Learn how to tell time in Romanian
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Intro |
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| Antoni: How do you ask for the time in Romanian? |
| Anna: And how do you tell the time? |
| Antoni: At RomanianPod101.com, we hear these questions often. In the following situation, Sasha Lee and her classmate, Veronica Voicu, are chatting during a short break at school. Afraid of being late for their next class, Sasha asks, |
| "What time is it?" |
| Sasha Lee: Cât este ceasul? |
| Dialogue |
| Sasha Lee: Cât este ceasul? |
| Veronica Voicu: Este trei și un sfert. |
| Antoni: Once more with the English translation. |
| Sasha Lee: Cât este ceasul? |
| Antoni: "What time is it?" |
| Veronica Voicu: Este trei și un sfert. |
| Antoni: "It's a quarter past three." |
Lesson focus |
| Antoni: One of the first things one often learns when studying a new language is how to tell the time. In this lesson, you will be learning how to ask for and how to tell the time in Romanian. |
| An important point to take note of is that words like "morning" |
| Anna: dimineaţa, |
| Antoni: "afternoon," |
| Anna: ziua, |
| Antoni: and "evening," |
| Anna: seara, |
| Antoni: are not usually used when telling the time in Romanian. Romanians are comfortable with using both the twelve-hour and the twenty-four-hour clocks when talking about the time, so mentioning the time of day is not necessary. It is not uncommon to hear time expressed in either a twelve-hour or a twenty-four-hour format. Consider this example in which a time in the evening is being talked about: |
| Anna: Este ora optsprezece. |
| Antoni: This means "it's eighteen o' clock." The same time can also be expressed as |
| Anna: Este ora șase P.M. |
| Antoni: This means "it's six P.M.." Note that it's perfectly acceptable to use the expression |
| Anna: P.M. |
| Antoni: in order to specify the time of day. |
| Since, right now, we are talking about how to tell the time in a less specific way, this is a good opportunity to point out that, when a Romanian person is not sure of the exact time, you might hear them use the word |
| Anna: aproximativ. |
| Antoni: While this word may sound quite formal to an English-speaker, this is not the case in Romanian. It means "approximately" or "around." Let's hear it in a sentence: |
| Anna: Este aproximativ ora cinci. |
| Antoni: This means "it's about five o' clock." It is not uncommon for Romanian people to use this word either: |
| Anna: aproape. |
| Antoni: It means "almost," and it can be used in this way: |
| Anna: Este aproape ora cinci. |
| Antoni: This sentence means "it's almost five o'clock." |
| While these two expressions help us to give an approximate time, it is also good to know what to say when we want to talk about the exact hour. In English, one uses the word "sharp" to express this, and in Romanian, it's: |
| Anna: fix. |
| Antoni: Let's hear it being used in a sentence: |
| Anna: Este unu fix. |
| Antoni: This means "it's one o' clock." As you can hear, when telling time in an informal setting, it is not always necessary to use the word |
| Anna: ora. |
| Antoni: We'll talk a little more about this word later on in this lesson. |
| Let's now begin our discussion of how to ask for the time in Romanian. You already heard an example of this in the dialogue, so let's revisit that. |
| [Recall 1] |
| Antoni: Do you remember how Sasha Lee says "What time is it?" |
| (pause 4 seconds) |
| Anna as Sasha Lee: Cât este ceasul? |
| Antoni: As you have heard, Sasha Lee is asking "What time is it?" Interestingly, the direct translation of this question is "how much is the watch?" or "how much is the clock?" Let's break the sentence down so that you can hear how it is constructed. The first word – |
| Anna: cât – |
| Antoni: means "how much," while the second word – |
| Anna: este – |
| Antoni: means "it is" and the last word – |
| Anna: ceasul – |
| Antoni: means "the watch" or "the clock." If you are talking to someone you don't know, it is best to use the more formal expression: |
| Anna: Mă scuzați, cât este ceasul? |
| Antoni: This translates to "Excuse me, what time is it?" And, if you are talking to an older gentleman whom you don't know, you could use the even more formal expression: |
