"Man får inte ta på gravida kvinnors magar utan att fråga först."
Translation:One is not allowed to touch pregnant women's bellies without asking first.
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you might even want to ask non-pregnant women for permission first before you touch her belly
Shouldn't "One doesn't get to touch pregnant women's stomachs without asking first" be an acceptable answer?
Some people don't know this. Quite a few strangers crossed this line with me - not a huge deal, but awkward, lol.
Does ta på mean touch then? Google is telling tm to touch = att röra Does Man får inte (att) röra gravida kvinnors magar utan att fråga först work
You can't have att with får inte, it's too modal.
röra isn't wrong but it gets a wider meaning which might sound a bit odd here, I'd prefer röra vid.
ta på definitely means 'touch'
No, English uses the plural s' only when the singular and plural forms are identical (minus the plural -s, of course). So even though it's (sg.) the book's / (pl.) the books', it's also (sg.) the woman's / (pl.) the women's.
The main rule is to add
's
to indicate possession. This is done to both singular and plural nouns.
child's (singular) children's (plural) woman's (singular) women's (plural)
There is one exception. If the word already ends in "s," you just add the apostrophe. It doesn't matter if the noun is singular, plural, or a name.
cars' (plural) friends' (plural) crisis' (singular) crises' (plural) James' (name)
The idea is to avoid
s's
at the end of a word.
Would "...utan att be först" also work? My understanding is that att fråga means to ask, whereas att be is more specifically to request. Is that correct?
Though, now that I think about it, even though it is a request, it would be pretty strange to say "...without requesting first" in English.
That is basically the reason it doesn't work in Swedish, either. It does sound less weird than "requesting" would, but it's still not completely natural even though it's not unidiomatic.
You could say utan att be om lov först, though. The phrase be om lov is a fixed way of asking for permission.
'Belly' seems a little undignified for a pregnant lady. Might 'tummy' be more appropriate? This seems to be a term that is used commonly in preference to 'belly'.
We do accept "stomach" as well. I'm not sure about "tummy" - it's correct but to me it sounds like something you'd say about a child, certainly not an adult woman. I take it this differs regionally, then?
I got marked wrong for putting tummies. It's certainly idiomatic in English, but not just for referring to children. My family have always referred to it as a tummy, and tummy ache... Still, I'll put belly just to get past the exercise!!
Fair enough; I'll add "tummies". I'll admit it sounds really wrong to me but I won't question it if it's in active use.
We now accept 305 different translations of the phrase.
Thanks devalanteriel. Tummy is used by most I know. Stomach for more formal chat. "Belly" was banned by my mother and a teacher at school. "Animals have bellies blah blah blah. :)
Thanks for that. I hear from the nurses in the family that 'belly' is more widely used than I had believed. I think my query on that topic was not justified. On the subject of the best translation, I believe that the singular offers the best option: 'You should never touch a pregnant woman on her belly without asking her first.'
That definitely does sound like a more idiomatic translation outside of a language course.
As a native english speaker I would say "One cannot touch pregnant women's stomach without asking first" but that wasn't accepted.
I apologize if you just made a typo, but...
Your sentence would have to say "...a pregnant woman's stomach..." (which is the most natural way to say it for me).
OR
You would have to say, "...pregnant women's stomachs..."
Your sentence has multiple women sharing only one stomach, which is a strange picture. ;)
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Maybe because "magar" is plural. Not saying it shouldn't be accepted for that, just explaining why it isn't, probably. Hi, by the way, we're friends on FB.
"One is not allowed to touch pregnant woman's stomachs with asking first" was not accepted but I think its ok.
You wrote "woman's" which is the singular form, but kvinnors is the plural - "women's".
Unless you're pregnant with twins and then everybody thinks it's okay. I've never thought I would have to tell grown folks to keep their hands to themselves like children.
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I put "One is not allowed to touch pregnant women's bellies without asking them first". Somehow this is marked wrong?
Can ska here be translated as should? It's as much a moral rule as a legal requirement. I was marked wrong for "one should not touch...."
Why is, "One may not touch pregnant women's bellies without asking first" not accepted as correct?