To go…or not to go?

To go or not to go, that is the question. Moing around is something we all do every day. But, how do we talk about transportation and travelling in norwegian?

The verb å gå means “to walk”, not “to go” as in English: «Jeg går hjem» means therefore «I walk home» In order to express that you are going somewhere, but not necessarily walking,

you need to use another verb like «å dra» (to leave): Vi drar til Fjordvik. We are going to / leaving for Fjordvik (by any means of transportation). We can use «å dra” when it’s not so important which kind of transportation is involved as where we are going to. Jeg drar hjem = I go home (it doesn’t matter if by car, bus etc.) Jeg drar til Frankrike i juli = I’m going to France in July (It really doesn’t matter how I travel to France, but that is France I’m travelling to) Even if å gå means to walk, we still have some idiomatic expressions where ”å gå” has a general meaning and is similar in use to ”to go”.

Remember that these are fixed expressions: Jeg går på norskkurs. I go to a Norwegian course. Bussen går til Fjordvik. The bus goes to Fjordvik

We also use “å gå” in these expressions: Hvordan går det?How are you? (Litt.: How does it go?) Det går bra.I am fine. (Litt.: It goes well.) This verb means “to travel” and can be used alone when we speak in general terms,

or with the name of the transportation when we wish to be more specific: Jeg reiser til Frankrike I travel to / I go to France (in general terms) Alex reiser til Norge med fly (med båt, med tog osv) Alex is traveling to Norway by plane (by boat, by train etc)

I could also have said: Alex reiser til Norge med båt, med tog etc. Alex is traveling to Norway by boat, by train etc. Å fly = to fly    Jeg flyr til Norge i juli = I fly to Norway in July Å kjøre = to drive Jeg kjører hjem = I drive home Å sykle = to bicycle Anna sykler hjem = Anna rides the bike home And then we have some fix expressions Å ta tog = take the train Å ta buss = take the bus Å ta båt = take the boat The preposition used to indicate a destination, travelling from a set point to a destination

of choice, is TIL: Jeg reiser til Norge = I travel to Norway De tar bussen til sentrum = They take the bus to the city center The preposition indicating the point of origin for your travel, from a place to another

place, is FRA: Jeg kommer fra Berlin = I come from Berlin Anna tar bussen fra stasjonen = Anna takes the bus from the station Here we’ve learned about some differences between norwegian and english when talking about travelling and transportation. Now you know, that if your travelling to Paris, you don’t necessarily “gå”.