Learn Hardcore Hungarian: A városnézés nemcsak érdekes, hanem fárasztó is, ha egész nap sétálunk. - Sightseeing is not only interesting but also tiring if we walk all day.

A – the (definite article)
város – city, town
nézés – looking, watching (from the verb néz – to look; turned into a noun)
városnézés – literally city-looking → sightseeing
nemcsak – not only
érdekes – interesting
hanem – but (rather), but instead (in the “not only…but also” structure)
fárasztó – tiring, exhausting (from fáraszt – to tire someone out)
is – too, also (here paired with nemcsak)
ha – if, when (in conditional/general statements)
egész – whole, entire
nap – day
egész nap – all day, the whole day
sétálunk – we walk (from sétál – to walk (leisurely); -unk = 1st person plural ending)

So literally:
“The sightseeing not-only interesting but tiring also, if whole day we-walk.”

Why do we need A at the beginning? English doesn’t say “The sightseeing is…”.

In Hungarian, you usually use the definite article a/az in front of a general activity expressed as a noun, much more than English would.

A városnézés érdekes. – literally The sightseeing is interesting.
→ idiomatic English: Sightseeing is interesting.

English often drops the when talking about things in general; Hungarian tends to keep a/az:

A zene fontos. – Music is important.
A tanulás nehéz. – (The) studying is hard.

So A városnézés is natural and almost required in Hungarian, even though English would just say Sightseeing… without an article.

What exactly is városnézés? How is it formed?

Városnézés is a compound noun:

város – city
nézés – looking / watching → a noun formed from the verb néz (to look).

Hungarian very often creates activity-nouns by adding -ás / -és to a verb:

tanul (to study) → tanulás (studying)
olvas (to read) → olvasás (reading)
utazik (to travel) → utazás (travelling, trip)
néz (to look) → nézés (looking)

Then it’s combined with város to mean “looking at the city” → sightseeing.

As a noun, it declines like other nouns:

városnézés – sightseeing (nom.)
városnézést – sightseeing (accusative)
városnézés közben – during sightseeing
a városnézésről – about the sightseeing

How does nemcsak … hanem … is work? Is this the standard way to say “not only … but also …”?

Yes. The usual Hungarian pattern for “not only … but also …” is:

nemcsak X, hanem Y is

In this sentence:

nemcsak érdekes – not only interesting
hanem fárasztó is – but also tiring

A few points:

nemcsak
- Usually written as one word. You may also see the older spelling nem csak, but nemcsak is now standard in writing.
hanem
- Specifically used to oppose or correct something, often after a negation.
- Typical structures:
  - nem X, hanem Y – not X, but Y
  - nemcsak X, hanem Y is – not only X, but Y as well
is
- Means too / also, but in this structure it comes with hanem: hanem … is.
- It usually follows the word it emphasises: fárasztó is = tiring too / also tiring.

So the pattern is:

A városnézés nemcsak érdekes, hanem fárasztó is.
Sightseeing is not only interesting, but (it is) tiring as well.

Why is is placed after fárasztó? Can it go somewhere else?

The general rule is: is comes right after the word it modifies/emphasises.

Here we want to say that “tiring” is added to “interesting”, so is follows fárasztó:

fárasztó is – tiring too / also tiring

Other placements would slightly change the focus or be ungrammatical:

nemcsak érdekes, hanem is fárasztó – incorrect.
nemcsak érdekes, hanem fárasztó is – correct, neutral emphasis.
nemcsak érdekes is, hanem fárasztó – would suggest that interesting too is part of a different emphasis pattern, and sounds odd here.

So for “not only interesting, but also tiring”, the natural pattern is:
nemcsak érdekes, hanem fárasztó is.

Why don’t érdekes and fárasztó change form to agree with városnézés?

In Hungarian, adjectives before a singular noun usually appear in a simple base form, without extra agreement endings:

érdekes városnézés – interesting sightseeing
fárasztó városnézés – tiring sightseeing

In predicative position (after to be), it’s the same:

A városnézés érdekes.
A városnézés fárasztó.

Adjectives do not change for gender (Hungarian has no grammatical gender) and in most everyday structures they do not change for number either in the same way as in many Indo‑European languages. Agreement mainly appears in certain plural noun phrases, but even there it’s often optional or looks different from typical Indo‑European agreement.

So in A városnézés nemcsak érdekes, hanem fárasztó is, both adjectives just stay in their base form.

