Peacefully progressive Oslo | Canada.Com

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On one of my many visits to Oslo I was surprised by how peaceful the city felt. It seemed a world away from the shock and anguish that accompany 24-hour news here in the United States.

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I couldn’t help but take notes: parents park their strollers on the sidewalk while they abandon their babies for a few moments to go into a store to do some shopping. In the city center, with practically no traffic, you can hear the birds. And when you see a car, it is usually electric (the best-selling car in Norway is the Tesla). A “congestion charge” keeps most cars away from the city center. And where traffic used to clog the harbor front, a tunnel takes cars under the city instead of through it.

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Coincidental memories I have from my childhood visits, in the harbor I saw a weather-beaten sailor standing at the stern of his ship. He hoped to sell before sunset the last shrimp he had caught before dawn. Across the pedestrian boulevard, the former yellow train station is now the Nobel Peace Center, explaining the vision of a man who dedicated the wealth he earned to inventing dynamite to honor peacemakers. Nearby, the brick Town Hall, where the prize is awarded, is decorated with statues glorifying noble workers and towers above the action of the port.

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In the light fog that is common in the mornings here, the solid promenade facing the city’s harbor shines as if it were happy to be the city’s dance floor. On this visit I stood on the sidelines of the scene and marveled at seeing a hundred Norwegians swing dancing to a disc jockey under an umbrella in what seemed like a microcosm of a contented society. They were mainly American-style two-steps with old songs recorded: familiar melodies with unfamiliar Norwegian lyrics.

Every time I come to Norway, I am fascinated by its experiment in big government. My friends here like to tell me why they don’t care about their high taxes. For example, everyone loves November. It’s “half a month of taxes,” when the government wants people to have some extra money for the next vacation.

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Coming out of the pandemic, the Nordic countries experienced a baby boom, even as birth rates fell in many other countries. Strong social safety nets in the Nordic countries, along with tax incentives for newborns, are likely the key reasons. In Norway, parental leave is very generous. Families get up to 12 months of leave at 80 percent pay. While mom and dad can split the leave however they want, men should take at least a month of paid paternity leave when their baby arrives.

With each visit I also notice much less smoke. I remember a time decades ago when tobacco smoke was a real problem for American travelers in Europe. Then Italy and Ireland quit smoking… and so did Scandinavia. Today, much of Europe is as smoke-free as the United States. There is clean air for everyone in Norway’s bars, restaurants, cafes and trains.

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I visited one of Oslo’s infamous old “brown cafes,” so named for their smoke-stained interiors. Of course, no one has smoked in here for a long time. Nowadays, Norwegian restaurants and bars are routinely equipped with blankets so that those who still smoke can do so outdoors, even in the cold season. To consume nicotine internally, locals use snuff (snus in Norwegian). Men will notice that small packets of spent chewing tobacco accumulate in the urinals here where cigarette butts once piled up.

When the sun rises, Oslo’s parks are packed, filled with the joy of families barbecuing on a disposable aluminum pan filled with charcoal called an engangsgrill (single-use grill). American visitors will also notice a lot of nudity, mainly topless women and naked children. Parents let their kids play naked in city parks and fountains, and it’s really no big deal.

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Scandinavia has a casual approach to nudity, and I’m not just talking about co-ed saunas (which are common throughout Europe). Many Americans are surprised by what is broadcast on prime-time television. My friend told me that Norway has co-ed PE classes where boys and girls shower together since first grade. In Norwegian hospitals, he told me, women who need an X-ray are casually sent from the doctor’s office down the hall, past the waiting public, to the X-ray room after stripping to the waist. “No one notices and no one cares,” he said. Scandinavians are quick to point out the irony that while much of America is nervous about a teacher showing his students a photo of Michelangelo’s naked David, it is America that statistically has the biggest crime problem. related to sex.

Travel makes it clear that there is more than one way to live life. That’s one of the reasons I keep traveling.

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