Goal: Ask and say the time.
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Now hear it and say it
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 keepLimba must catch a bus on time
My Mongolian class starts at ten, and my bus leaves the stop near our building at nine o'clock sharp.
This morning I am slow: breakfast, tea, one more tea. Nomin watches the clock and gives me the time in Mongolian, so I learn the words while I panic.
I reach the stop with five minutes to spare, out of breath but proud.
| Mongolian | Letters | English |
|---|---|---|
| цаг | tsag | hour; o'clock; time; clock, watch |
| минут | minut | minute |
| хагас цаг | khagas tsag | half an hour |
| Хэдэн цаг болж байна? | Kheden tsag bolj baina? | What time is it? |
| хэдэн цагт | kheden tsagt | at what time |
| буудал | buudal | stop, station |
| автобусны буудал | avtobusny buudal | bus stop |
| өглөөний | öglöönii | of the morning, a.m. |
| оройн | oroin | of the evening, p.m. |
The “Letters” column is a letter-by-letter guide to the Cyrillic, not exact pronunciation. It disappears after level A1: by then you read Cyrillic directly.
The question is Хэдэн цаг болж байна? Word for word: "How many hours is it becoming?", from болох (to become). The method gives it without a final particle, but Хэдэн цаг болж байна вэ? is just as correct.
Answer with the same frame: the hour, the minutes, then болж байна. Before цаг and минут, numbers take their attributive forms (lessons 23 and 31), and the nouns stay singular.
Minutes are simply counted after the hour: no "past" or "to".
| Time | Mongolian |
|---|---|
| 7:00 | долоон цаг |
| 9:15 | есөн цаг арван таван минут |
| 10:30 | арван цаг хагас, or арван цаг гучин минут |
| 12:45 | арван хоёр цаг дөчин таван минут |
To say when something happens, put the dative-locative of lesson 35 on цаг: есөн цагт "at nine o'clock". Цаг ends in г, so the ending is –т. The question is Хэдэн цагт? "At what time?"
Цаг is "hour", "o'clock", "time" and "a clock or watch". Хагас цаг is half an hour; нэг цаг is one hour, or one o'clock.
To make clear which half of the day you mean, put өглөөний (of the morning) or оройн (of the evening) in front: өглөөний найман цаг (8 a.m.), оройн найман цаг (8 p.m.). Both are genitives (lesson 37).
Go deeper in the grammar guide: Time expressions · Mongolian numbers
Timetables, tickets and offices in Mongolia often use the 24-hour clock. So a bus at 16:30 is арван зургаан цаг гучин минут, and a museum that opens at 10:00 opens at арван цаг.
In conversation, people prefer the 12-hour clock with өглөө or орой: оройн зургаан цаг is six in the evening.
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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