“Things In Norway That Are Foreign To Me”: 25 ‘Cultural Shocks’ This American Woman Experienced After Moving To Norway Interview With Artist
Part of traveling and seeing new places is the thrill and excitement of finding out how people live in other countries. And the more drastic the difference is in culture, the more exciting it is.
Meet Jorie, a Chicago creative who has moved to Norway to live together with her husband, family, and pets, and who has also turned her TikTok channel into a platform to broadcast all of the interesting things she as an American found foreign in Norway.
In her running series of videos, appropriately titled “Things In Norway That Are Foreign To Me”, she points out things like bread cutting machines in grocery stores, leaving baby strollers with babies outside, packing your own groceries, and the like.
This, and other videos on her channel, have drawn in nearly 24,000 followers and almost 800,000 likes.
So, we’ve turned her intriguing points into a curated list that you can vote and comment on below. So, get cracking, and if you’re an international living in another country, why not share your biggest culture shocks in the comment section below!
More info: TikTok
This post may include affiliate links.
Dogs Are Allowed On Public Transport
Dogs should be allowed everywhere. Church, restaurants, theaters, schools, hospitals, nightclubs, prisons, trampolines, TV studios, nuclear substations.....all things better with dogs.
Bored Panda got in touch with the face behind the channel, Jorie, for an interview on her Things In Norway That Are Foreign To Me video series and all things Norway.
In the beginning, Jorie thought of creating these videos for an American-only audience as a way of informing them about the Norwegian culture. But she quickly understood that Norwegians like to see their culture reflected back at them, so the audience grew rapidly.
"Of course, it’s a small country in population and representation is exciting. I also think they enjoy explaining (as much as I enjoy reading it) why these differences are the way they are," elaborated Jorie.
So as my audience arose, I now try to point things out to Norwegian viewers of things here in Norway that are not common in other countries, especially the Americas, that they might not realize (like how much they add canned corn to, its not something they notice until they realize many other places don't have it as a common pizza topping!)."
Grass On Roofs
The turf was traditionally used to hold birch bark in place thus creating a leak proof roof.
Double Beds From Single Duvets
Now, it's not all culture shock, as there are also "spot the difference" videos. Sure, some can be a tad bit shocking, like the idea of the government having to agree on a baby's name, but the latter category would involve things like date format differences and, according to Jorie, they are more for the sake of discussion.
And speaking of videos in general, Jorie used to keep a running list of things to discuss in them, but it changed a bit when the audience got involved:
"Now I read heavily through the comments, and just note things as I experience them. Again, there are 2 categories in the series: the ‘culture shock’ which doesn’t have many items left on the list as I’ve been living here a while; and the 'basic-known differences', those I have a few more on the back burner about. I’m also highly sensitive to all the things that will be misinterpreted as 'stupid American' so I try to stay always from those… or at least give a very thorough brainstorm of how to communicate it in a video."
Colorful Houses
What colours do they use in usa if not blue and red (not trying to be mean, honestly curious)?
There are, however, videos that Jorie decided not to post, or there are videos that were posted despite it not really being "new" information at this point. She elaborates:
"Like I just mentioned, I hate the 'stupid American' comments. Of course, I know in Europe the dates are D/M/Y vs M/D/Y, or that the power outlets here were different, but I still want to post these small differences for Norwegians and other Europeans that don’t know how America does it."
"I also get a lot of comments telling me how America works (in a negative cliche light) from people who definitely have never been. Mind you, we are made up of SO many states that are SO different culturally than one another. So videos that bring up politics, I’ll stay away from as I don’t like feeling any personal association with those cliches.
"On the other end, I’ll get comments from people who studied abroad in the states telling me I’m wrong about my comparison (roundabouts are not common in the US, period, end of story!)."
Smaller Milk Packaging With Shorter Expiration Periods
Norwegian scientists recently clarified that milk can be perfectly good for way longer than what is printed on the carton.
Jorie continued:
"My biggest takeaway on it is that these videos are not 'who’s right and wrong', and no, I personally don't think the world revolves around the US, and many try to declare that. It’s just a fun note on how different countries and cultures can be. Although I find my commenters can be a very literal bunch! So I also try to put out as many disclaimers as I can to avoid all these types of comments."