| Anna: Mă scuzați, cât este ora, domnule? |
| Antoni: This question translates to "Excuse me, what time is it, sir?" Please note that the phrases |
| Anna: cât este ceasul |
| Antoni: and |
| Anna: cât este ora |
| Antoni: are interchangeable. They are not what makes the expressions you heard formal. What made them formal was the use of the Romanian words for "excuse me" and for "sir." The latter is |
| Anna: domnule. |
| Antoni: If you don't always want to be using the same words to ask about the time, you can also mix it up a bit by asking, "What is the time now?" |
| Anna: Cât este ceasul acum? |
| Antoni: or, you could ask, "Do you know what time it is now?" |
| Anna: Știți cât este ceasul? |
| Antoni: Now that you have learned several ways to ask about time, let's move on to the second part of the dialogue where we will discuss how to answer someone who asks for the time. |
| [Recall 2] |
| Antoni: Do you remember how Veronica Voicu says "It's a quarter past three?" |
| (pause 4 seconds) |
| Anna as Veronica Voicu: Este trei și un sfert. |
| Antoni: Here, Veronica is answering the question about what time it is by referring to the minutes and the hour. Before we get to talking about minutes, let's first look at how to tell the time in hours. You might remember it being mentioned earlier that we would be having a more in-depth look at the word |
| Anna: ora. |
| Antoni: It is in this segment of the lesson that we will do so. The Romanian word for "hour" is |
| Anna: oră, |
| Antoni: but when you are actually using the word in order to tell someone the time, it is pronounced: |
| Anna: ora. |
| Antoni: If you would like to learn more about this and other Romanian pronunciation, please check out our lesson on the subject. When telling someone the exact hour in Romanian, the expressions usually start with "it is," which is then followed by the word for "hour" and the last word is the number. Here's an example: |
| Anna: Este ora trei. |
| Antoni: This means "it is three o' clock." And here's another example: |
| Anna: Este ora doisprezece. |
| Antoni: This one means "it is twelve o'clock." Now that you know how to tell people the exact hour, it is easier to learn how to tell them what minute it is as well. Listen to this example: |
| Anna: Este ora cincisprezece și opt. |
| Antoni: This means "it's fifteen oh eight" and, as you can hear, it follows the same structure as simply talking about the hour does. We still start with "it is" followed by the word for "hour" and then add a number. Here's another example meaning "it is four twenty-three:" |
| Anna: Este ora patru și douăzeci și trei. |
| Antoni: The word |
| Anna: și |
| Antoni: was used twice in this sentence, which might be a bit confusing, but just remember that the way it was used in the latter part of the sentence was the way it is always used when talking about numbers related to time. To a Romanian person, it is simply seen as part of the number. |
| So far, you have learned how to talk about the hour and how to talk about minutes. Now, it's time to learn how to be even more precise by including seconds. Fortunately, this is quite easy. All you have to do is add the seconds at the end of the sentence structure you have already learned. For instance, if you wanted to say "It is nine minutes and twenty-one seconds past two," this is how it would be structured: |
| Anna: Este ora două și nouă minute și douăzeci și unu secunde. |
| Antoni: Now, just as it is with English, we don't always have to use exact numbers for the minutes because we can also use words like "quarter" and "half." In Romanian, the word for "half" is |
| Anna: jumătate |
| Antoni: and the word for "a quarter" is |
| Anna: un sfert. |
| Antoni: Do remember to use the word |
| Anna: un |
| Antoni: to denote that it is one quarter and not two? Two quarters would, after all, just be a half and there is already a word for that! Let's listen to an example of how to use the word for "quarter" when telling the time: |
| Anna: Este două şi un sfert. |
| Antoni: This means "it is a quarter past two." And now, let's hear how to use the same word but when talking about the time being "a quarter to:" |
