<div dir="ltr">Hi Tom,<div><br></div><div>Thanks for this one. Having spent four years in Denmark and 16.5 years married to a Dane, I have many "hate" stories about these wonderful but complicated people.</div><div>
<br></div><div>1. Danes, Norwegians, and Swedes all hate the Finns, because they are swarthy and carry knives (go figure). They are not true Scandinavians, but the other three reluctantly allow them to be part of the Nordic (but not Scandinavian) countries.</div>
<div><br></div><div>2. They include the Icelanders and Faroe Islanders among the Scandinavians, but the latter are looked down upon because they eat sheep brains. I did not witness this, but in 1966 I was told in hushed whispers that in my Danish student dorm some "Faeringers" were all huddled around a sheep brain greedily dipping their bread in it . I shared their disgust, so I did not go down the hall to see if this were actually the case. It certainly can't be any worse than lyttefisk!</div>
<div><br></div><div>3. As part of my initiation at my dorm, I was introduced to Aquavit. At the depths of our drunkenness (it came very fast for me), the Danes started chanting "Vi hader svenskerne!" and I joined in the chorus of "We hate the Swedes." </div>
<div><br></div><div>4. My former father-in-law never forgave the Swedes for coming over the Baltic ice in the 17th Century and burning Copenhagen; for always beating the Danes in soccer; for urinating on the windows of his clock shop in the New Harbor District where all the Swedes drank on weekends; and for occasionally breaking into his shop. My former wife and I stayed in the town house above the shop in 1985-86, so we could smell the Swedish deposits all weekend long and we notified my father-in-law if there were any broken windows.</div>
<div><br></div><div>4. Copenhagen is a city of one million, and in 1966 I was the only guy who ran for recreation and wore Addidas running shoes all the time. One dark winter afternoon (sundown at 3 PM), I was running around the national stadium . Some kids had been harassing me on a regular basis and I thought that I would finally get their goat. I didn't know that many swear words yet (being the sober scholar that I was), so I made up the most negative thing I could yell to them: "I smaa svin!" in a heavy accent. I later regret putting pigs down in this way, because Dainish swine (the cleanest in the world) are at a much higher level than these little rats. In retrospect I should have anathemized them as "You little rats" rather than "You little swine." In any case, it worked: they scattered like startled birds. Behind a tree, I could hear one little rascal saying "Han maa vaere svensker!" Yes, you heard it right: "He must be a Swede!"</div>
<div><br></div><div>I just realized that I now have a column to go with Roy Zimmerman's song. It will be a nice break for all the political and religious columns that I will write when book is done.</div><div><br></div>
<div>Now back to that book, for which I now have a one week extension, which I just shortened by a half hour!</div><div><br></div><div>Skal to the Norwegians who actually come out comparatively well between the battling Danes and Swedes,</div>
<div><br></div><div>Nick Gier (a Scotch-Irish/German Catholic Hybrid)</div></div><div class="gmail_extra"><br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Thu, Jan 16, 2014 at 4:58 AM, Tom Hansen <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:thansen@moscow.com" target="_blank">thansen@moscow.com</a>></span> wrote:<br>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex"><div dir="auto"><div><span></span></div><div><div><img src="cid:C7B62884-2588-4BD7-8156-6587A94F54B9" alt="image.jpeg" width="640" height="354"><br>
<br><a href="http://youtu.be/4gWAUxP6RmM" target="_blank">http://youtu.be/4gWAUxP6RmM</a></div><div><br><div><span style="background-color:rgba(255,255,255,0)">Seeya 'round town, Moscow, because . . .</span></div><div>
<span style="background-color:rgba(255,255,255,0)"><br></span></div><div><span style="background-color:rgba(255,255,255,0)">"Moscow Cares" (the most fun you can have with your pants on)</span></div><div><a href="http://www.moscowcares.com/" style="background-color:rgba(255,255,255,0)" target="_blank"><font color="#000000">http://www.MoscowCares.com</font></a></div>
<div><span style="background-color:rgba(255,255,255,0)"> </span></div><div><div><span style="background-color:rgba(255,255,255,0)">Tom Hansen</span></div><div><span style="background-color:rgba(255,255,255,0)">Moscow, Idaho</span></div>
</div><div><span style="background-color:rgba(255,255,255,0)"><br></span></div><div><span style="background-color:rgba(255,255,255,0)">"There's room at the top they are telling you still.</span></div><div><span style="background-color:rgba(255,255,255,0)">But first you must learn to smile as you kill,</span></div>
<div><span style="background-color:rgba(255,255,255,0)">If you want to be like the folks on the hill."</span></div><div><span style="background-color:rgba(255,255,255,0)"><br></span></div><div><span style="background-color:rgba(255,255,255,0)">- John Lennon</span></div>
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