{"id":6641,"date":"2014-06-20T17:00:46","date_gmt":"2014-06-20T17:00:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/swedish\/?p=6641"},"modified":"2014-06-20T23:20:29","modified_gmt":"2014-06-20T23:20:29","slug":"one-of-the-most-important-swedish-verbs-vara-to-be","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/swedish\/one-of-the-most-important-swedish-verbs-vara-to-be\/","title":{"rendered":"One of the most important Swedish verbs: vara, &#8220;to be&#8221;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Hey guys!<\/p>\n<p>There are important verbs in every language. One of them is almost always some sort of copula verb, as in the case of Swedish.\u00a0<em>Vara<\/em> is a verb you simply cannot go without!<\/p>\n<p><strong>In this video I explain how to express &#8220;to be&#8221; in Swedish.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/S155csuGK1A?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen title=\"Embedded video\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>The verb\u00a0<em>vara<\/em>, &#8220;to be&#8221;, has many uses. For example, it can be used <strong>to give a subject an identity or a property<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px\">Rolf <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">\u00e4r<\/span> l\u00e4rare. \u2013 <em>Rolf <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">is<\/span> a teacher.<\/em><br \/>\n\u00c4pplena <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">\u00e4r<\/span> r\u00f6da. \u2013 <em>The apples <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">are<\/span> red.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>As you can see in the examples, <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">the present tense of <em>vara<\/em> is <em>\u00e4r<\/em><\/span>. While English has three present tense forms of \u201cto be\u201d \u2013 \u201cam\u201d, \u201care\u201d, and \u201cis\u201d \u2013 the Swedish language only has one: \u00e4r. In other words, whether it\u2019s jag, du, hon, vi, ni or de, the present tense conjugation is always <em>\u00e4r<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p><em>Vara<\/em> can be used <strong>to indicate when something is to occur or has occurred<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px\">Proven <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">var<\/span> ig\u00e5r. \u2013 <em>The tests <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">were<\/span> yesterday.<\/em><br \/>\nHans f\u00f6delsedag <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">var<\/span> tre m\u00e5nader senare. \u2013 <em>His birthday <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">was<\/span> three months later.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>The aforementioned rule also applies here: <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">the simple past tense of <em>vara<\/em> is always <em>var<\/em><\/span>.<\/p>\n<p><em>Vara<\/em> can also <strong>indicate the location of someone or something<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px\">Vi <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">har varit<\/span> hos min syster. \u2013 <em>We <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">have been<\/span> at my sister\u2019s.<\/em><br \/>\nDin papegoja <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">har varit<\/span> i sin bur. \u2013 <em>Your parrot <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">has been<\/span> in its cage.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>Vara<\/em> can also be used <strong>to indicate that something is equal to something else<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px\">En meter <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">\u00e4r<\/span>\u00a0hundra\u00a0centimeter. \u2013 <em>A meter <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">is<\/span> 100 centimeters.<\/em>\u00a0\u2192 (I made a mistake in the video: a meter is not 1000 centimeters! Thanks to those who pointed out the mistake!)<br \/>\n<em>L\u00e5da<\/em> <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">\u00e4r<\/span> \u201dbox\u201d p\u00e5 engelska. \u2013 L\u00e5da<em> <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">is<\/span> \u201dbox\u201d in English.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Finally, <em>vara<\/em> can be used <strong>to tell time<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px\">Vad <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">\u00e4r<\/span> klockan? \u2013 <em>What time is it?<\/em><br \/>\nHon <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">\u00e4r<\/span> kvart i fem. \u2013 <em>It\u2019s a quarter to five (4:45\/16:45).<\/em><\/p>\n<p>As you can see, the Swedish verb <em>vara<\/em>, \u201cto be\u201d, has many uses, just as in English. Though several of them are mentioned here, you will likely come across even more ways to use the word as you study Swedish.<\/p>\n<p>Lycka till!\u00a0\u2013\u00a0<em>Good luck!<\/em><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Hey guys! There are important verbs in every language. One of them is almost always some sort of copula verb, as in the case of Swedish.\u00a0Vara is a verb you simply cannot go without! In this video I explain how to express &#8220;to be&#8221; in Swedish. The verb\u00a0vara, &#8220;to be&#8221;, has many uses. For example&hellip;<\/p>\n<p class=\"post-item__readmore\"><a class=\"btn btn--md\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/swedish\/one-of-the-most-important-swedish-verbs-vara-to-be\/\">Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":62,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":""},"categories":[6,3079,13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6641","post","type-post","status-publish","hentry","category-grammar","category-swedish-language","category-vocabulary"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/swedish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6641","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/swedish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/swedish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/swedish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/62"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/swedish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6641"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/swedish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6641\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6647,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/swedish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6641\/revisions\/6647"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/swedish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6641"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/swedish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6641"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/swedish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6641"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}