Goal: Name the days and say 'on Monday'.
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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 makes a weekly timetable
After class on Friday I ask Oyuunaa for next month's timetable, and in the evening I make a weekly plan for the wall above my desk.
The names of the days are old Tibetan words for the Moon, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus, Saturn and the Sun: the same planets that name the days in many European languages.
Nomin helps me spell them, and Temuulen adds his football in big red letters.
| Mongolian | Letters | English |
|---|---|---|
| гараг | garag | day of the week |
| даваа | davaa | Monday |
| мягмар | myagmar | Tuesday |
| лхагва | lkhagva | Wednesday |
| пүрэв | pürev | Thursday |
| баасан | baasan | Friday |
| бямба | byamba | Saturday |
| ням | nyam | Sunday |
| ямар гарагт | yamar garagt | on which day |
| долоо хоног | doloo khonog | week |
| байдаг | baidag | is, stays (as a rule) |
| хөл бөмбөг | khöl bömbög | football |
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.
Each day is a name followed by гараг, "day of the week". You will see the names written with a small or a capital letter; this course writes them small inside a sentence.
| Mongolian | English |
|---|---|
| даваа гараг | Monday |
| мягмар гараг | Tuesday |
| лхагва гараг | Wednesday |
| пүрэв гараг | Thursday |
| баасан гараг | Friday |
| бямба гараг | Saturday |
| ням гараг | Sunday |
You will also see the spelling гариг. In everyday speech гараг is often dropped: Маргааш бямба! "Tomorrow is Saturday!"
"On" a day is the dative-locative of lesson 35. Гараг ends in г, so the ending is –т: даваа гарагт "on Monday". The question is Ямар гарагт? "On which day?"
In a list, the ending goes only once, on the last word, as with every group of words: даваа, лхагва, баасан гарагт "on Monday, Wednesday and Friday".
The verb tells the difference. A weekly habit takes –даг (lesson 44): Мягмар гарагт би номын санд явдаг. "On Tuesdays I go to the library." A single plan takes –на (lesson 42): Бямба гарагт бид зах руу явна. "On Saturday we're going to the market."
A week is долоо хоног, literally "seven nights". Энэ долоо хоногт is "this week", and ирэх долоо хоногт "next week".
Go deeper in the grammar guide: Time expressions · The dative-locative case
Saturday and Sunday have nicknames from the days when Saturday was a half working day: хагас сайн өдөр "the half-good day" for Saturday and бүтэн сайн өдөр "the fully good day" for Sunday.
The day names also live on in people's names. Many Mongolians are named after the day they were born, alone or in a compound: Даваа, Пүрэвдорж, Бямбаа, Нямдорж. Ask a friend: there is often a story behind it.
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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