17th of May

Gratulerer med dagen, Norge!

Yesterday was the 17th of May, which is the most important national holiday here and is also known as the Constitution Day. People celebrate the signing of the constitution in 1814 with a whole day of parades and parties. We were very excited about it because people had been talking about for quite a while and I am not used to national celebrating at all (except for when it comes to football, of course).
Everybody wears his or her best clothes and those who have bunads, the traditional Norwegian costumes, wear these. Every state in Norway, every region and sometimes even cities have their own costume, which differs from the others through color and some minor details. It is very beautiful to watch all the different bunads, which are very expensive and can be worn at weddings, confirmations and, of course, every year on the 17th of May. Those, who do not have a bunad (which are mostly foreigners, but also quite a number of Norwegians) at least try to dress up.
Our day started early (for a holiday), because the first of the three parades, the barnetoget (children's parade) started at 10 and it goes directly through our street. So people were standing under our windows since 9. But waking up was good, because we could watch the whole parade from our living room while we were ironing our clothes and grabbing Norwegian flags.

After the children's parade we went to the 17th of May brunch at Folken, which was open for everybody and most of the volunteers were there, too. We had way too much food and afterwards went out to see russetoget, the parade for all those who are in their last year of school and wear typical red or blue uniforms. This parade is much fun to watch because they really had a party.

At noon we went to konserthuset to attend the international festival there. A stage was built up outside on which different performances from many different countries were shown. And it wasn't even bad to be outside the whole time, because we were quite lucky with the weather. People, who were wearing bunads said it was not too warm (they are woolen, so you start to sweat easily) and I didn't freeze in my dress. We spent almost three hours at the festival watching the shows and seeing all the international food and costumes before we went back to the city center at four, where we would find a place to watch the biggest parade of the day: Folketoget. In this parade people from organisations, groups and institutions like sport clubs, bands, music schools, the university "march" through the city.

It lasts for almost two hours and we were lucky to find a spot on a bridge, so we could see everything from above. The special aspect of the 17th of May and all these parades is that it is completely without military. The whole day is for the people so there are only "civil" organisations or children marching in the parades. The Norwegians are very proud of this. And still: The whole day has a very patriotic touch.
After the parades we had dinner at Elena's place together with other friends and celebrated a bit. We were very tired from being outside the whole day, but it was really beautiful and something we will probably not forget for a long time!