Kjedelig!(Boring!) Late summer is a time when some people start to get bored – kids are tired of their parents dragging them throughverden(the world) on a busysommerferie(summer holiday) and just want to gohjem[yem] (home), while the adults maybe have started longing for their quietkontor[konTOHR] (office)! Let’s keep the worstapati[apaTEE] at bay by taking a look at boredom in Norwegian!

Kjedeligis the common word for ’boring’, and funnily, if you’re a language lover, the word isn’tthatdull… First and foremost, it starts with the famous Norwegiankj-sound. It’s similar to thechsound of the German wordich(as in Kennedy’s famous lineIch bin ein Berliner). If you’re familiar with British English, the first sound ofhuge(”hyuge”) is pretty close as well. The wordkjedeligcan be both an adverb and an adjective. When it’s an adjective, it of course gets the-eending in the plural:Jeg er så lei av nyhetene, de er så kjedelige!(I’m so tired of the news, they’re so boring!)

Gjesp![Yesp!] (Yawn!) To tell your Norwegian friends you’re bored, ’I bore myself’ is the expression to use (but do take care that you don’t end up being a bore to the others!):Jeg kjeder meg. And if you’re worried about your friend sitting too longi sola(in the sun) saying nothing, perhaps you can askKjeder du deg?(’Do you bore yourself’ = Are you bored?)

Yes,å kjede seg(’to bore onself’ = to be bored) is areflexiveverb in Norwegian. That means, you’d also sayhun kjeder seg(she…),vi kjeder oss(we…),kjeder dere dere?(are you guys feeling bored?) Sure, you can also use the verbå kjedeabout being boring to someone else, but that’s not so normal.Gå vekk, du kjeder meg!(Go away, you bore me!) is something a princess would say to a boringfrier(suitor) in aneventyr(fairy-tale).

Jeg håper ikke jeg kjedet livet av deg nå! Nyt sommeren og husk å ha det gøy!(I hope I didn’t ”bore you to death” now! Enjoy the summer and remember to have fun!)