Author: Chiara

Julehjerter – DIY Danish Christmas Hearts

Julehjerter, a common Christmas ornament In Denmark and Norway.

As i had already mentioned talking about Christmas symbols in Nordic countries, a common homemade Christmas ornament in Scandinavia is pleated hearts, very common in Denmark, known as Julehjerter, and Norway, where they are called Juletrekurv.

Children make them with their family with paper of different colours, although they are mostly red and white. They have been made for around 150 years: the oldest known guide to making pleated Christmas hearts is found in an 1871 edition of the Danish journal Nordisk Husflidstidende. A 1873 pleated heart can be seen at the National museum in Oslo and one from 1866 at H. C. Andersen house in Odense!

Make your own Julehjerter

I made my very own, simple version of them, so they are not really a basket as the Norwegian name says, and I used strings to hang them on the tree.

what I used:
  • colored paper (the most traditional version is white & red, but do as you please). I used leftover paper we had at home.
  • Scissors, obviously and something to make holes on paper, as pins
  • Strings
Process:
  1. cut paper, put two sheets on top of each other when cutting so it is of the same size.
  2. cut the lines to intertwine the two pieces: they can be all of the same size or the two inner parts narrower.

3. Intertwine the pieces: depending on how you cut the lines you will have a slightly different pattern

4. Make a hole and put the string in it

Your Christmas Heart is ready to be hung on your tree or wherever you want!

Please share with me your Julehjerter if you happen to make any 🙂

Glædelig Jul!

Astrid Lindgren’s places in Småland and beyond

Astrid Lindgren’s homeland and locations of her movies

Astrid Lindgren’s birthday was on 14th November, to celebrate Scandinavia’s and the world’s favourite children author here’s an article about her homeland.

Astrid Lindgren came from Småland, a region in the south of Sweden full of idyllic villages, wild nature (51% of Småland is forests!) and old farms. There you can visit the places from her childhood that were sources of inspiration for books as Emil in Lönneberga, Bullerby/Noisy Village, Pippi Longstocking and so on around the town of Vimmerby.

There were two things that made our childhood what it was – security and freedom.

From the book Mitt Småland (“My Småland”) by Astrid Lindgren and Margareta Strömstedt

Vimmerby and surroundings

Where Astrid Lindgren grew up

Astrid Lindgren’s family house in Näs

Astrid Lindgren spent her happy childhood on the Näs farm. The hollow elm which was Pippi’s “lemonade tree” (Sockerdricksträdet) is still in the garden. Astrid and her siblings had named it Owl Tree (Uggleträdet).

The farm is still owned by the family and is part of the cultural center, which was opened in 2007 for Astrid Lindgren’s 100th birthday. You can find out more about Astrid Lindgren, her life and work in exhibitions there.

Vimmerby’s Town Hall

Vimmerby is the town were Astrid Lindgren grew up and went to school. The young Astrid played with her siblings and friends in the alleyways of this small town and in the surrounding woods. Her childhood provided the raw material for her stories. Here are some contained in Pippi Långstrump, her major success:

  • The game “Don’t touch the ground”, that Pippi plays one day with Tommy and Annika was also played Astrid Lindgren.
  • The message in a bottle in Pippi Longstocking Goes Aboard comes from a game Astrid played with her brother Gunnar and her two cousins.
  • Her brother Gunnar also invented the “things-finder” (sakletare) game.
  • Pippi’s freckles and red hair came from a friend of Lindgren’s daughter Karin.
  • in Furusund, where the summer house of the Ericsson family was, there was a girl who had a horse tied to the porch similar to Pippi’s Lilla Gubben.

She was also good at school to the point where she was called “Vimmerby’s Selma Lagerlöf” after her first essay was published in the local newspaper Vimmerby Tidning. She worked two years as a volounteer for it until she got pregnant at 18 and left the town.

Emil’s village and Bullerby

Around Mariannelund, just 20 km south of Vimmerby, is where the Emil of Lönneberga films were made from 1971 to 1874, in the Film village Filmbyn Småland. In this interactive museum you will be able to have a look behind the scenes and see classic film clips, sing along to tracks and check out original props. Emil´s home, Katthult, is actually called Gibberyd, located between Lönneberga and Mariannelund.

Astrid Lindgren found the inspiration for Emil from the stories her father told about his childhood, but the character of Emil came to life when she was taking care of her three-year-old grandson, who was screaming with all his might. Astrid Lindgren asked the boy if he knew what Emil had done one day. Since the boy wanted to know that, he started being quiet to listen. From that moment, she went on telling her grandson about Emil and later wrote the stories down.

Sevedstorp and the surrounding area

The village of Sevedstorp became Bullerby (Noisy Village) in the films. This hamlet was the childhood home of Astrid Lindgren’s father, and the three farms in Pelarne, 10 km from Vimmerby, were in fact also the model for the Bullerby. Astrid Lindgren‘s father Samuel August Ericsson grew up there with his four brothers and two sisters. Astrid Lindgren’s grandfather was also the model for Bullerby’s grandfather. The farms are however private property now.

