5 difficulties foreigners meet while learning the Russian language

Russian is not that easy like natives say. Thousands of strangers get in a lot of trouble while teaching it. Let’s see why the Russian language is that hard.

5 difficulties foreigners meet while learning the Russian language

Weird letters

Can you imagine how hard for foreigners to study Russian letters? It is horrific to think of letters like Ы, Ъ, Ь and the combination of letters ОО. One couldn’t understand how to spell «оо» in words, for example, «сообщения» or «тихоокеанский». Another freaked out to know that the Russian has several silent letters. And the last one, who does not give up trying to reproduce Ы sound, says that the mechanism of producing this sound is beyond his comprehension.

Phonation

Someone enjoys perfectly sound Russian speech. But for someone the Russian phonation is a substantial challenge. Let’s see what students say. German student says that the Russian sounds like Minions language and repeat it is impossible. Chinese student thinks that Russian have similarities with Chinese. But the Russian sounds for her like an ill bird: «Черек щик чит чт чт чтрбыг (Cherek shick chit cht cht chtrbyg)».

Six cases

Let us suppose you have learned the Russian phonetics and pronunciation. But then you have another challenge — grammar. German student Simon Schirrmacher describes his experience: «The hardest thing for me was six cases in the Russian. We have less».

It is especially difficult for people who do not have cases in their own language or cases that are not affected to word structure. Mayu Okamoto says: «It’s beyond me that depending on the case, words had to be changed! Gross! And also verb conjugation. Every time when you want to say something, you need thinking about how to change every word, which form to choose.»

Compound verbs

And what’s about imperfective and perfective verbs? Simon Schirrmacher says: «I hope that one day I could understand this topic.» Another student recalled: «I read over the hundred times textbook with pictures: he «пришёл» and «приходил». It’s both «came» in English. So what does it mean? Where is he? Is he staying or has he gone already? It’s awful».

Declension

In the Russian you decline everything, even if grammar does not prohibit it. For the question «Why?» the answer is: «Exception.» Foreigners truly don’t understand for what they have exceptions and why you need to say «во рту» instead of «в роту». American student Bill Morris says: «It’s useless to find out in textbooks for what they have declensions. And ask Russians is useless, too. You can try to figure it out, but the odds are 100 to 1. If I had known who invented declensions in the Russian, I would have killed him».

Do you know someone studies the Russian? Which difficulties do they have?