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Is the informal etiquette for social behavior, first introduced by the author Torbjørn Egner in his child book (when the robbers came to Cardamom town»
The law is quite simple and liberal and goes like this:
Du skal ikke plage andre
(You should not bother others,)
Du skal være grei og snill
(You should be nice and kind,)
Og for øvrig kan du gjøre som du vil
(Otherwise you can do as you please.)
I feel this law reflects all sides off our society
We are nice human being, and we expect anyone to behave in nice ways. We don’t believe in life time sentences, we send them to a cardamom prison , where they live in a nice little cell with free internet, television access, free education and cooking lessons. The Norwegian politicians believe in rehabilitation, instead of punishment (I don’t think it’s preventive)
The sanctions for Sexual crimes are ridiculously low. Recently a deaf rapist got his sentence reduced, as the court believed that he didn’t understand that his victims were screaming no. He thought that she said “yes” or “ok”.
After 22/7 we have realized that we have to reconsider our Cardamom philosophy and watch up for the outside world.
Updated Feb 13, 2012
As a general philosophy we never talk to strangers. If a stranger suddenly invites to a small talk, that person is either:
1) A drunk
2) A foreigner who’s not been approximately assimilated to know when to shut up!
3) An extremely outgoing Norwegian
4) A mentally retarded person who just likes to talk.
Being a dog owner gives you an excellent opportunity to chat with other dog owners. But you should make sure you remember the appearance of the dog owner, in case you meet them without their dogs.
In remote places you are more likely to meet social Norwegians. We may be willing to say hallo, when you realize you’re completely lost 4 miles from civilization in Nordmarka. Some says that this social thing begins in Kikut.
In mountain areas, the greeting limit
starts when you have reached 250 metres above sea level, where the timberline stops.
Updated Feb 12, 2012
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under contruction.................
Some facts
Constitutional monarchy and parliamentary democracy
Prime minister: Jens Stoltenberg
We voted against EU membership (twice)
We have a multiparty system
.
The largest parties
The Labour Party (DNA): The biggest political party in Norway. Founded by the working class.They are currently in government with SV and SP.
Socialist parties
The Red Electoral Alliance (RV) : a new revolutionary political party who works for equality of income, labour rights, and controlled economy and feminism.
.
The Socialist Left Party (SV)Concerned with enviromental issues and education. Want to be perceived as unprejudiced people.but I guess you’ll probably only feel their acceptance and tolerance if you represent a minority group, otherwise they’re far from unprejudiced people.
If the father does not use his so-called father's quota to be home with the
Conservative parties
The Centre Party (SP) for farmers. They are mostly popular in the country side and other rural areas.
The Liberals (V):. they belong to the center-right side of Norwegian politics.They are very easy people do deal with!, they're either very up for it, or not very up for it! And they like public transport !
The Christian Democratic Party (KrF): Christian values, family values
•The Conservative Party (H) they represent the flagship in the vest side of Oslo. They won the municipal and county elections this year. They work for free market, liberal rights and equality of opportunities.
•The Progress Party (FrP)Right-side part and works for stronger immigration laws, a free market and tough penalties for crimes. they want to remove the sales tax on alcohol and drugs. Are well known for their scandals and pedophile youth leaders who make porns.
We also have a sametingsvalg (Sami government), I have never really understood what they are doing
Updated Feb 12, 2012
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I was heading home from work at 3.20 pm when I heard a big bang. Some minutes after, all I heard was the intensive sound of sirens. I walked past a young girl who was in some kind of panic, talking to someone on the cell phone. I picked up the words: injured people and blood. I really didn't understand what had actually happened before I came home and a friend told me to turn on the television.
Some hours later we heard about the massacre in Utøya, and we realized that it was more than just a bomb in Oslo.
I remember walking my dog to the dog park, and for some reason went from there with no purse in my hand. My keys and wallets were all in there, and I almost started panicking, as we were told to keep inside and don’t use the cellphone that evening. With no family in town it was a very bad timing, but I was comforting myself by thinking that there were people out there that were worse off than me this day. But thankfully, another dog owner called to say she had found my purse in the dog park, and I could return home.
But sadly I'm not surprised. Our naivety will attract terrorists to Oslo. Until recently everybody could enter the government building. My friend who has a visual impairment ended up there when she thought she had reached the library She couldn’t understand why she had to go through a security check in in order to borrow books.;). So I guess this man (whose name should be forgotten) had no difficulties fulfilling his plan.