I am sorry for all who do not live in Bullerby

Anna in Bara roligt i Bullerbyn

Astrid Lindgren’s Amusement Park: Astrid Lindgrens värld

And if you want to see everything at once, you can visit astrid lindgren’s world. The author’s theatre park, few minutes walking away from Näs, is where the characters and settings from Astrid’s most famous books are brought to life. It lets you truly immerse yourself in the stories of Astrid Lindgren. leap across the Hell’s Gap chasm with Ronja the Robber’s Daughter, meet Katla the dragon with the Brothers Lionheart or watch That Emil hoist little Ida up the flagpole.

Outside Småland

Here you can read (in Swedish) about the locations of the movies. However, not all films inspired by Astrid Lindgren books are located in Småland, in some occasions even outside Sweden!

  • Pippi Longstocking was filmed in the town of Visby in Gotland, the largest island in the Baltic Sea. The shops were located in the St Hansgatan street in the centre. Villa Villekulla is a few kilometres outside Visby, later moved to the south of the town.
  • Brothers Lionheart: Tomelilla and in the hills Brösarps Backar in Österlen, south-east Skåne. The town of Törnosdalen in the movie is in Den Gamle By, an open-air museum in the Danish city of in Aarhus, in Jutland. Much was also in Iceland.
  • Madicken: Söderköping
  • Ronja: most scenes are near the mountain Sörknatten i Dalsland. most scenes by the lake in Jämtland (lake Blåsjön). Other scenes are in the cave Tykarpsgrottan in Ignaberga, Skåne; and in the ruins of the Haga castle in Solna, near Stockholm.
  • Vi på Saltkråkan/ Seacrow island: islands in the Stockholm northern archipelago: most in Norröra, some Söderöra. A lot of scenes were also in Eckerö, in the archipelago of Åland (Finland).

5 symbols of Sami culture

Sámi people, indigenous people of North Scandinavia, have a distinct culture, symbolised by its unique flag and traditional clothing, and part of it are Duodji handicrafts and unique musical expression through yoik.

Chiara's avatar by Chiara

Tell Apart Nordic Languages

Learn quickly how to distinguish and identify all Nordic languages!

As a language lover I tend to take for granted that certain languages are clearly different from others or recognizable from certain features. Some time ago my sister asked what was the language I was reading in, and I was expecting her to know that with ð’s it has to be Icelandic. But if language learning is not your hobby, Dutch and Swedish might as well be the same thing, purely because you never get to see them. I still remember reading about differences between Danish and Norwegian and finding it really useful, so I decided to make a summary of features and differences that can come in handy as a guide for those who would enjoy being able to distinguish all Nordic languages without actually studying or knowing much.

Please note that I’m mostly writing about the written form, as nuances of the spoken language can be much harder to describe. For what concerns the oral form, you just have to listen to them a lot, and as a Swedish friend once told me:

Swedish is up ‘n downs, Norwegians is all ups, Danish is all downs.

And well, it makes sense.

How similar are Nordic languages to each other?

Swedish, Norwegian, Danish, Icelandic and Faroese belong to the North Germanic language family. Their cousins are German, Dutch and English. If you speak two of these three a big amount of vocabulary and grammar will be familiar to you.

Swedish, Svenska; Norwegian, Norsk; and Danish, Dansk, are the languages of Scandinavia, (yes, the Scandinavian paeninsula is made up of only these three countries) could be considered siblings (or twins?) because they are mutually intelligible, a Swede and a Norwegian will likely converse in their own language without recurring to English, the same goes with a Dane although Danish can be more problematic…But you can read about that later. Their unique letter is Å, which is roughly pronounced as O. So yeah, remember that when you talk about songs by Måneskin…

Icelandic, Íslenska, is essentially old Norse – the ancestor of all North Germanic languagages – that got crystallized in the middle of the North Atlantic. Because of this Icelanders find it pretty easy to read old viking sagas than the Scandinavians, who don’t really understand Icelandic. Faroese, Føroyskt, spoken in the Faroe islands – between Iceland, Norway and Scotland – is similar to Icelandic in the written form, but the spoken language is quite different. They are classified as Insular languages of the North Germanic family, its distinguishing letter is ð (called eð in Icelandic and edd in Faroese, capital Ð), pronounced as th in this. Both have æ, á í ó ú in their alphabets.

Swedish and Danish would be classified as East-North Germanic, while Norwegian and Icelandic West-North Germanic, the bound between Icelandic and Norwegian is is noticeable in some Norwegian dialects, but the geographical distance made Norwegian become more intelligible with the eastern branch instead.

However, there’s an odd one out of the Nordic languages. Not only Finnish, Suomi, does not belong to the North Germanic family, but it is not even indo-european. That means Hindi is potentially closer than its neighbour Swedish. Finnish belongs to the Finno-ugric family and is completely different grammar-wise, but has quite a lot of loanwords and cultural influence from Swedish. You can recognize it by very frequent double letters with combinations as yy and ää, double consonants after another consonant: tsemppiä, pankki. Finnish does not have B, G, D in its alphabet.

