Tag Archives: intermediate
Nightless nights, dayless days. Posted by hulda on May 26, 2014
Like A hundred names for snow might show, Icelandic has quite a rich vocabulary when it comes to nature and the seasons. An obvious example besides snow is light and darkness and the change from one to other, because the time during which day and night are about the same length is very, extremely short. Due…
With with, with or with? Posted by hulda on Apr 11, 2014
“Mig langar að tala við þig, hjá þér, og þá langar mig að tala með þér upp á sviði.” Put this sentence in an online translator and you get “I want to talk to with you and allow me to speak with you on stage” as a translation. Icelandic prepositions are endlessly confusing and here…
Hekla volcano – temperature on the rise. Posted by hulda on Mar 25, 2014
As spring approaches we begin to look at the volcanoes a bit more closely, especially the two that are overdue their eruption schedule: Katla and Hekla. In Iceland it’s actually very typical that eruptions begin in the spring or early summer because that’s when the snow and ice melt off the mountains and even subglacial…
Puddle punks for Eurovision. Posted by hulda on Feb 20, 2014
Eurovision is drawing near again. I admit I’m a fan so of course I’ve been eagerly following the Icelandic finals, especially since Icelanders are quite unpredictable in what they’ll want to send. Most countries have some kind of a pattern – you know that certain ones will send a girl in a miniskirt/supposedly sexy guy…
The end is nigh (again). Posted by hulda on Feb 13, 2014
Bad news first, the end of the world has been announced for the 22nd of February. Then for the good ones, this time it will be Ragnarök so no need to repent your sins, just strap yourself in and enjoy the ride! To be expected: earthquakes, volcanic activity, possible sightings of a massive sea serpent…
Suffix to say don’t panic. Posted by hulda on Feb 6, 2014
There’s a magic trick to learning Icelandic that I’d like to share with you today, and I guarantee that learning its basics will broaden your vocabulary skills in one go. Sounds too good to be true? Well, I’d say Icelandic is such a difficult language that using all the cheats you can find is not…
How is a bus like a deck of cards? Posted by hulda on Jan 24, 2014
Like mentioned in the previous post, counting in Icelandic is no simple matter, especially when you’re quickly trying to come up with a sentence that includes a number. I doubt one blog post is even enough to cover the whole counting problem, but let’s look at the basics at least. The good news: the only numbers…