Learn how to ask about someone's age
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| Salām be hamegi! Man Anita hastam. Hi everybody! I’m Anita |
| Welcome to PersianPod101.com’s “Persian in 3 minutes.” The fastest, easiest, and most fun way to learn Persian. |
| In the last two lessons, we learned the main usage of the verb Hast, which means “to be” in Persian. |
| In this lesson, we are going to learn about the verb dāshtan, which means “to have”. In this lesson, we’ll use this verb and Hast to talk about your age. |
| If someone asks you Chand sāl dārid? they are literally asking "How many years do you have" in formal Persian, or, "How old are you?" |
| [slowly] Chand sāl dārid? |
| Dārid is the verb dāshtan conjugated for "you". Do you remember the conjugation formula you learned in the last lesson? This verb follows the same pattern! Let's see how dāshtan fits into that pattern! |
| dāram - I have |
| dāri - You have |
| dārad - he/she/it has |
| dārim - We have |
| dārid - You have (plural) |
| dārand - They have |
| Pretty easy, right? You just need to know the verb base. This a special case, and for the present tense verb dāshtan, meaning "to have", the base is dār. If you use dāsht as a base with this formula, you will make a past tense verb of “to have.” |
| But don't worry! You will get used to it! |
| So if you want to be more informal, use the singular word for "you" |
| So |
| Chand sāl dārid? |
| becomes |
| Chand sāl dāri? |
| There's another version of this phrase which uses the verb Hast. |
| "Chand sāle hastid?" -- “How old are you?” |
| [slowly] Chand sāle hastid? |
| Their difference is only in their verbs, and an e after the word sāl, meaning “year” or “age.” |
| But when you're in Iran, the version you'll hear the most is: Chand sālete? |
| [slowly] Chand sālete? |
| Now you have to answer with your age! The pattern is very simple! |
| Here are some examples. |
| “I am 18” - hejdah sāl dāram. |
| Or hejdah sāle hastam. |
| “I am 20” - Bist sāl dāram. |
| Or Bist sāle hastam. |
| Can you see what is happening here? Let's break down the sentence hejdah sāl dāram. “I am 18” |
| Hejdah is “18”. We learned about numbers back in lessons 6 and 7. |
| sāl, meaning “year” or “age.” |
| dāram means “I have”. This is the verb dāshtan conjugated for "I". |
| [slowly] hejdah sāl dāram. |
| Sometimes young Persian people won’t ask your age directly, but instead, will ask your birth year. |
| You might hear this question in an informal situation: |
| Motevallede che sāli hasti? |
| [slowly] Motevallede che sāli hasti? |
| This literally means “what year are you born?” |
| You just have to answer using the two last figures of your birth year: |
| Man Motevallede Hashtād o Noh hastam. |
| which literally means “I am born in 89.” |
| Now it’s time for Anita's Advice. |
| You must remember that Iranians use the Solar Hijri calendar. So their years are different from the Gregorian calendar, but most Iranians know and use both. Just keep in mind that if you only mention the last two numbers of your birth year, someone might think you're talking about Solar Hijri years, and think that you are actually very young! |
| So if you don't know your actual birth year in Solar Hijri, make sure to mention your full birth year instead. |
| In this lesson, we learned how to talk about your age and birthdate using Dāshtan. Next time, we’ll learn how to use this verb for talking about possessions. |
| I'll be waiting for you in the next “Persian in 3 minutes” lesson! |
| Khodāfez! |
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