Social "International Interview" Thread--All Are Welcome!

1)I can say that turkish pop music and turkish rap are getting more popular every year but turkish pop is the most popular one.While the turkish folk music's popularity is decreasing every year,Turkish folk music is listened by the older generations.In my opinion most of the popular songs in Turkey are just crap.70's were really better with the climax of anatolian rock music.Anatolian rock was from the turkish culture but turkish pop music is mostly just american copycat.
I want to give two examples for comparison:
This is the translation of the the first song's lyrics
t hurts so much more than incision of paper
The scar of conscience (wound) does not improve immediately.
What's ever on my mind, all them are on my tongue so .
My common sense has escaped away before everyone

There's countless unanswered tinkling sound in my ear
Is someone that mentioning my name, that thinks: I love
That since I burn bridges and toss that aside
It's been a long time since i forget his face

Has he left any part that unbroken in my heart ?
What he says and what he does, somehow is different
Will be taken leisurely revenge (bit by bit) for the oppressed,
Leave him alone, let that pitiable one thinks himself has won


And this is the translation of the second one:
Having found myself in jail, there are many here giving advice
If I combined all of that advice, there would be road from here to the village
Mother, father, sister, brother, they all become strangers on my dark day
For the trouble of honor, brother, the blood we spill is our own

We are all in the same situation, we're from Turhal, we are similar to each other
We repent a hundred thousand times, yet we still drink wine
The horse is ours, the woman is ours, the gun is ours, fame is ours!
For the trouble of honor, brother, the jail we sleep in is ours

My virgin bride, my tall beauty, without satisfying each other
Without opening your face with a Basmala*, without sitting knee to knee
They have kidnapped you, and made you kneel to the deserted**
For the trouble of honor, brother, the life we don't value is our own

My Agha*** is forfeit, my lord is forfeit, I brought about my fate
Neither deficient nor excessive, I said everything completely
Break my castle! Dole out my punishment! What will I do to live?
For the trouble of honor, brother, the life we give is our own
*Basmala (Turkish: Besmele) is the phrase "Bismillah". It means "In the name of God" and it is a phrase spoken by Muslims before starting an important task.
**To be made to kneel to the deserted; when referring to a man, signifies torture; and when referring to a woman, as in this case, signifies rape.
***Agha (Turkish: Ağa) used to be an Ottoman civilian and military title. In the Republic of Turkey, it holds no official status, but it's still used informally to refer to the village elder.
The second one is a song of the famous turkish singer Cem Karaca from these lyrics you can understand that it is more anatolian than Aleyna Tilki's song.He has many great songs.He has also made songs from the turkish poet Nazım Hikmet's poems
II) there is our megastar Tarkan:




One of the most popular turkish musicians is Sezen Aksu,she is known as little sparrow in Turkey .One of my favorites songs of hers is this one::

It is about the child brides which is a big problem in the east of Turkey
Lyrics:

Ünzile

Ünzile, a human child
Five out of ten siblings are dead
Growing up, yet very small
And the matchmaker comes
Her teeth are like pearls
The matchmaker knows her business
My willow cries and leaves
And becomes a wife

Before reaching eight
Ünzile has become an adult
A child and a woman at the same time
At twelve she's a mother
Like a rose, scarlet and graceful
Like water, limpid and calm
Ünzile is a silent woman

Who's spilling the rain
How many sheep does Ünzile worth?
Disciplined with beatings, she asks nothing
She's scared, won't go behind
The last fence of a village
She believes that this is a margin
Where the world ends
Ünzile, a child of human
Pregnant with unknowns
The burden of her secrets
She had also put inside her belly
III)Unfortunately no.We don't really have many people representing it.The most popular classical music representer is Fazıl Say:

Note:If you are interested I can make recommendations​

 

Argentina here. You can ask me anything.

 

onqun Turkey doesn’t participate in Eurovision now a-days but do you know how you did chose your contender back when you did?

 

Welcome, Ando! I will add your name to the roster, so "stay tuned..."

 

Thanks for the great music examples, onqun! I found them all interesting, and the one by Tarkan was my personal favorite. What is the name for those little finger cymbals he plays there toward the end? (I must also note that he has lovely green eyes).

I also got a kick out of the Cem Karaca vid. He looks like one "groovy" old dude! Very interesting to see an example from the same time period as "classic rock" was developing in the U.S.

