Hi in Danish

[summer bear]

This probably won’t raise a chuckle from anybody, as you had to be there to experience it.

I have friends in Denmark who I often visit. But I don’t know the language and don’t have the patience or knack of language-learning. But one thing became clear: not in ‘official’ Danish, but in the real-world way that they talk, “Hi” means hallo, but “Hi Hi” means goodbye! I found it totally bizarre when people say “Hi Hi” and then walk away from each other!

Anyway, one day the old Beatles song by McCartney was on the radio, about “You say yes, I say no”. I happened to be surrounded by musicians, and we had the whale of a time. I came up with this irony on Danish-speak:

I don’t know why you say hi hi
I say hi
I don’t know why you say hi hi
I say hi
You say hi hi
I say hi
I say hi
You say hi hi. Hi!
Hi ! Hi!
I don’t know why you say hi hi,
I say hi!

I know it looks totally bizarre. I guess you have to be in Denmark and to hear it played. We were all rolling on the floor, literally!

V

 

[???- Bearing Arms -???]

LOL, you really do have to have been there to get the fun, I think. It's natural to Danes to say "hi hi" all the time. But then they walk away from each other! It was so funny to me and still is. I had to carefully learn to say "hi hi" and to mean "see you"

So I couldn't contain my humour, and the whole song began, with jazz musicians in fact. And they suddenly saw the deep (?) or Python-style humour. All around Denmark, people are saying "hi hi " to each other. To a person from England it is so bizarre and funny.

I don't know why they say "hi hi", I say "hi".

 

[Debisforeverfree]

I found this totally weird when I was in Denmark- and when I've met Danes whilst in Sweden.. blooming confusing, I tell you - what was worse, was that hihi was a popular way of just merely saying hi on one of the online games I used to play - so when interacting with Danes who played it got yet more confusing..

Made me chuckle to read this, reminds me of the old days..

 

[Arripantift]

Gussie,

Hihi

 

[Jilly]

And some of the other Scandinavains say "Hey" and "Hey hey!"



What I used to find difficult was that for a Japanese, a head "no" was an abrupt raising of the head, which almost looked like a nodding yes and then of course, you've got the side to side waggling of the head in our favourite country which means "yes"

Judy

 

[Maria Inkila]

Yes, talking of India, even when you intellectually know that a head-nod may mean "no" and a side-to-side shake means "yes", I think you'd have to be there a long time to get used to it. You still tend to take it the English way. Utterly confusing!

 

[gavilan_rood]

Hi, we have a similar thing in sweden. But only in the northern part. One of the dialects (guess thats what it is called in english?)

Confused me a lot when I lived there for a while.