This is actually something I have been thinking about for years. Now it is no longer just a hypothetical question but an actual issue that needs to be addressed so I thought I would throw this one out there. An appropriate question for the Women's Day. What is the modern day princess?

We have all seen them. Little cute girls dressed up in pink, frilly dresses with tiaras dreaming about being princesses. When someone gives
birth to a little girl people congratulate you with the "little princess". You go to the bookstores and you see the girl section full of pink princess stories. Pretty much everywhere where there is a girl section it is filled with overly pink Disney princesses.

A little princess in the street of Funchal, Madeira

I however don't think the princess concept is appropriate in today's society where we are supposed to be equal to men. It is an outdated image of a pretty helpless princess waiting for just one thing. A handsome, rich prince that comes and marries her. We actually have another name for it these days. We call it a golddigger. The hidden feminist in me gets a mild heart attack at the thought of Silja having these kinds of dreams.

It is much easier with little boys. They dream about being Spiderman or Batman or whatever superhero-man is popular at that time. Much easier to explain to them that they aren't real when the time is right for proper dreams. Princesses, however do exist in real life. Most of them inherit their position or marry into it. One might think that the princess image could be helped by the Norwegian princess Märtha Louise that partially renounced her title and started her own business adventures. Except that her money making scheme is to trick gullible people into believing in angels. Yes you read this right ANGELS! Not exactly a healthy role model there.

So isn't it about time that the princess ideal gets replaced with something else that is a better role model? Someone that has a respectable spot in society earned through hard work and kindness? It needs to be someone with visibility in media but is there any such person out there? The people in media are scandalous movie or music celebrities, politicians that have barely held a real job in their life, career women that have inherited their empires from their fathers, and other ruthless business women? Why are there so few women that have accomplished thing in their life on their own without coming across as brutal? I know they are out there but I still can't think of a single one that could act as a princess substitute.

Princess candidates? I think not!

I guess we could invent a hard working woman that got herself an education and a job, worked hard and got promoted, and maybe even started her own company. She would exercise and eat healthy because that weak princess on the pea concept got to go as well. She then finds a guy that does half of the house work and supports her with her career. No Cinderella dreams for her, she goes out and gets the things that she wants!

The problem is that I can't really see her wearing a pink frilly dress and I can't really see little girls being excited about going to costume parties wearing a little business suit with a laptop bag instead of a tiara. I seem to run into a dead end everywhere.

So does anyone have any ideas who the modern day princess could be? Someone that is successful, visible, and could at least pull off wearing a pink dress on an occasion?

From What Europeans think of each other

In Heaven…
the mechanics are German
the chefs are French
the police are British
the lovers are Italian
and everything is organized by the Swiss.

In Hell…
the mechanics are French
the police are German
the chefs are British
the lovers are Swiss
and everything is organized by the Italians.

It is an interesting read about what different European nationalities think about each other :) .

Ever since I spent some hours at the Paris airports I haven't been able to forget about lines and how rude the French were sneaking in line. It wasn't really the first time this happens either. The same thing happened while waiting at the airport in Iceland few years ago. A bus full of French people barged ahead of us and conveniently didn't understand a word of English (or sign/pointing language) when you tried to point out to them that there was a line. I remember being furious and daydreaming about kicking one of the lady long time afterward, but that is another story :) .

I have been wondering how someone can actually be so horribly self-centered to think they have the right to getting ahead of people that were there before them? During lunch we discussed this a bit but there were no conclusions. Up until now I simply thought people that snug in lines were rare, rude, ignorant, self-absorbed bastards but now I have started doubting my belief. I cannot remember when I learned to stand in line but I can remember it as far back as I can remember. There was never any question, you either get there early or waited your turn. I would feel horrible pangs of guilt if I tried to sneak in line. I don't understand how anyone can do it on purpose...

That lead me to explore the option whether these people were simply so absent minded that they sneak in line unintentionally? I have seen that happen at the canteen when people are busy talking they sometimes accidentally skip a spot or two. I might have done this myself at some point. But the airport cases can't have been accidental. There was pushing and obvious sneaking. Do those people feel it is their right, that they are more important than the people in front of them? Or does the concept of lines not exist in some countries? I have heard rumors of such things, but I cannot for the life of me imagine how things can function there. It must be a major disadvantage to be polite and proper there.

Does anyone reading this come from a non-line culture society that can shed some light on this before I either got nuts, or back to thinking the French are the rudest people on Earth? :)

While I am at it, can anyone teach me how to say, "I was here first, please get to the back of the line" in French? Oh, and maybe to add "you asshole" in case the first one doesn't work well enough?

In Iceland a duvet is called "sæng". In Norway a "seng" is a bed.



In Iceland a mattress is called "dýna". In Norway a "dyne" is a duvet.



In Iceland a room is called "herbergi". In Norway a "herberg" is a hostel



In Iceland a bed is called "rúm". In Norway a "rom" is a room.



You can imagine that this has been the source of some confusion. In pure protest, I talked about lying under the mattress for a while. It seems to be sinking in though:-).