I see your point about the Emrah Karaduman one--it does kind of seem more like a "copycat" version of American pop, in terms of both the music and the general visual content of the video.

The lyrics of the Sezen Aksu song are very touching, even just in translation.

Thanks again for taking the time to assemble and post those interesting examples and lyrics translations!








Thread announcement/updated roster:

We'll leave the current round open a bit longer--I know Chyntuck was going to try to post some questions, for one thing

Here's an updated roster of the next rounds that will be coming up:

--Violent Violet Menace
(son of Iranian immigrants; grew up in and currently lives in Norway)

--Anakin.Skywalker (USA--Texas)

--Cowgirl Jedi 1701 (USA--Michigan)

--Ando123 (Argentina)

 

********Thread host announcement:

Unfortunately, due to some significant RL issues that have been cropping up lately, I am going to need to pull back from involvement on the boards for an unspecified amount of time. I have messaged Skiara and asked her to remove my "title" and colors for hosting this thread.

If anyone reading this would like to take over as thread host, you can PM Skiara to ask her about that. Or, perhaps someone would like to start a new/different version of the thread using a different "format." Either way is fine with me--I'm quite sure I will be returning to the boards at some later point down the road (after all, I've been a JCF "regular" for over four years now), and if there is a version of this thread going then, I will be excited to rejoin it as a reader and participant (as the idea behind it is near and dear to my heart!). If no one wants to take it over, I think Skiara will probably lock it (in which case I could always reopen it later on when I return and have more time to spend here).

The current version of the roster can be found in the post above this one. I extend my apologies to the upcoming interviewees that have been waiting for their round, but as we know, RL must come first.

Thank you for reading and I'll see you all down the road sometime!

 

Well, since I was next in line, I'm willing to move the thread along. PM me your questions, and I will try to answer them as quickly and best as I can.

 

Welcome back to another update, folks! I have received my questions about Norway! The first one below:



1. What do you think about the very long cold period? How do you "survive" it?

I live in Oslo, so I don't have the hardest time with the cold. A lot of people outside of Europe (and many in Europe) don't know that northern Europe, and especially Scandinavia and the British Isles, are heated by the Gulf Stream, which carries the warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico with it to the northern Atlantic. This ensures that Scandinavia has a milder climate than its latitude on Earth would normally dictate. Hence why places on the same or lower latitude in Canada or Russia have a colder climate than Scandinavia and why Greenland is permanently covered in ice while the Scandinavian peninsula is not. However, the Svalbard archipelago (also known as Spitsbergen) further north from mainland Norway experiences permanent frost.

Oslo lies by the sea, so that alone ensures a milder climate than towns further inland, and it's also situated quite far south compared to most of the country. Still, the winters are long and usually last from October/November all the way to March/April. The first signs of spring are usually seen in April. So, while the temperate climate of continental Europe usually experiences four distinct and equally long seasons, we always have six months of winter.

Norwegians deal with this the only way they know how: by being very fond of winter activities like cross country skiing, snowboarding, skating and whatnot. People like me, who are not very athletic, deal with it with Netflix. It's much harder for the people living further north, above the Arctic Circle. Those guys have two months of endless night bookending the winter solstice. On the other hand, they have the aurora northern lights that we further south can't see, and two months of endless daylight bookending the summer solstice, so it balances out.

The world benefits from our willingness to live in the cold in at least one way, though:

 

(could not find it in the original norwegian sadly)

 

Violent Violet Menace Thanks for continuing this thread! I've been meaning to participate here since forever, but now that I went back to work the time I spend on the boards isn't what it used to be. ( Pensivia If you're reading this, I hope all is well with you. Hope to see you around here again soon!)

I met once a Somali-Norwegian who had gone to Norway as a refugee and was sent to Tromsø. He hadn't really been warned of what the place was like, and he arrived there in the middle of the summer. More than 15 years later, he still spoke of the 24 hours of daylight with awe. He never got used to the fact that the sun was going around the sky instead of up and down (at least, that's what I understood from his description, is that correct?)

Which brings me to my very specific question -- again, it's something that came up a few times in my work with refugees being relocated to Scandinavian countries. How do Muslims in Norway handle the Ramadan fast when it comes during the 24-hour days of the summer? I had an Afghan family asking me this just a few weeks ago, and the best I could come up with is that there's probably an exception to fast on Mecca time?

