Learn how to talk about time
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Gina: Hello and welcome back to DanishClass101.com. This is Absolute Beginner season 1, lesson 19, Spend Some Time On Learning The Danish Time. I’m Gina: . |
| Anna Hej! And I’m Anna. |
| Gina: In this lesson, you’ll learn how to talk about time. |
| Anna Knowing how to ask someone for the time in Danish, and answer if someone asks you is very important. |
| Gina: So let’s get started! |
| Anna The conversation takes place on the street, and it’s between William and Emma. |
| Gina: The speakers are friends, and they’re speaking standard Danish. Let’s listen to the conversation. |
| DIALOGUE |
| William Emma, skynd dig! Vi skal mødes med Peter klokken tolv. |
| Emma Ja, ja. Hvad er klokken nu? |
| William Klokken er elleve femogfyrre. |
| Emma Hvornår starter filmen? |
| William Den starter kvart over. |
| Emma Masser af tid så. |
| Gina: Let’s hear the conversation one time slowly. |
| William Emma, skynd dig! Vi skal mødes med Peter klokken tolv. |
| Emma Ja, ja. Hvad er klokken nu? |
| William Klokken er elleve femogfyrre. |
| Emma Hvornår starter filmen? |
| William Den starter kvart over. |
| Emma Masser af tid så. |
| Gina: Now let’s hear it with the English translation. |
| William Emma, skynd dig! Vi skal mødes med Peter klokken tolv. |
| Gina: Emma, hurry up! We're meeting up with Peter at twelve o’clock. |
| Emma Ja, ja. Hvad er klokken nu? |
| Gina: Yes yes. What time is it now? |
| William Klokken er elleve femogfyrre. |
| Gina: It's eleven forty-five. |
| Emma Hvornår starter filmen? |
| Gina: When does the movie start? |
| William Den starter kvart over. |
| Gina: It starts at a quarter past. |
| Emma Masser af tid så. |
| Gina: Lots of time then. |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Gina: Okay, Anna, let’s talk about daylight savings time in Denmark. |
| Anna Danes change their clocks twice a year - when daylight savings time starts and when it ends. |
| Gina: So when exactly does this happen? |
| Anna In the spring, you turn the clock one hour forward around the end of March; and in the fall, you turn the clock one hour back around the end of October. |
| Gina: The purpose is to make the best use of the daylight, right? |
| Anna Exactly! Many also call daylight savings time sommertid, which means “summer time,” because during summer the sun rises early in the morning and sets late in the evening. |
| Gina: Do many people forget to change their clocks? |
| Anna It happens, but many clocks today make the change automatically, so less people oversleep when summer time starts. |
| Gina: (laughs) That’s good news! Okay, now let’s move on to the vocab. |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Gina: Let's take a look at the vocabulary for this lesson. |
| The first word we shall see is: |
| Anna skynd dig [natural native speed] |
| Gina: hurry up |
| Anna skynd dig [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Anna skynd dig [natural native speed] |
| Next: |
| Anna skulle [natural native speed] |
| Gina: have to, have got to, must, be meant to, be supposed to, should, ought to |
| Anna skulle [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Anna skulle [natural native speed] |
| Next: |
| Anna mødes [natural native speed] |
| Gina: meet, get together |
| Anna mødes [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Anna mødes [natural native speed] |
| Next: |
| Anna klokken [natural native speed] |
| Gina: o'clock |
| Anna klokken [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Anna klokken [natural native speed] |
| Next: |
| Anna hvad er klokken nu [natural native speed] |
| Gina: What time is it now? |
| Anna hvad er klokken nu [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Anna hvad er klokken nu [natural native speed] |
| Next: |
| Anna hvornår [natural native speed] |
| Gina: when |
| Anna hvornår [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Anna hvornår [natural native speed] |
| Next: |
| Anna starte [natural native speed] |
| Gina: start, begin |
| Anna starte [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Anna starte [natural native speed] |
| Next: |
| Anna film [natural native speed] |
| Gina: film, picture, movie |
| Anna film [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Anna film [natural native speed] |
| Next: |
| Anna masser [natural native speed] |
| Gina: lots |
| Anna masser [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Anna masser [natural native speed] |
| And Last: |
| Anna tid [natural native speed] |
| Gina: time, appointment, tense |
| Anna tid [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Anna tid [natural native speed] |
