Class is in session

Hej!

Sorry I've been neglecting my blog this past week, but it's been hectic. I spend most of the beginning of the week studying for my Danish exams (which were Wednesday and Thursday respectively). My friend Heather (who will be studying in Aarhus came Tuesday and is staying here for now as well). Anyways, I did pretty well on my exams and as a result I'm going to teach you some Danish in this blog! Be warned, its tough for me to explain how to pronounce the words but I will try my best.

***Note: a lot of my explanations are in French, I apologize in advance, it just seems the easiest way to visualize the sounds for me

Basics:

Numbers:

1 - En

2 - To (French tau)

3 - Tre

4 - Fire (fia)

5 - Fem

6 - Seks (sex)

7 - Syv (Suv)

8 - Otte

9 - Ni

10 - Ti

The alphabet is said almost the same but I'll put it here, including the changes:

A (like the French et) - B - C - D - E - F - G (pronounced gay) - H (hoe) - I - J (Jol) - K (ko) - L - M - N - O - P - Q (like French cou) - R - S - T - U - V (Ve) - W (doubled ve) - X - Y - Z

Vowels (Seriously complicated, all of the A/E sounds are too difficult to differentiate unless you have a professional on hand, but you can hear them on google translate and try and notice the differences):

A (see above) - E - I - æ - å - ø (like the French eu) - U (ooo or French ou sound)

Basics:

Yes: Ja (Kind of sounds like ya, the Danes don't put a lot of emphasizes on J's)

He: Han

She: Hun

No: Nej (don't pronounce the J - Nie)

Me: Jeg

You: Du (doooo)

Thank you: Tak

Simple sentences:

What is your name:

Hvad hedder du? - Va hitha (like hither ending in an A) du (doo)

Where do you come from?

Hvor kommer du fra? - Vo (low O sound, like the French "au") komma du (doo) fra?

How many languages can you speak?

Hvor mange sprog kan du tale? - Vo (see above) maaaang (long A sound and a nasal NG sound - like saying ing at the back of your throat) spro kan du tale?

Hope you enjoyed this lesson! Sorry if it was too intense, I just thought I would give you a taste of my 3 weeks of classes :)

I will be doing an update of my weekend within the next couple days and I start classes Tuesday, should be exciting.

Elsker (prononuced elska),

Meghan