Jeg køber vand i kiosken, mens jeg venter ved busstoppestedet.

In Danish, the present tense often covers both:

• simple present: I buy / I wait
• present progressive: I am buying / I am waiting

So Jeg køber vand ... mens jeg venter ... can naturally mean I’m buying water ... while I’m waiting ...

Danish does not usually need a special -ing form the way English does.

Vand is usually treated as an uncountable noun, like water in English. Because of that, Danish often uses it without an article:

• Jeg køber vand = I’m buying water

If you wanted to be more specific, you could say things like:

• en flaske vand = a bottle of water
• noget vand = some water

But in your sentence, plain vand is perfectly natural.

I usually means in or sometimes at an enclosed place, shop, or building. A kiosk is treated as a place you go into, so:

• i kiosken = in the kiosk / at the kiosk

Using på would sound odd here.

A useful rough rule:

• i for enclosed places, towns, countries, shops, rooms
• på for surfaces, islands, and some institutions/events

So i kiosken is the normal choice.

Kiosken is the definite form: the kiosk.

In Danish, the definite article is often added as an ending:

• en kiosk = a kiosk
• kiosken = the kiosk

So i kiosken means in the kiosk / at the kiosk.

This often happens when the place is understood from the situation, even if English might not always stress the as much.

Ved often means by, near, or at. In this sentence, it means the speaker is at / by the bus stop.

So:

• ved busstoppestedet = at the bus stop / by the bus stop

It suggests location next to that place rather than being inside something.

This is a very common use of ved for being near a landmark or waiting place.

Danish often makes compound nouns by joining words together.

Busstoppestedet is built from:

• bus
• stop
• sted = place
• -et = the for a neuter noun

So:

• et busstoppested = a bus stop
• busstoppestedet = the bus stop

This is very typical in Danish. English often uses separate words where Danish prefers one compound word.

That is because Danish nouns have different grammatical genders.

• en kiosk → kiosken
• et busstoppested → busstoppestedet

So the definite ending depends on whether the noun is:

• common gender (en words) → usually -en
• neuter (et words) → usually -et

You usually need to learn the gender together with the noun:

• en kiosk
• et busstoppested

No, Danish normally needs the subject stated in each clause.

So you say:

• Jeg køber vand i kiosken, mens jeg venter ved busstoppestedet.

Not:

• ... mens venter ved busstoppestedet

The second clause has its own subject and verb, so jeg must be there.

Mens means while. It introduces a clause that happens at the same time as the main action.

Structure:

• main clause: Jeg køber vand i kiosken
• mens-clause: mens jeg venter ved busstoppestedet

So the idea is:

• I buy water at the kiosk while I wait at the bus stop

Because mens introduces a subordinate clause, and in Danish subordinate clauses the word order is usually:

• conjunction + subject + verb

So:

• mens jeg venter

This is different from a main clause, where Danish usually has verb-second word order:

• Jeg venter ...
• Nu venter jeg ...

But after mens, the subject comes before the verb.

Yes. The Danish present tense can describe:

• something happening right now
• something that happens regularly
• a general routine

So depending on context, the sentence could mean either:

• I’m buying water at the kiosk while I’m waiting at the bus stop
• or something like I buy water at the kiosk while waiting at the bus stop as a usual habit

Context tells you which meaning is intended.

In this sentence, ved busstoppestedet is the most natural choice because it means by / at the bus stop physically.

På is often used with platforms, islands, streets in some fixed expressions, or when something is thought of as a surface or institutional place. For a bus stop, ved is very idiomatic when talking about standing and waiting nearby.

So a learner should treat vente ved busstoppestedet as a natural phrase.

A rough learner-friendly guide:

• Jeg ≈ yai or very reduced yai/ya
• køber ≈ KER-ber with a Danish ø sound
• vand ≈ van
• kiosken ≈ kee-OSS-gen (roughly)
• mens ≈ mens
• venter ≈ VEN-ter
• ved ≈ vel or a very soft ved depending on accent and connected speech
• busstoppestedet ≈ boos-stop-pe-ste-thet very roughly

A few important notes:

• Danish pronunciation is often much softer than spelling suggests.
• Final consonants may sound weaker.
• The d in words like ved is often very soft.

If you are learning pronunciation, it is especially worth listening to native audio for jeg, køber, and ved, because they are less phonetic than they look.

Yes, Danish allows some flexibility. For example, you could front the mens clause:

• Mens jeg venter ved busstoppestedet, køber jeg vand i kiosken.

That still means the same thing.

Notice what happens in the main clause after the fronted subordinate clause:

• køber jeg
  not
• jeg køber

This is because Danish main clauses usually follow the verb-second rule.

Yes, a few things stand out:

1. Present tense covers ongoing actions
   Danish does not need a separate am buying / am waiting form.

2. Definite nouns usually take an ending

   • kiosken
   • busstoppestedet

3. Compound nouns are written as one word

   • busstoppested

4. Subordinate clause word order is different from main clause word order

   • mens jeg venter

These are all very common features of everyday Danish.