Adios, Swede.

April 30, 2007 2:58 PM

How do you say "good luck" and "Don't let the door hit you in the butt on the way out" in Norwegian? Bonus points for any hilarious Norwegian turns of phrase to welcome a friend into retirement.
posted by Foam Pants to Writing & Language (7 answers total)

"Good luck" is Lykke til (LEWK-kuh TIL, where what I've written as EW sounds like French u or German ü). I have no idea how you'd say the other, but frankly unless you know how to pronounce Norwegian pretty well it wouldn't be comprehensible anyway. If you want an insult to make him chuckle, a couple of short and easy ones are Dra til helvete! (DRAH til HEL-ve-te) 'Go to hell' and Kyss meg i ræva! (CHEWSS may ee RAV-ah) 'Kiss my ass.'
posted by languagehat at 5:35 PM on April 30, 2007

You could translate "Don't let the door hit you in the butt on the way out" as "La ikke døren treffe deg i ræva!" (don't let the door hit you in the ass) or "La ikke døren treffe deg i rompa" (don't let the door hit you in the butt - a little more polite).
posted by flod logic at 5:55 PM on April 30, 2007

My Norwegian friend was fond of saying, (not sure if the spelling is correct) “Svens gå faen!” It means, roughly, “Swedes go to the devil!”

Another, funny, but entirely innapropriate phrase he taught me was, “Fitte, fitte, om den en på gris eller ikke.” That means, roughly, “Pussy is pussy, whether it’s on a pig or not.”
posted by ijoshua at 6:59 PM on April 30, 2007

My mom says:

Lykke til - pronounced something like "leek-a-till" Also you can say "twee twee" which is something like spitting to keep the evil eye away (patooey- like that).
posted by croutonsupafreak at 9:19 PM on April 30, 2007

what ijoshua is referring to is "svenskefaen" and it really just means "swede-devil." or, more appropriately translated it would be "damn swede." norwegians and swedes have a friendly rivalry, even if this term doesn't sound so friendly.

bonus phrase: "hei gammelosten!"
that means "hi old cheese" where old cheese refers to a specific beloved norwegian cheese that is aged, and in my opinion, incredibly nasty.
posted by edlundart at 10:18 PM on April 30, 2007

ijoshua: Probably "Svensker går til faen."

Also, to the OP, I don't know if this is helpful, but I do kind of enjoy the phrase "gammel gretten gubbe" (basically, grumpy old man).
posted by flod logic at 10:22 PM on April 30, 2007

what ijoshua is referring to is "svenskefaen" and it really just means "swede-devil." or, more appropriately translated it would be "damn swede."

Well, if we're going there, the classic expression is jævla svenske ‘fucking Swede!’
/grew up with Norwegian-American mom who would be shocked at my using such an expression
posted by languagehat at 7:18 AM on May 1, 2007