The Sámi, indigenous people of north Scandinavia, have their own languages, which are related to Finnish as they belong to the Uralic language family, this article i wrote focuses on them.

And now let’s go into detail!

Swedish vs Danish & Norwegian

Norwegian and Danish look very much alike in the written form, but if you hear them you will be more likely to think Swedish and Norwegian sound similar while Danish stands out for its “weirdness”, It is said that Danes speak as if they had potatoes in their mouths, if you want to know more look up the stød linguisti phenomenon.

  • Swedish: Ö, Ä / Norwegian & Danish: Ø, Æ: The first and easiest difference
  • CK/KK: ck is found in Swedish, usually K or KK in the other two: lycka/lykke (luck); tack/takk, tak (thanks).
  • -A/-E: Swedish tends to have a lot of -a endings, while you have E’s in Norwegian and Danish. See the example above of lycka/lykke, also in plural adjectives: mina/mine (my) goda/gode (good).
  • HV/V is not found in Swedish, which got rid of the H: vad, vem/hvad, hvem; (what, who)
  • X an Q sometimes occur in Swedish, only in foreign names in the other two: exempel/eksempel (example).

To sum up:

  • Swedish ä ö ck: jag, och, vem, -a, lycka, exempel
  • Danish & Norwegian: æ ø, hv: jeg, og, hvem, -e, lykke, eksempel

Danish vs Norwegian

Modern written Norwegian was based off Danish so it can be extremely similar and if you have a very short text it might even be all spelt the same way, but a few features will signal which of the two you are reading:

  • ØJ/ØY: øj in Danish while øy in Norwegian: tøj/tøy (clothes)
  • MIG/MEG: Norwegian Bokmål uses E in deg/meg/seg, while Danish has mig as in Swedish
  • K/KJ: kj an b found frequently in Norwegian while Danish has directly a vowel after K: kære/kjære (dear); at kende/ å kjenne (to know)
  • TION/SJON: Norwegian’s spelling in words of foreign origin is more “tamed” to the language, for instance words ending in-tion, where Danish keeps the -tion ending and Norwegian has -sjon: international/internasjonal; chokolade/sjokolade (chocolate).

Tendencies:

  • D, G, B/ T, K, P: Danish tends to have much more D, G, and B’s (it could be compared to Spanish vs Italian I think?). bog/bok (book); nouns in -hed/het; at vide/å vite (to know); peberkager/pepperkaker (gingerbread). Swedish and Norwegian are usually more similar for what concerns this.
  • Norwegian got rid of many “unnecessary” letters (often D’s, G’s) to its pronounciation: at sige/å si (to say); vidste/visste (knew), sagde/sa, -ld, -nd endings trold/troll (troll); end/enn (than)
  • Æ frequence: Danish tends to have a lot more Æ, where Norwegian has a ‘simple’ E: næsten/nesten (almost); at tænke/å tenke (think). at hjælpe/ å hjelpe (help). Swedish usually has an Ä here: att hjälpa, nästan, att tänka.

To sum up:

  • Danish: øj, ld, nd, mig/dig; bog, kærlighed, mænd, legetøj, ud, chokolade, revolution
  • Norwegian: øy, kj, sj, meg/deg; bok, kjærlighet, menn, leketøy, ut, sjokolade, revolusjon

Norwegian could be further divided into Bokmål and Nynorsk, which are just two different ways to spell it. Bokmål “book language”, is fundamentally Danish with adjustments to the Norwegian language and the most widespread one, while Nynorsk “New Norwegian” was an attempt to create a more Norwegian-Norwegian, and it is more frequent in the west part of the country, used by about 12% of Norwegians. I won’t go into detail with Nynorsk, but ein, eit indicates Nynorsk, while en, et are Bokmål.

Icelandic vs Faroese

Faroese and Icelandic pronounciations contrast with their similar spelling, that is because Faroese was given an ethymological ortography to resemble its ancestor Old Norse. On top of that, Faroese adopted some words of Danish origin because of its history.

  • Þ/T: Only Icelandic has Þþ (þorn in Icelandic) which corresponds to English th in mouth, Icelandic words with Þ have T in Faroese: þú/tú (you); það/tað (it).
  • Ö/Ø: Icelandic uses ö while Faroese adopted ø.
  • Icelandic has accented E’s, É, not present in the Faroese alphabet: ég/eg (I).

