Phrases

An initial version of an English-Belarusian phrase book

We hope to correct any errors and introduce new phrases as time progresses.

We have found that this works best if the Microsoft Media Player is your default player for mp3 files.

English - Russian pronunciation guide

Always pronounce

a as in "start"
g as in "big"
kh as in "loch"
i as in "elite"
o as in "not"
u as in "flute"
zh as in the s in "pleasure"
Roll the r wherever you see y not immediately followed by a vowel, pretend you're on Merseyside and say "eh", it's about the nearest we've got to the Russian vowel ы

Note

The normal form of the pronoun "you" when speaking to a child is "ty "
The normal form of the pronoun when speaking to more than one person is "vy"
This form is also used as a polite form of address for people you don't know very well
For anyone familiar with French, it's like "tu" and "vous"
You will find instances of both forms in the list below.
If you happen to use "vy" when just speaking to one of your Children, they may look a bit surprised; that's all.
Note that all Russian words are heavily stressed on one syllable, which is shown by the underlinings in the pronunciation guide, and that unstressed o is pronounced more like the u in "up"
You can't go far wrong ... the children will just giggle!