत है ?

kya yah aapkii aakirii kiimat hai?

 

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#256 - We need to talk!

1) We need to talk.

हमे आपसे बात करनी है।

hame aapse baat karanii hai.

2) I want to ask you something.

Male speaker:

मैं आपसे कुछ पूछना चाहता हूँ।

main aapse kuchh puuchhnaa chaahathaa huun.

Female speaker:

मैं आपसे कुछ पूछना चाहती हूँ।

main aapse kuchh puuchhnaa chaahathii huun.

3) I want to say something.

Male speaker:

मैं कुछ कहना चाहता हूँ।

main kuchh kahanaa chaahata huun

Female speaker:

मैं कुछ कहना चाहती हूँ।

main kuchh kahanaa chaahatii huun

4) I am sorry.

मुझे अफ़सोस है।

mujhe afsos hai.

5) Excuse me.

माफ़ कीजिये।

maaf kiijiye.

6) I do not understand.

Male speaker:

मैं समझा नहीं।

main samjhaa nahiin.

Female speaker:

मैं समझी नहीं।

main samjhii nahiin.