"Sometimes my videos are dramatizations (I added canned corn to everything I ate that week of shooting, I do know Norwegians don't add it to those specific items). And some of my videos are more based on my experience coming from Chicago, not just the general US. But no matter how hard I try, no one reads captions and they will still find a point of contention. I do have a huge experience I plan to talk about in the very near future that I’ve been eager to share on social. So those will maybe become a sub-series to this series very soon. Stay tuned!"
Gender-Specific Names For Newborns
Standing Rather Than Sitting Next To A Stranger On Public Transport
Paprika Flavored Snacks
"Norway is a beautiful, safe, and lovely place to be! Posting videos and interacting with so many Norwegians via TikTok has been a great microscope to even more of their culture than I could experience alone. The biggest challenge was trying to explore my new home during Covid times. I hope to keep it up throughout my time living here," concludes Jorie.
Stay tuned for more videos from Jorie, which you can check out on her TikTok channel. But don't leave just yet, as there are more things to see by scrolling below, and why not leave a comment with some of your culture shocks in the comment section!
Flexible Shower Doors
Yup we have a foldable barrier in our shower in Britain
Windows Open In Multiple Directions
You mean, it is different in the US? I thought, windows are the same everywhere?
It would be simpler for all these articles to just have the Headline: "American Surprised Things Are Done Different In Other Parts of the World"
Yep. Still don't understand why they are surprised over International standards. What also puzzle me is why it is posted on Bored Panda. I mean... This website and its whole admin team is from Europe. Why the focus on US stuff like that?
Agree, @Guy, why? And, FYI, see people from the EU in the US. I had to calm down a German tourist b/c they were so horrified we had above-ground power lines. Well, we do where I live. If you want them underground, you hve to blast rock, at enormous cost and high risk, due to the geology here. She was shocked anywhere still had power lines above ground, and insisted we culd just "dig" through ------ through metamorphic rock we have to use high explosives on just to dig a shallow well!
Easy: Dynamite. That's what we do here in Sweden.
your country is also a bit smaller, mostly populated in the far south, and has like what 5 million people? if you have to run power lines a few thousand km to service a few tens of millions of people, that's a lot of work. Our lines here (Africa) are also above-ground. Easier to fix as well.
Power lines in Germany are below ground in cities and towns, and often above ground outside of them. We have 82 million inhabitants. It's not a matter of country size.
Yes but your geology is different, and it has always been like that. In the US power lines have always been above ground and yours have always been below (I am assuming) plus, underground in the US it is hard metamorphic rock which would take lots of work to dig threw. So while you are correct it is not like we could just up and change everything.
Powerlines are also underground in mounteneous areas, nowadays. Outside they are very vulerable to storms and winter.
10 millions ^^
This entire website is just a rehash of Reddit
Yes it is. Just put in easy to swallow, spoonful size bites.
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Says the troll.
He's right though. Many Bored Panda articles are directly copied from Reddit or Twitter.
Yes they are, and Reddit and Twitter are both given credit for the articles when they are posted on BP.
Because a large amount of traffic on this site is from the US.
US stuff is extra weird... Flat earth, vaccines make you gay, sliced bread is weird, drinking water from the faucet is weird?????
Are you serious? It’s bait to laugh at Americans. You don’t come here much do you.
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Because BP has an agenda to subtly vilify and demean some aspects of American culture and its people, and to get US kids to feel badly about themselves, their country, and the future. Now work out why yourselves.
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Point of order: the United States is a Union of Sovereign States much like the EU is a Union of Sovereign Nations. Our standards in the US are as “international” if not more so than any standards held by the EU. We consist of more members covering more territory. Europes’ millennium of bickering amongst itself does not confer a higher importance to accepted norms for trade or production. Besides. Even though you guys “use” metric none of you do it properly. I.e. if I asked how long is a football pitch and you answered “100m” you would confirm that you are no better than Americans because you aren’t converting. The real answer would be “1hm” because ease of conversion is the purpose of metric. Just throwing out big numbers along with a common reference for distance is exactly what we do. Fact of the matter is you are just as dumb as us but you are arrogant because your countries are older while we are arrogant because we have improved almost everything Europe had to offer.
Jesus, stop embarrassing the United States. We are absolutely sick of it. We need people to know that not all Americans are pieces of s**t like trump Trash.
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I'm sorry but the US embarrasses itself way too often. Get your things in order and then we'll talk
How about you get yourselves in order as well. Then we can all live happily ever after. Every country is a mess in it's own special way.
I take it you don't live in the US. I also take it that pretty much everything you know about the US is stereotypes. Please stop making yourself look foolish.
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Troll.
