Breakdown of Da jeg var yngre, pleide jeg å drømme om en drømmejobb.
Questions & Answers about Da jeg var yngre, pleide jeg å drømme om en drømmejobb.
Norwegian distinguishes between da and når in the past:
da = when referring to one specific time/period in the past
- Da jeg var yngre = When I was younger (in that period of my life)
når = when in general, repeated, or future situations
- Når jeg er trøtt, legger jeg meg tidlig. = When I am tired, I go to bed early (whenever that happens).
Being younger is one long, specific period in the past, so da is correct:
Da jeg var yngre, pleide jeg å drømme …
This is the V2 rule in Norwegian main clauses:
- The finite verb (here: pleide) must be in second position in the sentence.
- Anything placed at the beginning (like a time clause) counts as position 1, so the verb has to come next.
Structure of your sentence:
- Da jeg var yngre – whole time clause in first position
- pleide – finite verb in second position
- jeg – subject
- å drømme om en drømmejobb – rest of the sentence
So:
- Da jeg var yngre, pleide jeg å drømme … ✅
- Da jeg var yngre, jeg pleide å drømme … ❌ (breaks V2)
Both are past tense, but the nuance differs:
pleide å drømme ≈ used to dream
- Focus on habit/repetition in the past.
- Implies it was something you often did, but don’t (necessarily) do anymore.
drømte = simple past dreamed/dreamt
- Can be a single event or habit, context decides.
Examples:
Da jeg var yngre, pleide jeg å drømme om en drømmejobb.
When I was younger, I used to dream of a dream job (regularly).I går natt drømte jeg om jobben.
Last night I dreamt about the job (one time).
You could say:
- Da jeg var yngre, drømte jeg om en drømmejobb.
This is also correct, and often means the same thing here. Pleide å drømme just makes the “habitual” meaning more explicit.
Pleide is the past tense of å pleie (here in its auxiliary-like meaning):
- å pleie å + infinitive ≈ to usually / to tend to / to be in the habit of doing something
- pleide å + infinitive ≈ used to do something (in the past)
Forms:
- Present: Jeg pleier å drømme. – I usually dream / I tend to dream.
- Past: Jeg pleide å drømme. – I used to dream.
So in the sentence:
- pleide jeg å drømme = I used to dream (habit in the past).
In Norwegian:
å before a verb = English to
- verb
- å drømme = to dream
- å spise = to eat
og = English and
- Jeg liker kaffe og te. = I like coffee and tea.
Here you need the infinitive marker å because it’s the verb drømme in its infinitive form after pleide:
- pleide å drømme = used to dream
og drømme would mean and dream, which doesn’t fit the structure here.
Ung = young.
Yngre = younger (comparative form).
The expression Da jeg var yngre literally means “When I was younger”, not just “when I was young”.
Adjective pattern:
- Positive: ung – young
- Comparative: yngre – younger
- Superlative: yngst – youngest
You could say:
- Da jeg var ung, drømte jeg om en drømmejobb. – When I was young…
This is also correct, but Da jeg var yngre is a very natural, idiomatic way to talk about an earlier stage in your life, often implying contrast with now (I’m older now).
In Norwegian, the verb å drømme often uses the preposition om when you dream about something:
- å drømme om noe = to dream of/about something
Examples:
Jeg drømmer om en bedre framtid.
I dream of a better future.I natt drømte jeg om deg.
Last night I dreamt about you.
You cannot use på in this meaning:
- drømme på noe ❌ (wrong in this sense)
You can sometimes use drømme without a preposition, but then it usually means “to dream (sleep)”, not “dream about something specific”:
- Jeg drømmer hver natt. – I dream every night. (no object)
En drømmejobb is a compound noun:
- drømme- (from drøm = dream) used as the first part of a compound
- jobb = job
So drømmejobb literally = dream job.
Norwegian often makes compounds with drømme- to mean “dream [something]”:
- drømmedame – dream woman / ideal woman
- drømmehus – dream house
- drømmeferie – dream vacation
The article en is the indefinite singular masculine article:
- en drømmejobb – a dream job
- drømmejobben – the dream job
In Bokmål, jobb is normally masculine, so en drømmejobb is the standard form.
Yes, you can, but the meaning changes a bit:
en drømmejobb – a dream job
- Any job that fits your dreams. Very general and indefinite.
drømmejobben min – my dream job
- A specific job that is the dream job for you.
Examples:
Da jeg var yngre, pleide jeg å drømme om en drømmejobb.
When I was younger, I used to dream of a dream job. (unspecified, idealized job)Da jeg var yngre, pleide jeg å drømme om drømmejobben min.
When I was younger, I used to dream about my dream job. (more like: that one specific job I imagined for myself)
Both are grammatically correct; the original sentence is just more general.
Da jeg var yngre is a subordinate clause (a time clause). In Norwegian, it’s standard to:
- Put a comma before a subordinate clause when it comes after the main clause, and
- Also separate it with a comma when the subordinate clause comes first.
In your sentence:
- Subordinate clause: Da jeg var yngre
- Main clause: pleide jeg å drømme om en drømmejobb.
So you write:
- Da jeg var yngre, pleide jeg å drømme om en drømmejobb.
The comma marks the boundary between the subordinate and the main clause.
Approximate pronunciation (Bokmål, standard Eastern Norwegian):
drømme: [DRØM-meh]
- dr: like English dr in dream
- ø: similar to the vowel in British English bird or French eu in peur
- doubled mm: short, closed syllable
- final -e: a short, unstressed “uh” sound
jobb: [YOBB]
- j: like English y in yes
- o: like English o in long (but shorter)
- double bb: pronounced as a short, strong b sound
Together in the phrase:
- å drømme om en drømmejobb ≈ aw DRØM-meh om en DRØM-meh-yobb (roughly)