Clustered
around the head of the 68-mile-long Oslofjord, Oslo is probably the most
spacious city in the world. Its 175-square-mile metropolitan area
consists of over 75 percent forests and five percent water. Its fine
deep harbor, Pipervika, stretches into the heart of the city and from it
leave ferries to Denmark and Germany.
Icelanders eat a lot of fish and lamb. Fishermen
catch fresh haddock, cod, plaice, halibut, herring, and shrimp all
year round while sheep roam the grass-covered hillsides. In
addition, many farmers raise chickens, ducks, and turkeys.
Traditionally, an Icelander’s diet consisted of variations of the
two previous staples, plus potatoes, canned or frozen vegetables,
but over the years has expanded to include many other Scandinavian
and European dishes.
Today, Icelandic owes much to traditional Scandinavian and European
cuisines. One of the delicacies of Icelanic cuisine is salmon,
served in many forms, one of the most popular being gravlax, a form
of marination. Besides many varieties of fish, Icelanders eat
potatoes and vegetables grown in greenhouses heated by the natural
steam from geysers. Specialities include hangikjot (smoked lamb
eaten in sandwiches), skyr (a delicious high-protein yogurt-like
substance), and hardfiskur (protein-filled dried fish strips).
But Icelandic food isn’t all protein filled. Icelanders also like
their sweets---chocolate and licorice or the popular combination of
both, as well as opal candies and snudur, frosted pastries. During
the holiday season, they also enjoy jolaol (orange soda mixed with
malt) and some laufabraud, homemade fried flat bread.
Iceland offers wide varieties of traditional cuisine. Þorramatur,
meaning food of the þorri, is the Icelandic national food. Today,
Icelanders eat þorramatur mostly during the ancient Nordic month of
þorri, in January and February, as a tribute to old culture.
Þorramatur consists of many different types of food, such as rotten
shark, sour ram's testicles, blood pudding, burned sheep heads,
sheep's head jam, dried cod or haddock with butter and many other
courses considered delicious among many Icelanders.
Every year about 95 000 people die in
Sweden and, according to the law, everyone must be buried. There must be
room for everyone in the cemeteries, therefore the future needs of space
have to be predicted. Because of this funerals must be part of the
planning process.
In
the early Middle Ages, driven by famine at home and the promise of
wealth to be had in other lands, the Vikings set out from Scandinavia to
conquer parts of England, Ireland, France, Russia, and even Turkey.
Bolstered by their successes, the Vikings pushed westward, eventually
crossing the North Atlantic and founding settlements in Iceland,
Greenland, and Newfoundland in Canada. Read
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