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Truth hurts ?
Only when it's true. Lies don't hurt much I'm afraid.
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You wouldn't know the truth if it hit you in the head with a flag pole. And I'm not going to engage with trolls that want to fight first thing in the morning. See ya.
Like the cop that died on Jan 6th? (Being hit with a flag pole, to be clear)
Nope
He died of stroke actually, and it is unconfirmed if it was at all caused by anything that happened at the riot. Also, he died a day after Jan 6th. Seriously, do two seconds of research and you would know that.
Everybody's downvoting but nobody has argued against his points. Interesting.
@Brafne Heiwer: I'm European and I will not downvote Alexander, but also not the people downvoting him, who are also American..Americans seem to be utterly culturally divided about their own identity. I recently saw the very well done film "Stillwater". We Europeans - and I mean here film critics- appreciated the quality of the film. But from what I see, nobody in the USA can even talk about the artistic side and the novel take on identity perception without getting aggressive.
Fair enough.
Happens a lot
We don't need to. His arguments speak for them selves. He just confirmed all the stereo types and all the preconceptions Europeans have of people from the US
...that we also estimate distances?
Just upvoted it. Want to get it out of the negative.
I am from the USA and I would like to point out that it is a very big country that shares a border with only two other countries. It takes 5 or 6 days to travel from coast to coast in the US, and then you are still in the same country. If you drive that long in most of Europe you will go through multiple countries. Flying is very expensive. So traveling to other countries is not a possibility for most US Americans. I am sorry so many people on this site have such a low opinion of us, but I would like to point out that in the last two presidential elections more people voted against trump than for. But the reason trump got in office the first time is because we are not a direct democracy and we have an electoral college which causes candidates, that did not win the popular vote, to get into office occasionally (happened with Bush #2 also). My point being most of us are not close minded, ignorant a$$holes running around ready to shoot the first thing that moves.
I want to give you 40 upvotes.
So true about the size of the US, something that many people from other countries don't comprehend until they visit. I had a group of students from Central America who piled into a rented van for a road trip. When they came back they were absolutely stunned at how they could drive for days and still be in the US, where everyone still spoke mainly English and most of the customs were still the same.
Thank you!
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We aren't trigger happy idiots, but there's nothing wrong with guns themselves or the electoral college.
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RUSSIA is in Europe think about it !
This was one of the dumber BP posts. It is more a demonstration of her narrow sheltered existence. If she's really that culturally naive, she's going to have a hard time adjusting to living abroad.
I've only ever visited one place in the US, and I thought it sounded like the OP had just come out from under a rock
Agree. Also, some of this stuff happens in different places in the States. This is more of an "I've never lived outside of Chicago and it's my only frame of reference."
I noted that multiple times.
A lot of things though are common in America, so...
More accurate: a tiny collection of unsophisticated, most likely quite young Americans find differeces in some aspects of another country.
Tell me about it... I travelled to Canada, many years ago, and had to go through New York on my way to Toronto, and through Chicago on my way back. In Chicago, airport security made me open my suitcase because they thought the adapter for the outlets was suspicious - they had never seen one in their life! I actually had to explain to them that there are multiple different systems with differently shaped outputs and different voltages used worldwide. Thanks to the adapter, I can charge or use any of my appliances anywhere in the world.
I came here to say exactly that. I'm so sick of americans thinking that everyone else is weird.
yes, important stuff that is truly shocking is omitted
Or actually in Europe.
I'd add "Samll minded, inexperienced..." to the front of that headline.
Nah, that would be insulting. And for nothing.
No, what's unnecessarily insulting is constantly referring to Americans as whole as "shocked other countries do things differently" instead of calling out specific people for their own ignorance. See my comment below.
Yes, they are in a bubble. Yes, their country fell so low in all world index they can barely be called a "first world country" anymore. But if you ostracize and ridicule someone, you don't help them. They will barricade themself into the bubble.
We are in a bubble? Hm. I thought it was our tourist money was important, but apparently not. How are all your tourist driven monies doing? Think we just had 2 civilian rockets take off. I'm not sure, I may be too stupid, but if we're in a bubble then we can quit spending zillions of dollars supporting other countries, and sending the covid 19 vaccine to less fortunate countries. Think of the money we can spend on our OWN country!! YAY!! Guy, we aren't at all in a bubble. You're thinking in stereotypes. It's not a good look on you.
