It never hurts to know how to say that you’re sorry. It doesn’t hurt to know how to say you’re sorry in Turkish either, especially if you’re a student of the language, or you’ve got upcoming travel to Istanbul, or you have Turkish in-laws you’re trying to make a good impression on.
The thing about learning to apologize in a new language is that there are usually a handful of words and phrases you’ll have to learn — ways to say “I’m sorry,” ways to say “excuse me,” ways to express true regret and ways to express sympathy. Even more important is learning the appropriate contexts to use them in.
Here’s a quick guide to a couple of the most common ways to say sorry in Turkish.
A good deal of the time, you’ll probably want to express a more casual version of “sorry,” like the kind you use when you apologize for bumping into someone, or for bothering someone on the street when you stop to ask for directions.
There are two ways to say “excuse me” in Turkish. One is simply pardon, which is a word you’re already familiar with. Here’s how that might look in a sentence:
Another way of saying “excuse me” is affedersiniz.
For when you need to acknowledge your own wrongdoing and wish to express a sincere apology, the following phrase is more appropriate:
Özür dilerim. — I’m sorry/I apologize.
If you wish to make it sound even more formal (for instance, if you’re addressing your boss at work), you could also say the following:
Özür dilemek isterim. — I would like to apologize.
In some situations, you say “sorry” because you want to express empathy or sympathy toward someone, but not because you necessarily did anything wrong. Or maybe you ran late, but it was out of your control. Üzgünüm is the right word for this scenario.
What happens when you need to acknowledge wrongdoing on your part, but the offense isn’t that big of a deal? For when you make a mistake or wish to be polite about disagreeing with someone, you can say kusura bakma (which literally translates to “please tolerate my mistake”).
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