Because, Nordic Countries

[Laser Shark]

5 minutes ago, rmgill said:

It's the idea that soldiers sometimes have to doff gear to do things even under combat conditions. It'd be like issuing them all white t-shirts and underwear. 

Good point. Hopefully, they'll settle on another color that's not too different from the camoed parts.

[Ivanhoe]

On 2/10/2022 at 10:00 AM, Laser Shark said:

I’m not sure if I understand the question, but these are combat shirts designed to be more comfortable when worn together with bulletproof vests/plate carriers, so they probably figured that you don’t need camo on a part that’s going to be mostly covered up anyway.

Yep, standard thing here in USiana;

https://www.cryeprecision.com/ProductDetail/aprcse02lgr_g3-combat-shirt

[TonyE]

It was Haute-couture on the fields of glory we sought in the hallow field of Hindu Kush, the pure pinnacle of human warfare in all its forms, so it will remain until the 'stan-veterans have found other fields of work.

[Simon Tan]

It is so successful that the shalwar kameez has been dumped by the Taliban in favor of the mountains of Multicam left behind.

[Ivanhoe]

Multicam; the Universal Couture.

 

[17thfabn]

On 10/17/2021 at 9:46 AM, BansheeOne said:

after the various rampage events and terror attacks over the last two decades or so, everyone in Europe seems to have gotten around to the first two or four officers on the scene going in without waiting for the special squirrels as it used to be done. Obviously that becomes more difficult if those first officers have to equip themselves with the bare essentials first. 

Same in the U.S.

In active shooter incidents the first or first two police on scene are supposed to engage. They found that many times people were being killed while waiting for the SWAT team. 

[rmgill]

SOP now. First two officers on scene, pair up and go in. Next two officers, pair up and go in. I have a friend who was 1st of two officers on scene in the Atlanta Financial Center Shooting. 

[Laser Shark]

Article about the development of the new Norwegian camo patterns (forest, desert, snow). There's also photos of the deal deal now, and I'm happy to say that the end product looks a lot better than I feared it would, particularly the desert pattern (wow, we actually managed to come up with one that isn't godawful).

https://forsvaretsforum.no/forsvarets-forskningsinstitutt-innenriks-uniformsreglement/slik-ble-forsvarets-nye-kamuflasje-utviklet/246364

[Ivanhoe]

Rather strange, at least to me; American retailers are now getting Vihtavuori smokeless rifle powder back in stock.

With what's going on, shouldn't Vihtavuori be helping crank out 7.62x39 for the FDF?

Anything to deter Mad Vlad...

 

[Yama]

#Swedengate! On Reddit, somebody posted this tidbit:

Someone else forwarded this on Twitter, and because it is Twitter, it was presented as an example of SWEDISH RACISM  and soon the platform was alive with other people posting their experience of deep-rooted Swedish cultural discrimination.

That is seen as completely normal in Finland too, the expectation is that unless someone is specifically invited (eg. agreed-upon sleepover), then every family feeds their own kids.

[rmgill]

Is this due to Swedish/Finnish food shortages (poor farming resources) or due to the idea of bring your own lunch to the viking raids? 

[Soren Ras]

Huh, seen from Danish perspective, that is actually really weird.  Having a meal and not including someone present in your house is pretty much unthinkable here. It would be a serious breach of etiquette.

Having someone sleep over and then eating breakfast surreptitiously excluding them is a concept so outlandish, it actually boggles the mind. Anyone doing that would instantly become a pariah in the social circles here.

The only exception is if friends of your child are playing and it is getting close to dinner time. At that point we would either send the friends home before we started eating, or call their parents and make sure it was okay to have them eat over. The distinction being chiefly a matter of what is on the menu, since accommodating additional unplanned for people might not be practical.

I guess that is a marked difference between Denmark and Sweden, then.

Wow.

 

--

Soren

[rmgill]

This explains the longstanding feud between Sweden and Denmark. Hospitality. 

