The saddest part about this is I actually thought you were being serious up until the second paragraph, all because there are people in this country who actually talk about the US like this.

From your article: “Norway is currently one of Europe’s least overweight countries, with men ranking 20th out of the 34 European and Former Soviet Union countries surveyed, and women ranking 25th”

There have been a few studies in Sweden – or was it Finland, I don’t quite remember – that indicate fewer hours lead to higher productivity. Please correct me if I’m wrong, but Scandinavian countries are generally on the upper lot of the productivity scale, with high-end technology as mentioned in the blog post. I’d appreciate it if you specified what you mean by “extremely slow”.

I don’t mean to be rude or anything, but learning a little about local culture & some of the language is key if you objectively have the goal of living/working in a foreign country. While I do not agree with smearing someone’s dignity because of their origin, it’s certainly nice to show that you’re willing to give & learn in order to earn something. I hope you don’t take this as an offence though. Best of luck.

Listen: God don’t make mistakes, and neither does Merica! You may not understand her motives right now, but just give it another couple decades and you’ll see! We may all be broke from our medical system, useless foreign wars, and our unwillingness to tax the rich, but give it time baby! Papa Merica is just getting warmed up. Just wait for that sweet sweet trickle down economics. Oh man when that comes in, you’ll wish you lived in America!!!

USA! USA! USA! USA! USA!

I feel that this is going too far in the opposite direction.

Growing up in the US, we are often told that you should always be 10-15 early for an appointment. Having lived in Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg and Germany and now Norway, I learned that in these cultures showing up too early is considered just as much of a fault as showing up too late because you’re catching your hosts off guard or hijacking time previously reserved for something or someone else.

In Germanic cultures, being punctual means simply that: showing up precisely when you are expected. Not earlier, not later; on the dot. And yes, there’s definitely an art to that 🙂

Obviously with any job that is in the public sector, the working language here is norwegian, although I have several kind colleagues who will also speak english to me at time.

It was pretty scary the first few months (I’d only been in Norway and learning the language for 10 months) and also very, very tiring to have to concentrate so much on language every day but i’m now coming up to 18 months working here and in fact im now finding the working environment is much more relaxed than I was used to before!

The last tip I would give to anyone seeking work here is that it helps massively if you have a referral from a local. Join clubs, get out there and talking to people, everything helps!

I have always hated the name Tom. Now I know why. It always feels like a short, rude and frustrated person. Why the hard feelings?

Of course you are
…and…
No