Posts under "Vocabulary"

New Swedish words for 2012

Posted by jennie 4 Comments
Jan 4 2012

God forsättning, dear blog readers!

As a Swede living in England, I have recently discovered how useful the Swedish phrase “God fortsättning” is. It means something along the lines of “happy continuation” and this is the phrase we use when “God jul” (Merry Christmas) or “Gott nytt år” (Happy New Year) feels dated. Like on the 27th of December, when Christmas is gone but it’s too early to wish someone a happy new year… Clever, huh? The English language definitely lacks that kind of phrase, but what about other languages? Anyone aware of anything similar?

Anyhow, let’s continue along the vocabulary lines and look at some new words that have entered the Swedish language during the past year. Every New Year, Språkrådet (The language council) puts togehter and publishes a list of the new words that either are completely new or words that we have started to use more frequently. It’s always a quite interesting read and it normally mirrors the society rather well. Here are some of my favourites:

Ac-förkylning = Air condition cold, a cold you get from the air condition.
Appa = To “app”, to use and fiddle with your phone applications. (Verb)
Attitydinkontinens = Attitude incontinence, to not be able to keep your opinions to yourself.
Knarkometer = Drug-o-meter, a device which can detect any kind of illegal substances.
Lunchdisco = Exactly what it says, a disco happening during the lunch hour, a phenomena that’s getting bigger.
Matkasse = Food bag, a pre-packed food bag that is delivered to your home.
Padda = Toad, a nickname for ipads and other portable reading device.
Skräpbot = Rubbish fine, since last year you risk a penalty if you throw your rubbish elsewhere than in the bin.
Surdegshotell = Sourdough hotel, a place where you can leave your sourdough if you are going away on holiday etc. They exist, I promise!

You can find the full list here!

Julskinkan – the centerpiece of the Swedish julbord

Posted by jennie No Comments
Dec 8 2011

Warning: If you don’t like the look of meat being prepared, you should probably stop reading now!

I assume all you fellow Sweden lovers are familiar with our buffet style habit of eating. Our beloved smörgåsbord comes out at Easter, at Midsummer’s eve and most importantly – at Christmas. This time of the year, our julbord (Christmas table) is packed with köttbullar (meatballs), inlnagd sill (pickled herring), rökt och gravad lax (smoked and gravadlax), rödbetssallad (beetroot sallad), korv (sausages)… and most importantly, the ham. Julskinka. I think it’s safe to say that most of the non vegetarian julbord will have a piece of ham in the middle of the table and for most people (me!) this is definitely the most important part of the Christmas eating. It’s an ancient tradition to cook and eat ham in Sweden around Christmas and almost 7 000 tonnes are being sold every year. It’s best served with mustard, on a piece of knäckebröd (crisp bread) with a dollop of beetroot salad on the side – and this is exactly what I will stuff my face with tonight. My very own Christmas ham is calling me from the kitchen and this is how I did it:

1. A cured oncooked ham joint is left to soak in water over night to remove some of the salt from the curing. Is it just me or does this joint look like a pig’s face? Which I can assure you, it’s not…

2. Put it in a pot with carrots, a stick of celery, an onion, a few cloves and juniper berries. Cover it with water and then leave it to simmer until the internal temperature reaches 75 degrees C  (170 F). This takes about 20 minutes per 450 grams (1 lb).

3. Allow it to cool in the broth, take it out and put it in a rosting tin. Peel off the skin, leaving the fat underneath which can be scored into diamonds.  Spread the scored fat with a mix of egg and mustard and then sprinkle breadcrumbs on top of it. Put it in the oven for 20-30 minutes until the crumbs have got a nice colour.

4. Let it cool and then – eat!

PS: This is obviously just my personal take on it and in no way the “correct” way of doing it. Have you got another way – please share!

Writing utensils in Swedish

Posted by Steve 1 Comment
Nov 25 2011

Sweden has just as many different types of writing utensils as any other country. And as in many languages (although certainly not all) there are different words for these different types of writing utensils. However, there is one main word used to refer to a writing utensil, and that is penna. Penna can mean either ‘pen’, ‘pencil’, or ‘marker’, to name a few, depending on the context.