One of the utøya victims, Bano Abobakar Rashid made a great impact on me. The television company tv2 made an interview with here just some hours before the shooting. . I saw an enthusiastic girl talking about her meeting with Gro (our former prime minister) and her role model and how she lent her kind boots to Gro . Some hours later she was shot by a maniac pretending to be a policeman.
She and her family were refugees from Iraq and had settled in Norway in order to make a safe future for their kids.
What also made a great impact on we was seeing some parts of her funeral (tv2) in Nesodden church, which has a Muslim cemetory. To see a Muslim imam and a female Christian minister presided over her was a mighty image. By leading together they acted against the murders belief system
Some words that frequently spin in my head whenever I think about these tragedies are" absurd», «unbelievable","meaningless" and "unreal». The whole tragedy is just absurd, it sounds like something that could only happen in a bad horror movie on a low budget
I believe we all realize that terrorism can be performed by other than Islamic terrorists.
And as for the youths they acted as an example for all of us, by not searching revenge and hate, but heal the city with love and fight for more democracy.
Updated Feb 10, 2012
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Bunad: national suit used for special occasions, like the 17th of May and weddings, but newer in funerals. We have numerous different national suits, and you can't just pick a nice suit if you don't have some sort of a connection/link to a specific region. But if you like the national suit from Telemark , your cabin in Rjukan should be your necessary link..
But as a general advice you should never wear a Sami costume if you have no Sami affiliation
17th of May: our constitution day.We celebrate our freedom after being subjected to cruel aliens for centuries. It's also a great opportunity to see all the national suits you wish you had. Other keywords are hotdogs, ice cream, Norwegian flags, noise and balloons
hytte: "Cabin". A sort of a little house with fireplace usually isolated, and without a normal WC and hot water. We spend our time there in the holidays. It's a part of our national identity. But most of us DONT own a cabin, we just have access to one. sharing a cabin with family members and friends often means trouble, so think twice before going for this solution.
Our nature plays a big role in our Norwegian identity. According to all Norwegian lifestyle magazines, the ideal of happiness is moving to a remote and isolated place engage in farming, listening to the sounds of nature and cowbells- and just forget about the rest of the world. It’s the Norwegian way of self-realization
Gå en tur: go for a walk, from one distance to another and back, and for no special reason. In every personal ads they all like to "gå turer i skog og mark". I believe it's more like a Norwegian cliché.
ski cross country skiing We are actually born with skies on our feet, and its a part of the Norwegian identity.Some famous Norwegian skiers: Bjørn Dæhli, Vegard Ulvang and Thomas Alsgaard and not at least our new stars: Marit Björgen and Petter Northug
We’re proud to have arranged the Olympic Games in Lillehammer in 1994.
Harrytur: To avoid being ruined in Norway, we travel to the Swedish border and empty their shelves for cheap food and alcohol:
our word *ja* (yes) with ingressive affirmation, we don't have inhalation problems we just talk like this!
Målstrid: the never ending war between Norway’s two official written forms of Norwegian: Nynorsk and Bokmål.
kos* some kind of pleasure/kozy..
"brunost"Brown cheese: you either like it or hate it. Its'very Norwegian, just remember to use our Norwegian invention, our cheese slicer.
"Vaffler": We eat a lot of waffles. Eating waffles with jam and sour cream is a Norwegian tradition.
Dugnad a Norwegian term for voluntary work. Nobody can force you to participate, but you _should_ participate to gain more social capital.
Russefest: the crazy time before high school graduation. The whole concept starts in autumn and for most of us it ends in the middle of May ( and for some, it never ends) . It's by far NOT the most intellectual time of our life.
SOME PROVERBS AND SAYINGS
"Hvor var du når Oddvar brå brakk staven?*
Oddvar Brå: was a popular Norwegian skier than unfortunately broke his staff during a competition. I don't really know why it's so popular to ask about this, but you have to know where you were the day this incident occurred.
"å hoppe etter Wirkola/ to jump after Wirkola" " "*
Bjørn Wirkola was one of the best ski jumpers in Norway. He was always the best so being next in line to jump was not that fun. Today we use this saying when trying to compete with someone who's totally superior. I would totally lose my motivation if I knew that the person singing before me in a song contest was a famous singer like Celine Dion.
