(1) In what context? (Are you asking if someone's hurt themselves in an accident? If they're an okay person generally?) (2) What's the relationship of the speaker, the addressee, and the subject? Vietnamese has a complicated pronoun system. I wouldn't use the same word for "he" talking to someone who works in my office as I would with a store clerk or with my sister.
I am asking a stranger (a friend of a friend) if my friend is all right; he has disappeared from his LJ again (it's generally not a good thing) and she communicates with him daily.
I know this person is the "Anonymous" commenter in my friend's journal and it's the only way I know of communicating with her. I don't want anyone else to figure out who I'm talking to, or whom I'm talking about.
Yes, because I'm the only one who knows she's anonymous, and I plan to reply to her anonymous comment by her in his journal ... and she knows who I am, so she will make the connection.
If it's really necessary, you can say "Is he (the armadillo) okay", and then it will be really obvious. But maybe Vietnamese does not have a word for armadillo.
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(2) What's the relationship of the speaker, the addressee, and the subject? Vietnamese has a complicated pronoun system. I wouldn't use the same word for "he" talking to someone who works in my office as I would with a store clerk or with my sister.
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I know this person is the "Anonymous" commenter in my friend's journal and it's the only way I know of communicating with her. I don't want anyone else to figure out who I'm talking to, or whom I'm talking about.
Does that help?
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If it's really necessary, you can say "Is he (the armadillo) okay", and then it will be really obvious. But maybe Vietnamese does not have a word for armadillo.
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