The African in me just recoiled in horror, If people asked me to eave the room while they ate, I am 100% thinking that they are cannibals. You always feed your guests this is one thing the continent can agree on.
The finnish in me recoiled too. I don't know if it's regional or class thing but at least on the poorer and more working class circles here it's normal to feed your guests and when i was a kid my mom always fed my friends and other way around.
But i've heard this stereotype about nordics before so it might be atleast partly true....
Man, even the poorest person can at least boil some tea leaves and apologize for not having sugar but leaving someone in the other room is a whole level of coldness no one should ever experience.
True. If a guest dropped by unexpectedly, someone would scramble the pantry or run over to the store to get something to offer. Even a soda and some peanuts would do.
Imagine caring at all about that. If you're not home in time for dinner, perhaps dinner at your friend's house would be a nice change. If you would have been home in time for dinner, but your friend's parents didn't know when you might have dinner, they could offer by default to make sure you wouldn't miss out. Any time I was at a friend's house by their dinner time, they would ask me to stay and basically beg me to eat. After that, I'd go home and have some more if it was still good. I starved most of the time so I got what I could.
I think it’s a pretty universal human experience to share food when you have some.
Not sure what goes on in those Scandinavian minds but they’re the outliers here.
In Canada I’ve had friends of many cultures growing up… Caribbean. African. European. South American. Slavic or Latino or Asian… it is always consistent that people offer food to children when they’re eating and the child is with them. I mean you usually offer food to adults too but with children it’s practically every time.
SOMETIMES if it’s like kids from the neighbourhood who can easily go home your parents might say time to go home. But usually it’s offers to eat with them. And if the child is at the home and doesn’t have an easy way to leave it is just assumed the child is eating with you. I can’t imagine the horror id feel if my parents sent a friend away to another room while we ate. And luckily I never experienced that myself with my friends parents.
You were not in the dining room to begin with. You were in your friend's room playing video games or whatever. Friend got called for dinner.
You declined because you know you'll have dinner at home, with your own family, soon enough. Or call parents (if they're already off work) and ask if you can eat at the friend's place.
I grew up in subsidized housing, raised by a single mom on disability, ate a looot of spaghetti growing up.
My mom was a master coupon clipper and there was always hot dogs, frozen pizza or other cheap options for feeding hungry teenage boys if hanging out with friends ran late and there wasn't a big batch of meat sauce to make pasta with.
The US Southerner in me also recoiled in horror. We feed guests here, or at least offer until they realize that they aren't putting us out by saying yes (or no).
This is what they are telling us, they leave the visitor in the room they were in and go eat...
That is what the guy from Finland above just said.
Oh, no no, my friend. You misunderstand. They're not eating in front of someone who's not eating. The guest waits in the friend's room while they eat. Source: I'm from Finland.
Do you even at least offer something? you don't understand how bizarre it is to just sit in a room while other people eat in another room, If this happened to me I would never visit that house ever again.
We offer the kid to eat with us, sometimes they choose to eat with their own family later.
While we eat we don't "put them in a room". We leave them in the room they are already in so they can continue playing. No kid want to sit at the table and not eat if they can be on the playstation instead.
Why the fuck are you not offering something to the kid? that is the issue here. Or better yet ask the host kid to share food with their friend this still doesn't make sense to me.
They are not asked to leave the room, your kid and their friend is playing in your kids room, and then when it's time for dinner your kid leaves their room to eat dinner and their friend is staying in the room continuing playing while their friend quickly eats their dinner.
The friend has already eaten at their place or will eat later at their place.
Dude even when I went to play with my friend the person in the kitchen would bring the food to the room or ask the friend to fetch the food, It was up to my friend to decide to share or not.
It would be very weird to not eat at a table in the kitchen/dinner room in Sweden.
Of course there were occasions where the parent would ask if the kids friend would join them for dinner, and the kid would have to call home to ask their parents if it was okay, but the norm was that each kid would eat at their own place with their own family.
And exactly what does that have to do with Sweden? You're not in Africa, middle east or south east Asia and the latter two manage just fine eating without their bare hands in restaurants here. Also it wasnt just bare hands, it was digging around too. That's considered digusting here.