 

Yes, that is correct. In most latitudes, you will see the sun rise in the east and move in a curve across the sky to set in the west. The closer you get to the north pole, the more you see of this curve, until you reach the Arctic Circle, at which point you will see the entire curve, as you said, and see the sun complete a circle in the sky every 24 hours and never drop out of view. During winter, you see less of the curve until the entire arc is out of view for two months.

Conversely, the Tropic of Cancer in the northern hemisphere, and the Tropic of Capricorn in the southern hemisphere, will see the movement of the sun in a straight line across the sky rather than a curve during their respective summers, to be directly overhead at noon.

I'm sorry for the long-winded confirmation; the nerd in me enjoys explaining this stuff.

As to your second question: the vast majority of Muslims south of the Arctic circle follow the sun where they are, although I know one dude who wasn't able to complete the fast until 10:45 PM (Oslo sunset for most of Ramadan this year), so he would break fast at 8. But that is rare, most people I've met complete the cycle. The rules set forth in the Quran use nature (day/night) as guidelines, so Muslims will follow nature where they are. North of the Arctic circle, I really don't know what they do. I'm not sure if there is a consensus on it. I think some people follow Mecca, while others who find that to be a cop-out will follow the nearest place that has a night. So they'll look up the sunset/sunrise times for Trondheim or Oslo, for instance.

 

stealing Dagobahsystem 's questions again :

A few general questions about Norwegian music:

What are the most popular musical genres in Norway today?

Most popular artists?

Is the art music (classical) scene thriving and/or popular in Norway?

Are there any unique musical instruments that are associated with or that were invented in Norway?

 

What do they say in English?

 

Frame 1: “I want once again seize the opportunity to thank our beloved ancestors...”
Frame 2: “They who come to this land for thousands of years ago, and thought...”
Frame 3: “Here I want to live!”
Frame 4: “We do at least have some good skiers...”
“Hipp Hurra!”



Frame 2: "Yeeees...?"
Frame 4: "What really happened to to snow?"
"I think we have some old postcard somewhere!"

 

The second one is referencing global warming. We've been getting noticeably less snowfall every year. The winters are noticeably milder than twenty years ago. Is it from Pondus, Gamiel?

And on to your questions:

What are the most popular musical genres in Norway today?
The same as most of the Western world, I think. Electronic dance music and house, the stuff that tops the global charts currently, as well as hip hop. You guys have Swedish House Mafia, we have Kygo. I think our 'top of the pops' charts are pretty similar to yours and to the UK, for that matter. It might be a bit different from the US charts; US charts tend to have more hip hop and R&B, while European charts lean more toward dance music; but it's not that stark a difference. Most of the Western music scene is dominated by Anglo-American exports anyway, it seems to me. In any given hour on the radio, you will probably hear much of the same across all of Europe and North America. Adele, Taylor Swift, Justin Bieber, Miley Cyrus, Rihanna, Ed Sheeran, Zara Larsson, DJ Khaled, Calvin Harris, David Guetta. I listen to podcasts on my commutes, so I'm not entirely updated on what music people listen to, but I pulled this list of artists off the current domestic top 20 chart.

Most popular artists?
I'm guessing by this question you mean domestic artists. Do you mean currently, or of all time?

Currently, the most popular are the aforementioned Kygo (DJ), as well as Karpe Diem (hip hop duo), Sigrid, Astrid S, Freddy Kalas, Aurora (female singer), Cezinando, Plumbo (band) and the duo Temur & Hkeem. I know almost none of these. I pulled their names from the chart of the 40 current top-selling singles.

Of all time, there is of course A-ha, who reached global recognition in the 80s. Susanne Sundfør is someone who currently has niche international success, as well as Aurora. Then there are some domestic greats: Jahn Teigen and Sissel Kyrkjebø. I guess Jahn Teigen used to have the same status in Norway as Carola does in Sweden, Gamiel. The aforementioned Karpe Diem is a duo of Indian and Egyptian immigrants based in Oslo, rapping in Norwegian. Paperboys and Madcon rap and sing in English, but for a domestic audience. I don't think they've had any success abroad. There are a lot of people and bands I can mention that have a place in the public consciousness, but I don't think people necessarily consider them as greats. I can list some if people are interested. An interesting curiosity you might like is that Jo Nesbø, writer of some internationally renowned crime novels featuring police detective Harry Hole (lol) used to be the songwriter and lead singer of the rock band Di Derre, which sang in Norwegian.

