Posts tagged with "weather"

An all time favorite conversation starter :)

Posted by Katja 3 Comments
Dec 11 2011

Generally speaking, a good conversation starter is the weather. And so  it can be good to have some good phrases up you sleeve.

“Visst är det fint väder idag?”

Isn’t it nice weather today?

“Fint” is the adjective, but can be substituted for a number of other words as well, depending on what you want to say.

Swedish English equivalent
fint

härligt

underbart

skönt

strålande

soligt

trevligt

behagligt

 nice

lovely

wonderful

nice

radiant, magnificent

sunny

pleasant

agreeable
 

stormigt

regnigt

blåsigt

fuktigt

  

stormy

rainy

windy

humid
kallt

kyligt

snöigt

 cold

chilly

snowy

“Vi har verkligen haft tur med vädret på senaste tiden”

“We’ve really been lucky with the weather lately”

“Tur” (lucky) is also a word that can easily be substituted for a couple others like otur, (unlucky).

Swedish English equivalent
tur lucky
otur unlucky

Right around this time of year (christmas time) you can always talk about snow. This year was the first since SMHI started recording weather data that the 9th of November was without snow. (Sveriges meteorologiska och hydrologiska institut) The Swedish meteorological and hydrologic institute is in other words the organization that amongst other things provides the weather reports for all of Sweden.

Some parts of Sweden have in the past couple of days had some snow, but many people are still worried that it is going to be a Christmas without snow, whilst others can’t be happy enough. Therefor, it is quite the conversation started if you mention the lack of snow this year.

Who knows, if you try some of the weather phrases on somebody you’d like to have talked a little more to, you might make some new acquaintances :)

Swedish summer: Sizzling heat

Posted by jennie 8 Comments
Jul 12 2010

If you think Sweden is a rather cold place, you better think again! This summer is officially the hottest for years, and yesterday, the highest temperature since 1994 (all time high is 38 degrees, from 1947) was measured in Skåne, in the south of Sweden. The people of Målilla had to cope with a sizzling 35 degrees and similar temperatures were measured all over the country.

In addition, in a number of places in Skåne, Gotland and around Stockholm, temperatures stayed above 20 degrees throughout the whole night, which officially makes it a so-called tropical night. (Read: A night when it’s fricking impossible to sleep…)

Tropical nights! 35 degrees! I can’t get my head around this. Okay, I have had great and hot summers in Sweden before, but I can’t recall any other heat wave hanging around for this long. A week, tops. But hey, this wave seem to like it up there and I am crossing my fingers and praying to any weather god available that it will stick for another few weeks, since I am stuck in a sizzling office probably breaking some all time highest temperature ever measured in an office-record… As Marcus explained here, almost all of Sweden is off on their loooong holiday now, which 1. Makes it impossible to work, because all emails you send are instantly replied by an “Autoreply; Out off the office” . And 2: Makes it almost unbearable to even have quick glance at Facebook, since everyone “is swimming, BBQ-ing, drinking wine, enjoying the sunshine, hanging on the beach….”.

So. Let’s talk about the weather for a bit! What’s it like where you are? Any heat wave hanging around your place? Colds naps?  Thunderstorms?

Some weather vocab for potential conversations with Swedes:
Weather = Väder
Heat wave = Värmebölja
Tropical night = Tropisk natt
Breeze = Bris
Sweaty = Svettig
Air Condition = Luftkonditionering
Sunshine = Solsken
Thunder = Åska
Forecast: Prognos

Foto: Alex Brandell/Sweden.se

Winter Is Coming

Posted by Transparent Language 13 Comments
Sep 30 2008

Oh no!

Ceci made a comment about the weather and how wonderful the autumn colors are this time of the year. Yes, they indeed are. But I’m not a fan of autumn. Why? Winter comes next!

In fact tonight is the perfect time to begin writing about winter. It’s the first time this fall (winter?) that the temperature has dropped below zero Celsius. Or at least, it’s the first time that I’ve noticed how cold it gets at night. Soon, it will also be cold during the day. And then the snow will come.

Sometimes I feel, and I mean literally feel, that all this talk about global warming is just a talk.

Last year I attended a very interesting lecture given by a visiting professor at the university here. The guy, sorry, I don’t remember his name now, said some really interesting things about this part of Norrland. He said that we are at the very end of an ice age, and the changes we are seeing here in the north are due to the normal reaction of the land that had been covered with a thick layer of ice for several thousand years. He used the Ume river and the area around Umeå and Holmsund as an example.

Back in the olden days the river was much deeper and even sea going vessels could easily get to Umeå. This is no longer possible due to the river getting shallower and shallower each year.

He explained this phenomenon by using a mattress analogy. (Don’t worry, this is all very innocent.) When you sit or lie down, you’re pressing down on the mattress. Depending on how soft your bed is, the weight of your body compresses the mattress slightly. And then you get up. The indentation made by your weight will remain for a while and then the mattress will spring back to its original state. Well, the professor said that the same thing is happening with the area all over the Gulf of Bothnia. The ice sheet had retreated and now the ground is springing back. Of course, since northern Sweden is not exactly a mattress, we are talking about thousands of years of slow springing back here. But that’s why the Ume river is getting shallower and that’s why the whole Gulf of Bothnia will eventually disappear.

The professor tied it all very nicely with global warming, but I was so taken with the idea of being able to walk to Finland in a couple thousand years that I missed that point completely.

Anyway, where were we? Ah yes, winter. So, because we are at the tail end of an ice age, things are supposed to be warming up. I truly hope that this will be one of those “warm” winters. The last one wasn’t that bad. It was just long. And the one before wasn’t that bad either, except it was super-snowy. And the one before that was awful. But as far as I remember, it was awful everywhere. I went through three car batteries that year. Let’s hope that this year I can get away with only one!

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