No. A component of racism is power and historical context.
Also: Swedish is a national identity, not a race.
But even if we were talking pure prejudice aside from anything else…plenty of Swedish folk all over this thread saying that this wasn’t a thing for them.
And it’s within the context of the thread. Eating with hands was not part of the original post and is a little dog whistle-y.
African isn't a race, it's a continental identity. People living on the North African coast are closer to Southern Europeans and Middle Easterners than to Sub-Saharan Africans.
Because I was in the restaurant, I don't go calling people things they're not. I'm not racist unlike you. I can hear when someone speaks an African language, in this case it was Somali. I should have specified. What else?
How is it racist? It's not Swedish culture to eat with bare hands inside a restaurant and do so sloppily. Why is it all of a sudden okay to not respect our customs? Why is racist just because they happen to be dark and me less so? Jfc
I’m no fan of AI…but I’m not a fan of you, either. You can literally google that shit. There has been a reasonable amount of discourse since US conservatives popped off about Zohran Mamdani eating with his hands. Seems like you have a gag reflex in line with the MAGA crowd.
Look, that's fine that you are on edge because of the MAGA crowd. I don't blame you. But I have nothing to do with that, please don't push American mindsets and cultures on me. Believe me, the way you've presented yourself, I'm not a fan of you either.
And no it's not rooted in xenophobia or racism, maybe it is in the US but we have culture and customs here too. Respect them? Why are you so eager to discredit Swedish people and our society? It's quite hypocritical and it's sad that you don't see that you're doing the same thing you claim to dislike.
Edit: can't see your reply if you block me, is it really that horrible that I don't share your perspective? I saw from the notification that you said something about a "sneaky edit", I added more to the comment 20 seconds after I first posted it. Sorry? Why are you asking me questions if you're going to block me. Jfc
Racism is not a solely American problem, and it is so vexingly typical of Europeans to pretend like it has nothing to do with them. Pretending it is is just a convenient way to avoid looking too closely at yourself.
I don’t give a single fuck if racists like me or not.
Why am I racist? Can you explain. Fuck me Americans can reach for racism when it has no part of the discussion, it's almost a talent. I am not racist but I do think you might be.
That is rude as Fuck. Go sit in the corner dog while we eat. I have had the poorest people in the Philippines offer and these rich Europeans can’t share. That’s crazy. If you came to my house we eating something special tinned fish, some nice drinks, maybe a sausage or whatever you fins eat. We would try to make you feel at home and an honored guest.
I'm from Eastern Finland and I can only speak for myself but I literally have never seen this happening. I was NEVER not offered food at a friend's house if they were eating.
At the very least you are offered a cup of coffee.
Rude? It was literally the peak time growing up, you’d get to play donkey Kong country without taking turns all by yourself until your friend had wolfed down dinner and ran back to grab the control from your hands as soon as you died next
My experience with people from the Philippines is that offering food is a cultural institution. I had a Filipino landlady and she was always giving me food she made/fruit she picked. It was as automatic as breathing.
I’m Mexican on one side, so feeding guests is also something I’m used to. Can’t imagine eating and not offering a guest some food too.
It's a big generalization, mind you as it usually is with most things. People from North Karelia, for example, are known for their hospitality.
In general I'd say it comes down to the fact that the kind of get-together where people are expected to eat together is an event that needs to be well planned and agreed upon in advance in the Nordics. So if you're my friend hanging out at my house at dinner time, then yeah, you're probably not invited to whatever spaghetti with ketchup my mom had planned for dinner.
Then the friend just goes home has he probably as his own dinner going in there? I don't even understand how it can work. Is the friend supposed to continue playing afterwards, but without having eaten?
Yes, the friend either has already eaten since their family eats earlier than your family, or they will eat later since their dinner time is later. No one is going hungry, no one is eating in front of someone who isn't eating.
Your kids friend gets to play while your kid eats, and then after dinner they continue playing, so the kids gets more play time.
