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- "Why is your aunt eating turt…
"Why is your aunt eating turtles?"
Translation:Varför äter din moster sköldpaddor?
36 Comments
Now we know why Swedish aunts are almost called "monsters" -- because they eat turtles.
274
Duo is one smart owl indeed. This must be so because he is reading books in the Dutch course.
Historically yes in numerous parts of the world. Especially in island nations throughout the south Pacific and the Caribbean.
Maybe they mean turtles the candy. Turtles turtles yak yak yak. Turtles turtles turtles ha ha ha.
- 274
Not necessarily in Sweden, but I think that in the Far East, especially in South-East Asia, this may not be an all-too-unusual eating habit. But I cannot warrant for the correctness of my rumour.
- 1630
My Swedish husband says that Swedish aunts eat turtles because it makes them smell good and nephews and nieces like the smell of turtles!
- 1453
In questions, the verb always goes before the subject. The only thing that can go before the verb is a question word (like varför in this case) or a phrase that functions as a question word.
I'm a member of the contributors team, and I'm confused too. :p
No, remember that Swedish doesn't use the continuous construction.
Hmm, I must've missed that part, or completely forgotten it. Could you explain it please?
English can express a verb like "she eats" in a continuous sense: "she is eating". Swedish cannot - we don't have that option grammatically. So both of those translate to the same thing: hon äter.
Good response, I knew this but haven't been able to put it into words. :)
Varför äter sköldpaddor din moster? could that be acceptable or it changes the meaning of the sentence?
That would change the meaning to ask why turtles are eating your aunt.
- faster is a contraction of far + syster, i.e. paternal aunt
- moster is a contraction of mor + syster, i.e. maternal aunt