Is the art music (classical) scene thriving and/or popular in Norway?
Not noticeably, no. Is it popular anywhere these days? That said, because we have a state-funded television broadcaster here, similar to your PBS for you American readers of the thread, there will be televised broadcasts of orchestral concerts from time to time. But we're talking like once a month or something. Our public broadcaster has three channels, so it can afford to broadcast more niche programming like that. Our public radio also has a channel dedicated to classical music. (Reportedly, the percentage of Norwegians who listen to radio is particularly high compared to other countries. I'm guessing most of that consists of drivers listening during their commutes.)

Are there any unique musical instruments that are associated with or that were invented in Norway?
From Wikipedia:
A Hardanger fiddle (or in Norwegian: hardingfele) is a traditional stringed instrument used originally to play the music of Norway. In modern designs, this type of fiddle is very similar to the violin, though with eight or nine strings (rather than four as on a standard violin) and thinner wood. Four of the strings are strung and played like a violin, while the rest, aptly named understrings or sympathetic strings, resonate under the influence of the other four.
The Hardingfele is used mainly in the southwest part of Norway, whereas the ordinary violin (called flatfele - 'flat fiddle' or vanlig fele - 'common fiddle') is found elsewhere. The Hardingfele is used for dancing, accompanied by rhythmic loud foot stomping. It was also traditional for the fiddler to lead the bridal procession to the church.


The langeleik, also called langleik, is a Norwegian stringed folklore musical instrument, a droned zither.
The langeleik has only one melody string and up to 8 drone strings. Under the melody string there are seven frets per octave, forming a diatonic major scale. The drone strings are tuned to a triad. The langeleik is tuned to about an A, though on score the C major key is used, as if the instrument were tuned in C. This is for simplification of both writing and reading, by circumventing the use of accidentals.
Since the instrument cannot play a chromatic scale nor be easily tuned to other pitches, it is very limited in its ability to play along with other instruments and/or more harmonically complex music. The combination of the lone melody string and the multiple drone strings gives the langeleik a distinctively rich sound.

There exists a variety of box zithers in Europe. The German scheitholt and the Swedish Hummel have been suggested as the predecessor of the langeleik. However, in 1980 a langeleik dated as early as 1524 was uncovered on a farm in Vibergsroa, Gjøvik, Norway. This instrument predates any documented occurrences of the scheitholt, the hummel or any other similar instrument.
The older Langeleik types were tuned after Pythagorean fashion, based on pure fifths and octaves, with variable smaller intervals. Thus, the pitches could easily be moved between more sombre "low" intervals and the more bright major ones. The fixed Langeleik with a recognizable major scale is dated to after 1850. After this change in tonation, many players had to change their melodies, or find new ones, as the older repertoire no longer fitted into the new system.


The psalmodicon (psalmodikon or salmodikon) is typically a single-stringed musical instrument, developed in Scandinavia for simplifying music in churches and schools, and providing an alternative to the fiddle for sacred music.[1]:19 The instrument could be plucked or bowed. Beginning in the early 19th century, it was adopted by many rural churches in Scandinavia; later, immigrants brought the instrument to the United States.[2]


Wikipedia had more, but these were the ones I found most noteworthy, and I didn't want to make the post too long. Here's their complete list.

 

Do you know of any norwegen fantasy or science-fiction that you would recommend?

Yes

 

Violent Violet Menace Can you tell us anything about norwegen food?

 

Do you know of any Norwegian fantasy or science-fiction that you would recommend?
I don't read fiction, so I have nothing to recommend there, but a Google search gave me this list of recommendations from goodreads.com. Also, someone learning Norwegian has asked the same question as you on Reddit. Siri Pettersen seems to be a prolific writer in the genre.

As for movies, Wikipedia gave me this one, which sounds intriguing:

Strings (2004) is a mythic fantasy film about the son of an ostensibly assassinated ruler who sets out to avenge his father but through a series of revelations comes to a much clearer understanding of the conflict between the two peoples concerned. The film was made with marionettes and the strings are part of the fictional world as life strings. It is famed for its innovative cinematography and scenic design.
Strings is directed by the Dane Anders Rønnow Klarlund and is a Danish-Swedish-Norwegian-British co-production. The film has received several awards.