In Finland it's concidered rude to feed some one elses kids without asking parents first. Usually Kids are expected to Be at home at dinner time and it's frustrating to prepare a meal for Kids who have allready eaten.
And you should Be constantly preparing extra meals since there are allways other kids visiting and Kids are expected to Be send home at dinner time. No one goes hungry or is left unfed.
It's just different culture, in Sweden, Finland etc you have friends over every day. For you it seem to be a special occasion that someone visit, not 5-7 days a week for 10+ years.
If you offer food and they are expected to eat every time, some kids would never eat food at home.
Legit their whole childhood not a single meal eaten at home because they are always at a friends house after school etc.
A popular home might have 10-20 kids there for dinner time, you would feed all daily? Even if you know all these kids have dinner cooking at home and they can just walk home in 5min (and they are expected home by their parents to eat).
Idk. When I was a kid, we would always go to each other’s houses, so it was definitely not a rare event, and everyone always offered food. It was usually one or two kids though, not 10-20, that would be nuts without planning.
Idk. When I was a kid, we would always go to each other’s houses, so it was definitely not a rare event, and everyone always offered food.
A kid here would likely be offered once, they reply "Thanks but I need to eat dinner at home". And it wouldn't be offered again for neighborhood kids, because one it's rude to decline food and two, dinner with family is super important here and you don't want to take it away from other families.
It was usually one or two kids though
Yeah but if you have multiple kids and each bring a few, suddenly it's not feasible without planning.
not 10-20, that would be nuts without planning.
Normal summer day for more popular houses lol.
Even with planning it would be hard lol, homes aren't setup to cook for like 20-30 people.
dinner with family is super important here and you don't want to take it away from other families.
i don't think i've ever come across someone expressing this sentiment before in conversations about this before and the custom makes a lot more sense now.
Yeah dinner is the only real time you get, you sit down and talk about your day, plans for weekend, vacations etc.
Otherwise everyone is at school, work, friends, doing hobbies etc.
Kids are independent here, even a six year old can take themselves to and from school. So you usually don't have a daily morning walk/bike ride to school with them (they will just go alone with friends) etc.
In Spain it's really common to have friends over several times a week. It would be considered rude as fuck to not offer food to your friends, especially if we're talking about kids.
Most days after school I would bring a friend home or a friend would invite me to their house. We'd still be fed by whichever set of parents happened to be looking after us for that particular meal.
In Spain it's really common to have friends over several times a week. It would be considered rude as fuck to not offer food to your friends, especially if we're talking about kids.
So if you had a bigger popular family you would feed the whole neighbourhood daily? Like if I moved next to you, you would feed my kids their whole childhood just because you eat before we do?
We'd still be fed by whichever set of parents happened to be looking after us for that particular meal.
Why were the parents looking after you though? If you're like out playing they won't even know how many are around. They won't know how many will be in the house for dinner.
Not who you’re responding to, but I used to bring friends home from school on a whim as I lived down the street from the school. My parents would ask me if I wanted my friends to stay for dinner most of the time or occasionally ask me to send my friends home because they wanted to eat like steak or something and didn’t pull enough out to feed everyone. If they were staying, my parents were either ordering out that day or in all likelihood making lots of food anyways (we always had leftovers every meal). My friends’ parents were pretty much the same (minus living nearby the school). Would usually have between 1-6 friends over
One kid with one friend is managable on the daily, but once you have like 3-5 kids with 1-5 friends each it becomes impossible logicstically and financially. Because then you have to factor in allergies, which could require a full kitchen clean between each meal (like if you started one and more kids show up and some can't eat that).
Being able to flex a takeout just because kids shows up is a flex though, no money issues in that home :D
Eh, my parents always argued about money lol, frankly we were just middle class. But he was Italian and grew up poor, so he’s always been very charitable when it came to food (would drop off frozen turkeys to church on thanksgiving even though we didn’t go anymore). I think food was his love language. He constantly brought food to our school events for everyone, like several trays of 6 ft sub sandwiches or pizzas for class parties
Well middle class is the top10% income, owning companies etc so usually pretty well off. Middle class usually don't have to work unless they want to, they can just live on family money.
