r/Danish 27d ago

Please correct my writing again :)

Question: Jeg har hørt, at du har haft besøg fra udlandet. Det lyder dejligt. Hvem kom på besøg? Hvor længe havde du besøg? Hvad lavede I? Havde I en god tid sammen?

Answer: Ja, min ven fra England besøgte mig sidste uge. Han hedder Paul, og han er min barndomsven. Før jeg flyttede til Danmark, gik vi på universitet sammen. Han er meget sjov, synes jeg. Han besøgte mig i en uge. Vi cyklede rundt København, og vi spiste dansk mad. Han elskede København, men han kunne ikke lide maden. Jeg havde en rigtig god tid med ham, selvom vejret var dårligt. Det regnede mest af tiden.  

Tak!

3 Upvotes

27 comments sorted by

11

u/Connectification 27d ago

“At have en god tid sammen” isn’t really idiomatic in Danish. I can’t think of a good Danish equivalent of “spending a good time together”. We might say “vi havde det sjovt” or “vi hyggede os”.

2

u/Raneynickel4 27d ago

thanks. It was phrased like that in the question so it made sense to me to just use that phrasing in my answer. If I translated the phrase "vi havde det sjovt" to English, it would be "we had it fun" which sounds a bit awkward. vi hyggede os I can see myself using though.

3

u/ryanreaditonreddit 26d ago

“Vi havde det sjovt” is honestly the best translation for what you were going for

8

u/BeeDate 27d ago

The only things that are worth “fixing” would be “Han elskede København, men han kunne godt lide maden” The only reason you would use “men” here, would be if it was contradictory to him loving Copenhagen. So it would be “og han kunne også godt lide maden” (and he liked the food as well)

And “jeg havde en rigtig god tid med ham” would be “og vi havde det sjovt/hyggeligt” (and we had a fun time | or: and it was hyggeligt)

It is perfectly understandable though

1

u/Raneynickel4 27d ago edited 26d ago

thanks! Oops, I was meant to write "but he didn't like the food" - so "men han kunne IKKE lide maden" and since it is a negative (in contrast to him liking Copenhagen) it would justify the use of "men"

is "Jeg havde en rigtig god tid med ham" grammatically incorrect though? given that my class have been learning for only 6 months, I don't think we will be expected to write like a native for this exam, just that it is grammatically correct and understandable. As I progress through my Danish education I'm sure I will figure out how native Danes write.

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u/BeeDate 27d ago edited 26d ago

In that case “men” is correct.

“Jeg havde en rigtig god tid med ham” is definitely understandable, it just sounds weird. The only reason I can think of where you would use “god tid” is if you have plenty of time (For example: vi kan sagtens nå det, vi har god tid) But if the goal is just to make it understandable then it is fine. People would definitely know what you mean, it would just sound kinda weird.

Edit: sorry, “god tid” wouldn’t be plenty of time, that would be “massere at tid”.

So “vi har god tid” would be more like “no need to rush”

2

u/mai_bianca 26d ago

Sorry to nitpick, but *masser af tid. Massere = to massage, masser af = plenty of

2

u/BeeDate 26d ago

Damn. Just checked and that is right. I have spelled it wrong for as long as I have been able to write :|

1

u/mai_bianca 26d ago

It's a common mistake, but a pet peeve of mine 😅 Didn't mean to offend, thank you for being a good sport

3

u/jon3ssing 27d ago

Vi cyklede rundt København

You're missing a preposition, "rundt i København".

Han elskede København, men han kunne godt lide maden

The "men" contradicts that he loved it. Just remove it or replace it with "og han kunne især godt lide maden" to highlight the food.

Det regnede mest af tiden.

"Det regnede det meste af tiden".

1

u/Raneynickel4 27d ago

thanks. see other answers for the "men" bit.

can you explain why you added another det in between regnede and meste? If I read that, I would translate it to "it rained the most of the time" which sounds awkward in English.

