Tir n’a Noir Posted by Bjørn A. Bojesen on Nov 23, 2012
Are you looking for Norwegian music? A band I’d recommend to anyone is Vamp. Based in the west coast city of Haugesund, they’ve been famous for their Irish-inspired folk rock since the 1990’ies. They’re a staple at televised festivals, and have won an armful of the prestigious spellemann (”fiddler”) awards. The band was founded by Torbjørn Økland and…
From Play to Playful Posted by Bjørn A. Bojesen on Nov 14, 2012
Sometimes you need to change a word from one grammatical class to another. In English you do that all the time, for example when you make the verb ”to read” into a noun by adding an -ing suffix: Reading makes me happy. When you want to swap the class of a Norwegian word, you have several…
What time is it? Posted by Bjørn A. Bojesen on Oct 28, 2012
Today Norwegians had the chance to sleep one hour longer, as the official time changed from sommertid (summer time) to vintertid (winter time). 8 o’ clock in the morning became 7 o’ clock – and with temperatures below zero in the whole country (including lots of early snø, snow, in the city of Tromsø and…
Nobels fredspris 2012 Posted by Bjørn A. Bojesen on Oct 27, 2012
Once a year, Norge is mentioned by every news outlet in verden (the world), from Indonesia to Illinois. If you’re thinking Nobels fredspris (the Nobel Peace Prize), you’re absolutely right! A couple of weeks ago, on den tolvte oktober (October 12th), chairman of Den norske Nobelkomité (The Norwegian Nobel Committee), Thorbjørn Jagland–social democrat and former…
Åsne Seierstad – A Brave Norwegian Voice Posted by Bjørn A. Bojesen on Oct 20, 2012
These days Åsne Seierstad, highly awarded journalist [shoornalIST] and bestselling author of Bokhandleren i Kabul (The Bookseller of Kabul), is making headlines again: In a new investigational skriveprosjekt (writing project), she intends to unravel the question that keeps harassing the minds of countless Norwegians: What on earth caused Anders Behring Breivik to act in the…
Kongefamilien Posted by Bjørn A. Bojesen on Oct 16, 2012
Having taken a look at some Norwegian words for familiemedlemmer (family members), the Norwegian ”First Family” stands in line. I suppose you’ve already seen the no. 1 of kongefamilien (the Royal Family) – kongen selv (the King himself). On every Norwegian 10 or 20 Kroner coin, the profile of kong Harald is looking towards the…
As Easy As ÆØÅ Posted by Bjørn A. Bojesen on Sep 30, 2012
Alt er større i USA. Everything is bigger in the US. That’s what we Scandinavians often think when we’re suffering from an attack of mindreverdighetskompleks (inferiority complex). The Americans have got bigger cars, houses, plains, trees and burgers than us. But wait… Is that always so? Norwegian komikere (comedians) Fridtjof Stensæth Josefsen and Jakob Schøyen Andersen, of the TV2 programme Kollektivet (The…