Refusing to break bread with folks can be a very large cause of offense. 

[Yama]

Yeah, I have never thought it could be seen as strange...going to visit my pal unannounced, his mum would probably not know I was coming, and might not have prepared enough food for extra guest. I would simply eat home before, and then wait in my friend's room reading comics or playing with his computer for the 10-15 minutes it took him to eat, or return home for my own dinner. Although, it's true that in many cultures it is a matter of honour to feed your guests, and not automatically inviting a guest to eat would appear very strange, at minimum.

[Mikel2]

My Italian friends would feel terribly insulted if an unexpected guest leaves without eating a six course meal. 

[rmgill]

26 minutes ago, Mikel2 said:

My Italian friends would feel terribly insulted if an unexpected guest leaves without eating a six course meal. 

This seems to be a thing from China to Greece. And their grandmothers would be scolding then for months from the grave for not offering to make them a 6 course meal. 

by way of a friend (Kurt) who went to another friend's mother's house (Mike's Mother) for some sort of visit. They're greek. He related that he got there and it was as if Mike's mom was on a mission to help him gain 10 pounds that night. 

"OH MY YOU MUST BE HUNGRY! Here, sit down you have to eat some dinner!"

"Do you want a salad? Here let me make you a salad" *Chops half a head of lettuce into a salad*

"Do you want dessert? Let me make some fresh Baklava!"

 

[Ivanhoe]

If I've got to bring my own vittles, I need to rethink my plans for conquering Scandinavia. Italy just bubbled up several notches on my conquest list. 

 

[rmgill]

8 hours ago, Stefan Fredriksson said:

Pretty much like Yama and Soren wrote.

If I played with a friend, my dinner is at 17, his at 18, waiting in the friend's room while the other ate felt perfectly ok. But spinning it to (Scandinavians) refusing to offer guests food does if course look much more entertaining. 🙂

You guys will never live down that viking thing. 😉

[Mikel2]

[BansheeOne]

The dark-blue shoud be "will force-feed you if you don't run fast enough". 😁

If that's from Weber's book, I suspect though that things have changed somewhat in the last 100-plus years with increasing common wealth and cultural interchange. I wouldn't say it's "unlikely" to get food as a guest in Germany today, even if you weren't originally scheduled to join a meal.

[Ssnake]

That Northern Germany part - won't comment on Berlin - is, IMO, hogwash. It'd be a "Usually Yes" though, admittedly, it's maybe also a question of how informal the visit is and whether it's between adults, kids, or kids visiting adults etc. And I daresay, it's the same in the Netherlands, or Denmark, and I think it's been refuted as a myth by our Finns and Swedes already. Norway and Iceland OTOH ... okay, they're weird.

[Rick]

6 hours ago, Mikel2 said:

Sooo... this is where Iceland should go before that Plate Tectonics thingy began 

Edited June 8, 2022 by Rick

[Mikel2]

33 minutes ago, Rick said:

Sooo... this is where Iceland should go before that Plate Tectonics thingy began 

 

Imagine traveling all the way to Iceland to visit some friends and having to eat some gas station sushi for dinner

[rmgill]

11 minutes ago, Mikel2 said:

 

Imagine traveling all the way to Iceland to visit some friends and having to eat some gas station sushi for dinner

Probably better than shark someone buried in a hole for 3 months, then peed on, then hung up to dry. 

Or sheep's head with testicles. 

 

[bojan]

1 hour ago, rmgill said:

Probably better than shark someone buried in a hole for 3 months, then peed on, then hung up to dry...

I really want to know what did people that came up with that think and what kind of hallucinogen mushrooms they consumed before coming with that brilliant idea. 

Sheep's head on the sauerkraut is occasionally made locally, through pig is preferred. Ears are quite tasty. Oh, and never order "white kidneys".

Edited June 8, 2022 by bojan