I wrote about Jennifer Smith last week. A girl that was kidnapped at the age of 14, kept hostage in a brothel for six years or until a man she later marries saves her.

I got one good comment to my blog entry which said many interesting and intelligent things. Not surprisingly it said pretty much what I had expected. The comment brings out the important fact that there would be a lot of emotions involved so it is difficult to predict the exact outcome but the general theme in the comment was compassion for the girl.

My simple prediction doesn't involve too many emotional details. I would think that if I were Jennifer's parents I would be overjoyed and try to do everything in my power to help her get back on track with her life and to help her heal her wounds. In addition, I would make sure that the police made sure the people responsible were punished. If I were the police I would do anything in my power to make sure they get the punishment they deserve. In the shoes of John Wilson's family, I might be a bit more skeptical. I would probably worry that she has gone through too many difficult things to be able to give my beloved son a happy life. At the same time I think I would think it was romantic (after I got over the shock that my son had been in a brothel that is). So some skepticism, lots of relief and happiness and enormous anger towards the criminals.

Now what if I told you that Jennifer couldn't go back to her family and even had to hide from them because they want kill her? What if I would tell you that the police is trying to send Jennifer back to the brothel since the brothel owner pretends that he was married to Jennifer? And that John Wilson's family isn't much more helpful and that his brother-in-law is threatening to divorce his sister just because of this. Sounds like bullshit doesn't it?

Unfortunately, the girl I have been calling Jennifer is really Aisha Parveen and John Wilson is Akram. They are live in Pakistan where traditions are drastically different from what we know.

The worst is to read about this and know that there is nothing that you can do to help her. Such cruelty towards a young girl which has been kidnapped and abused is incomprehensible. The entire story is sad and cruel but the biggest monster in my minds are her family. How is it possible to want to kill your child which has done nothing but be at the wrong place at the wrong time?

The latest craze here in Norway is a new artist called Mira Craig. It is quite interesting to watch an artist with as questionable music talents as she has get that well known.



First time I heard about her was when she did a stage dive into a non existing audience and broke her knee when she landed on the floor. I didn't see the video of that until much later and was more shocked by her music than her infamous stage dive.



Then she started appearing on TV and to be fair to her she is quite sexy and charming. Her first video (to what is probably her "best" song) is nothing less than fascinating. The only thing I could think of while watching the video was how much it reminded me of cavemen and more specifically the Clan of the Cave Bear movie". To make it more dramatic it was filmed in raw Icelandic nature and mainly features Mira Craig in almost non exciting clothes jumping around doing pretty extreme hip movements and singing something that sounds like "Cause baby boo boo.." in a dark voice.



Seeing her get this famous has been a bit puzzling but I guessed it was because she was good looking and lively. I think I understood a bit more yesterday why this is catching on this quickly. I ended up on the dance floor with bunch of girls that were desperately trying to imitate Mira Craig's crazy hip movements. It must have been quite amusing watching us dancing. I at least suspect that Pinocchio would have fit right in there. In other words, it didn't quite come naturally to any of us but it was really fun.



In any case, I predict this craze will continue a little bit longer. It is also likely that with lots of girl practicing that in the springs Norwegian clubs will be filled with lightly dressed girls shaking their ass in all direction...



If anyone wants a little "Norwegian cultural insight" the Boo boo song video is here and the stage dive is here.

One week ago, I went to the comedy show called “Tatt av Vinen” (“Gone with the wine”) by Anne-Kat. Hærland, a Norwegian comedian. Anne-Kat is my favorite Norwegian comedian and I try to always watch her in my favorite TV show Nytt på nytt on Fridays. Anne-Kat is like a fresh but sharp breath of air. She is extremely funny, sharp, and what I like best about her is that she has self irony in buckets. In other words, she doesn't take herself too seriously. I wish more people had that trait!



I really liked the show. It was funny but might have had a bit too much girl humor to be as funny for guys. I especially liked that she made fun of my much “loved” women magazines.



The only thing that I can complain about was that the lighting wasn't compatible with my eyes. It was quite strong and I must admit that I saw two Anne-Kats the entire show. I tried to put on my glasses to solve the problem but that just made the two Anne-Kats clearer... I guess it is about time I go and get new glasses.



I recommend the show to at least all girls!

Yesterday I was all one big heart and had vibrating pants.



To be more specific, I went and saw a Pink Floyd show at Oslo Konserthus. It was an all right show with a fantastic saxophone player but the sound wasn't quite right.



After only sitting there for a little while I started wondering whether my heart had moved over to the other side, then down in my stomach, into my arm, my leg... and then I realized that my pants were vibrating. Ok, so the bass was slightly overdone. The worst was that the music was played so loud that it sometimes hit your ears so that it hurt. Towards the end I wasn't even able to enjoy the music since it hurt so badly (and I know the people around me were hurting too). This was really sad since they played the best songs towards the end.



So to sum up: Sound quality/setup really bad. Song selection not so good. Performance kind of boring. The light show was really cool sometimes. The big bonus though was the saxophone player which almost made it worth it to go to bed in pain.