Nordic Conversations #1

Why Are European Countries So Funny?

This was Victoria and I. Photo courtesy of this website. 

After realizing how weird the conversations I have with my cross country ski team are, I have decided to start a new series on this blog called Nordic Conversations. So, this is the first in my series nordic conversations. This one happened just the other day and it was the time Victoria and I laughed so hard that our stomachs hurt and we couldn't breath over European countries.

It all started when we were waiting for Victoria's mom to pick us up from training. We have a European countries/capitals test in two weeks, so we decided to try and start studying. We went onto quizlet and found a European countries/capitals flash card set, so we decided to start using those flashcards. I began quizzing Victoria, it started out with me asking her what the capital of ______  is, but then at some point we just started uncontrollably laughing about European capitals.

Thank you Cassie25fh for making this quizlet

After thinking about it, we decided that the laughing fit began with me asking Victoria what the capital of Bulgaria is. She didn't know, so I gave her a hint. The hint was that it was the name of a girl we were talking about earlier. Sofia. So, to give you some back story, there is this girl. Her name is Sofia, if you didn't catch onto that yet. She is also a nordic (cross-country) skier, but she lives in Idaho. I met her last summer when both our teams went to Canada and went on a hike/run together. She told me that she used to be the 6th best alpine skier in the country for her age, but then quit because she had a bad season. I was severely questioning why she quit if she was that good, but let her continue with her story. She told me that last year was her first year ever nordic skiing. I had not payed that much attention to her races last year, but wanted to see how she placed this year. Two weeks ago we had a race in Yellowstone and I was shocked when she passed me by how good her technique looked and how fast she was going. I told this story to Victoria and she remembered that Sofia passed her as well and "made her feel bad about her technique cause she was so good". Sofia placed 7th in that race and we (Victoria and I) are still  questioning how she could have done so well if she only "started" skiing last year. Anyway, for some reason we both found that hint to be funny and we both started laughing. 

The next question I asked her was "What is the capital of Germany?"... She didn't know, so I gave her a hint. I said that the capital had a wall that was named after it. The ______ wall. She still didn't get it, so I said the fall of the _____ wall and she didn't didn't know and then I told her what it was (Berlin) and we started cracking up. I'm not really sure why we found this to be humorous, but for some reason we found it to be really funny.

Then I asked her "What is the capital of Brussels"? I gave her a hint, it's a food. She rapidly blurted out the first word that came to her mind... Hungary... Then we both started laughing again. 

Then I asked her "What is the capital of Switzerland"... She didn't know and when I told her what it was, we lost it laughing again for some reason I don't remember. The next one was when I asked her "What is the capital of Turkey?"... Again she didn't know, but it reminded us of another funny story. Earlier that day in geography I asked if Turkey was considered a part of Europe or Asia, our teacher said Asia. Right after without really thinking about it Victoria asked "What about Istanbul?", he said well that's apart of Turkey, so no. That one was really the breaking point we started laughing and couldn't stop for at least five minutes. We were laughing so hard we couldn't breath, our stomachs hurt and we were both crying from laughter. 

You are probably sitting here thinking that this was the stupidest post you've ever read in your entire life or you are wondering what is wrong with us. If I'm being honest I don't know why everything was so funny to us that day, but it was. If you're telling yourself that you've never had a day where everything was funny to you, you are lying to yourself because it happens to the best of us. Oh and if you're thinking we are really bad at geography as well, this was our first time studying for this test, so don't judge us too harshly. Also there were a lot more inside jokes that added to the cause of the laughing fit, but it would either take too long to explain them or I couldn't write about it because it was about something someone did. 

Claire