If you are going to take a test and you’re told to use a ‘pencil’, then instead of saying blyertspenna in the following description of the test, the word is replaced with just penna. The same goes for bläckpenna, or what we know simply as ‘pen’—that is, an ink pen—if it is already understood that the speaker/writer means ‘pen’, then he or she may simply use the word penna in the following text. En markeringspenna is a ‘marker’, and this word can be used the same way.

In contrast to these scenarios, if there is no context, then you can assume that the speaker/writer means that you can use whatever type of writing utensil you will.

Here’s how you conjugate the word penna (here its translation will be simplified to ‘pen’):

en penna a/one pen
pennor pens
pennan the pen
pennorna the pens

Wordfeud – a new way of practicing Swedish

Posted by jennie 6 Comments
Oct 19 2011

Have you been bitten by the Wordfeud-bug yet? Well, if you haven’t and you have no intention to be bitten by it either, I strongly advice you to stop reading now. Wordfeud is highly addictive and might harm your relationships- unless your family, friends and partner are addicts too, that is. But Wordfeud can also -  as I have discovered recently – be an excellent tool for improving one’s vocabulary.

Some fact first of all:
Wordfeud is a Scrabble-style app-game for Androids and  iOS platforms. It was created “for fun” by the 28 year old Norweigan Håkon Bertheussen and 24 hours after it was released, over 10 000 people had downloaded the word game – without it being marketed at all. Today, millions of people worldwide use Wordfeud and you can play in either English, French, Spanish, Dutch, Swedish, Norwegian or Danish. The game has a 15-by-15 tile gameboard,  a letter tile set and the same scoring mechanism as Scrabble, and you start a new game by either inviting a friend or searching for a random opponent. Each player can have up to 30 games going at once, and has up to 72 hours to make a move before forfeiting the game. The game is free, but there is a premium version as well that costs money.

And boy do the Swede love it! The Wordfeud fever has spread with an increible pace over Sweden and as of today, around 500 000 Swedes play the game. 500 000! In other words, there are plenty of opportunities for Swedish language students (who own an adroid…) across the globe to practice and expand their vocabulary. I have learnt loads of new words in English since I started playing agains native English speakers – some more useful than others – and I’ve made a silly but rather practical point of writing them all down. And the best thing, I can justify my playing by claiming that I am, after all, studying.

So, anyone up for a game?

I Love You in Swedish

Posted by jennie 6 Comments
Oct 5 2011

Ah those magic words, so lovely to hear and sometimes so hard to say. Well, especially if you don’t know HOW to say them. Therefore, we decided that a blog post about these three little words would be absolutely essential. So here goes:

I love you = Jag älskar dig
(“dig” is pronounced “dej”)

 

And for those of you who might not be that loved up, here are some alternatives:

Jag tycker om dig (I like you)
Jag gillar dig (I like you)
Jag är kär i dig (I am in love with you)

I think in general Swedes are a bit reluctant to say “Jag älskar dig”.  It is – and should be – big words and I actually think that lots of Swedes rather say “I love you” than “Jag älskar dig”. Perhaps it feels a bit less… I don’t know, pompous? Like you are saying it, but in disguise. Anyone agrees?

A fun thing about being an expat in England is getting used to being called “darling”, “honey”, “love” and “sweetheart” by the cashier at Tesco, the lady in the post office and the gym receptionist. This is extremely rare in Sweden and I would find it very strange if the cashier at ICA would call me “älskling” (darling, honey, love). In fact, I think it safe to say it would never happen. It’s a very affectionate word in Swedish and I would only call my husband älskling. Or my children if I had any.

Anyway, let’s spread the love and finish off with some lovely vocabulary.

Älskling (darling, honey, love)
Älskade (lovely)
Sötnos (Sweetheart – but literally means sweet nose)
Kärlek (love)
Att vara kär (to be in love)
Att älska (to love AND to make love – beware!)
Puss/Pussas/Pussar (Kiss/to kiss/kisses AND is kissing-  without the tongue)
Kyss/Kyssas/Kyssar (Kiss/to kiss/kisses  – with the tongue)
Kram/Kramas/Kramar  (hug/to hug/hugs AND is hugging)

Make sure to use it and spread it, okay?

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