Learn how to talk about being sick
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Sherah: Hello and welcome to hebrewpod101.com. This is Lower Beginner Series Season 1, Lesson 9 - Talking About Illnesses in Hebrew. I’m your host, Sherah! |
| Amir: And I’m Amir. |
| Sherah: In this lesson, you’ll learn how to talk about being sick. |
| Amir: The conversation takes place in the dining hall of the kibbutz, in the morning. |
| Sherah: It’s between Anna and her new friend Ofir. |
| Amir: The speakers are acquaintances, so they’ll be using informal Hebrew. |
| Sherah: Let’s listen to the conversation. |
| DIALOGUE |
| אופיר: בוקר טוב. מה שלומך? |
| Ofir: Boker tov. Mah sh’lomekh? |
| אנה: בוקר טוב אופיר. אני מרגישה על הפנים. |
| Anna: Boker tov Ofir. Ani mar’gishah al ha-panim. |
| אופיר: באמת? מה הבעיה? יש לך כאב ראש? |
| Ofir: Be’emet? Mah ha-be’iyah? Yesh lakh ke’ev rosh? |
| אנה: כואבת לי הבטן . |
| Anna: Ko’evet li ha-beten. |
| אופיר: חבל, קשה לאכול עם כאב בטן. אולי את צריכה ללכת לרופא. |
| Ofir: ħaval, kasheh le-ekhol im ke’ev beten. Ula’i at tz’rikhah lalekhet la-rofe. |
| אנה: כן. איפה המרפאה? |
| Anna: Ken. E’ifo ha-mir’pa’ah? |
| Sherah: Let’s listen to the conversation one more time, slowly. |
| אופיר: בוקר טוב. מה שלומך? |
| Ofir: Boker tov. Mah sh’lomekh? |
| אנה: בוקר טוב אופיר. אני מרגישה על הפנים. |
| Anna: Boker tov Ofir. Ani mar’gishah al ha-panim. |
| אופיר: באמת? מה הבעיה? יש לך כאב ראש? |
| Ofir: Be’emet? Mah ha-be’iyah? Yesh lakh ke’ev rosh? |
| אנה: כואבת לי הבטן . |
| Anna: Ko’evet li ha-beten. |
| אופיר: חבל, קשה לאכול עם כאב בטן. אולי את צריכה ללכת לרופא. |
| Ofir: ħaval, kasheh le-ekhol im ke’ev beten. Ula’i at tz’rikhah lalekhet la-rofe. |
| אנה: כן. איפה המרפאה? |
| Anna: Ken. E’ifo ha-mir’pa’ah? |
| Sherah: Now, let’s hear it with the English translation. |
| אופיר: בוקר טוב. מה שלומך? |
| Ofir: Boker tov. Mah sh’lomekh? |
| Ofir: Good morning. How are you? |
| אנה: בוקר טוב אופיר. אני מרגישה על הפנים. |
| Anna: Boker tov Ofir. Ani mar’gishah al ha-panim. |
| Anna: Good morning, Ofir. I'm feeling awful. |
| אופיר: באמת? מה הבעיה? יש לך כאב ראש? |
| Ofir: Be’emet? Mah ha-be’iyah? Yesh lakh ke’ev rosh? |
| Ofir: Really? What's the problem? Do you have a headache? |
| אנה: כואבת לי הבטן . |
| Anna: Ko’evet li ha-beten. |
| Anna: My stomach hurts. |
| אופיר: חבל, קשה לאכול עם כאב בטן. אולי את צריכה ללכת לרופא. |
| Ofir: ħaval, kasheh le-ekhol im ke’ev beten. Ula’i at tz’rikhah lalekhet la-rofe. |
| Ofir: That's a pity, it's difficult to eat with a stomachache. Maybe you need to go to the doctor. |
| אנה: כן. איפה המרפאה? |
| Anna: Ken. E’ifo ha-mir’pa’ah? |
| Anna: Yes. Where is the clinic? |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Sherah: Going to the doctor is Israel is really convenient. |
| Amir: Healthcare in Israel is universal, so every citizen must be a part of one of several healthcare providers. |
| Sherah: Each person pays a small monthly fee for basic care, and if you want to expand to non-essential treatments, you can get an extended package. |
| Amir: Finding a doctor is usually not a problem, because there are clinics all over the country, even in very small villages. |
| Sherah: In the bigger cities, there are several different doctors in the clinics for different needs, like a pediatrician, a family doctor and a geriatric doctor. |
| Amir: There is usually a pharmacy in the bigger clinics as well. |
| Sherah: If you do need to see a doctor, you can make an appointment or you can come at a time when appointments are open. |
| Amir: In general, people in Israel are quite healthy. We have the fourth longest life-expectancy in the world. |
| Sherah: I think that that is because Israel practices a good mix of traditional medicine with preventative medicine. |
| Amir: That’s true. If they can cure something without medicine, they will try that first rather than giving you medicine right away. |
| Sherah: That’s why I really appreciate the medical system in Israel. Okay, now Let’s move on to the vocabulary. |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Sherah: Let’s take a look at the vocabulary for this lesson. |
| Sherah: The first word we shall see is... |
| Amir: בוקר טוב [natural native speed] |
| Sherah: good morning |
| Amir: בוקר טוב [slowly - broken down by syllable] בוקר טוב [natural native speed] |
| Sherah: Next |
| Amir: ללכת [natural native speed] |
| Sherah: to walk, to go |
| Amir: ללכת [slowly - broken down by syllable] ללכת [natural native speed] |
| Sherah: Next |
| Amir: להרגיש/הרגיש [natural native speed] |
| Sherah: to feel |
| Amir: להרגיש/הרגיש [slowly - broken down by syllable] להרגיש/הרגיש [natural native speed] |
| Sherah: Next |
| Amir: על הפנים [natural native speed] |
| Sherah: horrible; terrible |
| Amir: על הפנים [slowly - broken down by syllable] על הפנים [natural native speed] |
| Sherah: Next |
| Amir: בעיה [natural native speed] |
| Sherah: problem |
| Amir: בעיה [slowly - broken down by syllable] בעיה [natural native speed] |
| Sherah: Next |
| Amir: בטן [natural native speed] |
| Sherah: stomach |