Finnish: the outsider

As previously mentioned, Finnish is completely unrelated to the North Germanic family, it belongs to the Ugro-Finnic family and its closest language is Estonian.

some loanwords from Swedish:

  • katu – gata (street)
  • koulu – skola (school)
  • sokeri – soker (sugar)
  • tuoli – stol (chair)
  • suklaa – choklad (chocolate)
  • pankki – bank

Language comparison

SWEDISH-DANISH-NORWEGIAN ; ICELANDIC-FAROESE; FINNISH

  • THANKS: tack-tak-takk ; takk ; kiitos
  • TO HELP: att hjälpa-at hjælpe-å hjelpe ; að hjálpa ; autaa
  • SOMEONE: någon-nogen-noen ; einhver-onkur ; joku
  • TO SAY: att säga-at sige-å si ; að segja-at siga ; sanoa
  • APPLE: äpple-æble-eple ; epli; omena
  • WHAT: vad-hvad-hva ; hvað-hvat; mikä

Article 1 from the Universal Declaration of Human Rights :

  • Swedish: Alla människor är födda fria och lika i värde och rättigheter.
  • Danish: Alle mennesker er født frie og lige i værdighed og rettigheder. 
  • Norwegian bokmål: Alle mennesker er født frie og med samme menneskeverd og menneskerettigheter; Nynorsk: Alle menneske er fødde til fridom og med same menneskeverd og menneskerettar.
  • Faroese: Øll menniskju eru fødd fræls og jøvn til virðingar og mannarættindi.
  • Icelandic: Hver maður er borinn frjáls og jafn öðrum að virðingu og réttindum.
  • Finnish: Kaikki ihmiset syntyvät vapaina ja tasavertaisina arvoltaan ja oikeuksiltaan.

If you want to go even more in detail, you can check out this on mylanguagebreak.com, but my advice is to just expose yourself to the languages, and experience all the differences yourself. 🙂 Here you can briefly read about even more languages used in the Nordic countries.

if you want to see an even more succint summary of all this, you can check out my post on instagram.

💛💙❤️

Who are Greenlanders? 3 symbols of Greenlandic culture

Discover Greenland, home to the Inuit Kalaallit, and its most iconic aspects as its flag, language and folk costumes. The biggest island of the world has a rich history of indigenous culture intertwined with Norse colonization and later Danish rule.

Chiara's avatar by Chiara

New start & Languages

news about this blog: languages, new articles & a new look

After a long break, I decided to continue using this blog, (at least for now), even after the end of my school project, but with some changes, among which 2 or 3 new categories:

  • The most important news is that I will start writing about languages, focusing on nordic ones but not only, that also depends on the feedback i might get.
  • I will also add a new My journey, aka articles like this about what I am doing, maybe my progress with languages? And of course my trips, only one up to now (read below!).
  • The third possible category would be Fun Facts, that is to say weird/unusual things related to Nordic countries. For example a village in japan that is basically a copy of Sweden, and the shipwreck of a Venetian nobleman in Norway in the 1400s.. I will have to figure out if I can make illustrations for that though..

Changes:

  • I decided to use only English, the majority of people who might want to read it are not Italian, and if they are they speak English, so two languages just make the readability harder. (se qualcuno tiene a leggere i miei articoli in italiano mi contatti). I am still in the process to take parts in Italian out from older articles.
  • I changed the blog’s theme, it might still undergo minor changes, but after a few days working on it here and there I think I got a reasonably nice result, and definitely more functional than it used to be for people landing on it. take a look at it and let me know!
old layout

new layout

I will of course continue making informative articles about Nordic culture with illustrations and I’m already planning an article about guess what: my time in Denmark ❤️🇩🇰 I was in the countryside around Grenaa, although I never visited the centre, stupid me, and I quickly, very quickly explored Aarhus (When I wrote this article i had no idea I would se it in reality few month later), and I will just talk about my experience and culture facts.

I am planning an article for Astrid Lindgren‘s birthday as well (14th November), so I will see what happens

If you are curious to know what I will talk about in my new articles you can have a sneak peek on my Instagram. My first language article will be about telling apart the 6 languages spoken in the Nordic countries, then idioms, and whatever seems interesting (I am open to suggestions).

Chiara

17. Mai in Norway

17th May is Norway’s national day, in which parades are the central event

Known as Syttende Mai (17th May) is Norway’s Constitution Day, Grunnlovsdagen, the most important day in Norway, characterized by parades, a sea of flags everywhere and people wearing the Norwegian folk costume, the Bunad. It is commonly called Norway’s birthday!

On this day the Constitution was signed at Eidsvoll in 1814, declaring Norway as an independent kingdom after being continuosly handed over from and to Sweden and Denmark. Celebrations began among students despite Norway still being in an union with Sweden. WW2 ended in Norway nine days before that year’s Constitution Day, and this strengthened the meaning of 17. mai!

Parades (17. mai-tog)

Norway’s national day is also called “Barnas dag” (children’s day). Each elementary school district arranges its own parade with marching bands. In 1864 the first children’s parade was launched in Oslo, but only with boys until 1899. The parades are, in order:

  • senior school children carrying the school’s official banner
  • others carrying full-size Norwegian flags;
  • the school’s marching band;
  • the rest of the children follow with hand-sized flags, and often self-made banners for each class.

