"I was four years old when I went to Norway."

Translation: Jag var fyra år gammal när jag åkte till Norge.

[danyen]

Would "gick till Norge" also be appropriate here, as an alternative to "åkte till Norge" or "for till Norge"?

[rhblake]

No: "gick" in the sense of having gone somewhere means "walked".

[danyen]

Ah thanks - I had mistakenly thought that "gå" and "åka" were completely interchangeable.

[Yerrick]

What if you lived right on the border?

[dariussavory]

I walked from Oslo to Stockholm once, no need to live on the border! ;)

[Arnauti]

You should have said walked in English if you really went on foot.

[podgorsk]

Not necessarily if one lives on the border, one would still say I went to Norway even if by foot. So in this (rare) situation 'gick' should be accepted, shouldn't it?

[TomMCauser]

Help! I'm a bit confused. I thought after a mention of 'time', you switch the pronoun and verb. Like;

"Jag var fyra år gammal när åkte jag till Norge." - Why is this wrong?

[Arnauti]

The idea of "switching" is not helpful. The thing is this: in main clauses, the verb goes in second place in the sentence. In subclauses, the subject goes before the verb.

The main clause is Jag var fyra år …  – here, the verb is in second place.
The subclause is när jag åkte till Norge – here, the subject is before the verb.

Long post about Swedish word order here: https://www.duolingo.com/comment/8970470

[Martin76891]

Can you construct a similar sentence in which the inversion of subject and verb does occur? For example, "Nar jag var fyra ar, akte jag till Norge."

So this changes the first half into the subclause (subject first) and that entire phrase fills position 1 so the verb "akte" comes next?

I don't mean to suggest this should be an accepted answer, I am just checking to see if I understand the word order rules correctly.

[kiasams]

I am getting very confused as to when to use subject first, then verb, or the other way around. And I don't really understand the explanation. For example, det har du ratt i.
The subject is du. the verb is har. Why is this ok?

[TomMCauser]

Thank you very much - I'll be sure to give this a read. Appreciated :)

[ChrisHackett]

I walked across the border because i lived in Jukkasjarvi so there!!

[MarisBoyd]

varför kan man inte säger: jag var fyra års alder när jag åkte til norge

[devalanteriel]

That's because ålder means age, somewhat like in English: you can say "I was four years old" or "I was four years of age", but not "I was four years age".

[kinj1973]

Can't use 'blev' instead of 'var'?

[Arnauti]

That means became or turned.

[kinj1973]

aha, thanks :)

[ghostofthefuture]

Is the second 'jag' necessary? Does the subject not carry through the sentence in Swedish?

[Zmrzlina]

It is necessary. I sounds strange to omit it in either English or Swedish.

[22decembre]

So there is not this "da" like in danish that you use only if it happened once in the past?

[Arnauti]

You could have said då instead of när, but it gets a little more formal that way.

[Hed_Cyan]

Why not "fyra år gammalt"? I am really struggling with when adjectives need the "t" or not.

Thanks for any help!

[Arnauti]

If you think about it like this: I was four years old - I was how old - I was old – you can see that old modifies I. So since you'd say Jag var gammal, you also say Jag var fyra år gammal.
But if we're speaking about an ett word: Huset är gammalt 'The house is old' – the adjective is in the -t form.

[Ezra746950]

Jag fyllde fyra år när jag åkte till norge. ?

[StephenAte]

Kan man säga också 'Jag var fyra nar jag åkte till Norge'?