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If you can't take a few jabs at ignorant muricans you shouldn't be on websites like bored panda
Zaza, over the last few months BP has had a lot of articles that result in America bashing. I know I am tired of it, others are as well. It's getting a bit over the top. The woman who wrote this must have been a shut-in here in the USA. Some of what she's saying is common as f**k here, and it's well known that Europe does things differently than we do, it's just the way it is. Why all the hate?
And what shithole country are you from?
Muricans went out of style in 2017.
Definitely inexperienced. Please go back and correct the spelling of small. Gives the point more gravitas
"American surprised the whole world doesn't revolve around them"
It actually does. How far do you think you would get without Microsoft, Google, or Apple? What movies and shows do you plan on watching? Doing any investments or financial trading because the USD is king and half of EVERY major trading pair in forex. I can go on….
It's hilarious every time we talk about one of these idiots, they actually show up to prove our point.
What a meta comment.
Def
Before you down vote, has he said anything untrue? All three are American companies. America has Hollywood. America had the first man on the moon. America has the strongest military in the world. America is an economical superpower. The US dollar has been adopted in many places. Most revolutions were based on the American revolution. Things that happen in America are broadcast across the world, as evidenced by the fact that people in Europe are still talking about Trump. America has an excellent system of Democratic government, one of the first successful democracies. America has a bill of rights for it's citizens. America has good education. America's national language, English, is the most spoken language on Earth. What happens in America effects the world. So, in a non geographical way, it is the center of the world. Culturally and economically.
Holy crap, BP, again!? Don't people from anywhere else move?
Especially since Bored Panda and its whole admin team is from Europe... Getting tired of these US focused posts.
It’s like vodka in bars, pays the bills
or get shocked by things in other places withotu considering that the world is not all the same as their own experience in their hometown?
Aren't there any Americans moving to the Maldives - it's getting a bit boring? How about Africa?
yes, there are quite a few who have selected Gambia because it's english-speaking and is the original location of some of the slaves that were taken in the 1700s.
I very much would like to know how life is in any country of the continent Africa.
West Africans are friendly, witty, jovial, and just all around awesome people. Freetown, Sierra Leone, was crowded with stalls all along the streets. It is never quiet. It smells of food, people, dust, and plants. It's multicolored with the main two colors being that of earth: green and a burnished red. While families where the same bolt of cloth turned into colorful clothes. Babies ride on their mothers back. Motorbike taxis zip through traffic like daredevils. There is almost always laughter/singing in the air. Music is always playing loud at the many cafes. The food is spicy and rich. Even when it's just rice and chicken. When I say I loved it there, I mean it to my bones.
And because The Gambia is one of the poorest countries in the world and they expect to live a good rich-mans life there without having to work for it
Who expects? Americans? Christ, you're a one track bitter little train, aren't you?
I lived in Africa for two years and I had a lot of culture shock like moments. But they were mainly on the social level. At least west African culture is very different from the US. I personally loved it there. Also, I miss Fufu the food.
See? THIS kind of culture shocks and this poetic descriptions combined with a few photos would do more good to all the world than a repetitive post about first world citizens comparing supermarket items.
It would be simpler for all these articles to just have the Headline: "American Surprised Things Are Done Different In Other Parts of the World"
Yep. Still don't understand why they are surprised over International standards. What also puzzle me is why it is posted on Bored Panda. I mean... This website and its whole admin team is from Europe. Why the focus on US stuff like that?
Agree, @Guy, why? And, FYI, see people from the EU in the US. I had to calm down a German tourist b/c they were so horrified we had above-ground power lines. Well, we do where I live. If you want them underground, you hve to blast rock, at enormous cost and high risk, due to the geology here. She was shocked anywhere still had power lines above ground, and insisted we culd just "dig" through ------ through metamorphic rock we have to use high explosives on just to dig a shallow well!
Easy: Dynamite. That's what we do here in Sweden.
your country is also a bit smaller, mostly populated in the far south, and has like what 5 million people? if you have to run power lines a few thousand km to service a few tens of millions of people, that's a lot of work. Our lines here (Africa) are also above-ground. Easier to fix as well.
Power lines in Germany are below ground in cities and towns, and often above ground outside of them. We have 82 million inhabitants. It's not a matter of country size.
Yes but your geology is different, and it has always been like that. In the US power lines have always been above ground and yours have always been below (I am assuming) plus, underground in the US it is hard metamorphic rock which would take lots of work to dig threw. So while you are correct it is not like we could just up and change everything.