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Have you ever been wondering what is the best country to live in?

Å væreen glad laks[1]- why Norway is the best country in the whole world to live in?


By Maria Bondyra, 1st grade


Everyone likes discovering new places. Travelling is a huge part of life, no matter how you look at it. I’m sure that most of you have either been abroad or are planning to do so in the future. I think I can even say that some of you want to live in one of the countries in western Europe. I don’t blame you, who wouldn’t want to have a better job and improved living standards? The question is, what is the best country to live in?

Most. Polish people who emigrated moved to the UK, the USA or Germany in search of a better life. However, according to the Human Development Index from 2019 made by the United Nations Development Programme, not even one of these countries in the top three most desired places to live. HDI is a statistic composite index made up of life expectancy, education, and per capita income indicators, which is used to rank countries into four tiers of human development. The top 10 from highest to lowest are Norway, Switzerland, Ireland, Germany, Hong Kong, Iceland, Australia, Sweden, Singapore, and The Netherlands. With the US positioned slightly below the UK in 15th place.


As you can see, the country in the first place in Norway, but what makes it so special? It’s simply a small rich country in the North where people eat a lot of fish, speak like Vikings, not to mention the blisteringly cold weather there. I too thought the same at first, but before I realised it, I had fallen completely in love with the place. Why? You may ask.

Well, the answer is quite complicated. During the past two years, I have done a lot of research including reading many books about Norway as well as talking to a lot of Norwegian people. On this basis, I have come up with three main points for why I think this country is the worlds best. First of all, I want to focus on Norwegian society. Scandinavia is known across the world not only for its good living conditions but also for its acceptance of others. In Norway, homophobia and racial issues are almost non-existent. People treat each other with respect. Norway is also a country where people fully trust one another. From what I have observed they simply don’t see a reason why their neighbour would try to do anything bad to them. For example, it is common for people to not lock their doors or cars. There are of course many flaws in this approach, one being that most refugees use the naive trust of Norwegians against them, which really saddens me. However, the high level of trust between Norwegians also applies to the government. Nobody there would ever break a law or avoid paying taxes, in fact, they would more likely go so far as to make them higher. Why is this? The answer is simple. It just pays off. Punishments in Norway are awfully expensive due to how much income the country receives from the distribution of oil, so paying a fine that costs nearly half of your salary does not sound great, does it? Even if Denmark has the highest taxes in the world, Norway isn’t any better. This is true, the government does take away half of your income, no matter how much money you have, which makes it awfully painful for richer people, although they don’t seem to mind. As far as they are concerned, if the country offers them a good health care system and their kids are able to get a quality education (students at certain levels of education are given laptops from the school to use instead of notebooks) then they are completely fine with that.

The second reason is language. Norwegian is extremely easy to learn. It is one of the easiest languages in the whole world, especially for people who already know a Germanic language. There is only one small issue with it. The dialects. Norwegian has two main dialects, Bokmål (writing style) and Nynorsk (literal translation: new/modern Norwegian). Why? Norway has been an ever-changing country for hundreds of years. Different parts of have been occupied predominantly by Danes and Swedes. As a result, many dialects of the language have been created over the years resulting in every city having a different dialect. Sometimes people from Oslo don’t understand someone from Trondheim at all, even if they speak the same language! This seems to scare a lot of people away, but you need not worry. Most Norwegians know Bokmål because it is easiest for them, but if you are going to live somewhere outside of Oslo, learning the regional dialect of that area would be compulsory in time. You may ask, “ what is Nynorsk for then?”. Well, in my opinion, it is just a failed attempt to revolt against Norway being similar to Denmark. These countries hate being compared to one another. The best way to offend a Norwegian person would be to say, “Norway is basically Denmark” or worse, “Norway is basically Sweden” and vice versa. Norway was occupied for the longest time in its history by Denmark and Bokmål is the result of that. Due to how “Danish” it sounded to some Norwegians, Ivar Aasen – a 19th-century Norwegian linguist, decided to combine many Norwegian dialects into one and to create Nynorsk. At first, it was well-received, but people quickly returned to using Bokmål again. Today, Norwegians still learn these two main dialects at school, but they appear to strongly dislike Nynorsk and often say that it is “an unnecessary complication” to the language. Overall, most Norwegians prefer to speak to tourists and immigrants in English, but when it comes to Norwegian they often speak in their own dialect and if you don’t understand them, you can still ask them to speak in Bokmål and they won’t get offended.

Last but not least is, of course, the environment of Norway. The main feature of the country’s beauty is its nature. Norway has the longest coastline in Europe amounting to 58,133 km. It has many islands, bays and most importantly, the country’s biggest attraction – fjords. Nowhere else on Earth can you see so many of them. In Norway, it is completely legal to camp wherever you want! If you want to put up a tent near a fjord, you are welcome to do so, although of course you mustn’t disturb anyone else and you must take care. Norwegians are proud of their nature and do everything to keep it the way it is. Even going as far as to not extract oil from some places, like the Lofoten Islands (with its famous one-lettered city, “Å”, pronounced as “O” in Polish)just to keep the natural habitat safe. They are also obsessed with ecology, thus when it comes to lawbreaking, harm to the environment is considered one of the worst crimes. Most people pay a lot of attention to recycling, as a result, it is almost impossible to see any litter lying around. Like other Scandinavian countries, Norway tries to be as green as possible, with most of its energy sources renewable. Finally, Norway is the only country in the world that has a special bank in case of a future natural disaster, which you can check it here: https://www.nbim.no/.

Thank you for reading, I hope I was able to teach you something about the country of Norway and spark your interest in the topic.


[1]The title is a popular Norwegian idiom meaning “As happy as a salmon”, which Norwegians like to be associated with, as a happy society that likes salmon.

References: ,, Szczęśliwy jak łosoś – O Norwegii i Norwegach” Anna Kurek (I also highly recommend her blog which delves further into the topic of Norway https://norwegolozka.com/ )

,,Skandynawski Raj – O ludziach prawie idealnych” Michael Booth

,,Skandynawia – Światło Północy” Michał i Zofia Miedzińscy

,,Jeden z nas – Opowieści o Norwegii” ÅsneSeierstad

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