Describe your country/state/area!
Nov 29, 2016 9:08:08 GMT
DragonRacer, PATPATPATlol, and 7 more like this
Post by Nwalmenil on Nov 29, 2016 9:08:08 GMT
Since @dragonracerposted posted such an excellent rundown of what it's like living in Florida I thought it might be interesting to see others posting similar things about their state/country/town or area. 
I figured I could go first and try to summarize my neck of the woods!
So.
Sweden!
We don't actually have polar bears walking around our streets (or anywhere else). We do have plenty of moose, some wolves and bears though. Those wolves and bears are basically our only "dangerous" animals. They don't really pose a problem either. Last time I heard of someone ending up in a precarious situation was when a hunter managed to step through the roof of a sleeping bear's den.
There are some snakes, the only one that's actually poisonous is the common European adder and that one's not that bad. There's only been a few deaths as far as I know, probably due to anaphylactic chock. Get to a hospital and you'll be fine unless you've got allergies.
Our biggest offender? The mosquitoes. They're a plight. Truly.
Some areas are terrible during the summer. You can hardly go outside unless you want to be enveloped in a buzzing cloud of nasty insects. Get some insect spray ("Mygga" is a decent one for instance) and you might get a slight protection.
And we do actually have summers. It's not just snow and ice even though that tend to be a common opinion. We do have a pretty wide range of temperatures over here. From 25-30 celsius (77-86 F) during a warm summer down to negative 25-30 C (-13 to -22 F) during really cold winters. Depending on where you live the winters are handled with varying success. Snow tend to create some chaos in the south while the northerners are usually used to it and prepared. You have to be really when you end up with enough snow to bury parked cars.
Maybe due to our rather varying climate Swedes tend to constantly complain about the weather. The summers are too hot and the winters are too cold.
Be prepared for bright summers and dark winters as well. If you go a bit up north the sun won't set during the summer and won't actually rise during the winters either. Yay cold darkness! Having sunlight 24/7 during the summer is pretty great though!
On the topic of summers. If you ever feel a nasty smell coming from (probably quite a few) houses during August, don't be overly alarmed!
People have probably just opened their can of Surströmming (fermented herring) and that's quite a big deal. It does smell though. Very much so. According to a Japanese study, a newly opened can of surströmming has one of the most putrid food smells in the world. You basically have to eat it outside and even more importantly, open the cans outside since they have a tendency stink up the place for quite a while otherwise. There are quite a few amusing Youtube clips of foreigners trying to eat it with varying degrees of success. You don't usually eat them straight from the can though but rather on a piece of bread with chopped up onions and potatoes. And washed down with a shot of snaps (Basically a spiced vodka. That probably helps and is something that tends to pop up during basically any and every big holiday. I guess we do like our alcohol) It's considered a delicacy and something of a festive occasion.
I personally don't touch the stuff however.
Here's an example of peoples first reaction:
There's another oddity as well, and that's Lutfisk that's eaten around Christmas. That's a fish that's been air dried and aged with lye. You have to soak it in water for some time before cooking it (carefully) before you can even consider eating it. Though it might sound strange, it's actually not all that bad. I like it myself! You end up with something that's basically just fish, even though the consistency is a bit.. wobblier than usual.
Beside strange foodstuffs we comsume insane amounts of candy and coffee! I seem to recall we've been one of the countries that eat the most candy and drink the most coffee in the world. We might not be number one right now but we're up there.
This is a common sight in pretty much any grocery store:
And it's good stuff too! We do know our candy.
My guess is that we've developed a need for different means to get us through our long dark winters. Coffee, candy and alcohol, the cornerstones of a healthy lifestyle?
Oh, and if you want to fit in? Make fun of Norway. Just make them out to sound stupid and you're golden. We've got tons of jokes that basically just point out that they're, well.. not quite the sharpest tools in the shed.
Don't worry though. They do it to us as well so it's all good. We really do love our Norwegian neighbors though, it's more like two siblings bickering than anything else.
And if you're a sports fan? Hockey and football (soccer as you yanks would call it) are the two big ones around here. You get plenty of other sports as well but football and hockey dominate the others.
We're a pretty connected country as well. If you move in to an apartment for instance and find that you can't get a connection around 500 mbit for a decent price it would be rather surprising. Hell, even gigabit connections have started popping up. I know of a few places where you get a 1000/1000 connection included in the rent.
Something else that's pretty typical of Sweden is snus.
It's basically a moist tobacco powder that you put under your lip. Kind of like dipping tobacco in the US but without the spitting. It's illegal to sell in the EU except in a few countries like Sweden. They tried to outlaw it here as well but we don't like to let go of our bad habits.
What else..
If you see a bunch of Swedes donning flowery wreaths dancing around what basically a big flowery penis (that actually is what it originated as), don't be alarmed, they're just celebrating midsummer! One of the biggest holidays around here. The big four are midsummer, Christmas, new years and Easter.
That's basically Sweden I suppose!
Oh yeah. Gas is expensive and we pay a ton of taxes but at least we get a decent welfare system out of the latter.
Oh, and don't trust our trains during winter. Go by bus, car och plane. There tends to be a lot of delays and other issues due to the cold and snow.
There we go!
Looking forward to hearing odds and ends about other place around the globe!
[edit] Looks like I messed up the formatting.. fixing..
