# How do I say "Hello my friend!" in Russian?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-say-hello-my-friend-in-russian/245084>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [May 14, 2004, 6:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-say-hello-my-friend-in-russian/245084 "2004-05-14T06:52:52Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\
**Post date:** [May 14, 2004, 6:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-say-hello-my-friend-in-russian/245084/1 "2004-05-14T06:52:52Z")

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The question’s pretty straight forward. If you saw an old friend from Moscow and basically wanted to say “Hey there Buddy!” (enthusiastic and informal), would you use “Prizet”, “Tovaris”, “Nazdrovia”, or none of the above? And what’s a word for friend or pal?

(Please write the answer phonetically if its pronunciation is not self evident.)

Thanks

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**Author:** ![Gest](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/9d8465/32.png) [@Gest](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gest)\
**Post date:** [May 14, 2004, 7:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-say-hello-my-friend-in-russian/245084/2 "2004-05-14T07:32:05Z")

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priv-YET

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**Author:** ![Gest](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/9d8465/32.png) [@Gest](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gest)\
**Post date:** [May 14, 2004, 7:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-say-hello-my-friend-in-russian/245084/3 "2004-05-14T07:37:00Z")

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Sorry. My (male) friend = moy drook  
My (female) friend = mya pah-DROOG-a

I’m not sure you’d say that in a greeting though. It might look a little twee or quaint especially from a foreigner. Stick with privet if it’s an old friend.

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**Author:** ![Hello\_Again](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/85e7bf/32.png) [@Hello\_Again](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hello_Again)\
**Post date:** [May 14, 2004, 2:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-say-hello-my-friend-in-russian/245084/4 "2004-05-14T14:22:22Z")

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“Tovarish” means comrade and unfortunately, hs such strong communist era connotations that it is shunned for the most part. (it has become analagous to comrade in English really, you wouldn’t use it unless you were being ironic or trying to signify that you _are_ a communist)

I might say

[name]! kak delah? (stress the “ah” sound… del-AH)

= “[name]! How’s it going?”

That’s a very informal greeting and even a non-speaker of Russian has a hope of pronouncing it well enough to be understood. 🙂