The parade often stops at homes of senior citizens and war memorials. Kindergartens and bystanders often join in behind the parade as it passes.

songs about the celebration of the National Dayare sung, and the parade is concluded with the national anthem Ja, vi elsker dette landet, and the royal anthem Kongesangen. At the end, The children shout “Hurra!”. All parades begin or end with speeches. Both grown-ups and older children are invited to speak. After the parades, there are games for the children: sekkeløp (sack race) and potetløp (egg & spoon race) are two classics.

Norway’s birthday is the day on which children are allowed to eat as much ice cream as they please! Popular snacks are pølser (hotdogs), barbecue, waffles. Food with colors of the Norwegian flags is of course a must.

Other parades

Parades for the public, Borgertog, where everybody is welcome to join in. They are led by marching bands and often local boy scouts, local choirs, NGOs, sport associations and firefighters. The borgertog take place in the early morning or in the afternoon, before or after the school’s parade.

The Russ, graduating class of the videregående (high school),celebrate 17 May with their own parades in Norwegian streets later in the day, usually around 4 or 5 pm, on a Russebuss, a party bus, highlight of Norwegian graduation traditions…

Celebrations in Norwegian cities

The longest parade is in Oslo, broadcasted on tv. It includes around 100 schools, marching bands, and passes the royal palace where the royal family greet the people from the main balcony. In the municipality of Asker, near Oslo, the children gather outside the residence of the Crown Prince in the morning.

Bergen has its own traditions for the parade, including comic troupes, various local organisations, a children’s parade, and the buekorps

In Stavanger international schools arrange parades with flags from many countries and an international parties. the British school started it in the 1970s, followed up by the Dutch school and the American school.

Kristiansand, is known for the conclusion of the National Day with running through the city centre (“Tapto”) and spectacular fireworks. A trad jazz band plays until midnight in front of the Christiansholm Fortress.

17 MAI IN THE WORLD

Norwegian seamen churches (sjømannskirken) and Norwegian heritage associations organise 17 mai parades, Norwegian church service, and celebrate the day in parks, with typical Norwegian food and music.

AMERICA

In the United States and Canada, the local lodges of the Sons of Norway often play a central part in organizing the festivities, attended by people with Norwegian ancestry, common in the mid-western USA.

  • Chicago – holds a three-day 17 mai celebration
  • New York City – has had a 17 mai parade since 1952.
  • Petersburg, Alaska a.k.a. “Little Norway”: has a festival the weekend around 17 May, including Vikings and Valkyries.
  • Since 1969, the city of Westby, western Wisconsin has a four-day festival
  • Seattle and Salt Lake City, Utah also have 17 mai celebrations with parades, folk dancing and luncheons.

EUROPE

  • Stockholm has the biggest 17 mai parade outside Norway – ending at Skansen, where you can get waffles, coffee and hot dogs!
  • 17 May in London is celebrated every year in Southwark Park. Games, live music, and a parade from the Norwegian church to the park are in the programme
  • In Orkney/Shetland (Scotland) 17 May is celebrated as the islands used to be part of the Norwegian kingdom. Orkney holds a parade, and children are invited to bring their Norway and Orkney flags.

GRATULERER MED DAGEN! Happy birthday Norway!

Who are the Sámi? – The indigenous people of Scandinavia and their history

The indigenous people of North Scandinavia & 6th February

February 6th is, other than my birthday, Sámi people’s National Day.

The Sámi – also spelled Saami – are an indigenous people inhabiting Sápmi, which today encompasses large northern parts of Norway, Sweden, Finland and Russia. The Sámi have historically been known as Lapps or Laplanders, but these terms are usually regarded as offensive. There are about 100,000 Sámi people, divided by the borders of 4 states: Norway (ca. 60.000), Sweden (30.000), Finland (8.000) and Russia (2.000).

The Sami are well known for their traditional occupation of reindeer herding: around 10% of Sámi practice reindeer herding nowadays, which in some parts of the Nordic countries can be practiced only by Sámis.

Sami people mantain a strong cultural identity while being citizens of their countries, from languages – which are related to Finnish – to traditional clothing and a Sami flag.

Sami people of Norway, Sweden, and Finland also reunite in Sami parliaments of each country since the late 20th century, and have a joint Saami Council. The first meeting of Sami across borders in 1917 became Sami national Day, on 6th February.

After religious missions and colonisation of Northern Scandinavia, Sami people were subject to discriminization and forced assimilation – from prohibiting them to enter territories to the south in Sweden or buying land in Norway, to the Systematic Norwegianization in the 1860s.

The majority of the Sámi now speak the majority languages of the countries they live in and all Sámi languages are at some degree of endangerment.

Sámi languages had been illegal for centuries in Sweden and Norway, with assimilation policies and special residential schools (similarly to what happened in North America with indigenous people). This left many with traumas, not speaking Sámi languages to children as a way to protect them.

