Lingoflyнестало је струје
- нестало је струјеnestalo je strujethe power went out
“нестало је струје” (nestalo je struje) — the power went out in Serbian. Phrase, level A1. An impersonal turn with the of-form struje: literally "the current has run out". About a single lamp they say ugasilo se svetlo. In a live sentence: “Нестало је струје у целој улици” (Nestalo je struje u celoj ulici) — The power went out on the whole street. You can hear how it sounds right here.
In short
| Written in Serbian | нестало је струје (nestalo je struje) |
| Read in Latin letters | nestalo je struje |
| Translation | the power went out |
| Part of speech | phrase |
| Level | A1 |
Why it looks that way
An impersonal turn with the of-form struje: literally "the current has run out". About a single lamp they say ugasilo se svetlo.
A word with a story stays in memory longer than one learned as a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.
In a live sentence
A single word almost never appears alone in conversation. A sentence shows where it fits and what stands next to it.
- Нестало је струје у целој улициNestalo je struje u celoj uliciThe power went out on the whole street
How not to forget this word
Reading a word and remembering it are different jobs. A day later, little survives of a single reading — and that is not bad memory, that is how memory works.
- This has been tested on foreign words too. The difference shows up most when you test yourself a few days later rather than straight away.checked many timesKim & Webb, 2022, Language Learning 72(2) · 48 experiments, 3,411 participants, 98 comparisons.
- Recalling beats re-reading. Covering the translation and trying to remember it does more than reading it ten more times.checked many timesAdesope, Trevisan & Sundararajan, 2017, Review of Educational Research 87(3) · 188 experiments, 272 comparisons. g = 0.61; against plain re-reading 0.51, against passive review 0.93.
- An answer you worked out yourself sticks better than one handed to you.checked many timesBertsch et al., 2007, Memory & Cognition 35(2) · 86 studies, 445 comparisons, d = 0.40.
Frequently asked
How do you say “the power went out” in Serbian?
«нестало је струје» (nestalo je struje), read “nestalo je struje”. In a live sentence: “Нестало је струје у целој улици” (Nestalo je struje u celoj ulici) — The power went out on the whole street. You can hear how it sounds right on this page. Phrase, level A1; written with the characters н, е, с (s), т, а (a), л, о (o), ј, е, с (s), т, р…
How is “нестало је струје” (nestalo je struje) written in Latin letters?
nestalo je struje. This is a practical spelling — you need it to read aloud and be understood, not to meet an academic standard.
Why does this word look the way it does?
An impersonal turn with the of-form struje: literally "the current has run out". About a single lamp they say ugasilo se svetlo. A word with a story stays in memory longer than a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.
Can I hear how this sounds?
Yes, right on this page: click the word and it will play. The sound works on any phone, and nothing needs to be installed.