One of the Locals

The thing about Norwegians is that, they are not used to tourists, especially at this time of the year and especially at this part of the country, which is down south. So whenever I go to shops and make payments as usually the thing to do before leaving shops, they will always, without fail, speak to me in Norwegians.

At first this baffled me a little, but after a while I found that it is not bad to be perceived as a local. So these days whenever they went on in a stream of Norwegians, I would simply say:

"I beg your pardon?"

After which I would be replied with a puzzled gaze, a couple of blinks, followed by a welcomed phrase in English.

Provided the cashier I was dealing with could speak English or was not bashful to speak it. It was quite a curious thing for Norwegians to be shy to speak English. Considering that there are only almost 5 million native Norwegian speakers seeing as Norway has a population of 5 million people, I suppose this is the case. And they are surrounded by Scandinavian countries that had their own unique language and given the proximity of England and Ireland, I'd expect English to come a bit more naturally to them than we South East Asians.

But it was not so. My venerable hostess told me that Norwegians can be bashful to speak English sometimes. Of course, I must not expect to be spoiled with English when I'm here and I realize I should at least learn some basic Norwegian.

Takk, meaning Thanks. Laks, for salmon, Hår for hair and bukser, pants.

I also learned a few phrases. The one Iæm most familiar with is: Jeg har en an i bukser "I have a duck in my pants". And several phrases that says 'I am lost', and 'I am bleeding'.

When I tried saying 'I am lost' which is jeg har gått meg bort, I was replied with, 'you want to buy a boat?'. Aghast, I tried again. With a more confused expression, she asked me the same thing, only more incredulously,: 'you want to buy a boat?' I gave up and finally said what I meant. Apparently, I had mispronounced bort, which sounded like båt (å is pronounced as o).

So can you imagine if I was ever in an emergency and I wanted to say 'I'm bleeding and I am lost' but instead said 'Jeg blør! Og jeg har gått meg båt!', what kind of look would the locals have I wonder?

Adjø. Hvor er toallettet? Takk.

Ah...I am still a long way to mastering Norwegian.