Breakdown of De tar hand om varandras hundar.
de
they
hunden
the dog
ta hand om
to take care of
varandras
each other's
Questions & Answers about De tar hand om varandras hundar.
What does the -s at the end of varandras do?
It makes the word possessive. varandra means each other, so adding an -s turns it into varandras, meaning each other's. It works just like the apostrophe-s in English!
Why do we use the indefinite form hundar instead of the definite hundarna?
In Swedish, any time you use a possessive word like min, deras, or varandras, the noun that follows must be in the indefinite form. Because varandras already tells us exactly whose dogs they are, we don't need the definite ending on hundar.
Is tar hand om a fixed expression?
Yes! tar hand om is a set phrase that means takes care of or looks after. Literally translated, it means takes hand about. You need to keep all three words together to get this meaning.
Why do we use the preposition om for taking care of?
You simply have to memorize it as part of the phrase tar hand om. Prepositions in fixed expressions often don't translate literally from English to Swedish, so it is easiest to learn the whole phrase as one complete chunk.