| Amir: בטן [slowly - broken down by syllable] בטן [natural native speed] |
| Sherah: Next |
| Amir: לכאוב/כאב [natural native speed] |
| Sherah: to hurt |
| Amir: לכאוב/כאב [slowly - broken down by syllable] לכאוב/כאב [natural native speed] |
| Sherah: Next |
| Amir: רופא [natural native speed] |
| Sherah: doctor |
| Amir: רופא [slowly - broken down by syllable] רופא [natural native speed] |
| KEY VOCAB AND PHRASES |
| Sherah: Let's have a closer look at the usage for some of the words and phrases from this lesson. The first phrase is על הפנים. |
| Amir: That is a funny expression in Hebrew, the literal translation is “on the face”. |
| Sherah: But it means “terrible” or “horrible”. |
| Amir: You can use it to describe how you feel just like Anna did. |
| Sherah: You can also use it to describe other things, like terrible food or a terrible day. |
| Amir: You will hear it used a lot too. |
| Sherah: the next phrase that we want to talk about is מה הבעיה? |
| Amir: This is “what’s the problem?” |
| Sherah: You can ask this in a positive or a negative tone. |
| Amir: Right, if someone is struggling with something you can ask them מה הבעיה? |
| Sherah: Or when someone is bothering you, you can ask them מה הבעיה and if you ask it with a שלך at the end, it really becomes negative. |
| Amir: מה הבעיה שלך? |
| Sherah: The last word that we want to talk about is בטן and this can refer to your abdomen, belly, stomach or even your bowels. |
| Amir: Some common phrases that we use with this word are כאבי בטן which is “stomachache” and כפיפות בטן which are “sit ups”. |
| Sherah: A funny expression I’ve heard is that someone עושה בטן גב. Literally translated, this means that he “does stomach back”. |
| Amir: It sounds funny, but it comes from the idea that someone is lying on the beach and tanning all day, going from the belly to their back over and over again. It basically means that someone is bumming around. |
| Sherah: It’s a very interesting phrase! Okay, let’s move on to the Grammar. |
| GRAMMAR POINT |
| Sherah: In this lesson, you’ll learn how to describe how you feel physically. |
| Amir: The main focus of this lesson is the sentence כואבת לי הבטן. |
| Sherah: Right, we are talking about our aches and pains today. |
| Amir: The structure of this sentence is a little different from other sentences in Hebrew, since the verb comes first and the subject last. |
| Sherah: It begins with the verb כואבת or likh’ov, which still agrees with the subject, even though the subject is at the end of the sentence. בטן, the subject, is a feminine noun, so לכאוב is conjugated to agree with it. |
| Amir: The next word is לי or “to me”, and this is important. |
| Sherah: Yes, the preposition -ל follows the verb לכאוב. At the end of the sentence we find our subject הבטן. So we say “hurts to me the stomach” in Hebrew instead of “my stomach hurts” the way we do in English. |
| Amir: you could say it with the same word order as in English, הבטן שלי כואבת, but this would sound like something a child might say. |
| Sherah: So, something that you may be wondering about is why בטן is a feminine noun even though it doesn’t have the normal feminine ending. |
| Amir: There are some irregular nouns that don’t have the normal endings for feminine nouns. Oddly, many of those are body parts. |
| Sherah: Right, all of the double body parts are also feminine in gender even though they don’t end in -ה or -ת. |
| Amir: Right, “legs” רגליים and “hands” ידיים and also “eyes” עיניים are all feminine. |
| Sherah: So, this sentence that we learned from the dialogue, you can apply it to other body parts. You could say כואבות לי העיניים. “My eyes hurt.” |
| Amir: or כואב לי האף “my nose hurts”. |
| Sherah: There is also another way to express pain, and Ofir showed this when he asked Anna יש לך כאב ראש? |
| Amir: “Do you have a headache?” |
| Sherah: This uses the word יש to show possession. We have talked about this before, so we are not going to spend a lot of time on it here. |
| Amir: There are some words that form a smichut and others that don’t. |
| Sherah: Right, for the words that don’t form a ‘smichut’, like כאב ראש, you would add a -ב before the body part like כאב ברגל. Here are some examples of aches taken from those we talked about earlier, but in this alternative form. |
| Amir: The first is יש לי כאב ברגל. “I have a pain in my foot.” |
| Sherah: The next one is יש לי כאב בטן. “I have a stomachache”. This is how Anna could have said it. |
| Amir: The last example is יש לי כאב גרון. “I have a throat ache”. |
| Sherah: As you can see, in the first example the two nouns don’t form a ‘smichut’ and in the last two examples they do. |
| Amir: So, now you know two different ways to talk about how you feel physically. |
Outro |
|---|
| Sherah: Okay. That’s all for this lesson. Make sure you check the lesson notes, and we’ll see you next time. |
| Amir: Now that you’ve listened to this lesson, please visit HebrewPod101.com and tell us how you feel. |
| Sherah: Thanks everyone, bye! |
| Amir: |
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