Swedish Blog

Earlier this week I was sitting in my bedroom, reading a book and trying very hard to ignore the party going on outside. My apartment building is surrounded by student housing (or “corridors” as they’re called here), and if you want to keep your sanity, you learn very quickly to ignore whatever is going on outside during the university year, or you move elsewhere.

And I was doing just fine with this ignoring bit that night until someone outside started screaming as if he was being skinned alive. And kept screaming. THAT I had to check out. I stuck my head outside and saw a butt naked man running in circles in front of my building shrieking like a banshee. Sadly, it was too dark to take a photo. Other banshees were doing a mosh pit dance some distance away.

My neighbor also stuck her head out. She nodded at me, mumbled “nollning” and retreated to her apartment.

Nollning? Already? Dang, where did the time go! I’m so out of it this year. A sure sign I must be getting old.

But yes, apparently it’s nollning time again. In various places around the world it’s known under different names (hazing, orientation week, student initiation, etc) but the basic principles are the same – to humiliate new uni students by making them perform a series of ridiculous tasks while consuming copious amounts of alcohol.

In Sweden nollning seems very well organized however, probably due to the fact that the activity is managed by the many student unions in conjunction with university personnel. And membership in a student union (studentkår) is mandatory by law.

As all unions in Sweden, student unions hold a great deal of power. In addition to organizing goofy initiation rituals, they also represent the student body in the decision making process within the universities, provide all sorts of services for its members (such as counseling for example), publish their own magazines and newspapers, and run shops, cafes and nightclubs on campuses.

The Swedish National Union of Students (Sveriges Förenade Studentkårer, SFS), is the main umbrella organization of most students’ unions in Sweden and here’s their website, sadly only in Swedish.

• nollning (def. nollningen, plural: nollningar, def. pl: nollningarna) – aktiviteter för studenter som just har börjat på en ny utbildning (t.ex. ett universitet) = activities for students who have just begun their freshman year (for example at a university)

Here are some photos taken during last year’s nollning. I was having fika with a friend and we just stumbled upon it downtown.

One of the humiliating tasks last year was for a guy to try on dresses and high heels and parade around the department store. And dressed like that he was charging random shoppers 1 SEK for hugs and kisses.

Another exercise in public humiliation - asking random bystanders to shave their legs or facial hair.

I don’t have a Swedish calendar at home, I only have a goofy little one with a “Hello Kitty” design that is totally useless in Sweden (because what do I need Japanese public holidays for?) but it’s so darn cute that I keep it anyway.

So imagine my surprise when I go to tvättstuga in my building this morning to rebook my laundry time (note to self: prepare a blog post about tvättstuga) and look at the Swedish calendar hanging there. It’s surströmmingpremiären today. The fish is finally rotten enough to be consumed.

Surströmmingpremiären takes place traditionally on the third Thursday in August (like today), and I wasn’t joking in the sentence above. Today is really the official day when we know for sure that the fish is finally fermented enough.

What? The words “fish” and “fermented” in the same sentence make you nervous? And they should, oh yes.

Those who know what surströmming is can go now and look for some clothes pegs to clip on their noses while I tell the others about this dreadful thing.

“Sur” means sour, and “strömming” is a small fish that lives in the Baltic sea, a type of herring, if I remember correctly. The fish is caught sometime in spring, and then, innards and all, fermented in big barrels for a couple of months. After this initial fermentation, the fish is packed into cans. The fermentation process happily continues in those cans, and you can see them in supermarkets, all nicely round and bulging. There are urban legends about those cans exploding, and many airlines even ban them as dangerous materials for that very reason, but seriously, I’ve never heard of it actually happening. I don’t think the airlines are worried about surströmming exploding, I think they’re more concerned about a leaking can and the smell.

Oh yes, the smell. Or rather, the stink.
Surströmming smells stinks like nothing else on the planet. The stench can slay buffalo and make flies drop dead in mid-flight. And yet some people actually eat it. Needless to say, this rotten fish is mostly eaten outdoors, and you can smell a surströmming party long before you reach one.

This vile product is normally eaten with potatoes, or wrapped in tunnbröd (thin flatbread) sandwich-style. If you manage to brave the stench and bite into it, it’s actually not that bad. Just salty. Not very sour, at least not to my taste.

Here is a typical reaction of a foreigner exposed to surströmming for the very first time.

Bravely opening the can. I even provided plastic gloves, see what a caring friend I am?

And a panicky retreat. Surströmming wins again.

Last week when I read about the Swedish agriculture minister Eskil Erlandsson’s statement that he hopes to establish Sweden as haute cuisine leader of the world, I naturally assumed it was a joke. Or maybe that the venerable government official had one too many shots of Absolut. Because c’mon now, “Sweden” and “world-class” cuisine in the same sentence? I’m trying not to laugh too hard as I’m chewing on a bit of falukrov while eating in front of the computer. Yet it seems Mr. Erlandsson was totally serious.

Sweden may be famous for many things. Elks (yes, you can call them “moose” if you want), buxom blondes, gender equality, state-provided welfare, pop music, Saabs, Volvos (even though both are now technically American), Ikea and so on. But food? Nah, never heard of it. Unless we’re talking about the Swedish Chef here. Bork, bork, bork!

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