Updated Feb 10, 2012
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welcome to "Nydalen tunnel of light", financed with my tax money
This is one of the things supported with our tax money, an escalator with 1800 flashing lights,and 44 speakers installed behind a layer of glass. I feel a bit dizzy after the ride with the escalator.
I hate this station!!! it gives me a headache. why can't they just use or money on something else !
Our tax system is based on the principle that everyone should pay taxes according to their means and receive services according to their means
direct taxes consists of income, taxes, i.e. deducted from our earrings from employment or business activities, interests on bank deposits etc., and wealth tax. 37% of my earnings goes to taxes.
indirect taxes, are used to reduce our consumption of products that are hazardous to our health and or the environment.
So I’m I financing Nydalen light house and some incompetent doctors with their expensive education, but except from this I hope my tax contribution will make a difference to the society.
Updated Feb 2, 2012
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One thing that is often strange for foreigners is the custom of taking off your shoes in the hallway. This is for practical reasons, preventing the floors from becoming dirty especially in winter .if you're arriving a party with your party shoes you shouldn’t be thinking of taking them off unless they got dirty on your way there.
Updated Jan 26, 2012
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Some information about our juridical system.
first instanse is the district court (tingretten). District court judgment can be appealed to
Court of Appeal (lagmannsretten)
The Norwegian Supreme court, calles "Høyesterett" is the highest court of law in Norway. It is composed of a Chief justice and seventeen permanent justices. in individual cases the Supreme court sits with a chairman and four judges.
Most cases never gets as far as the Supreme court, but are instead settled in one of the lower law courts.
In Norway dealing with drugs can give you up to ten years in jail. If you rape a kid or something, you probably get two years or something. Many foreigners from outside of Scandinavia see Norwegian prisons as luxury hotels. One prisoner said that Norwegian prisons were like being in preschool with some very strict nursery aunts
We don’t practice death penalty in Norway, no life time penalty either, but we might consider it after the terror attacks in Oslo performed by ABB.
Instead of life time penalty, we practice forvaring (Involuntary commitment), it practically means that the person can be locked in jail for a long time, if s/he is considered a threat to the society. Nobody has been in “forvaring” for more than 21 years yet, prisoners who serve long time sentenced can be realised after being in served 2/3 of the year in jail, with good manners.
Forvaring is not ordinary punishment, it’s an option, if he’s a danger to the society. Forvaring differs from ordinary prison, there’s more educated people working there and more facilities, The longest minimum time is 10 years. After that they have to let him go, if he shows good manners. But it’s difficult to predict future actions.
So a person being in forvaring can benefit from it , cause of the minimum time. An ordinary 21 year sentence, will mean at least 14 years in jail. So that's one of the dilemmas the Norwegian court is facing when it comes to ABB. He can actually be a free man after 10 years if he's a model prisoner.
Other sanctions are:
fines
Community service
suspended jail sentence there’s no sentence as long as the person don’t repeat his wrong actions.
Tvungen psykisk helsevern , an instance is forced to treat a mentally disturbed person for his wrong action.
Dom til tvungen omsorg, a sanction for the mentally retarded.
In Norwegian forensic psychiatry, we follow the medical principle.
A criminal can’t be punished if he was insane (psychotic) when he committed his actions. So if ABB is finally declared criminally insane *, he can’t be punished, can’t be blamed and will not end up in jail.
*We did not like the first forensic psychiatrists’ conclusion, so we’re relying on a new rapport, which will declare him criminally sane (and will cause even more confusion).
Updated Jan 26, 2012
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What you should now about us, is that we like to meet new people but we don't like to take the first step. We may seem a little reserved, but once you start talking to us you'll notice that we are friendly but still a bit shy (well with some alcohol, we're quite different). We are not a kissing and hugging nation. (Except from those we know very well).
I believe that's represent the general Norwegian person, but we also have some regional differences. It has been said that the people from Bergen are more outgoing; the people from Trondheim have their own sense of humor and really like to party. The people from the south coast of Norway, like Kristiansand are very shy people and are more affected by their Christian beliefs. When a person from the north of Norway gets angry or hot -headed we think of it as charming and a part of the North Norwegian culture and identity. But if a person from Oslo gets angry it's not that charming. The North people are also allowed to use some swear words that would not be acceptable by a person from another place. I believe that some of these character sketches are just stereotypes that the Norwegians likes to make fun of
We don't usually talk to strangers, and when using public transport you'll probably notice that the Norwegians will not share seat with someone if they do not absolutely need to
-we don't like to cluster. Personal space is respected. So you should not be offended if no one wants to share a seat with you. It's just a culture thing.
