In Cod We Trust

In Cod We Trust

                Eric Dregni has an impressive resume. He's written over 14 books, and he has a masters degree in Italian. He took a year of his life to live in Norway to discover how Norwegians really lived and to find his families heritage.  His story starts off on an interesting note. His wife just found out that she was pregnant, right around the same time he got the good-to-go with his trip. They worried whether insurance in would cover a birth overseas. It turned out that he had nothing to worry about. In the most expensive country in the world you get paid to have children. This is supposed to help the declining population. If you a working for six months and have a baby you get 52 weeks paid maternity leave and up to 60 weeks of 80% of your salary, or something like that.

                This wasn't the only cultural difference he noted in his speech. Taxes and the expense of things there was mentioned quite a lot though. I would imagine that the transition from a country where the conservative party was in rule to a place where almost 50% of you wages are given to taxes would be hard. He said that the people of Norway didn't mind the taxes at all. It was just a way of life, and this way there were no poor. Norwegian traditions include Rockfish. This is an old fermented fish that is buried in the ground for 3 months then cooked and eaten. Dregni's experience seemed quite interesting.  It was also apparent that Norwegians were pranksters.  They loved to drink and laugh and pull jokes on one another. He said that the high school seniors there get a month off of school before they graduate, where they have free reign. This whole concept seems pretty crazy to me.

                This convocation was a lot harder to relate back to what I have learned in honors this year. I haven't learned about any European country. I haven't learned about the importance of tracing back family roots. The connection I do make is the importance of culture and assimilation. At the end of his speech today he said that Norwegians in Norway would not consider those who are of Norwegian descent, yet live in America, Norwegians. They are Norwegian - Americans. Eric Dregni's great-grandfather had to make decisions about what from his Norwegian culture he wanted to keep, and what he wanted to give up, to assimilate more easily into American culture. Every generation after that made decisions about how they would live their lives that affected their culture. In just the four generations that Eric's family had been removed from Norway, a lot changed. But at the same time, some things didn't. He found his relative's grave's and his great-grandfather's old house. Life just gets more interesting the more you learn about it