It was my favorite case already from the start. And no other case has ever been able to take its place as number one in my heart. Yes, I’m talking about «творительный падеж» [instrumental case]. Back when I first made my acquaintance with the six splendid cases of Russian language – yes, let’s all repeat them just for fun: «именительный» [nominative], «родительный» [genitive], «винительный» [accusative], «дательный» [dative], «предложный» [locative] and the best one of them all – the glorious «творительный» [instrumental]. I remember when we first fell in love, it feels like it was yesterday, but it really wasn’t, it was over four years ago now, back in the days when I shared a flat in Saint Petersburg with another Swedish girl. Her name was Kajsa. And you should’ve seen the wide smile on my face when our teacher at the university told me that in the sentence for that in Russian was: «Я живу с Кайсой» [I live with Kajsa]. Wow! I had never seen grammar do such a thing to a word before; it practically swallowed the whole ending! And even better when the noun was a male one: «Я встречаюсь с Магнусом» [I'm dating Magnus (yeah, as the Russians would put it - «было дело»)]. But no matter how grand the instrumental case is for all words Russian, it can cause some trouble when paired with a word not so Russian. As the word ‘iPod’ (what language is that, by the way?) for example. As in the very real situation when I had some trouble with my iPod this past week, it wouldn’t synchronize with my iTunes at all, and so I decided to pop by the Apple store when I was at the mall and see what the boys there could do about it. But I was faced with the dilemma of… just how do you put that in Russian? I figured I’d just use my imagination, and see what I’d come up with so to speak, as I’m not a beginner of Russian after all… And that’s why I stepped up to the young man at the counter and said: «Извините, у меня проблема с моим айподом» [Excuse me, I have a problem with my iPod]. I got his attention; now what? «Он не хочет синхронизировать с айтюнсом» [It doesn't want to synchronize with iTunes]. The young man asked to take a close look at my iPod, so I handed it over, and then he plugged it into his computer, did something with it. A couple of minutes later he showed me that it was now working. I thanked him and left the store, blissfully happy after having affirmed the politeness of Apple’s staff and confirmed the convenience of the instrumental case. Then, later in the evening, my boyfriend (Russian and not afraid to show it) told me that such foreign words don’t change according to the Russian cases. That may be correct; nevertheless I think that’s pure madness. Why not share the beauty of Slavic cases with the rest of us? Don’t you agree?
Just how much do I love my little pink iPod? Find out here!
