Svalbard! Svalbard is a Norwegian archipelago found at 78°N, halfway between Oslo and the North Pole.  It is cold, rocky, desolate, and populated with more polar bears than people.  It is home to 2,600 inhabitants, 2,100 of which live in Longyearbyen, the administrative center and the world’s northernmost settlement of more than 100 people.  Very rarely […]

Many months ago, in early autumn, we were afraid of the winter.  Self-deprecating Norwegians were worried about us — surely, we would find Trondheim cold, dark, wet, and depressing, and we would absolutely need to get away in February to somewhere warm and sunny.  This turned out to not be true; we’re loving the winter, and […]

This blog post comes on request from my college roommate Susan Bean, who sent the following inquiry: Hello friend!! So I got a fascinating question yesterday from [another friend]. Apparently she heard recently from a friend that in Scandinavian countries it is normal to leave babies outside in the winter for naptime because the cold […]

The Winter Olympics, which are awesome, open a week from tomorrow.  Most of the time, NBC focuses on sports that have tricks and judges, like figure skating.  This is unfortunate, because figure skating is some repetitive and boring nonsense.  Snowboarding’s even worse, in that it’s repetitive and boring, but also trying really hard to be […]