Hade du tänkt att borra i väggen själv, eller ville du vänta på mig?

Hade du tänkt is a very common Swedish way to ask about someone's intention or plan in a softer, less direct way.

• tänkte du = were you thinking / did you think
• hade du tänkt = had you planned / were you intending

In real usage, hade du tänkt att + infinitive often means something like:

• Were you planning to ...?
• Had you intended to ...?

So here it is not mainly about past time in a strict grammatical sense. It is often used to ask politely about what someone meant to do.

Yes, grammatically it is the past perfect of tänka:

• har tänkt = have thought / have planned
• hade tänkt = had thought / had planned

But in everyday Swedish, hade tänkt att is often used idiomatically to talk about a plan or intention, especially in questions. So even though the form is technically past perfect, the meaning is often closer to:

• Were you going to ...?
• Did you mean to ...?
• Were you planning to ...?

This is one of those cases where the tense form and the natural English translation do not match perfectly.

Because Swedish commonly uses tänka att + infinitive when it means intend to or plan to do something.

So:

• Jag tänker att borra = I intend to drill
• Hon hade tänkt att ringa = She had planned to call
• Hade du tänkt att borra...? = Were you planning to drill...?

In English we usually say plan to drill, without a separate word like att, but Swedish normally needs it here.

borra i väggen means to drill into the wall or to drill in the wall.

The preposition i is used because the action affects the inside/material of the wall. Swedish often uses i where English might say:

• in
• into
• sometimes just nothing at all, depending on the verb

Examples:

• borra i väggen = drill into the wall
• skriva i boken = write in the book
• göra hål i väggen = make a hole in the wall

So i väggen is completely natural Swedish here.

Normally, no, not in this meaning.

borra i väggen is the natural expression for drilling into the wall.
If you said borra väggen, it would sound odd or incomplete to most speakers.

Swedish often needs a preposition with verbs where English may not. So even though English can say drill the wall, Swedish usually says borra i väggen.

Here själv means yourself or on your own.

So borra i väggen själv means:

• drill into the wall yourself
• do it on your own, without help

It emphasizes that the person would do the drilling personally, rather than waiting for someone else.

Compare:

• Jag gjorde det själv = I did it myself
• Kan du gå dit själv? = Can you go there by yourself?

Because själv is modifying the whole action, not just the object.

borra i väggen själv sounds natural because the main idea is:

• drill in the wall — yourself

In Swedish, själv often comes late in the clause when it means personally / by yourself.

You may also hear similar patterns like:

• Kan du fixa det själv?
• Hon målade huset själv.

So the placement is natural and idiomatic.

ville du is past tense grammatically, but in Swedish it is often used to sound softer, less direct, or more tentative.

So:

• Vill du vänta på mig? = Do you want to wait for me?
• Ville du vänta på mig? = Did you want to wait for me? / Were you wanting to wait for me?

In context, ville du can sound more polite, less pushy, or more like you are checking what the other person's intention was.

This matches the tone of hade du tänkt in the first half. Both forms make the question feel less blunt.

It can be either, depending on context, but here it is most likely about intention in a softened way, not strict past time.

In this sentence, the speaker is comparing two possible plans:

• drill in the wall yourself
• wait for me

So ville du vänta på mig? is best understood as:

• Or were you wanting to wait for me?
• Or did you mean to wait for me?

It is not necessarily saying that the waiting idea belongs only to the past.

Because the verb vänta usually takes the preposition på when it means wait for someone or something.

So:

• vänta på bussen = wait for the bus
• vänta på mig = wait for me
• Jag väntar på dig = I’m waiting for you

Without på, vänta often has a different use, like vänta ett ögonblick = wait a moment, where no object meaning for someone is involved.

Because after eller, the sentence starts a new main clause:

• Hade du tänkt att borra i väggen själv
• eller ville du vänta på mig?

Each main clause needs its own verb and subject structure. Swedish does not usually omit the subject here the way English sometimes can.

So the repeated du is normal and necessary.

Yes. In a yes/no question, Swedish puts the finite verb first and the subject after it.

Statement:

• Du hade tänkt att borra i väggen själv.

Question:

• Hade du tänkt att borra i väggen själv?

The same happens in the second clause:

Statement:

• Du ville vänta på mig.

Question:

• Ville du vänta på mig?

So the sentence uses standard Swedish question word order.

Yes, but the nuance would change.

For example:

• Skulle du borra i väggen själv, eller skulle du vänta på mig?

This sounds more like:

• Were you going to drill into the wall yourself, or were you going to wait for me?

That is possible, but hade du tänkt att and ville du sound very natural when asking about someone's intention in a gentle, conversational way.

So the original sentence feels a bit more idiomatic and softer.

It sounds conversational and fairly polite. The speaker is checking what the other person's plan was, without sounding too direct.

The use of:

• hade du tänkt att
• ville du

makes the question softer than more direct alternatives such as:

• Ska du borra i väggen själv?
• Vill du vänta på mig?

So the overall tone is something like:

• What were you planning to do?
• I’m just checking your intention.

Yes. The pattern is very common:

• Hade du tänkt att X, eller ville du Y?
• Skulle du X, eller ville du Y?
• Tänkte du X, eller skulle du Y?

Using eller to link two possible intentions is completely natural. The speaker is essentially offering two interpretations of the other person's plan and asking which one is correct.