Last weekend I tagged along with my Mom, Aunt and Grandma to visit Scandinavian fest in New Berlin, WI. It is hosted by the Nordic Council of Wisconsin. It was a good time with delicious food. I had Swedish pancakes and meatballs, Danish gris on a stick, Danish Æbleskiver and some desserts. I also bought some milk chocolate from Norway. It tasted much better than a Hershey bar. When I was studying abroad I often purchased Milka bars and this was very similar.

I got the chance to watch some folk dancing. The troupe consisted of 5 couples and they performed dances from across Scandinavia. The man introducing the songs did a good job of it. He explained that many of the dances are for 8 couples so they had to be modified for only 5. Four of the couples were older and one was younger. The man telling us about the dances made sure to give them a shout out and said they wouldn’t be able to do many of there dances if they became any smaller as modifying to 4 was just too hard. If they had 8 couples they probably would have ran out of room on the stage.

I am not an expert on dancing and it is not something I go out of my way to see. What struck me about this dancing was the community aspect of it. Many of the moves involved everybody with a lot of circles and “bridging” by holding their arms up and creating a tunnel that everybody else passed through. I wonder if all dances are like this or if this a kind of the stereotypical Scandinavian community thing. I enjoyed watching it and learning a little bit more about Scandinavian culture.

I had a very good time and would definitely go back again. Especially for the food. If you ever get the chance I suggest you check it out.

One other thing I wanted to point out. This was held in a school and the food was in the cafeteria and the wall said InPro Commons. I had read about sponsored rooms and corporations getting their names in schools by donations but this was the first time I had actually seen it. From a quick look at their website it looks like InPro is based in Muskego and makes door and wall protection along with other things. It was interesting to see in person.