Scandanavia! The three countries!!!

[Dillon 1st MRB]

I may be odd, but I like to know "stuff." While I've had a decent working knowledge of England, Wales, and Ireland, I've been largely ignorant of our Scandinavian brethren and sistren and their respective countries. So, I went about educating myself. So when I look at a map of Scandinavia (the region of Norway, Sweden, and Finland), it looks sort of like a rather painfully partially split penis and a scrotum (ballsack).

First, we'll start with Norway, home to Zahl and some other people.

Norway would be the western-most country. The top of the penis, if you will (not the head). There is some very interesting history for Norway. For one, it was in a partnership with Denmark for over 400 years, which resulted in a bit of a drain on the intellectuals and artisans leaving for Copenhagen. Then, in 1814, Denmark lost a bit of a war with the UK. And Denmark lost, thanks to Lord Admiral Viscount Nelson (and his disobedience of a direct order), and Denmark gave Norway to Sweden. Norway, not liking this one iota, said "fuck you" and declared their independance. Norway pretty much did okay until WWII. They managed to stay neutral in WWI (which was a VERY good idea, considering how fucked up it was) and then was under Nazi occupation. Norway had a pretty hopping Resistance and to this day, Norway gives the UK a Christmas Tree that is then erected (*snicker*) in Trafalgar Square in thanks for their assistance during WWII. Norway is CLASSY.

Norway has a shit ton of mountainous land. This is what helps fjords be fjords. Because of this mountainous land, it tends to be fairly high in elevation for a country with so much ocean-front land.

Norway has different dialects. I never knew this. North Norwegian, West Norwegian, East Norwegian, and Trondelag (its supposed to have cool bastard o with a /, but I can't do those at work) Norwegian. Why the fuck couldn't it be Southern Norwegian? Because its spoken in the middle of the country. Norwegian is similar to Swedish and Danish, and just like everyone else in the world, they think if they yell it, it will be understood.

Some famous Norwegians who made the world a better place:

Edvard Grieg - composed some kickass classical music.

Henrik Ibsen - who may have the sweetest sideburns known to man.

Edvard Munch - he did The Scream. Not the movie, but the cool yet disturbing painting.

Sweden - home of Elf and Berg and some other people.

Sweden is the bottom of the penis. Sweden is historically a bit of a bastard. Not in a Nazi way, but more of in a UK or US way. See, Sweden had a full-on Empire. Sweden started off pretty poor in finances and in people. Well, then they decided they would export the one thing they did well: ass-kicking. Sweden took over parts of Poland and Lithuania and most of Finland as well as took some parts of the Holy Roman Empire. Pretty much the only reason we don't all speak Swedish is because Sweden failed at the one thing everyone fails at: invading Russia. Sweden was good at staying neutral in WWI and not so good at it in WWII. However, they got really good at smuggling out Jews from the Nazi's, which is funny, because the Nazi's sure didn't want them, but they didn't want others to take them from them. But Sweden did it. Good on them.

Sweden is not Norway. But parts of it are like Norway. It has mountains, but no where near the amount of them. Sweden has a lot more arable land, so they have a bit more agriculture.

Sweden has a king and a queen! Suck that, England!

Famous Swedes:

Carl Linnaeus - pretty much the one of the grand-daddies of ecology.

Anders Celsius - decided 212 degrees was just too many, made a metric temperature scale.

Abba and Ace of Base - kind of the same band, but from 2 different decades.

Finally, we get to the scrotum. Finland.

People from Finland - Ella, Jani, and maybe even other people.

Finland had a bit of a bad time, historically. They were sort of around, and then then the Swedes took over in the 1100's. Then the Russians took over in 1809. However, Finland recognized an opportunity when they saw it, so when the Russians decided to kill all of each other, Finland said, "We are Finland!" Finland kept themselves separate from Russia for the next 20 years until Russia said, "Game on, bitch!" Oh, did they have it wrong. See, Finland had one mean little fucker on its side, Simo Hayha who decided to be so ridiculously good at killing, he was the 1st MRB's first Badass of the Month. Russia technically took land from Finland, but at the cost of huge Soviet casualties. Enough that one Red Army general stated "We have won just about enough ground to bury our dead." Nice job, Finland! During WWII, Finland ended up allied with Germany because Russia just would not quit invading Finland. I suppose if I had to choose between someone who hated me because they wanted my land and someone who liked me because I looked like them, I'd have made the same choice.

Finland doesn't have many mountains, except in Lapland. Its a pretty its a pretty cool place, and by cool, I mean cold compaired to the two "dick" countries.

Finland has a sizable population of ethnic Swedes. And they speak Swedish, too! There is also a Karelian language, for those from the southeast.

Famous Fins:

Simo Hayha - immortalized White Death in the 1st MRB newsletter.

Linus Torvalds - he gave us Linux! yeah!!!!

Similarities:

All three countries celebrate Walpurgis Night. Its a good old holiday (read: Pagan), but instead of doing fun things with virgins, they burn stuff. Lots of stuff. So yeah, its not so bad, but not as good as doing things with virgins.

All three countries have a people called Sami. They are from the far north, and personally, I think they should rise up create their own country of Samiland, or perhaps even better, Samiwhich. If there capital could be called, "Bichegetmea" I would die a happy man.

All three countries worry about hitting moose (European Elk) and/or reindeer with their cars.

[Luna 1st MRB]

[Takel 1st MRB]

Top of the Class! You need to start doing these regularly, they'd make a great addition to the newsletter IMO(a country/region/company/etc a month)

[Peurala]

Nice interesting info! GO FINLAND!!!

[Takel 1st MRB]

I just noticed somthing, isn't it scandinavia?

[Branem 1st MRB]

You did a great job here, sir! But I did wonder a bit when you left out Denmark, and included Finland.

Most of us, in Norway, Sweden and Denmark, consider these three countries "Scandinavia". Now, since

I do beleive you have done your homework on this I just had to check, and shure enough there are different

opinions about this: Is Finland part of Scandinavia?

Anywho, I actually live in Trøndelag, more spesific the city of Trondheim, witch is the third biggest city in

Norway, after Oslo and Bergen.

And speaking of dialekts, you are right about the four main groups, but actually we have several hundreds

of dialets in total. Our language vary just as much as say english, from one part of the country to the other.

And btw this was very fun to read, very interesting to see what you deside to include when you did this

little reserch on Scandianvia.

[Peaker]

Hahah, I love it, excellent piece.

One small detail however. Horatio Nelson had been dead for 9 years in 1814, since he died at Trafalgar.

[Vatsia]

nice info Dillon

hope we see more post like this

and omg there is my name xD

[St-Denis]

Wow.... What happend of looking for a job lol.

[Dillon 1st MRB]

Wow.... What happend of looking for a job lol.

This was me at work.... that's how lame my job is. I have time to do this. fml.