For today’s post, we’re going to decode a sign on a trash can that I saw in Budapest.
What do you think it says?
“Dohányzásra kijelölt hely!”
a) “No smoking area!”
b) “Do not throw cigarettes in here!”
c) “Place designated for smoking.”
Click on “Read More” to see the answer and an explanation of the phrase!
Answer:
c) “Place designated for smoking.”
The sign apparently has nothing to do with the trash can itself!
Explanation:
Ok, let’s break this down:
The root word in this that should tip you off is “dohány” = “tobacco”
- “dohányzás” = “smoking”
- “kijelölt” = “designated”
- “hely” = “place”
The “-ra” ending after “dohányzás” means “for”. So “dohányzásra” = “for smoking”
In English, we would put the word “place” first, but in Hungarian, “for smoking” and “designated” are put before the noun for “place.”
Dohányzásra kijelölt hely! = Place designated for smoking.
Why does Hungarian use an exclamation mark in this phrase? Using an exclamation mark is common in notices like these to the general public.
Readers: we hope this will be a regular series. Would you like to see more of these? Let us know in the comments!
Sziasztok!
It’s nice “hearing from you” again! This sort of post is a great idea. It’s fun, helps learning the language and also shows us some “real world usage”.
I’ll look forward for more!
Szia Rodrigo! I appreciate your comment and feedback. There’s more coming like this too!
Love this! There are about a dozen signs like this in Budapest which I don’t have enough time to snap a pic of or remember to translate later. Love this idea!
Thanks and hope to hear from you guys soon.
Thanks for the comment, Sylvie! I thought it would be a fun and practical way to improve Hungarian. If you have any ideas for other signs, notices, etc. that we could cover, feel free to let us know! I’ll definitely be adding more of these as well as other things 🙂