I haven't seen that one. But I have seen The Bothersome Man (2006), which I recommend. However, it's more surrealist than fantasy or science-fiction. The story is about a man suddenly finding himself in an outwardly perfect, yet essentially soulless dystopia, and his attempt to escape.

Besides those, there is the Dead Snow duology (2009 / 14). A pair of wacky zombie slasher flicks featuring undead nazis. Trollhunter (2010) is a dark fantasy film in the 'found footage' style, similar to The Blair Witch Project or Cloverfield. I have seen none of these.

Veering more into children's or family entertainment, The Pinchcliffe Grand Prix (Norwegian: Flåklypa Grand Prix) is a stop motion-animated feature film directed by Ivo Caprino. It was released in 1975 and is based on characters from a series of books by Norwegian cartoonist and author Kjell Aukrust. It is the most widely seen Norwegian film of all time, having sold some 5.5 million tickets since its release to a population which currently numbers just over 5 million. I'm sure you must have seen this one yourself, Gamiel. If not, I will be very offended indeed. All Norwgian kids of my generation grew up with Emil i Lönneberga and Ronja Rövardotter, okay? You better have seen Flåklypa Grand Prix! I myself used to watch it pretty much anytime it was on television when I was little. It used to air almost any Christmas and Easter when I grew up, not as often anymore.


Since I'm talking about movies anyway, I might recommend some Norwegian films that I've seen and liked. From my experience, anything the director Erik Poppe has worked on is good. In particular, I have seen his three films popularly dubbed "the Oslo trilogy"; Schpaaa (1998), Hawaii, Oslo (2004) and DeUsynlige (English title: Troubled Water, 2008). His latest project The King's Choice based on actual WWII events is said to be very good, but I have yet to see it. Speaking of WWII, Max Manus is about a Norwegian saboteur during the war and is relatively good. The star of that movie, Aksel Hennie, is in another movie called Headhunters that is very good for a domestic film. It's a thriller about an art thief who finds himself on the run from some unsavoury characters who want him dead. The interpersonal drama is perhaps a bit forced, but the film overall is captivating and hooks you in. Hennie actually has a minor supporting role as a German crew member in The Martian. These are the movies that spring to mind now at the moment.

Finally, this is cheating but since you asked about sci-fi: the Norwegian research crew in the sci-fi horror The Thing (2011), which is a prequel to John Carpenter's identically named The Thing (1982), is played by Norwegian actors.

To you foreign readers of the thread, you will see the crew in The Thing (2011) getting drunk and singing melodically without words, in a fashion that seems like a gibberish repetition of 'lo lo li lo li le la lo lai la'. Gamiel, like me, knows the origin of this. What they're partaking in is a folk music tradition of the Sámi people, who are an indigenous people of the northern parts of Norway, Sweden and Finland, and also the nearest parts of Russia. This type of singing is called joiking (pronounced yoik). It's used as a verb in this sentence. To joik is the act of joiking. But it's also a noun; namely, the song that you produce when joiking is called a joik. Similar to how when you give someone a look, you're looking. It's both a verb and a noun. Read more about it here. The words are not important in a joik, in fact I think they're usually without lyrics. Perhaps the most prominent purveyor of the joik into the Norwegian and Nordic mainstream is Mari Boine, who I forgot to mention when answering the previous questions about musical genres and artists.


By the way, I forgot to thank Skiara for providing the initial questions for my round. I only answered one of her questions in my first post with the plan of returning to the rest later. Here is her second question:

2. What are the most favorite holiday countries for Norway people?
Spain and Greece are the two top destinations, with Spain taking the definite #1 spot. This is mainly charter tourism to specific tourist resorts and villages. They are typically island destinations too, because while the host countries are more than happy to receive these tourists and the money they inject into the economy, I can imagine even they preferably want them out and away from sight and mind. In Spain, many go to the Mallorca archipelago and the Canary Islands. In Greece too, people typically go to one of the myriad islands rather than the mainland. Turkey used to be a very popular destination too, mainly the southern cities of Antalya and Alanya, but recent events have put a significant halt to that. Cyprus is popular, though, especially for young people looking to get ****faced. Outside of beach bum and getting hammered tourism, London, Paris and Barcelona seem to be the most popular urban travel destinations for those looking for a more shopping and/or sightseeing oriented holiday, not to mention Rome and Venice. Also, of course, New York and LA. Prague and Kraków are popular destinations for those wanting cheap beer. Strangely, not Warsaw.

