Different ways of saying "I got"

Question

I've encountered several different ways of saying "I got" in Russian, but I am a bit confused on the differences in nuance these expressions have. To be clear, my question is about the phrase "I got" in the sense of "I acquired something" and not in the sense of "I have something."

Firstly, I've seen the expression "у меня появился что-то" and I always thought it was used when you cannot help getting what you got. It literally means "something appeared to me," so I'd use this expression for "I got a chance/opportunity" and maybe even for "I got a new friend" (not sure about this). But I recently heard someone (who's a native Russian) say "у меня появился Netflix." This seemed strange to me since Netflix is not something that just randomly appeared to her; she actively went and bought a Netflix account. So, in which types of situations can this Russian expression — у меня появиться — be used?

Secondly, when trying to solve this question myself, I stumbled upon the verb приобретать. If I'm not mistaken, this means "to acquire", but does this sound as formal in Russian as the verb "to acquire" sounds in English? Or is it more frequently used in daily situations?

Thirdly, the verb получить means, if I'm not mistaken, to get something from an other person as a gift/reward. Is it correct that you cannot say, for example, "я получил Netflix," since you cannot use this verb when you buy something?

Lastly, I've heard people say things like "я мне купил что-то" but I wonder if there is a generic verb for "to get something" without specifying that you bought it, or someone gave it, etc.

Answer 1

I wonder if there is a generic verb for "to get something" without specifying that you bought it, or someone gave it, etc.

I am not a native speaker, but I think that the expression у меня появился Х is more or less what you are looking for. Here are some examples:

У меня появился ноутбук. (I got a laptop.)

У меня появился острый нож. (I got a sharp knife.)

У меня появились навыки игры в рэндзю. (I got renju skills.)

У меня появилась проблема. (I got a problem.)

In all these example sentences, it is not specified how I got what I got. For example, I may have bought the laptop or may have been given the laptop by someone for free. The only information is that I did not have the laptop and now have it.

However, you should be careful because the expression у меня появился would sound unnatural in some contexts. For example, imagine you go to an exam, get an A grade, and call your parents to say you got an A grade. In this situation, the natural way is to say я получила пятерку, not у меня появилась пятерка.

Below are some other phrases that are close to I got X:

• Мне дали Х. (I was given X.)

• Мне достался Х. (I ended up having X, in the end of a process of distributing something or fighting for something.)

• Теперь у меня есть Х. (Now I have X.)

• Я достала Х. (I managed to acquire X.)

• Я заимела Х. (I came to own X.)

• Я приобрела Х. (I got X as a result of a certain action of mine.)

All such expressions have their own undertones or flavors.

As a general remark, the Russian language is very rich lexically, so I would advise to always strive to find situation-tailored lexical solutions rather than to resort to generic expressions.

Answer 2

I'd translate "I just got Netflix" as "Я только что подключился к нетфликсу."

There's a larger point here that the verb "get" (and much of language in general) is highly idiomatic and difficult to summarize with hard and fast rules. I'd recommend just absorbing as much native material as possible, and as a result intuiting what to use when, instead of spending a lot of energy on trying to logically map everything out.

Answer 3

In conversational Russian, a very informal word "перепало" is used. E.g.,

"Мэрии выделили землю под дачи. Лучшие участки пошли начальству, но что-то перепало и рядовым работникам."

Not always but oft, it bears a slight sarcastic connotation:

"Вчера в кабаке пережрались, опрокинули чей-то стол, затеяли драку. Вовик, бедняга, зуба лишился. Перепало и мне, еле ноги унёс."

Here, "пережрались" is a very conversational term for "overconsumed booze" ,
while "перепало и мне" means: "I also got some beating".

Answer 4

1. "У меня появилось что-то" ("У меня появился что-то" is grammatically incorrect) is the closest meaning to "I got." It means that I acquired something without specifying how it happened. In that example with Netflix, the girl just didn't draw attention to how exactly she got the Netflix account. She just wanted to say that now she has Netflix.

2. "Приобретать" is somewhat formal in Russian. It's an "offical term" of getting ownership on something, like "acquire" is in English. But it still can be used in everyday speech. Usually it appears in common speech when one is talking about major acquisitions. For example, "Я приобрёл себе автомобиль," "Я собираюсь приобрести квартиру в Питере." But "Я приобрёл кулёк семечек на рынке" would be appropriate only in a police report.

3. You are right about "получить." But if you got Netflix through some marketing effort or sales strategy (like an offer that comes with an official DVD), you can say "я получил Netflix с официальным DVD."