On Sandefjord

Sandefjord is the closest thing I have to a "home town". It is a small place, sometimes a bit claustrophobic, full of good people, and irritatingly modern. It is a place where people cannot make up their minds as to whether they are semi-urbanized peasants or urban people living in the provinces.

It is a place I would like to go back to live, but it is probably too late. I would only get annoyed and begin to be destructive. Better to visit - now and then.

Others have different views or, at least, views that vary over time. People have moved to Sandefjord in quite large numbers, and it is not surprising. It is a pleasant place to live - at least in summer. The place has attractions: an international airport, trains, ferry, a motorway nearby, an international school, other educational opportunities a fairly international set of businesses and so on.

Trouble is, the local authorities think a forward-looking plan for the town involves important issues like the illumination of some of the streets in the centre of twon, and the possibility of profiting from schemes to exploit the district’s Viking heritage for tourism purposes.

They haven't realised that the climate, in itself, prohibits tourism for more than about three months a year and that, moreover, the locals are not particularly keen on having more strangers there than they have already. They are already upset about the influx of Swedes some hundred years ago, not to speak of the following appearance of people from the West Coast of Norway - the effects have yet to be seen, if I understand relatives correctly.

It is not an easy place to be an immigrant - I was one myself, as a child - many years ago. It is even more difficult for someone not even Norwegian. One such was an Egyptian ship captain who married a local girl - 35 years ago? - And took quite a bit of time before he found a place in the local community.

Another one - who should be supported - is an American woman who has produced an excellent blog "http://michelesmistakes.blogspot.com/" which should be read by anyone interested in how "our" community appears from the point of view of a newcomer.

Best of luck to her, with her Norwegian course, her work, husband, pets, bureaucrats and other annoyances.

On Prisoners

"28. februar 2007 befinner Pham seg inne på Club Kamikaze i Oslo", says Aftenposten 15 March 2007 (http://www.aftenposten.no/nyheter/iriks/article1690117.ece).

For those who have not not followed this story, the short version is that an individual was murdered in Oslo, possibly in the context of some shady transactions among people involved in the restaurant / entertainement business in Oslo.

The interesting thing is that one of the main suspects was, at the time, serving a 21 year sentence for a previous murder. Apparently he was not subjected to particularly onerous conditions: he was allowed leave almost on a weekly basis. Hence - as indicated in the first sentence (in Norwegian), he was at Club Kamikaze in Oslo on 28 28 February.

Can anyone explain how someone who has been sentenced to 21 years prison (the most severe sentence available to a Norwegian court) is allowed to visit a nightclub more than 100 kms away from his prison cell? Is there any point to the incarceration of this individual at all?

Moreover, from other press reports, it appears that the murder of which this individual is now accused was planned from witin the prison, and involved other prisoners in other prisons: can anyone explain this?

We have a tradition of giving people another opportunity, and a third or an eleventh. That is good and positive. People can make a whole strong of stupid mistakes and still turn out OK. But there is a difference between your common-or-garden variety burglar,  and people who 
have been described by  professionals as  "en person med mangelfullt utviklede sjelsevner, på bakgrunn av mange nevrotiske og personlighetsavvikende trekk, hvor også manglende selvinnsikt kommer inn." (Aftenposten, ibid). 

To translate, informally, someone who is a nutcase. And he is given the opportunity to continue to operate from within the prison, and someone ends up dead.

Well done, systen!