| KEY VOCAB AND PHRASES |
| Gina: Let’s take a closer look at the usage of some of the words and phrases from this lesson. What’s first? |
| Anna Skynd dig. [pause] Skynd dig. |
| Gina: This means “hurry up.” |
| Anna It’s composed of the verb skynde in imperative, which means “hurry,” “hurry up,” “hasten,” or “be quick;” and the pronoun dig in the oblique case, which means “you.” |
| Gina: So the phrase literally means something like “hurry you” or “hurry up you,” but it should be translated as just “hurry up.” |
| Anna That’s right. |
| Gina: What’s next? |
| Anna Film. [pause] Film. |
| Gina: This means “film,” “picture,” and “movie,” and it’s a common gender noun used in the same way as in English. |
| Anna For example, Filmen var dårlig. [pause] Filmen var dårlig. |
| Gina: This means “The movie was bad.” |
| Anna Filmen is film with the definite article -en, which means “the movie,” var is the verb “be” in past tense, and dårlig is the adjective “bad.” |
| Gina: Can you tell us about this noun’s irregular plural? |
| Anna Usually, you add -e or -er to the end of a noun in the plural, but film in its indefinite plural form remains as film. |
| Gina: What about the noun’s definite plural form? |
| Anna Then you add -ene so it becomes filmene. [pause] Filmene. |
| Gina: Which means “the movies.” What’s next? |
| Anna Tid. [pause] Tid. |
| Gina: This can mean “time,” “appointment,” and “tense,” as in grammatical tense. |
| Anna It’s a common gender noun, and it’s used in the same way as in English. |
| Gina: Can you give us some examples? |
| Anna Har du tid? [pause] Har du tid? |
| Gina: This means “Do you have time?” |
| Anna Har is the verb “have” in present tense, du is the pronoun “you,” and tid means “time.” Another example is Har du en tid? [pause] Har du en tid? |
| Gina: This means “Do you have an appointment?” |
| Anna When tid follows the indefinite article en and becomes en tid, it means “an appointment.” |
| Gina: Great! Okay, now onto the grammar. |
| GRAMMAR POINT |
| Gina: In this lesson, you’ll learn how to talk about time. |
| Anna If you need to ask someone for the time in Danish, it’s Hvad er klokken? [pause] Hvad er klokken? |
| Gina: This means “What's the time?” or “What time is it?” |
| Anna Hvad means “what,” er is the verb “be” in present tense, and klokken literally means “the clock,” but here it means “the time.” |
| Gina: So how do you answer this question? |
| Anna If we pretend it’s 12 o’clock, you can say Klokken er tolv. [pause] Klokken er tolv. |
| Gina: This literally means “The clock is 12,” but it’s equivalent to “It's 12 o’clock.” |
| Anna You can replace klokken with the pronoun den, so the sentence becomes Den er tolv. [pause] Den er tolv. |
| Gina: This means “It's 12.” |
| Anna You can also just say Tolv. [pause] Tolv. |
| Gina: So what about when it’s half past something? |
| Anna Then you say Den er halv…, which means “It is half…,” followed by the next whole hour. |
| Gina: How do you say “It’s half past eight,” for example? |
| Anna Den er halv ni. [pause] Den er halv ni. In Danish, you don’t say that it’s half past the previous whole hour. Instead, you say that it’s half of the next whole hour. |
| Gina: So the phrase literally means “It is half nine.” |
| Anna Which is the same as half past eight in English. |
| Gina: I see. So how do you say “a quarter past” or “a quarter to"? |
| Anna If we pretend that it’s 5.15, you say Den er et kvarter over fem. [pause] Den er et kvarter over fem. |
| Gina: This means “It’s a quarter past five.” |
| Anna Yes. You use the preposition over to say “past.” |
| Gina: So “a quarter past” is… |
| Anna Et kvarter over. [pause] Et kvarter over. |
| Gina: What about “a quarter to”? |
| Anna That’s et kvarter i. [pause] Et kvarter i.. |
| Gina: Can you give us an example? |
| Anna Den er et kvarter i seks. [pause] Den er kvarter i seks. |
| Gina: This means “It’s a quarter to six.” |
| Anna When telling the time, Danes use the preposition i to say “to.” |
| Gina: Great! Do you use a.m. and p.m.? |
| Anna Not really, but after you say the time you can add om morgenen. |
| Gina: Which means “in the morning.” |
| Anna Or om eftermiddagen. |
| Gina: Which means “in the afternoon.” |
| Anna Or om aftenen. |
| Gina: Which means “in the evening.” |
| Anna Or om natten. |
| Gina: Which means “at night.” |
Outro |
|---|
| Gina: Okay, listeners, that’s all for this lesson. |
| Anna Check out the lesson notes for more examples and information. |
| Gina: Thanks for listening, and we’ll see you next time. Bye! |
| Anna Vi ses! |
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