Goal: Describe symptoms.
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Download the Mongolian audio course24 audio lessons · MP3 · yours to keepLimba feels ill after the trip
After Naadam, Nomin and her friends took me hiking in Terelj for two days. It rained the whole second day, and we slept in a wet tent.
Back in Ulaanbaatar, I wake up with a burning head and a throat full of sand. Saraa has an early shift at the hospital, so Nomin walks me to the family clinic at the foot of our building.
The doctor is a young woman with a calm voice. She asks me a lot of questions, and for once, ill as I am, I understand every one of them.
| Mongolian | English |
|---|---|
| өвдөх | to hurt, to ache; to be ill |
| халуурах | to have a fever |
| ханиах | to cough |
| халуун | fever, temperature (also: hot) |
| хоолой | throat |
| гэдэс | belly, stomach |
| бага зэрэг | a little |
| хэзээнээс | since when |
| норох | to get wet (бороонд норох, to get soaked in the rain) |
| хэмжих | to measure (халуун хэмжих, to take someone's temperature) |
| хэм | degree (of temperature) |
| ханиад | a cold |
| ханиад хүрэх | to catch a cold |
| амрах | to rest |
You do not say "I have a headache" in Mongolian. You say "the head is hurting": Толгой өвдөж байна. The body part is the subject of өвдөх (to hurt), and very often the person is not mentioned at all, because it is obvious. If you want to be precise, add миний (my) in front.
The doctor's first question uses хаана (where), so it ends in вэ (lesson 18):
| Verb | Meaning | Happening now |
|---|---|---|
| өвдөх | to hurt; to be ill | өвдөж байна |
| халуурах | to have a fever | халуурч байна |
| ханиах | to cough | ханиаж байна |
Watch the converb: халуурах gives халуурч with –ч, like сурч (lesson 43), while өвдөх and ханиах take –ж. халуурах is built on халуун, "hot, fever": to have a fever is "to become hot".
The starting point of an illness takes the ablative, "from" (lesson 36). The question word declines too: хэзээ → хэзээнээс.
ханиад is a cold, and ханиад хүрэх is to catch one: literally "a cold reaches (you)". The doctor uses –сан байна, which describes the result she can see now: "you have caught a cold".
Go deeper in the grammar guide: Present and future: –на, –ж байна and –даг · Time expressions
For an ordinary illness, people in Ulaanbaatar go first to their өрхийн эмнэлэг, the family health centre of their neighbourhood, where they are registered. Hospitals are for serious cases. In an emergency, the number for an ambulance in Mongolia is 103; the police are 102 and the fire brigade 101.
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Lesson done? Train your ear
This written course teaches you to read and write. The LIMBA audio course makes you speak: 24 lessons of 12 to 15 minutes, recorded with a native speaker. You listen, you repeat, you answer — the perfect partner for these pages.
Download the Mongolian audio course24 audio lessons · MP3 · yours to keep