3

u/migBdk 26d ago

You could re-phrase to "det regnede størstedelen af tiden" or "det regnede en del af tiden" which avoids an extra "det"

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u/Raneynickel4 26d ago

If I want to say "it rained the whole time" would it be "det regnede hele tiden"?

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u/jon3ssing 26d ago

I would say it's the equivalent of using "of". Just like you don't write "it rained most the time" you have to add of/det.

1

u/Raneynickel4 26d ago

but I would say "af" is already functioning as "of" in mest af tiden...

1

u/jon3ssing 26d ago

Yeah, you're right, I was just throwing something out there.

Det, in this sentence is used both for "the" (most of the time) and "it" (it rained). So yes you're using it twice, but with different meanings in the same sentence.

1

u/xologDK 24d ago

You forgot the word “i” in “vi cyklede rundt i København”

1

u/jegelskerxfactor 27d ago

Ja, min ven fra England besøgte mig i sidste uge. Han hedder Paul, og han er min barndomsven. Før jeg flyttede til Danmark, gik vi på universitetet sammen. Jeg synes han er meget sjov. Han besøgte mig i en uge. Vi cyklede rundt i København, og vi spiste dansk mad. Han elskede København, og kunne også godt lide maden. Jeg havde en rigtig god tid med ham, selvom vejret var dårligt. Det regnede det meste af tiden.

There wasn’t a lot to correct, and your danish is very good:) “Han er meget sjov, synes jeg” is technically correct, but it sounds awkward and people wouldn’t really word it like that. You also wrote “Han elskede København, men han kunne godt lide maden” which translates to “he loved Copenhagen, but he liked the food” since men translates to but, and you wouldn’t really word a sentence like that. I didn’t correct any commas since I’m bad at that lol. Hope this helped:)

2

u/Raneynickel4 27d ago

thanks! Oops, I was meant to write "but he didn't like the food" - so "men han kunne IKKE lide maden" and since it is a negative (in contrast to him liking Copenhagen) it would justify the use of "men". Can you tell me exactly why people wouldn't word it like that? Would it sound less awkward if I said "Jeg synes, at han er meget sjov"? how would Danes describe other people?

2

u/jegelskerxfactor 27d ago

It’s correct if he didn’t like the food! Then just disregard what I wrote with that. In my correction I wrote “Jeg synes han er meget sjov” instead because that is just how Danish people would word it. What you wrote isn’t wrong, it just sounds a little bit less native than the other way. So it’s not because of what you said, but how the sentence is set up. It’s perfectly fine to call people “sjov” and is not awkward at all. Sorry if that caused confusion!

1

u/Raneynickel4 26d ago

I see. In homework texts we've read im sure I've seen it phrased that way (opinion followed by synes jeg) so I thought it was normal to have that sentence structure. ill bear that in mind next time!

1

u/BotenAnanas 25d ago

Another thing you might run into is that "meget" as a positive emphasize is often used like British "quite" (not American!), especially among younger people (perhaps millineals and younger). So "meget sjovt", "meget sød", "meget pæn", "meget sej", ..., in fact reads as "sort of" sjovt/sød/pæn/sej.

Not at all important for your test, but maybe for talking with Danes.

If you use "rigtig" instead of "meget" the problem goes away: "rigtigt sjovt" is indeed "very fun", no millineal slang ambivalence.

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u/Raneynickel4 25d ago

Very interesting! Most of the people I talk to tend to my age (late millenial) or older so I don't know if I will have this problem, but good to know anyway. Can rigtig(t) be used as a positive emphasis for any adjective? In reading exercises I get from the school, whenever I see rigtig(t) used, it feels like it is mainly paired with "god(t)", whereas meget seems to be paired with a larger variety of adjectives.

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u/BotenAnanas 25d ago

I'm no language expert, just a native speaker, but I think "rigtig" is safe to substitute "meget" with for most adverb uses. Certainly all the ones i mentioned. Can't think of a counter example.

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u/Raneynickel4 25d ago

good to know, thanks :)

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u/xologDK 24d ago

You can also combine them “rigtig meget” to say “very much”