How to meet people and make friends in Norway

Another stolen article that is very good from whereinoslo.com/blog/8608/make-friends-in-norway

    Once you make a Norwegian friend, it is a friend for life!


Here are a few tips for you to make friends in Norway.
Forget about what you have heard about Norwegians

First of all, forget all these things you’ve heard about Norwegians: they are closed, not interested in making new friends, not interested in people outside their childhood circle etc. Of course, it’s not like anyone will ask for your number in a party and call you every time they are up to something. This is a cold country, people have been used to living in secluded fjords with little contact with other communities, so be patient, it takes time. Norwegians are usually shy and not very good at smalltalk, but it doesn’t mean they are uninterested or uninteresting. It just takes time to know them. So ask questions, organize dinners, meet again. In other words: break the ice.

Once a half-Norwegian half-Malagasy woman told me that:

    Norwegians are like a Thermos bottle: hard and cold on the outside and warm and “myk” (soft) in the inside. You just need to manage to open the lid.

So, start this journey with an open heart, no pre-conceptions about Norwegians being like this or like that. Like everywhere else on this planet, some are idiots and some are great human beings, just make friends with the kind that suits you best.
Second principle, go out and learn about this country.

You don’t know how to do cross-country skiing? Take a course (you would be surprised how many Norwegians take those beginners’ class). Bored in the winter? Join a band, a climbing club or a knitting group. Meet and mingle, and once they meet you once, twice, and many other times, you will slowly become acquaintances. And they will invite you to parties or other gatherings and before you know it you have enlarged your circle friends even more.
Some Norwegians act like they are already your friend.

It might take time and you might be disappointed on the way. Like this time when I talked to so many unknown people in a party, so happy to believe I had made a new group of friends. I went to a concert where they were all meeting up the next week (and which they had invited me to) and they all pretended they had never met me before. Note that when drunk, some Norwegians act like they are already your friend when they’ve only met you 5 minutes ago. This is an illusion, you need to meet a Norwegian when sober to make sure he or she is really interested in becoming your friend.
Learn Norwegian language and get to know what turns them on.

Third principle, learn Norwegian language and get to know what turns them on (skiing, hiking, cabins in the woods, brownies with lots of butter and sugar and chocolate, picking berries and chanterelles, and “koselig” or “cosy” evenings). You are a foreigner, do not expect anyone to make a move towards you. These people (like yourself in your own country) have enough family and friends to sustain themselves until the end of times.
Remain happy and positive

So you need to be happy and positive (I know it’s hard when you have 4 hours of daylight, but try your best). You also need to relate to their language and culture, so learn a bit of Norwegian and they will appreciate the effort (even if spoken badly). Get into dinners with candles and Saturday evenings spent skiing on the illuminated slopes of Nordmarka. Engaging in these “typical” Norwegian activities will make any Norwegian interested in you and even talkative: Norwegians, more than any other nation, love to listen to foreigners talking about what they love about Norwegian culture.
How to be sure you’ve made a Norwegian friend?

He or she invited you to their family hytte, he or she has confided in you and showed some kind of emotion (sadness for example), and they stay roughly equally friendly when sober and when drunk (usually more loving and expansive when drunk). You now know you can call them through tick and thin until the end of times.

Good luck!

Written by A Frog in the Fjord.
You can find other posts of the author at her Blog