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Winter Activities in Sweden Posted by Marcus Cederström on Jan 13, 2011
I used to be a halfway active person. Basketball, football (the American kind), even a little track and field. At one point I even ran a half marathon. And by run, I mean stumbled slowly across the finish line, but close enough. Now my activity is limited to skiing (the downhill kind) and walking. A…
Fun with the Swedish Language – Pluskvamperfekt Posted by Marcus Cederström on Jan 6, 2011
I’m sure we all remember such riveting posts as “Perfect Perfekt” and “Imperative.” How could you not really? Everyone loves grammar. Because we all remember the imperative and the perfect form though, it’s time to move on to pluskvamperfekt, or, as it is known in English, pluperfect or past perfect. This form is used, not…
New Year’s Eve in Sweden Posted by Marcus Cederström on Dec 31, 2010
New Year’s Eve in Sweden tends to be celebrated with family and friends, just like in a lot of countries. Fancy clothes are worn, delicious dinners are eaten, plenty of champagne consumed, and of course, the cell phone companies are overloaded with texts being sent. It’s not too different than New Year’s Eve celebrations in…
Fun with Swedish Grammar– Perfect Perfekt Posted by Marcus Cederström on Dec 16, 2010
Now that we know the imperative form (and we are all experts now of course), we can move on to the perfect tense. The perfect tense describes an action that has been completed, but the consequences are still ongoing. For example: Marcus har sprungit till jobbet. This suggests that I have run to work, the…
Fun with Swedish Grammar – Imperative Posted by Marcus Cederström on Dec 9, 2010
The imperative form (or imperativ in Swedish) is that form where you really just want to make some demands. Like “Stop!” or “Look!” or even “Listen!” It’s a good form to know, and it comes in handy in a few different verb tenses. Like the perfect tense. But first, we need to learn the imperative…
The Swedish Chef and Google Posted by Marcus Cederström on Dec 3, 2010
I didn’t really grow up with the Muppets like some people might have. And although I was familiar with Kermit and Miss Piggy, I guess I never paid much attention to the Swedish Chef. Somehow though, invariably, my Swedish skills lead to a conversation about blonde women, IKEA, and the Swedish chef. The trifecta of…
Fun with Swedish – Compound Words. No Really. Posted by Marcus Cederström on Nov 18, 2010
Swedish words can end up being really long. I mean really long. Nordöstersjökustartilleriflygspaningssimulatoranläggningsmaterielunderhållsuppföljningssystemdiskussionsinläggsförberedelsearbeten long. I found this word on the always reliable Wikipedia, which we all know should never be doubted. Or something like that. The claim is this word holds the Guinness World Record for longest word in the Swedish language Regardless of the…