In ha egész nap sétálunk, why is the subject “we” not written? How do we know it’s “we”?

Hungarian usually drops subject pronouns (I, you, we, they) unless you really need to emphasize them.

You know the subject from the verb ending:

sétálok – I walk
sétálsz – you (sg) walk
sétál – he/she/it walks
sétálunk – we walk
sétáltok – you (pl) walk
sétálnak – they walk

So sétálunk contains the -unk ending, which marks 1st person plural: “we”.

If you want to emphasize we specifically, you can add the pronoun:

ha mi egész nap sétálunk – if we (as opposed to others) walk all day.

But in normal, neutral sentences, the pronoun is omitted, and the verb ending tells you the subject.

Why is it sétálunk (present tense) in Hungarian, when English might say “if we walkED all day”?

Hungarian uses the present tense in “if/when” clauses to express a general or hypothetical condition, where English often uses:

if we walk, if we walked, or
if we were to walk.

In Hungarian:

Ha sokat eszünk, meghízunk. – If we eat a lot, we get fat.
Ha fáradtak vagyunk, pihenünk. – If we are tired, we rest.
Ha egész nap sétálunk, elfáradunk. – If we walk all day, we get tired.

So ha + present tense is the normal pattern for these kinds of if-clauses.
There is no need for a special “conditional tense” form of the main verb here.

What does egész nap literally mean, and why is there no article?

Egész nap literally means “whole day” → idiomatically “all day”.

egész – whole, entire
nap – day

In this time expression, Hungarian does not use an article:

egész nap dolgozom. – I work all day.
egész nap esik. – It rains all day.

If you say az egész nap, that usually refers to a specific day that was mentioned or is understood:

Az egész nap borzasztó volt. – The whole day was awful. (that particular day)
Az egész napot a strandon töltöttük. – We spent the whole day at the beach.

In our sentence, we are talking about a general situation (if we walk all day in general), so no article: egész nap.

Could the ha-clause come at the beginning of the sentence? Would the meaning change?

Yes, you can move the ha-clause to the front without changing the basic meaning:

Original:
A városnézés nemcsak érdekes, hanem fárasztó is, ha egész nap sétálunk.
Variant:
Ha egész nap sétálunk, a városnézés nemcsak érdekes, hanem fárasztó is.

Both mean:
Sightseeing is not only interesting but also tiring if we walk all day.

Differences:

Information structure / emphasis:
- Original: starts with Sightseeing is not only interesting but also tiring…; the condition is added at the end.
- Variant: starts with If we walk all day…; it introduces the condition first.
Grammatically, both are fully correct and natural. Hungarian word order is quite flexible, and ha-clauses can appear either before or after the main clause.

What is the difference between fárasztó and fáradt?

fárasztó – tiring, exhausting → causes tiredness
fáradt – tired → experiences tiredness

Examples:

A városnézés fárasztó. – Sightseeing is tiring. (it makes you tired)
Városnézés után fáradt vagyok. – After sightseeing, I am tired.

So in the sentence:

A városnézés nemcsak érdekes, hanem fárasztó is…
we are describing the activity (sightseeing) as something that tires you out. Therefore fárasztó is the right word, not fáradt.

Why is sétálunk used here instead of just a verb like “go” (menni)? What’s the nuance of sétálni?

Sétálni means to walk in a leisurely way, often for pleasure, not just for transportation.

sétálni – to stroll / take a walk
menni – to go (on foot or in general), more neutral
járni – to go regularly / to attend / to frequent

So:

Ha egész nap megyünk – if we go all day → vague, sounds odd.
Ha egész nap sétálunk – if we walk all day (strolling around) → this matches the idea of sightseeing, where you walk a lot around a city.

Using sétálunk emphasises the walking-around aspect of sightseeing rather than just “going somewhere” in a general sense.

Is the comma before ha required in this sentence?

Yes, in standard Hungarian orthography you separate main clauses and subordinate clauses with a comma, including ha-clauses (if/when‑clauses).

A városnézés nemcsak érdekes, hanem fárasztó is, ha egész nap sétálunk.
- main clause: A városnézés nemcsak érdekes, hanem fárasztó is
- subordinate clause: ha egész nap sétálunk

If the ha-clause comes first, you also use a comma:

Ha egész nap sétálunk, a városnézés nemcsak érdekes, hanem fárasztó is.

So the comma usage in the original sentence is both normal and required in written Hungarian.