"De er på besøk hos oss."
Translation:They are visiting us.
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So does "hos" work like the French word "chez" where it's actually a preposition?
Like in French, to say "I'm going home" you would say "je vais chez moi." This literally translates to "I go home me." To say "I am going to his house" you would say "je vais chez lui." Does it work the same way in Norwegian?
Yes, it's a preposition. However we don't use 'hos' as extensively as the French use 'chez'.
When the home someone's going to is their own, then the adverb 'hjem' does the trick - with no preposition or pronoun:
Jeg drar hjem.
I'm going home.
If there is a need to specify whose home someone's going to, then we use another preposition:
Jeg drar (hjem) til Nate.
I'm going to Nate's (house).
However, if you are -at- someone else's place, rather than going to it, we'd use 'hos' like 'chez':
Jeg er (hjemme) hos Nate.
I'm at Nate's (house).
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So the hjemme is optional? Would I be correct in saying 'Jeg er hos Nate'?
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And when one drops the hjemme, is that considered less formal or somehow less proper in certain social contexts, or are they neutral equivalents?
If I wanted to be a little more formal, I'd probably say that I was visiting instead:
Jeg er på besøk hos Nate.
Using just 'hos' in a sentence like the above doesn't come off as particularly informal to me though, just normal.
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I know this forum is for Nowegian, not French, but "chez" is more like "place":
- chez moi - my place
- chez le docteur - the doctor's [place]
- chez les Belges - the Belgians' place (Belgium)
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No, I'm French, and all "chez" means is "at" a place, not necessarily a house. Any place. So Chez le docteur means "at the doctor's". and the first assumption would be that that is at his medical office where he practices. Not his house, unless it is understood you are friends and visiting him. Chez moi means at my place.
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No, you're wrong, chez refers to someones house
Chez le docteur - the doctor's HOUSE
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I'm french. No, "chez" does not refer to someone's house, not necessarily. Maybe the formal "chez" is like you said, but in daily life everybody say "Je vais chez le docteur/coiffeur/boulanger"
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Ok, merci beaucoup! Je suis étudiant de français, et avec un livre seulement je ne peut pas apprendre le français de la vie quotidienne
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Ok great, hey I see you're learning french. I'm french, so I'm thinking, when I'm feeling comfortable enough to speak in your language, I'd love to do a skype if you want.
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I'm still a bit confused, after reading all the comments here (but all of them were very helpful!)
But my question is: what would be direct LITERAL translation of this sentence?
"They are on (a) visit at us (meaning our place)"
Again, I'm asking about literal transltion ;)
Mange takk in advance! :D
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I think that's about as close as you're going to get with a literal/word for word translation. "hos" doesn't have a good English equivalent so you have to re-arrange the sentence to get something grammatical in English.
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But "hos" is a preposition and has nothing to do with house in any way, am I right?
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They are etymologically related, but yes, hos is a preposition and it doesn't imply that there is a house involved (e.g., "hos tannlegen" = "at the dentist")
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Is this "er på..." + "verb" construct the norwegian way to make a present continuous? Or "besøk" is a noun and "er på besøk" means "to be on a visit"?
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"besøk" is a noun. Norwegian typically uses the regular present where English would use a present continuous (although some ways to emphasise the continuous nature of an action are covered in the Continuous skill)
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"De er på besøk hos oss" specifies that they are visiting our place. "De besøker oss" is more general
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Could someone please clarify the function of "på" in this sentence? Am I correct in translating it as (roughly equivalent to) "at" --- They are at our house on a visit"
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In this context it translates better to "on". Roughly: "på besøk" = "on a visit", "hos oss" = "at our house"
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One could translate "på besøk hos oss" in German as: "zu (på) Besuch (besøk) bei (hos) uns (oss)". "Bei uns" / "hos oss" has no direct english translation.
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This was confusing. Great comments and discussion to help understand. Cheers!
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Would "They are on a visit to our house" be an incorrect translation?
Well, as a Brit, I think it sounds acceptable. Overly formal but "being on a visit to" isn't wrong.
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It is less strange a sentence if your house is this one: :)
https://en.wikipedia.org/?title=Chatsworth_House#/media/File:Chatsworth_Bridge.jpg
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I guess it would convey the same meaning, putting more emphasis on the visit itself. The Norwegian translation would be "De er på et besøk i vårt hus"
Would "De er på et besøk hos oss" be incorrect? That just seems to make sense... "They are on a visit with us"
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Could one also translate this using a more 'archaic' form such as 'they are calling on us'?
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All the words have English relatives, but they don't work in the same way:
They are upon beseech house us (~= they are on beseeching with us)
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Beseech is probably one of those "false friend" cognates. Means to ask urgently, from middle english seek with a be- prefix. In other Germanic languages it became into "visit" but went in a totally different direction in English.
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Because they are not staying, just visiting :)
The Norwegian sentence is in the present tense, meaning that they are on a visit right now.
That's a different tense - vil and skal are different (and important) ways of saying things. De VIL komme til å besøke huset vårt - de SKAL komme til å besøke huset vårt ....
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As a speaker of British English, can I think of "besøk HOS oss" as being roughly equivalent to "visiting WITH us" like they say in the States.. (but not in UK.)..?
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'å være på besøk' is a fixed phrase meaning 'to be visiting' or more literally 'to be on a visit'
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If you skip "er på" and "hos", you could say "De besøker oss" (=they visit us). But if you want to use "er på" and indicate where the visit is taking place, then you'll have to use "hos" as well. "De er på besøk." or "De er på besøk hos oss." =(They are visiting, they are visiting us)
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:) Yes, "hus" means "house" and "hos (noen)" can be translated to "at (someones place)".
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So the above sentence actually means "They are visiting us (at our house)"?
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Yes, I would say that's implied. (It could be at our house, cabin, tent - the important part is that someone is coming on a visit to an area that belongs to us.)
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"De er på besøk hos oss" would specify that they're at our place. Whereas "De er på besøk (sammen) med oss" would mean that they are with us, visiting someone else.
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its just so hard to determine what is hos means in a sentence,.. It can mean at, from, of, with, by, and among. but thanks anyway,.. now i understand what is the use of hos in that sentence
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Some info about "hos" (in Norwegian) :http://www.nob-ordbok.uio.no/perl/ordbok.cgi?OPP=+hos&ant_bokmaal=5&ant_nynorsk=5&bokmaal=+&ordbok=begge