I figured I could go first and try to summarize my neck of the woods!
So.
Sweden!
We don't actually have polar bears walking around our streets (or anywhere else). We do have plenty of moose, some wolves and bears though. Those wolves and bears are basically our only "dangerous" animals. They don't really pose a problem either. Last time I heard of someone ending up in a precarious situation was when a hunter managed to step through the roof of a sleeping bear's den.
There are some snakes, the only one that's actually poisonous is the common European adder and that one's not that bad. There's only been a few deaths as far as I know, probably due to anaphylactic chock. Get to a hospital and you'll be fine unless you've got allergies.
Our biggest offender? The mosquitoes. They're a plight. Truly.
Some areas are terrible during the summer. You can hardly go outside unless you want to be enveloped in a buzzing cloud of nasty insects. Get some insect spray ("Mygga" is a decent one for instance) and you might get a slight protection.
And we do actually have summers. It's not just snow and ice even though that tend to be a common opinion. We do have a pretty wide range of temperatures over here. From 25-30 celsius (77-86 F) during a warm summer down to negative 25-30 C (-13 to -22 F) during really cold winters. Depending on where you live the winters are handled with varying success. Snow tend to create some chaos in the south while the northerners are usually used to it and prepared. You have to be really when you end up with enough snow to bury parked cars.
Maybe due to our rather varying climate Swedes tend to constantly complain about the weather. The summers are too hot and the winters are too cold.
Be prepared for bright summers and dark winters as well. If you go a bit up north the sun won't set during the summer and won't actually rise during the winters either. Yay cold darkness! Having sunlight 24/7 during the summer is pretty great though!
On the topic of summers. If you ever feel a nasty smell coming from (probably quite a few) houses during August, don't be overly alarmed!
People have probably just opened their can of Surströmming (fermented herring) and that's quite a big deal. It does smell though. Very much so. According to a Japanese study, a newly opened can of surströmming has one of the most putrid food smells in the world. You basically have to eat it outside and even more importantly, open the cans outside since they have a tendency stink up the place for quite a while otherwise. There are quite a few amusing Youtube clips of foreigners trying to eat it with varying degrees of success. You don't usually eat them straight from the can though but rather on a piece of bread with chopped up onions and potatoes. And washed down with a shot of snaps (Basically a spiced vodka. That probably helps and is something that tends to pop up during basically any and every big holiday. I guess we do like our alcohol) It's considered a delicacy and something of a festive occasion.
I personally don't touch the stuff however.
Here's an example of peoples first reaction:
There's another oddity as well, and that's Lutfisk that's eaten around Christmas. That's a fish that's been air dried and aged with lye. You have to soak it in water for some time before cooking it (carefully) before you can even consider eating it. Though it might sound strange, it's actually not all that bad. I like it myself! You end up with something that's basically just fish, even though the consistency is a bit.. wobblier than usual.
Beside strange foodstuffs we comsume insane amounts of candy and coffee! I seem to recall we've been one of the countries that eat the most candy and drink the most coffee in the world. We might not be number one right now but we're up there.
This is a common sight in pretty much any grocery store:
And it's good stuff too! We do know our candy.
My guess is that we've developed a need for different means to get us through our long dark winters. Coffee, candy and alcohol, the cornerstones of a healthy lifestyle?
Oh, and if you want to fit in? Make fun of Norway. Just make them out to sound stupid and you're golden. We've got tons of jokes that basically just point out that they're, well.. not quite the sharpest tools in the shed.
Don't worry though. They do it to us as well so it's all good. We really do love our Norwegian neighbors though, it's more like two siblings bickering than anything else.
And if you're a sports fan? Hockey and football (soccer as you yanks would call it) are the two big ones around here. You get plenty of other sports as well but football and hockey dominate the others.
We're a pretty connected country as well. If you move in to an apartment for instance and find that you can't get a connection around 500 mbit for a decent price it would be rather surprising. Hell, even gigabit connections have started popping up. I know of a few places where you get a 1000/1000 connection included in the rent.
Something else that's pretty typical of Sweden is snus.
It's basically a moist tobacco powder that you put under your lip. Kind of like dipping tobacco in the US but without the spitting. It's illegal to sell in the EU except in a few countries like Sweden. They tried to outlaw it here as well but we don't like to let go of our bad habits.
What else..
If you see a bunch of Swedes donning flowery wreaths dancing around what basically a big flowery penis (that actually is what it originated as), don't be alarmed, they're just celebrating midsummer! One of the biggest holidays around here. The big four are midsummer, Christmas, new years and Easter.
That's basically Sweden I suppose!
Oh yeah. Gas is expensive and we pay a ton of taxes but at least we get a decent welfare system out of the latter.
Oh, and don't trust our trains during winter. Go by bus, car och plane. There tends to be a lot of delays and other issues due to the cold and snow.
There we go!
Looking forward to hearing odds and ends about other place around the globe!
[edit] Looks like I messed up the formatting.. fixing..
)
). I wont say this is the safest place ever, but at least it is extremely uncommon to get robbed on the streets by a guy with a shotgun or some shit. Bad side is that if you ever decide to acquire yourself a gun, the amount of paperwork to be done could fill a Normandy size ship.
(although good luck trying to get a date, or maybe I suck I dunno).
.jpg)
true fact... its the lowest point in North America