We consider us self as strongly independent people. We want our kids to do well in life and don’t depend on different (social instances). If you’re familiar with some of our fairy tales like Askeladden (ash lad), he’s the one who takes life in his own hands, killing the troll, winning the princess and half the kingdom-with no help from anybody.
If you're planning to stay in Norway (Oslo), maybe you want to study here and make friends, keep in mind that it takes time to make Norwegian friends. It takes time to know the Norwegian culture, our jokes, and our funny language. But please be patient and you'll get Norwegian friends for life.
Almost all young Norwegians master (good) English. Most of us also had French/Spanish and/or German at school but hesitate to speak it, even though we understand it. The problem is that we hardly ever practice it. And we usually watch English spoken programs on TV. So talking about television shows like. can be a conversation topic. But please don't reveal the end, we're some light years behind other countries like the US.
Updated Jan 26, 2012
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The United Nations has ranked our country as the best place in the world to live. We have rights “from the cradle to the grave” .We don't starve her, we don't freeze to death, and education is free. We want everybody to have the same opportunities in life.
The average age for first-time mothers is 30 years. Most of us want to be in a stable relationship, be graduated be employed before we decide that's time to make some kids. Norwegian women have a year of maternity leave( if she has been working six out of the last ten months), and it can easily be combined with the pram-pushing father. Since 1993, the father has had the right to take six weeks leave for absence from work. I know fathers who use this as opportunity go on a long vacation with the whole family. That was not the original intention of this plan. If the father doesn’t use his father’s quota, to be home with the new born for at minimum one month, they’ll lose their right to this portion of the leave period. A family can receive 36000NK, annually for each child aged one or two who doesn’t go to day care.
If you have not been working a year before you give birth to your child, you get less money.. Norway is an expensive country, and the money does not last long. If they are single parents or do not have a rich spouse, they will be struggling economically. Until the child is 12 years old, there's free health care.
Family life is often referred to as "tidsklemme". There’s no time to arrange all the activities needed to make family life complete. Parents are usually in the hurry, heading home from work, picking up their kids from Kindergarten in time for dinner.
In Norway approximately 50 percent of all marriages end in divorce. In a Norwegian classroom, it's not unusual that around half of the kids, have divorced parents, or their parents have never been married and don't live together, (or don't know each other ).In Norway living together without being married is just as usual as being married. It's called to have a «samboer». In 90 percent of all marriages, the women take their husbands name as their last name. The kids usually gets to last names, that's probably why we don't practice double names that often, tree names are just enough.
Norway is also one of few countries where we practice, same sex-marriage. And if two women of the same sex decide to have a child with artificial insemination the other women will get parental rights.
The task of the Norwegian child welfare Barnevernet is to assist parents in giving their children the best possible upbringing. They support families in different ways, like giving parents advice on how to take care of their children, and organize foster home and visit homes
According to Norwegian laws, BV can take action if they suspect a child is suffering. We’re in a lack of good foster homes so many kids end up moving from place to place, cause the families rely on three months contracts.
Female drug users who get pregnant are admitted into an institution with force until the baby is born. We're about the only country that actually has this rule to protect the baby against damages because of the drugs being used.
If you give birth to a child with some kind of handicap you have to make sure that you municipality is a rich one. Many parents have actually moved to another municipality or town, because their home town would not support them (economically). The parents with kids that have special needs actually have some rights, but it doesn't always work in real life. Many of the kids with development disorders live part of their life in institution (every second week or something) with their weekend’s parents.
So what characterizes the kids and youth in Oslo/ Norway?
After my opinion many kids are overprotected and spoiled. Our childhood last longer than many other countries in Europe. ( we never really grow up) Norwegian kids have the highest amount of pocket money in Europe. Norwegian kids are not used to taking orders from authorities. The upbringing is very democratic. The kids are used to negotiating with parents and teachers. I believe countries like German are the opposite from us. Our Norwegian kids are often referred to as the diva generation.
But even though they might be spoiled with pocket many and material things, find the kids and youth quite sensitive and reflective. They often reflect on their life in Norway with one of the best welfare systems in the world. And many kids want to do something for others who's least fortunate
" Regines bok"* a young girl's battle against cancer. Regine passed away on December the third (2009) (my birthday) and her blog became a book which has touched many Norwegian teens.
Updated Jan 26, 2012
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