This started to change with laws, the funding of Sami parliaments, and recognization of Sami as indigenous people of Scandinavia, giving them the right to education in their language. Despite this, most Sami languages are endangered

Recommendations

  • the movie Sameblod, or Same Blood in English (2016), directed my Amanda Kernell. It is set in Sweden in the 1930s and concerns a 14-year-old girl who experiences prejudice at a nomad school for Sami children, and decides to escape her town and disavow her Sami heritage. Parts of the story are inspired by Kernell’s own grandmother.
  • books by Ann-Elen Laestadius: Stöld (stolen is the English title- with a Netflix adaption from 2021 as well), Straff (punished in English)
  • Sami singers: Jarnna (their Nilas jojk was my favourite song to calm down in an incredibl stressing period), Jon Henrik, Elin Oskal

Sources :

  • Samiskeveivisere.no – Samer og nordmenn i Norge – Samiske Veivisere
  • Store Norske Leksikon – snl.no/samer
  • sametinget.no
  • samer.se
  • YLE’s Say it in Saami quick guide to Saami culture

the MOOMINS

The Moomins, created by Tove Jansson, are the most famous and beloved Finnish characters, First appeared in books, then animated series. Still immensely popular in the Nordic region and Japan, they are feature in countless merchandise items, especially mugs!

The Moomins are a family of hippo-looking characters, created by Swedish-speaking Finnish illustrator Tove Jansson, who created Moomins during the Second World War, as ‘an escape from reality in a fairytale world’. Moomins are still incredibly popular in Nordic countries, and are often used as a Finnish cultural symbol.

moomin books mug tissues

Tove Jansson wrote and illustrated several books and strips between 1945 and 1980, which got translated into 38 languages.
The first animated series is from 1969, but the most popular is from the 90s, and the most recent is from the 2020s.
Other series were made with puppets and cutouts. and there’s even a Moomin opera! Here’s the Moomin timeline.

Moomin Characters

The core family of the moomins is Moomin himself muumipeikko in Finnish, and his parents, Moominmamma and Moominpappa, live in their iconic cylindric blue house (for a while they lived in a lighthouse and a theatre too). But the ‘family’ is not limited to them, and has incorporated other members:

Moomin Pixel art I made!
  • the fearful Sniff
  • the naughty Little My, who teaches that being angry is okay too, sometimes.
  • Moomintroll’s girlfriend Snork Maiden,
  • the vagabond and freedom lover Snufkin, an artist soul,connected to a typical Finnish feeling of melancholy and solitude

Other characters who often appear are:

  • the bossy and stubborn Hemulens and the anxious Fillyjonk, representing the petty bourgeoisie of the time when Tove invented the Moomin world
  • the wise and pragmatic Too-Ticky,
  • Mymla, Little My’s big sister.
  • To the east borders of Moomin Valley there are lonely mountains (Ensliga Bergen), a mysteryous place where the monster Groke lives, who freezes everything she walks on and is hard to communicate with.

Many characters are actually invented after people from Tove Jansson’s life, as her parents , Too Ticky – her partner Tuulikki Pietilä.

Letters i decorated with Moomin art.

Life in the peaceful Moomin world is often about enjoying small pleasures, as Moomin says:

I only want to live in peace and plant potatoes and dream!‘

‘One can’t be too dangerous, if they like to eat pancakes. Especially with jam on it’.

Moomin in Finland

Moomins are still incredibly popular and easy to find in Finland: on Fazer candy and cookies, on finnish postage stamps (since 1988)… but the most classic item to own is probably moomin mugs: produced by Arabia since the 1950s.
You can even fly on a Moomin FINNAIR plane, which of course fly to Japan.

moomin mugs shop
moomin fazer candy

Most Finns (and maybe Swedes or other Nordic peoples as well) have some kind of Moomin object. Even the former Finnish President Tarja Halonen has been known to wear a Moomin watch!

spot the moomins inside this Swedish house!

If you travel to Finland, you can also visit some Moomin-themed attractions:

  • Moomin World theme park (in Finnish Muumimaailma) in Naantali, near Turku, in 1993.
  • Tampere Art Museum has a Moomin section: Muumimuseo, which contains around 2000 original works of Tove Jansson, including a model of the Moominhouse, which Tove Jansson contributed to build.
  • Moomin ice cave is a 30 meters below of a Spa Hotel near Kuopio, it includes Moomin-themed ice sculptures, and offers activities for families with children.

Moomin shops, cafes and attractions in the world

The real Moomin Boom started in the 1990s, with the Japanese animated series Tales From Moominvalley. Moomin books were already bestsellers in Nordic and Baltic countries, but the animation made Moomin extremely popular in Japan among others.

Japan has a Moomin-themed park since 2015: MoominValley Park, in the prefecture of Saitama, near Tokyo.

Besides Moomin shops in Nordic countries (I have been in the Gothenburg one, Sweden), there are quite a few in Asia (most in Japan, but also Korea, Thailand, China and Hong Kong), and there is one in the USA, but not NYC or LA – in Hawaii! Not surprisingly due to the Japanese tourists…

lamp and glass bought in Gothenburg, Sweden
Moomin corner of ArOS art museum in Aarhus, Denmark.
moomin gacha gacha japan
Japanese gacha-gacha moomin!

