Learn Hardcore Hungarian: Ez a szálloda nem nagy, de tiszta, és a strand nagyon közel van. - This hotel is not big, but it is clean, and the beach is very close.

Ez a szálloda kicsi. = This hotel is small. (pointing at a specific hotel)
Ez egy szálloda. = This is a hotel. (explaining what this building is)

So:

ez a szálloda → “this hotel” (a specific, known hotel)
ez egy szálloda → “this is a hotel” (classification, “this is a kind of thing called a hotel”)

Why is there no separate word for “is” in nem nagy, de tiszta?

Hungarian usually drops the present‑tense “to be” (van) in 3rd person singular and plural when the predicate is a simple adjective or noun.

So instead of:

Ez a szálloda nem nagy.
(lit. “This the hotel not big.”)

Hungarian doesn’t say:

*Ez a szálloda nem nagy van. (wrong)

Likewise:

A szálloda tiszta. = The hotel is clean.
A szálloda drága. = The hotel is expensive.
A szálloda jó. = The hotel is good.

All of these have an “understood” is, but you don’t say van.

In the sentence:

Ez a szálloda nem nagy, de tiszta …

both nem nagy and tiszta are adjectives, so you omit van. English needs “is”, Hungarian doesn’t here.

Then why do we suddenly use van in a strand nagyon közel van?

Because with adverbs of place or time (like közel, “near/close”), Hungarian normally keeps the verb van.

Compare:

A strand közel van. = The beach is near.
A bolt messze van. = The shop is far.
A buszmegálló itt van. = The bus stop is here.
A pénztár ott van. = The ticket office is there.

So:

With adjectives:
A hotel tiszta. (no van)
With adverbs of place:
A strand közel van. (need van)

In your sentence, nagyon közel is an adverbial phrase (very near), so you say:

… és a strand nagyon közel van.
not *nagyon közel. on its own.

What is the difference between nem nagy and kicsi?

Both can be translated as “small” in English, but they sound a bit different in Hungarian:

nem nagy = not big
- more neutral, less categorical
- doesn’t explicitly say “small”, just “it’s not big”
- can sound a bit softer, less negative
kicsi = small
- directly states the size
- can sound more definite

In your sentence:

Ez a szálloda nem nagy, de tiszta…
= This hotel is not big, but it’s clean…

You could also say:

Ez a szálloda kicsi, de tiszta…
= This hotel is small, but it’s clean…

Both are fine; nem nagy feels a bit more “polite/neutral” than just calling it “kicsi”.

Why is the negative nem placed before nagy and not somewhere else?

In Hungarian, nem normally comes right before the word or phrase it negates.

Here we negate the adjective nagy (“big”), so we say:

nem nagy = not big

If you changed the word order, you’d change the focus or make it ungrammatical:

*nagy nem – wrong in this meaning; it doesn’t work like English “big, not”.
Ez a szálloda nem nagy. – correct: “This hotel is not big.”
Nem ez a szálloda nagy, hanem az. – “It’s not this hotel that is big, but that one.”
(here nem negates ez a szálloda, not nagy)

So for basic “not X” structures, use nem + X:

nem tiszta = not clean
nem közel (normally you’d say nincs közel, but grammatically not near)
nem drága = not expensive

What exactly does strand mean in Hungarian? Is it the same as English “strand”?

Hungarian strand is a loanword, but its meaning is a bit broader than English strand:

strand = a place for bathing/swimming, usually with facilities
- a beach by a lake or sea where people swim
- a public outdoor bath or pool complex
- e.g. Balaton strand, városi strand (city swimming complex)

It often means “beach” in contexts like your sentence:

a strand nagyon közel van = the beach is very near

For “seashore / coast” in general, Hungarian usually says:

tengerpart = seashore, coast
- a tengerpart közel van = the seashore is near

Why are there commas before de and és in this sentence?

Hungarian comma rules are a bit different from English.

Sentence:
Ez a szálloda nem nagy, de tiszta, és a strand nagyon közel van.

Comma before de (“but”)
Hungarian always uses a comma before the conjunction de when it joins contrasting parts:
- Nem nagy, de tiszta. = It’s not big, but (it is) clean.
Comma before és (“and”) here
With és, you do use a comma when it joins two separate clauses with different subjects:
- Clause 1 subject: Ez a szálloda
  → Ez a szálloda nem nagy, de tiszta
- Clause 2 subject: a strand
  → a strand nagyon közel van
Because there is a new subject after és, we insert a comma:
- …, és a strand nagyon közel van.

If és just joins two words or two adjectives (not full clauses), there is no comma:

nagy és tiszta szálloda = a big and clean hotel

Why don’t nagy and tiszta change form to agree with szálloda? Is there no gender?

Hungarian does not have grammatical gender. Adjectives do not change for masculine/feminine/neuter (because those categories don’t exist).

In the singular, predicative adjectives (after “is”) also don’t change for case, so they stay in their dictionary form:

Ez a szálloda nagy. = This hotel is big.
Ez a szálloda tiszta. = This hotel is clean.

So you never need to match adjectives to “feminine hotel” or “masculine hotel” – there is no such thing.

However, with plural subjects, predicative adjectives do take a plural ending:

Ezek a szállodák nagyok. = These hotels are big.
Ezek a szállodák tiszták. = These hotels are clean.

So in your singular sentence, nagy and tiszta stay unchanged.

What does nagyon add to közel van? Could we leave it out?

közel van = is near / is close
nagyon közel van = is very near / very close

nagyon simply intensifies the adjective/adverb (“very”, “really”).

You can absolutely leave it out:

A strand közel van. = The beach is near.
A strand nagyon közel van. = The beach is very near / very close.

Other examples:

A szálloda tiszta. = The hotel is clean.
A szálloda nagyon tiszta. = The hotel is very clean.

How would this sentence look in the plural, e.g. “These hotels aren’t big, but (they are) clean, and the beach is very near.”?

Plural version:

Ezek a szállodák nem nagyok, de tiszták, és a strand nagyon közel van.

Breakdown:

ezek = these
a = the
szállodák = hotels (szálloda
- -k plural suffix → vowel lengthening: a → á
  - k)
nem nagyok = are not big (nagy
- plural -ok)
tiszták = (are) clean (tiszta
- plural -k → tiszta + k → tiszták)
a strand nagyon közel van stays singular, because strand is still one beach

So you can see the plural endings -k / -ok / -ák on the noun and the adjectives in the plural sentence.

The Hungarian sentence doesn’t say “close to the hotel”. Is that just understood? How would you say it explicitly?

Yes, in your original sentence:

Ez a szálloda nem nagy, de tiszta, és a strand nagyon közel van.

it’s understood from context that the beach is near the hotel. Hungarian often leaves that implicit.

If you want to say it explicitly, you add the hotel in the -hoz/-hez/-höz (“to, towards”) form:

A strand nagyon közel van a szállodához.
= The beach is very near to the hotel.

Putting it all together:

Ez a szálloda nem nagy, de tiszta, és a strand nagyon közel van a szállodához.
= This hotel isn’t big, but it’s clean, and the beach is very near to the hotel. (more explicit than usual)