Note: This post and future posts will be using a more interactive way to help you learn Hebrew. Hovering your mouse cursor over the Hebrew words (without clicking on them) will show you how to pronounce the word in Hebrew, along with the English translation. This will help you get used to reading Hebrew faster.

I learned something during my travels over the years. Many times you’ll find that nobody really speaks like the phrasebooks or language courses do. For example, in Israel you get right to the point – if I want to know where to find the main Post Office. Normally, the typical phrasebook or language course will tell you to say:

אמור לי, בבקשׁה,איך אני יכול להגיע מכאןלדואר המרכזי?
“Tell me, please, how can I get from here to the main post office?”

In reality, this is a time waster to an Israeli. If you want to know where the post office is, simply ask “המרכזי?” with a question tone in your voice and you’ll get the directions you need.

You can do this to ask where any street is, or a resuartant or a shop
שׂדה תעופה
תחנת רכבת
בית חולים

And it’s useful for asking for something you need, but without the question tone in your voice:
קפה הפוך
אספירין

This can help you sound more fluent in Hebrew than you really are, and you don’t have to memorize an entire sentence to get your point across.

But…

Keep in mind this is how you’ll hear it in Israel. in other parts of the Diaspora, you may hear things a little different. Just listen to how things are being said around you and follow their lead. After all, making that first good impression is always top priority. 🙂

Giving Directions in Israel

Receiving directions to get somewhere by an Israeli can be a very interesting experience. You will see in language courses a whole chapter or two devoted to this task. A very helpful Israeli will give complete directions to where you need to go. But in reality, they are glad to help out, but if they don’t know how to get to a place, they will be too proud to say “I don’t know.” So you may hear something like this:

סליחה
כן?
איפה המוזיאון?
זה לא רחוק. פּנה כאן בפּינה הראשׁונה ימינה. תמשׁיך ישׁר עד הסופ

Sometimes you may also hear “Go straight this way until the end.” Don’t let it frustrate you, just follow the directions and when you get as far as you can, ask the next person you see and continue from there.