A Norse Appraisal
VIEWS ON AMERICA AND DARTMOUTH GIVEN BY NEWLY ARRIVED STUDENT
The author of the following article, Johs. Johnson, is one of two Norwegian students from the -University of Oslo who enrolled at Dartmouth this term under a special scholarship arrangement whereby American colleges and universities are providing a year of education for some of the Norwegian students who cannot yet be accommodated in their country as a result of Nazi occupation. He plans to be a journalist and is specializing in English courses at Dartmouth, while his Norwegian roommate, Odd Ramsay, is concentrating on sociology and psychology. Both are awaiting some snow for skiing.
DEAR L: T HAVE NOW BEEN A WEEK in New York and a week at my college, Dartmouth, in Hanover, New Hampshire, and I would like to tell you some of my impressions of this country.
It is a strange country, America, I mean. Just imagine America and Norway having a total population of about 138 million people, and 135 millions of these are doing lots of things the wrong way. Now I must admit, though it is not Norwegian to do so, that they do a great many things better than we do, too, and I will try to give you an impression of both.
When you arrive here the first time, the first thing you will do is to have something to eat. (The second time you arrive you will have that much experience from your first visit here that you primarily will ask for something to drink, because drinking is not so much of a habit here as it is an art.) Now, about that foodstuff over here If you look for an ordinary meal, like you are used to have at home, you will not find it. In fact, the only Norwegian food you will find here is roast-beef, and even that is pronounced in a wrong way. They do not say "ross-biff," the way we do. And now suppose you want dinner, and you ask for roast-beef: They will bring you just a small piece of meat, but a heap of fruit- dishes, salads and things you never even heard of before, and which you absolutely do not know how to deal with. When you look for that plateful of potatoes you are used to, you will find bread instead. Fancy that! Bread for dinner! Apart from this however, the taste is OK. (They say OK here in America too.) I guess I have had about as much excellent tasting food in two weeks now as you are likely to have during your whole life. Unless you come over here, too, that is. And then last, and that is last only because you cannot start with them, there are the desserts. Believe me, comrade, they come in a good bunch of miles ahead of us there. You see, the kinds of dessert you dream about having for your birthday dinner, or when you become a millionaire, well, you get that in the middle of the week here, and they do not seem to make any fuss about it either. Gee, it beats me!
If you are to eat at some restaurant here, and you do not want beer, just say so and ask for water. The waiter will not look upon you as something he has just involuntarily picked out of the water at the docks. In fact, he is likely to bring you a glass of water without even being asked, and long before you are going to leave, too. Quite a difference from conditions in Norway, eh? But on the other hand you will have to ask for it if you want brandy with your dinner. The waiter will not come rushing up to you at 3 o'clock with your ration of brandy like you are used to. You know, the only time I have seen anything making a real impression upon a New Yorker was once when I asked for a double gin. He asked me what more I wanted: water, gingerale or something, and I said: "Just plain gin, please." I assure you, it took him about half a minute before he got his lower jaw hoisted up in its right position and got moving, and when I drank it in the usual way he gazed at me as if I were some tough guy from the movies. Well, I ask you!
Another of these amazing things you find in America is that the motorcars seem to have some kind of legal right to the streets. It is almost impossible to walk in the streets here, and they seem to have a law putting the responsibility upon the pedestrian if he walks where he should not. I remember the first evening I was in New York, I was going to cross Broadway- Well, at the moment I walked out into the street, somebody turned on a red light in front of me. (The policemen do not seem to leave work at 4 o'clock in the afternoon in this country.) Of course I did not take any notice of this red light, being used to the cars always stopping when a pedestrian appears in front of them. But believe it or not, I suddenly got the feeling that the whole world was a solid mass of nasty cars, *nd when finally in some way or other I succeeded in getting across, I was on the point of being arrested. I only escaped arrest by telling the policeman I was from Norway. Then he told me he was bom in New York but he had an uncle in Ireland, and did I know him? I said I guess so, you see from the place where I live in Norway you may get over to Ireland in some four or five days, and besides, the Vikings and all that, so we parted as the very best of friends. But I certainly would like to drive a car in this country!
I would like you to hear a little about my impressions of the college too. On my way up here I thought I should have to walk about in Hanover for a couple of hours, trying to find my way to the college building. Instead of that I arrived at the college, and for two days kept asking for Hanover. In case you get the impression from this that colleges are pretty impor- tant institutions over here, I guess you are right. Anyway that is the way I feel. It seems to me that when you go to college here, it is not because you want to join, the upper class society and make easy money, like such a lot of students do at home. (And then after they have completed their studies they find that they might have made just as much money by starting to dig ditches or something.) The American governmental authorities, or any other authorities, seem to take a special interest in educating people, not so much for the sake of the individual as for the good of the whole country. Theoretically the result may seem to be the same, but practically I think that a lot of the things being better here than in Norway are derived from this fact.
The way they study here is also quite different from ours. The freshman courses here are on the whole more elementary than they are in Norway, but after four years the students will be on a level of education which only occasionally is reached in the same time by us. I suppose this must be due to the dynamic energy you find everywhere over here. I do not think you would find anybody here sleeping two hours after dinner every day like you do. Everybody keeps telling me: "Don't work too much," and "Don't study too hard," but in spite of this it is amazing to see how many things they find time to do.
A Norwegian town of the same size as Hanover is about the most dull and drowsy spot on earth, and so it would have been even if there had been a dozen, universities there, but here I somehow always have the feeling that the whole place is buzzing with energy like a bee-hive; anyway it seems like that from a Norwegian point of view.
Well, this will have to do for the nonce. I hope you will find out from this letter that I like it here, because I really do, and I bet you never received a letter as long as this one. The energy, see?
TWO NORWEGIAN STUDENTS enrolled at Dartmouth this term are Johs. Johnson (left), author of the following article, and his roommate. Odd Ramsay, both from the University of Oslo.
