Cultural differences NL-N (1)
Saturday, January 5th, 2008
One of the cultural differences between The Netherlands and Norway is
the social behaviour on the streets. Everbody has a phone to his ear,
nobody is noticing anything anymore, or looking at eachother, or saying
‘hei’ when passing another.
It’s clearly related to the mobile age we’re living in, the mobile
society where the ‘device’ seems more important than the one-to-one
contact with the guy/girl sitting next to you. The fact that
Norway/Scandinavia has a much longer tradition in mobile phones than
other countries probably made this behavior a cultural thing which
also prevails when people don’t have their cellphone at their ear.
Perhaps this situation is also different in Norway compared to NL due to population density.
Since your neighbor could be literally far away, the Norwegian culture
has historically developed itself to be much more oriented on the
individual and family, living in your own house and minding your own
business (although one will ALWAYS help another when asked…Norwegians
are far from a-social and of course I have been generalizing!)
Have to admit that I’m the kind of guy who always tries to greet the
people I pass, make eye contact and smile…it’s just amazing to see
what happens to the other person if you just smile, you should try it
too! 
