Learn 10 hardest words to pronounce
Get this lesson’s key vocab, their translations and pronunciations. Sign up for your Free Lifetime Account Now and get 7 Days of Premium Access including this feature.
| Hello, I am back. It’s me Christine and today’s lesson, the 10 Hardest Words to Pronounce in Afrikaans. So it’s going to be a difficult one and remember to get those mouth muscles moving because we are going to be using them quite a bit in this lesson today. |
| 1. goeie "good" |
| Dit is goeie nuus. "That is good news." |
| This one is hard to say because it’s got the /g/ sound that’s so popular in Afrikaans language. Just pretending that you are really angry or irritated at something and you are going, ugh, and then, keep that sound and go goeie. And it’s a goeie thing to learn it because it’s used all the time. |
| 2. nuus "news" |
| Ek het baie goeie nuus. "I have very good news." |
| I hope you have very goeie nuus to tell me because if you do, it means, you’ve learned the /g/ and the /nuus/ which is what makes that word little bit harder than others. So, this one is /uu/, you are going... making this weird shape with your mouth, /uu/. Goeie nuus. |
| 3. gebruik "use" |
| Kan ek jou kar gebruik? "Can I use your car?" |
| This one is a little bit as awkward as that question because you don’t really want to give someone else your car just in case something happens but you do because you are a nice person and they are your friend. So this is that word. You really want to learn it because it’s the word for using any word. So the word is gebruik, the /g/ sound as before and now you’ve added a new sound, /ui/. |
| 4. rak "shelf" |
| Die rak is vol stof. "The shelf is full of dust." |
| This word, it doesn’t have the /g/ that we’ve been talking about but now, we’ve got a new sound in Afrikaans that a lot of people in different languages struggle with a little bit. And it’s the /r/, as if your tongue is jumping up and down in your mouth, /r/. Rak. |
| 5. more "morning" |
| Ek gaan more kom kuier. "I am going to come and visit tomorrow." |
| This one has a /r/ like before. It’s a little bit easier but it just, you have to remember to read 'more' because in English, its spelled like more. So don’t say more, say 'more'. and the older generations Afrikaans people, they might say it a little bit differently and they sometimes say 'more' but it’s more commonly used as 'more'. |
| 6. lekker "nice/delicious" |
| Die kos is baie lekker. "This food is very nice." |
| This word is a must. You must learn how to say this word lekker, because it is used all the time in South Africa. Everything is lekker not just the course that we were just talking about. The weather is lekker, the party was lekker, the drink is lekker, my friends are lekker. It’s just the word that we use all the time. So it’s definitely lekker to know the word lekker. |
| 7. rol "roll" |
| Die pen het gerol "The pen rolled." |
| This one is funny because the rol, roll, all you have to do is roll your tongue on your mouth. So it makes the /r/ sound like before. Roll, it’s quite nice to say actually if you say it a couple of times. Roll. |
| 8. gek "crazy" |
| Die man is gek om te spring. "The man is crazy to jump." |
| You are saying that because you are watching some bungee jumping show or someone jumping out of an airplane, they are gek! And gek is also a bit of a gek word to know because it’s got the /g/ sound and the /ek/ which means "me". So it’s like you are saying you are gek, but you are not really. But it’s a gek word. It’s a gek lekker word. Crazy nice word. |
| 9. lag "laugh" |
| Ek lag elke dag vir my hond. "I laugh at my dog every day." |
| Lag is such a lekker word. And to laugh, it’s the greatest thing ever. So it’s important to learn this word because maybe learning how to say it will make you laugh and you are having a happy memory and you remember the word and it’s a win-win situation. |
| 10. raas "noise" |
| Die bure raas baie. "The neighbors are very noisy." |
| Just like me sitting here in the park today where there’s lot of people around me having picnics and everything and there is quite a lot of noise going on but at least the raas isn’t too much for me to make this lovely video and teach you some Afrikaans. So, raas. |
| So we’ve made it to the end of the 10 Hardest Words to Pronounce in Afrikaans. If you haven’t managed them, that’s okay. They are very hard and like I said, they are the 10 hardest. So keep on trying. Keep using that mouth and /g/ /r/ /n/. Say all those things. Say it weirdly in the mirror and look at your mouth when you are saying them and that sometimes helps because it helps your muscle memory to remember how to do them. Just keep learning Afrikaans with Afrikaanspod101.com |
Comments
Hide