Norwegian phrase of the day – 20/04/09 (Oversvømmelse)

Posted April 20, 2009 * Comments(5)

Preface

It has been a while since the last one, sorry about that! I have been orienteering in England and dealing with a bout of conjunctivitis but I’m back in the office now and raring to go. Today’s phrase got a bit messy because I’m still a bit tired and out of practice – so forgive me, but also be thankful there are a few points to discuss :)

Today’s word: Oversvømmelse

  • Translation: Flood
  • Pronunciation: aw-ver-shvur-merl-ser

First attempt

Det har vært så lenge
siden jeg har skrivet
noen ting, derfor trenger jeg
en oversvømmelse av inspirasjon!
Siden jeg er ikke helt sikker om
setningen opp der, skal jeg også
sier at oversvømmelse i fjor
i England var kjempedårlig og
mange folk måtte dro fra husene deres.
Det var bra vær for ender!

Errors/Observations:

  • There is not really a Norwegian equivalent for “it has been so long since” so we should stick with “it is so long since”, det er så lenge siden
  • å skrive, skrev, har skrevet
  • derfor does not really work here, we can replace it with at jeg trenger
  • Ikke placement can be tricky, in this sentence (a subordinate clause) ikke must precede the finite verb: Siden jeg ikke er helt sikker
  • Om and På can also be tricky for English speakers – here we should use sikker på
  • The next sentence is a bit messy, and is better written as forige setning, or sentingen over
  • “Skal jeg også sier at” is better written as vil jeg også si at. Vil and Skal can also cause some difficulties, since skal generally means “will, shall” and vil generally means “would like to, want to”. Sier should also have been in the infinitive, å si.
  • kjempedårlig does not really work in this context, so we can introduce a new word: forferdelig (terrible)
  • dro should be dra, as in English you would say “had to leave” not “had to left”.
  • Since we are talking about their own houses, we should say husene sine, otherwise we could be referring to “their” as in anybodies houses.

Final edit:

Det er så lenge
siden jeg har skrevet
noen ting at jeg trenger
en oversvømmelse av inspirasjon!
Siden jeg ikke er helt sikker på
forrige setning, vil jeg også
si at oversvømmelse i fjor
i England var forferdelig, og
mange folk måtte dra fra husene sine.
Det var bra vær for ender!

Translation:

It has been so long since
I have written anything that
I need a flood of inspiration!
Since I'm not totally sure about
the previous sentence, I will also
say that the floods last year
in England were terrible and many
people had to leave their houses.
It was nice weather for ducks!

5 Comments so far

  1. wojak on April 20th, 2009

    1. It should be “jeg” instead of “jer”
    2. You should put comma after “forferdelig”, because it is a new sentence
    3. “Previous” in Norwegian has double “r”, so it should be “forrige”
    4. I’m not sure but I think that you should separate “noenting”, in this case it should be more like “noen ting”

  2. wojak on April 20th, 2009

    5. There is no word “folke” in Norwegian, Possible forms are: et folk; folk; folket; folk; folkene; In your sentence you need ubestemt flertall, so you should use “folk”

  3. wojak on April 20th, 2009

    * Possible forms are: et folk; folket; folk; folkene;

  4. Russ on April 21st, 2009

    Haha, yes – I was tired that day… Some typos and some just stupid mistakes. Will work on some corrections… June did tell me about forrige but I forgot to edit it…

    I think noen ting works both ways, but maybe it’s “safer” to write as two words. Needs a Norwegian opinion really…

  5. Cecilie on May 6th, 2009

    Oversvømmelse doesn’t really work in terms of Oversvømmelse av inspirasjon. It’s a bad translation from English. It would be better to say en flom av inspirasjon.

    Oversvømmelse in Norwegian only gets used when there’s water rising really…

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