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Speak / Lesson 63

Time and Date (Vocabulary Sprint)

In this lesson, we go over common vocabulary words for the time and date. This includes the words for the seasons and days of the week. The days of the week in Persian are:

 

 

Mondaydoshambéدوشَنبه
Tuesdayseshambéسِهشَنبه
Wednesdaychārshambé چِهار شَنبِه
Thursdaypanjshambéپَنج شَنبِه
Fridayjom'é جُمعِه
Saturdayshambé شَنبِه
Sundayyekshambéیِک شَنبِه

GREETINGS:

salām
hello
سَلام
chetor-ee
how are you?
چِطوری؟

Note: In Persian, as in many other languages, there is a formal and an informal way of speaking. We will be covering this in more detail in later lessons. For now, however, chetor-ee is the informal way of asking someone how they are, so it should only be used with people that you are familiar with. hālé shomā chetor-é is the formal expression for ‘how are you.’

Spelling note: In written Persian, words are not capitalized. For this reason, we do not capitalize Persian words written in phonetic English in the guides.


ANSWERS:

khoobam
I’m well
خوبَم

Pronunciation tip: kh is one of two unique sounds in the Persian language that is not used in the English language. It should be repeated daily until mastered, as it is essential to successfully speak Persian. Listen to the podcast for more information on how to make the sound.

Persian English
salām hello
chetor-ee how are you?
khoobam I’m well
merci thank you
khayli very
khayli khoobam I’m very well
khoob neestam I’m not well
man me/I
bad neestam I’m not bad
ālee great
chetor-een? how are you? (formal)
hālé shomā chetor-é? how are you? (formal)
hālet chetor-é? how are you? (informal)
khoob-ee? are you well? (informal)
mamnoonam thank you
chetor peesh meeré? how’s it going?
ché khabar? what’s the news? (what’s up?)
testeeeee

Leyla: Hello and welcome to lesson 79 of learn Persian with Chai and conversation. My name is Leyla and I'm your teacher for the course.

Chris:  And my name is Chris. I'm the co host for our vocabulary sprints, and my husband and I'll be learning Persian along with you.

Leyla: And this is the third episode in our vocabulary sprint series. In the first one we learned about animals. The second one we learned about colors, and now we're moving on to time and dates. We're going

Chris:  to cover a section of the vocabulary words that are associated with this theme, but there are lots more and lots more material that you can cover. You can find that material on our website. It's Chai and conversation.com Chai spelled ch CHAI.

Leyla:  and without much further, Chris, are you ready to begin to learn?

Chris:  Let's  do it.

Leyla:  All right, then let's begin to learn Persian with Chai and conversation. So if you're following these podcasts in real time, we are releasing this episode in March, which is the month of the Persian New Year. So Iranians don't follow the same calendar as they do in the West. It's not the Gregorian calendar, which starts on January 1, instead, the first day of the new year is on March 21. And what is that holiday called?

Chris:  Well, that is nowruz. That's a very important holiday in, in the Persian tradition. It's, it's one of my favorite. We've done videos on that before. But why is it that the Persian calendar starts in March?

Leyla:  Well, because it's the first day of the spring starts usually around March 21. This year, it's actually March 19. It's the earliest that I've ever seen it, but it's when the earth enters the equinox. It's the first day of the new year and so our calendar goes along with Be seasons. So for today, we're going to cover time and dates. And we're going to go over the seasons. And let's get right into it. So Iranians have two different words for the word time. So let's start with that. One word is simply vakht. And as you should know by now, when I say a word, and Chris repeats it, you should repeat it along with him. This is a little bit of a difficult word to say, again, it's vakht

Chris:  vakht.

Leyla:  And this is more, add the word for the measurable time. So like hours and like time of the day. So something that you can measure is vakht

Chris:  vakht. so so what I use that word if I was going to ask you what time it is,

Leyla:  We'll get into that. But the other word that we have for the concept of time is zaman

Chris:  zaman

Leyla:  That's right. And if you could see me right now I said that word with a lot of With a dramatic flair because it is a very dramatic word. It's it's the concept of, you know, the epic time of like,

Chris:  the infinite,

Leyla:  the infinite, exactly.

Chris:  unknowable

Leyla:  zaman. So some on exactly. So it's not something that's just like measurable that you can see throughout your day. It's like, the concept of like time flowing zaman.

Chris:  Okay, so for our listeners, let's all take a moment, stop whatever you're doing, unless you're driving, and, but let's all contemplate the infinite and say zaman.

Leyla:  it's a good thing to do. So again, then there's the concept of measurable time, vakht. And then there's the concept of zaman

Chris:  zaman

Leyla:  all right, and let's get into kind of the more measurable concepts of time. Let's talk about the seasons. Okay. So, season in general is fasl

Chris:  fasl

Leyla:  Yes. So it's a little hard because you have this two constants together the se and the le sound, fasl

Chris:  fasl

Leyla:  fasl and season and we're about to get into the season of spring. So spring in Persian is bahar

Chris:  Bahar

Leyla:  perfect to Bahar and after Bahar comes summer, tabestoon,

Chris:  Tabestoon

Leyla:  and after tabestoon, Payeez

Chris:  so that's fall. Payeez

Leyla:  and I think that's Chris's favorite.

Chris:  It is I love the fall because you get to wear jackets and I think I look best.