Oh yeah, and there's a lot of cross-Scandinavian travel, as you might imagine. Probably more than any of the other countries mentioned. The mutual intelligibility of the languages and the common culture makes it very comfortable to travel this way, similar to a Canadian traveling the US. You might be surprised to hear, however, that Iceland is not that popular a destination despite the common roots. They definitely feel kinship, but not as many vacation there as you might think. I suppose people would rather go someplace warm than somewhere even colder. More importantly, though, with them, there actually is a language barrier. Scandinavians can't understand them. But they learn Danish as a second language in school, so they can understand us to a degree, depending on interest.

I'll get back to Skiara's third question later.

 

Can you tell us anything about Norwegian food?

Sadly, this is a part of Norwegian culture that I am not that well versed in, growing up in an immigrant home with its own foreign food culture. At first glance, I would say that it is likely very similar to your own cuisine, Gamiel, as Swedish and Norwegian cultures are very closely related. In fact, if you would like to write an answer to your own question, I'd be most delighted.

However, I can offer some interesting and amusing tidbits.

Brown cheese:
Despite what I just wrote above, brown cheese is something that indeed is quite unique to Norway. Its proper name is actually whey cheese, but everyone colloquially just calls it brown cheese. Believe it or not, the tradition is not actually as old as one might assume. In the late 19th century, a milkmaid experimented with boiling milk, cream and whey and letting it reduce to create a fatty product with a cheese-like consistency and texture. The heat caramelises the whey, which contains lactose (or milk sugar if you like), which gives it its characteristic colour. You can try this yourself by putting a can of condensed milk in boiling water and let it boil for a while. When opening the can, you will see the content of the can having turned brown. The Swedes have something similar to brown cheese called messmör, which we in Norway call prim. It's a softer type of spread that tastes similar to the Norwegian whey cheese, but with more of a caramelly flavour.

Wikipedia describes further:
Whey cheese is a dairy product made of whey, the by-product of cheesemaking. After the production of most cheeses, about 50% of milk solids remain in the whey, including most of the lactose and lactalbumin. The production of whey cheese allows cheesemakers to use the remaining whey more efficiently instead of discarding it as a waste product.

Rakfisk:
They say that necessity is the mother of invention, and some Nordic inventions in the way of cuisine prove this adage beyond any doubt. There's the Icelandic hákarl, which is fermented shark meat, stored in the ground under the weight of rocks for 6 to 12 weeks, because the meat of the particular Greenlandic sleeper shark that this is made of is poisonous under normal circumstances. In order to be consumable, it must be pressed under the weight of rocks for 3 months to squeeze out the toxins, but whether the finished result, which reeks of ammonia, is any more consumable is up to, shall we say, individual interpretation.

Not quite as extreme as this Icelandic concoction is the Norwegian/Swedish invention called rakfisk. This is a dish made from trout or sometimes char, salted and fermented for two to three months, or even up to a year, then eaten without cooking.


Lutefisk/lutfisk:
Common to all Nordic countries' cuisines, lutfisk is made from aged stockfish (air-dried whitefish) or dried/salted whitefish (klippfisk) and lye (lut). It's gelatinous in texture. Its name literally means "lye fish".

The first step in preparation is soaking the stockfish in cold water for five to six days (with the water changed daily). The saturated stockfish is then soaked in an unchanged solution of cold water and lye for an additional two days. The fish swells during this soaking, and its protein content decreases by more than 50 percent, producing a jelly-like consistency.

When this treatment is finished, the fish (saturated with lye) is caustic, with a pH of 11–12. To make the fish edible, a final treatment of yet another four to six days of soaking in cold water (also changed daily) is needed. Eventually, the lutefisk is ready to be cooked.

In Finland, the traditional reagent used is birch ash. It contains high amounts of potassium carbonate and bicarbonate, giving the fish a more mellow treatment than wood lye. It is important not to marinate the fish too long in the lye because saponification of the fish fats may occur.

 

Well, since Gamiel stole my question about Norwegian food *waves fist* I'm going to have to ask something else...

Is rakfisk the one that causes cans to become deformed because it's still fermenting inside? (The Icelandic stuff sounds absolutely gross though. I'm normally open to trying pretty much any sort of new food, but stuff that reeks of ammonia is where I draw the line.)

Can you please tell us about immigrant communities in Norway and how they influence the local culture?