Eight phrases to get back in the groove like a Swede after the summer holidays

Local Sweden

07-08-2025

Sweden's summer holidays are often so long that it can come as a shock when normal service resumes. Here we've compiled some Swedish phrases you're likely to hear that will help you readjust.
Advertisement
Sweden lives for the summer. After the bleary-eyed darkness of interminable winter, a short spring season serves as a joyous precursor to bright nights, barbecues and endless refreshing dips in lakes and seas. It's not uncommon for working Swedes to take four, five, six, or hey, why not even seven or eight weeks off if they've saved up enough days.
But, like all good things, it ends, and Swedes have developed remarkable linguistic coping mechanisms to make it all not seem so bad.
'Att vara ledig med småbarn är ju ändå ingen riktig semester.'
Having time off with small kids isn't really a holiday anyway.
Subtext: you're better off back at the office with it's flatpack hierarchy and dull, easily assembled, meetings.
Sure, the weather was lovely and you took a kayak out to the island but your children could write a book on new forms of psychological torture that would put Ingmar Bergman to shame.
'Nu får man äntligen klä sig snyggt igen.'
Finally we can wear nice clothes again.
Again, let's put a positive slant on things. You had the best summer ever. Lazy days at the summer house, reading books and gazing out over the lake. So incredibly relaxing. But you had to do it all in shorts and swimming gear.
Now the weather's getting a little cooler and so are you.
Advertisement
'Det gäller att boka in roliga saker nu under hösten, så man har något att se fram emot.'
It's important to get fun stuff in the diary to have something to look forward to.
A healthy approach from those who have exited the denial stage.
'Det här borde vara det verkliga nyåret! Det är ju nu allting drar igång igen.'
This should be the real New Year. It's now when everything gets going again.
OK, no. Let's see how this strained positivity is working out for you in the depths of January, the real real New Year.
As they say in Sweden, håll huvudet kallt, literally 'keep your head cold' but really: 'stay sensible', even when it's still warm outside.
Advertisement
'Kul att TRÄFFA alla igen!'
Great to MEET everyone again.
As discussed in a recent article on networking, social codes in Sweden can take a lifetime for outsiders to crack.
It can be hard to accept that the same old phrases that are trotted out every year are meant genuinely. But I think they genuinely are.
'Det är ändå mysigt med hösten.'
Autumn is such a cosy time of year.
The nights are closing in and soon it will be time to whip out thousands of candles and turn the cosy dial up to twelve. Swedes do love the summer but what they really understand is the darkness. They're back in their element and there's some comfort in that.
'Jahaja. Det är väl bara att bita i det sura äpplet och börja jobba.'
Well then, nothing for it but to bite the sour apple and get to work.
Whereas in English you grasp the nettle or take the bull by the horns, in Swedish you bite the sour apple.
But it you do it with a lagom mix of humour and stoicism you might be able to avoid any bitter aftertaste.
Because when all is said and done:
'Det känns bra att komma in i sina rutiner igen.'
It's good to get back into the routine.
We're creatures of habit after all. Summer takes us out of ourselves for a while. We eat ice cream like there's no tomorrow, we laugh and joke and talk to the neighbours, we veer into euphoric moods that might be deemed un-Swedish at other times.
But all that's over now, and that's alright, because things are about to get very cosy.
READ ALSO: Six keys to understanding autumn in Sweden