Leyla:  again payeez and the winter zemestoon

Chris:  zemestoon. So again let's go over all of these spring, bahar

bahar

Leyla:  summer. Tabestoon

Chris:  Tabestoon.

Leyla:  Tabestoon

Chris:  tabestoon

Leyla:   the fall payeez

Chris:  payeez

Leyla:  and winter zemestoon

Chris:  Zemestoon

Leyla:  Ok, now let's go to other more more measurable concept of time. So let's start off with a year a year is called sal

Chris:  sal

Leyla:   a month is called Mah.

Chris:  Mah

Leyla:  and mah is also the word for moon unrelated. Mah,

Chris:  Mah

Leyla:  month and moon

Chris:  and also is very close to the word for fish.

Leyla:  Mahi.

Chris:  Yeah, you Mahi, you would know that if you listen to our first vocabulary sprint.

Leyla:  That's right. And then a week is hafteh,

Chris:  hafteh.

Leyla:  So let's keep going. Let's make it smaller a day. You should know this one really well. Chris it's Rooz

Chris:  Rooz.

Leyla:  And that's the name of our firstborn son.

Chris:  That's right.

Leyla:  Hour is sa'at

Chris:  sa'at

Leyla:  and then keep going a minute. Daygheh

Chris:  daygheh

Leyla:  So this word is a little difficult because it's that's not how it's written. In written version, it's dayeegheh, but no one says that they all say, dayegheh

Chris:  daygheh

Leyla:  Yep. So we're gonna just say it like that daygheh

Chris:  daygheh

Leyla:  That's a difficult word. second is sonyeh

Chris:  Soneeyeh

Leyla:  So that one's really easy, Sonyeh. So again, let's zoom out and then go all the way to a second. So a full year sal,

Chris:  sal

Leyla:  then a month. Ma,

Chris:  Ma.

Leyla:  A week, hafdeh

Chris:  hafdeh

Leyla:  A day, rooz

Chris:  rooz

Leyla: van hour, sa'at

Chris:  sa'at

Leyla:  and a minute daygheh

Chris:  daygheh

Leyla: vand second sanyeh

Chris:  sonyeh

Leyla:  So then how do we say days of the week? We say roozhayeh hafteh

Chris:  roozhayeh hafteh

Leyla:  great, so days of the week. So again, we're, we're learning, you know these measurable concepts of time. So. So now this is a hafteh, let's learn the days of the week. So, in Iran, actually you only have one day off. It's not like the weekend in in the west where you have Saturdays and Sundays off. Your day off is Friday. And so the days of the week start on Saturday. So let's start learning with with Saturday and you'll see why this makes sense. Later. So the word for Saturday is Shambe,

Chris:  Shambe.

Leyla:  And this is another one of those where you see it written. It's very different than spoken. In written it's actually with a nice sound shambeh, but for some reason everyone pronounces it with a M sound. So that's how we're going to learn it. Shambe,

Chris:  Shambe

Leyla:  Okay, so Shambe. Then Sunday is yek shambeh

Chris:  yek shambeh

Leyla:  yak shambeh. Yak means one.

Chris:  So it's, it's one day after shambeh.

Leyla:  Yes. And then Monday is do shambeh

Chris:  do shambeh.

I'm starting to see a pattern.

Leyla:  Exactly. If you know your numbers, you know that the next one Tuesday should be seshambeh.

Chris:  Seshambeh

Leyla:  Great. And then Wednesday,

Chris:  Chahrshambeh

Leyla:  again, another one of those words when it's pronounced. It's just charshambeh. Then, Thursday panj shambeh

Chris:  panj shambeh

Leyla:  And then finally,

Chris:  is it going to be what I think it's gonna be?

Leyla:  Nope. Friday is a totally different word. Jomeh

Chris:  Jomeh

Leyla:  and that one is so jome tateeleh Fridays off. That's a big concept. jomeh tateele

Chris:  jomeh tateeleh

Leyla:  Yeah. Which means Friday is free. It's off. And just to go over In the midweek days, so in Iran, it'd be Sunday through Thursday. Vasateh hafteh

Chris:  Vasateh hafteh

Leyla:  Weekend is akhareh hafteh

Chris:  akhareh hafteh

Leyla:  Yes. So vasateh hafteh, middle, or akhareh hafteh means end. And obviously, there's so many more words that we can learn about time and about seasons. This is again, the month of the beginning of the year, it's a good time to go over these will have a ton more on our bonus materials that you can go over yourself. That again, the concept of time let's go over one more time. The word for time can either be vakht

Chris:  vakht

Leyla:  or zaman

Chris:  zaman.

Leyla:  and zaman is going to keep keep quote flowing by we know that time keeps moving you will find the best thing you can do is study a little bit of Persian every day. While you are while zaman that one keeps moving right

Chris:  we have one existence here we have one, one chance to experience Zaman to you, so you better learn Farsi and Persian and keep driving, if that's what you're doing or pull over and contemplate the infinite.

Leyla:  That's right. So this was our third lesson in the vocabulary series will be back next month with another theme topic. And we'll learn more vocabulary with so thank you so much for joining us.

Chris:  We'll see you guys next time.

Leyla:  khoadahafez from Leyla

Chris: vkhodaHafez from Chris. And that's it.