Moomin themed-cafes are very popular in East Asian countries: other than in Finland various pop-up cafes have appeared now and then in Japan, Hong Kong, Thailand, South Korea and Taiwan.
You could eat a moomin shaped meal in front of a giant moomin character plush there! Moomin Cafes.

You can check out all currently open Moomin shops, attractions and cafes on Moomin official website.

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7 fun facts about Lucia, Sweden’s pagan saint

Lucia brings light in the darkest night of the year and is a mix of pagan and christian traditions. It is celebrated in Scandinavia with processions, saffron buns and church concerts.

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Puffins: Iceland & Faroe’s mascot

The lovely sea parrot living around the North Atlantic coasts, symbol of Iceland and the Faroe Islands.

The Atlantic puffin (Fratercula arctica), Lundi in Icelandic and Faroese, is a species of seabird in the auk family. The Atlantic puffin moves to North Atlantic coasts in summer and breeds in Iceland, the Faroe Islands, the Shetland and Orkney Islands, Norway, Greenland, Newfoundland and Labrador, and as far south as Maine in the west and Britain in the east. More than 90% of the global population is found in Europe  and colonies in Iceland alone are home to 60% of the world’s Atlantic puffins, in particular Westman islands (Vestmannaeyjar).

Cutouts from magazines, I can’t resist to puffin pictures!

The generic name Fratercula comes from the Medieval Latin fratercula, “friar”, a reference to the black and white plumage which resembles monastic robes. The vernacular name “puffin” comes from puffed in the sense of swollen. The striking appearance, large colourful bill, waddling gait, and behaviour of this bird have given rise to nicknames such as “clown of the sea” and “sea parrot”.

The beak is the most distinctive feature. From the side, it is broad and triangular, but viewed from above, it is narrow. The half near the tip is orange-red, yellow, and blue-greyish. A puffin beak can contain 12 up to 18 fish at once! The Atlantic puffin is sturdily built with a thick-set neck and short wings and tail. It is about 30 cm and weighs 400-600 g.

Traditions in Iceland and Faroe Islands

A tradition exists on the Icelandic island of Heimaey (part of Westman islands) for the children to rescue young puffins, a fact recorded in Bruce McMillan’s photo-illustrated children’s book Nights of the Pufflings (1995). The fledglings emerge from the nest and try to make their way to the sea, but sometimes get confused, perhaps by the street lighting, ending up by landing in the village. The children collect them and liberate them to the safety of the sea.

Palli the Puffin greeting travellers coming to Iceland in Reykjavik airport (picture by Mundi Lundi, page about a puffin who was found injured in the Icelandic capital and the nursed back to health)
Faroe islands 1978 postal stamp by Holger Philipsen

Puffins have been hunted by man since time immemorial, coastal communities and island dwellers with few natural resources at their disposal didn’t have much else to hunt besides fish and seabirds.

They are still caught and eaten in Iceland and the Faroe Islands A typical device used in the Faroes to catch them was a fleyg. This was a long pole with a neton the end. a skilled hunter could gather 200–300 in a day!

Puffins in logos and symbols

  • The Norwegian island municipality of Værøy, part of the Lofoten, has an Atlantic puffin as its civic emblem.
  • the name of the island of Lundy (UK) might come from Norse lund-ey or “puffin island”. The Vikings might have found the island a useful refuge and restocking point after their depredations on the mainland . The island issued its own coins, and in 1929, its own stamps with denominations in “puffins”.
  • The paperbook publisher Penguin Books introduced a range of books for children under the Puffin Books brand in 1939. The demand was so great that a children’s magazine called Puffin Post was established, Puffin Post.

Puffin characters in pop culture

  • The Swan Princess -Puffin
  •  Madagascar – Hans
  • Happy Feet 2 – Sven is a puffin who pretends to be a penguin
  • Puffin Rock – A Netflix original cartoon about the puffin Oona and her little brother Baba

Icelandic and Faroese mascotte in the world

Puffins are often used to promote these Nordic islands, ICELAND MARKET in Nagoya, Japan, still has puffins in its logo and gadgets in what used to be its cafe, proudly representing Iceland.

FRAMTAK, a Faroese site, now inactive, promotes the Nordic archipelago and has a section with comics about Ludvík Lundi (“the puffin with glasses”), ideal if you want to practice Faroese!

Puffins in danger

In most countries, Atlantic puffins are now protected by legislation, and in the countries where hunting is still permitted, strict laws prevent overexploitation, but calls have been made for an outright ban on hunting them in Iceland because of concern over the rapid and ongoing population decline in its European range especially since 2000. In 2015, the status of this species was upgraded from “least concern” to “vulnerable”.  Some of the causes of population decline may be increased predation by gulls and skuas, the introduction of rats, cats, dogs, and foxes onto some islands used for nesting, contamination by toxic residues, drowning in fishing nets, and climate change.  Based on current trends, the European population will decline an estimated 50–79% between 2000 and 2065.

