• ContrarianTrail@lemm.ee
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    17 hours ago

    In Finnish, I can simply ask, “Juoksenneltaisiinko?” whereas in English, I have to say, “Should we run around aimlessly?”

    • Nomecks
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      16 hours ago

      Traipse?

      That’s the full sentence asking if you want to run around aimlessly.

      • ContrarianTrail@lemm.ee
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        16 hours ago

        Interesting word, I hadn’t heard of that one before. While not exactly perfect translation, it seems like a similar kind of word nevertheless. Doesn’t exactly seem to refer to running directly though.

        I guess that in the case of my example, it’s more of a demonstration of how weirdly Finnish language can work. Juosta = run, juoksennella = run around aimlessly, juoksenneltaisiinko? = should we run around aimlessly?

        • Dasus@lemmy.world
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          11 hours ago

          Yeah but no-one would ever really use a word like that. It’s just the example given in all memes, but a a more realistic one than epäjärjestelmällistyttämättömyydellänsäkäänköhään. I think it would be more probable that in that scenario, a Finn might say something like “pitäiskö juoksennella vähäse?”

          But it is a good feature we have, yeah. Imagine trying to learn all those, whereas now they just come more or less naturally. (For that wordmonster, it takes a bit of concentration and I’m still unsure whether I typoed or not but whatever.)

          • whaleross@lemmy.world
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            7 hours ago

            Not the same thing. The complete sentence in English would be “do you want to frolic with me?”, which in Finnish is mashed together in a single word as the example given above. The chaining is something like “frolic-aimlessly-us-youwanna?”, though not by words but by endings.