Some cultural observations part 1

Living in Norway has a foreigner I can't help but notice things that are different compared to Germany. It makes me think about my own culture, too, about what is typical German and what is part of my own family culture (eventhough ancestor-wise my family is completely German, in our behavior and traditions we are not...) . I am sure when we move to Germany, it will be the same for Erlend....
Anyways, I just wanted to write a bit about things I have found so far, it is not that much, hence the "part 1" in the title. So here we go:


Norwegian last names are often the place where one is from. (like Røsvik is a part on the island we are living on)

My mother-in-law told me that people even use to change their last name when they moved somewhere else. Other commen last names are names such as Andersen, Petersen, Larsen and so on, with comes from son of Anders, son of Peter, son of Lars, you see a pattern? Yeah.
I concluded from this that it is very important here where you are from or who your family is.

That made me think about German last name and I realised that a lot of German last names like Müller, Schmidt, Bauer....have to do with professions, they tell others what you do.
It does seem very important to Germans what kind of job you have. In no other country that I have been to, it was as important as it seems to be to the Germans, to get an education, a degree of some sort. If you compare it to Norway again, here it is (from what I heard) not as important which education level you have, as long as you make a lot of money :-).

Oh yeah, and using that smile face reminds me of something else.

Norwegians use smiley faces excessively! Erlend told me that according to a survey, a lot of Norwegians consider it rude to not use smiley faces in, for example, text messages.
So if I use a lot of smiley faces in the future, it is only because I am adapting to a new culture and because I want you to know that I am not mad or sad but happy while I am writing :-)!

Okay, sunday dinner, cooked by the parents-in-law is almost done, so this is it for today!
Have a nice sunday y'all :-)!