| Anna: Este trei fără un sfert. |
| Antoni: This expression means "it is a quarter to three." The difference between the two sentences is that, when we say "it is a quarter past...," we use |
| Anna: ...şi un sfert |
| Antoni: and, when we say "it is a quarter to...," we use |
| Anna: ...fără un sfert |
| Antoni: Let's listen to a couple more examples. This first one means "It is a quarter past four:" |
| Anna: Este patru şi un sfert, |
| Antoni: and the next one means "it is a quarter to four" |
| Anna: Este patru fără un sfert. |
| Antoni: The last major point on the clock is "half-past." Let's hear an example of how to use that: |
| Anna: Este patru şi jumătate |
| Antoni: This expression means "it is half past four." And that brings us to the end of this segment of the lesson. |
| [Summary] |
| Antoni: So far, in this lesson, you have learned how to tell the time using terms like "half past, a quarter past, a quarter to" and also how to tell someone it is exactly "o'clock." You've furthermore learned how to tell the time down to the exact minute and second, as well as how to ask for the time in either an informal or a formal way. Just to consolidate what we have learned thus far, let's quickly listen to a few further examples of questions and answers. |
| Anna: Cât este ceasul? Este ora trei. |
| Antoni: In this example, you heard the informal version of the question, "What time is it?" and then the reply, "It is three o'clock." Let's now hear the slightly more formal version of the same question and the answer, "It is fifteen oh eight" |
| Anna: Mă scuzați, cât este ceasul? Este ora cincisprezece și opt. |
| Antoni: And, finally, the most formal version of the same question and the answer, "It is a quarter past two.:" |
| Anna: Mă scuzați, cât este ora, domnule? Este două şi un sfert. |
| Expansion/Contrast (Optional) |
| Antoni: Another context in which people often talk about the time is when it comes to making plans. If you are going to be making plans with Romanian people, it will be useful to know an expression like "at what time," which sounds like this in Romanian: |
| Anna: la ce oră. |
| Antoni: We will now use it in a question, and then hear the reply as well. Please do take note of the difference in pronunciation between |
| Anna: oră |
| Antoni: in the question, and |
| Anna: ora |
| Antoni: in the reply. Here is the question, meaning, "What time is that movie?:" |
| Anna: La ce oră e acel film? |
| Antoni: And the reply to the question is: |
| Anna: Între ora patru și cinci. |
| Antoni: This means "between four and five." In Romanian, there is also a distinction between the questions "at what time" and "when." The question: |
| Anna: Când va fi asta? |
| Antoni: means "When will that happen?"Another question you may need to ask is: |
| Anna: Cât va dura? |
| Antoni: This means "How long will it take?." You could also ask "How much time will it take?" or, in Romanian: |
| Anna: Cât timp va dura? |
| Antoni: Knowing these few expressions should help you a lot when making plans in Romanian. |
| Cultural Insight/Expansion (Optional) |
| Antoni: While on the subject of time, it is also useful to learn a few common idiomatic expressions related to time in Romanian. In English, we have plenty of these. Phrases like "in time" "on time" and "just in time" are used often. If you want to say "in a little while" in Romanian, you can say: |
| Anna: în scurt timp |
| Antoni: and, if you want to say "in just a moment," it sounds like this: |
| Anna: într-o clipă. |
| Antoni: Someone can also be "right on time" |
| Anna: chiar la timp |
| Antoni: and it is also good to know how to say |
| Anna: momentul ideal pentru… |
| Antoni: which translates to "the perfect time for…." And this is a perfect time to end the lesson. Well done. You are now equipped with some good, practical phrases to use when talking about time in Romanian. |
Outro |
| Antoni: Do you have any more questions? We're here to answer them! |
| Anna: La revedere. |
| Antoni: See you soon! |
| Credits: Anna (Romanian, Romania), Antoni (English, synthetic voice) |
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