Dialogue

Vocabulary

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Lesson Notes

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Lesson Transcript

INTRODUCTION
Gina:Hi, I am Gina.
Nora:Hei, and I am Nora.
Gina:And welcome back to NorwegianClass101.com. This is Beginner season 1, Lesson 9 - A Mysterious Norwegian Letter.
Nora:In this lesson, you’ll learn how to use “til” and “for”
Gina:These mean “to” and “for” and are are quite different, but very easy to mix up.
Gina:In our dialogue, Kjersti has found a letter on her desk that doesn’t have a recipient.
Nora:So she asks Espen who it is for.
Gina:Okay, let's listen to the conversation.
POST CONVERSATION BANTER
Gina:Norwegians are fond of receiving presents.
Nora:... and of giving them!
Gina:But Norwegian tradition is to give gifts just at Christmas and on birthdays.
Nora:At Christmas time, presents are placed under a Christmas tree until Christmas Eve - the 24th - when the family gathers around the tree after dinner and opens presents.
Gina:Aww I love that! And other than Christmas and birthdays, it’s common courtesy to bring a small present when visiting someone for dinner or a party.
Nora:But this is not a norm, it is just common politeness. If you are visiting a Norwegian family or friend for dinner, try bringing some wine or a small token of your gratitude.
Gina:That should make your hosts quite happy, and probably make the rest of the evening much more worth it.
Nora:Indeed. Especially if you bring something that can be enjoyed while you are there. Although, the hosts have never opened a bottle of wine right away when I brought it as a gift to dinner.
Gina:Hmmm. True, they often save it for later occasions. Okay, now let’s move on to the vocab.
KEY VOCAB AND PHRASES
Gina:Let’s take a closer look at some of the words and phrases from this lesson. In Norwegian we have two common words for “father”, just like English.
Nora:One is “far” and the other is “pappa.”
Gina:The latter is used in more intimate speech, and often when referring to one’s own father or talking to him.
Nora:On the other hand, you use “far” when you’re talking about someone else’s father.
Gina:This word is often used in conjunction with a pronoun or noun as in “your dad”. Let’s take a look at some examples.
Nora:“Faren hennes virket skummel”
Gina:“Her father seemed scary”
Nora:“Det er en presang til pappa”
Gina:“It’s a present for Dad”. Not too hard, right? Next we also want to cover a word, or more specifically a pronoun, that’s not in the vocabulary.
Nora:“Ham”.
Gina:It is best translated as “him”...
Nora:Just like the pronoun “han.”
Gina:However in Norwegian the words have separate meanings.
Nora:Both are pronouns meaning “him”, but “han” is the subject in the sentence, while “ham” is the object.
Gina:Hmm, this is so complex that many Norwegians also mistake these two...
Nora:Or simply refuse to use ham at all.
Gina:But let’s look at some examples.
Nora:“Han var en stolt far”
Gina:“He was a proud father”
Nora:“Jeg så ingenting godt i ham”
Gina:“I saw nothing good in him”. Okay, now onto the grammar.

Lesson focus

Gina:In this lesson, you’ll learn how to use the words “to” and “for”...
Nora:Or til and for in Norwegian.
Gina:Now, they might sound similar to their English counterparts, but the truth is they’re used in quite opposite situations. That means til and for in Norwegian might not always correspond with their direct translations “to” and “for” in English.
Nora:In fact, the difference is even hard for Norwegians, and they often get the two confused.
Gina:In English you will often differentiate between “to” and “for” by grammatical difference.
Nora:In Norwegian, the difference is often whether what you are talking about is a gift, or whether it was requested. However, this is only talking about certain things or actions. Til and for also have several wider uses than “to” and “for” in English.
Gina:Before we go any further, let’s just quickly break down the two sentences we have in the dialogue in this lesson.
Nora:It was Til faren din
Gina:And it means “to your father”.
Nora:The first word is til
Gina:Which we know means “to”.
Nora:Then we have faren
Gina:Which is the definite noun “father”.
Nora:And finally, we have the possessive pronoun din which means “your”.
Gina:This sentence shouldn’t be that difficult to process. But our next sentence is a bit longer and a bit more complicated.
Nora:Åja. Er det for å takke for gavene?
Gina:This translates roughly as “Oh Right. Is it to thank him for the presents?”
Nora:The first word here is the interjection Åja
Gina:“Oh right” in English. This stands as a sentence by itself.
Nora:The beginning word of the next sentence is Er, the present tense of the verb å være
Gina:Which means “to be”.
Nora:Next we have det
Gina:Which means “it”. It’s a pronoun.
Nora:After this comes the first for
Gina:Which here translates better as “to”.
Nora:Then we have å takke
Gina:The infinitive of the verb “to thank”.
Nora:This is followed by the next for
Gina:Which this time translates as “for”.
Nora:And finally we have the definite plural noun gavene
Gina:In English, “the gifts/presents”.
Nora:This sentence proves the point that “to” and “for” don’t always correspond with Norwegian til and for.
Gina:The reason, as stated earlier, is the way they are integrated into the language.
Nora:In a nutshell, til is best thought of as either pointing to a direction or between two points, and finally “to” someone. While for has much more varied uses.
Gina:Let’s look at some examples of til first.
Nora:Toget går fra Oslo til Skien
Gina:"The train travels from Oslo to Skien"
Nora:Denne pakken er til lillebror
Gina:“This present is for little brother” in other words, “my little brother”.
Nora:Now til is all good, but what about for. For is best thought of connecting something that is meant for something else.
Gina:Again this is best illustrated through examples.
Nora:Kan du kjøpe ost for meg?
Gina:“Could you buy cheese for me?”
Nora:Jeg trenger ost for å lage kake
Gina:“I need cheese to make a cake”

Outro

Gina:Well, that’s all for this lesson.
Nora:As always, don’t forget to read the lesson notes and leave a comment on the lesson page.
Gina:And most importantly, don’t forget to join us next time to learn even more Norwegian!
Nora:See you next time!
Gina:Thanks for listening, bye!
Nora:Ha det

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