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Nordic findings in japan

Nordic culture experienced in Japan: Moomins, Dala horse stationery, Nordic-inspired foods and books about Scandinavia seen by the Japanese.

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How Nordic are Baltic countries

Are Baltic countries Nordic at all? I explored Latvia and Estonia, noting their ties to Nordic culture, from languages to Rye bread and Midsummer.

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Scandinavian Christmas: symbols, sweets and gift bringers

Nordic Christmas, or Yule, means among others flag tree decorations, a pinwheel-shaped pastry, and gnomes.

Nordic countries share quite a lot Christmas customs and symbols, whether it is Christmas tree decorations, gnomes and elves instead of Santa Claus, and of course spiced cookies. Let’s see what a Scandinavian Christmas looks like!

1. Scandinavian Santa Claus: Gnomes and pixies

In Sweden and Norway it is a Santa Claus-like gnome bringing presents: Jultomte in Sweden and Julenisse. According to the tradition it lives in farms and takes care of the household while the family is sleeping, Bringing presents if the family treated him and the farm animals well. In Norway, an adult disguises himself as Julenisse and gives out presents to children, often greeting them by saying Er det noen snille barn her? (“is there any good child here?”).

In Denmark Julemanden (literally Christmas man) arrives on a sleigh with reindeers and has elves as helpers, Julenisser or just Nisser, who are believed to live in barns and attics. Children leave rice pudding for the Nisser, who find it delicious accoring to popular belief. In the Faroe islands it is called Jólamaðurin.

Initially the gift bringer was the Julbocken/Julebukk goat mentioned above, so in Finnish Santa Claus is called Joulupukki…

2. Christmas Decorations: straw goats, pleated hearts and flags

Yule Goat: A common Christmas symbol and decoration is a straw goat, Julbocken/Julebukk, often put under the Christmas tree. It goes back to the Viking times and it was a household protector, representing Thor’s magical goats, who lead him in the night sky. Bigger versions can be found in town centres – this tradition started in the Swedish town of Gävle in the 60s, and every year this traditions is repeated with a Julbock as tall as around 10 metres.

Things to hang on the tree

Julehjerter are pleated hearts, very common and in Denmark and Norway (Norwegians call them Juletrekurv “Christmas tree baskets”), but also present in other Nordic countries as a typical Christmas symbol. Children make them with their family with paper of different colours, although they are often red and white.

Flag garlands: Decorating Christmas trees with flags originated in Denmark and it can be seen in all Nordic countries, although it was more common in the mid-20th Century. A survey showed that one in three Norwegians thinks flag garlands are suitable Christmas tree decorations, while only 3 % and 5 % is of the same opinion in Sweden and Finland. Nonetheless, I bought a Christmas tree flag ornament in Sweden…

3. Christmas treats: spiced cookies to rice porridge

  • Baking gingerbread cookies is a typical Christmas time family activity: Pepparkakor in Swedish, Pepperkaker in Norwegian and Peberkager in Danish, piparkakut in Finnish.
  • Hiding an almond in rice porridge with a prize for who finds it is a common things in Nordic countries. in Sweden the rice pudding is called risgrysgröt. In Denmark you have the Risalamande (from French ris à l’amande, just because French sounded fancy), It is served cold with a warm cherry sauce, kirsebærsovs. The lucky person who finds the entire almond in it wins a marzipan pig!
  • Lussekatter are Swedish saffron pastries, typically eaten for Lucia.
  • Joulutorttu, a Finnish pastry filled with plum or apple jam.
  • Æbleskiver are Danish fried snacks, round and often served with jam and powder sugar. The name literally means “apple slices”, although apples are usually not an ingredient!
  • Kransekake, Norwegian and Danish almond cookie rings, commonly eaten on festive occasions.

Mulled wine, glögg, is a classic, with spices as cinnamon, cardamom and ginger, but you can also drink Chistmas beer! It is darker and spicier than the usual ones.

God Jul!

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velkommen, välkommen, tervetuloa, velkomin

Why I started this blog and what I will do with it

    I am Chiara B., 22, I opened this blog as a university project, choosing as topic one of my passions: Nordic cultures, uniting them with my illustrations. Ever since i was a child i have always had a fascination for North Europe, to the point that I started to self study Swedish when i was 19 in my last school year, after having studied other 3 foreign languages for 5 years. I did not know much more than the average person about Nordic cultures at the time, just about Pippi, IKEA, and Danish cookies and a couple words.

    sketch done with markers

    While learning Swedish I also got closer to the culture, as it is natural to do, and I recently started dabbling in Danish and Norwegian as well. One of the few perks of the pandemic was having the time to start studying Icelandic and Finnish, despite having a long way to go I definitely cherish doing this! I will use this blog to write about traditions, places and iconic things of Nordic countries i learned about throughout the years, making an illustration everytime!

    NU KÖR VI! (Here we go!)