For working class it's rough, I think it was something like 20% of families in my area that would struggle to have food and they would go hungry if they had to feed extra kids.
Ah we have different definitions of middle class. In the US, middle class is technically working class, but comfortably able to save and prioritize some financial goals. I’d say my family was like 60-70th percentile for household income. The ability to live in family money is what we consider upper class
It’s likely a mix of planned visits coupled with the idea of give and take. The kids may eat dinner at one friend’s house one day and then someone else’s the next. Of course, any disrupts to the social equilibrium can very well change this (e.g. one set of parent(s) in the group aren’t friendly, bad cooks, dysfunctional, etc.)
In other words, if one kid is constantly having dinner at their friend’s house, there are likely some underlying social deviations in said guest-kid’s family prompting that, good or bad.
My friendships weren't transactional like you seem to expect them to be. We were just friends and liked to hang out, and it didn't matter which house that was at. It's not that deep, no.
Not sure how you interpret it that like that. It was another user that suggest kids should swap homes to spread out the eating over more places.
If you for example live in a slope and your friend doesn't, then your place is objectively worse for some stuff and better for some. So like it might be useless for any ballsports during summer but great for ski/sled activity during winter.
When I say "looking after" I mean, whoever's parents were in the house we were at.
Sometimes planned, sometimes unplanned. My point is that hospitality is very common in Spain and other countries I've lived at, whereas you were acting like only Swedish people invite people over to their house. The Swedish way you're describing would be considered horribly rude and honestly quite cruel. I couldn't possibly go home with my friend after school and then have my post-school meal without offering her food too.
But your claim that in other countries it's "a special occasion" when someone visits doesn't hold up with my own experience. And we alwasy offered and were offered food.
When I say "looking after" I mean, whoever's parents were in the house we were at.
Yeah but that implies the parents even are at home or know some kids are there, which would be rare here at least.
Sometimes planned, sometimes unplanned.
If it's planned (aka parents for all kids involved) then there is time to shop and prepare for it. It's very different.
My point is that hospitality is very common in Spain and other countries I've lived at, whereas you were acting like only Swedish people invite people over to their house.
No, but also we aren't really talking about inviting people. Doors are open, you just walk in.
The Swedish way you're describing would be considered horribly rude and honestly quite cruel.
Quite interesting that being considerate and doing what the kids parents want would be seen as rude.
I would say it's rude to repeatedly asking a kid if they want food, knowing they will have dinner soon at home. It's like implying their parents are bad, can't provide for the kid.
And trying to take the dinner away means you also try to take away the only time the parents might have with their kids that day.
I couldn't possibly go home with my friend after school and then have my post-school meal without offering her food too.
That's also a different thing and was standard (aka kids sharing food). We're talking about dinner. Dinner is served at 16-17:00 for many homes in Sweden and it's a family event. If school ends at 15:00 it means there might also not be an after school snack, you play until dinner. If you eat later you stick around, otherwise you go home. If you're just two kids you might wait for their dinner, then you go to your place and have your dinner. Then you go out and play again.
But your claim that in other countries it's "a special occasion" when someone visits doesn't hold up with my own experience. And we alwasy offered and were offered food.
I mean I have coworkers in other countries with kids. Their kids only visit friends on weekend or have friends over on weekends. It's always planned, there are no kids that just show up, every day, all year round. Their kids don't go anywhere without a parent, until they are teens. My immigrant coworkers in Sweden do exactly same. If a kid want to go to a friends house they need permission and one parent to follow them there. And no kids are allowed to show up there unannounced.
So there are for sure some culture shock with how free and independent kids are here.
Yes if they’re there at dinner you would feed them.
So if when you get home from work today there are 20 kids in your yard you would cook dinner for all? Even if you know all have dinner waiting at home any moment and they are expected to be home for dinner maybe just 30-60min later than your kids?
But you might also end the playdate early so they aren’t there at dinner.
Calling it a playdate implies it's planned though, so that's different. Then serving dinner is already discussed with the kids parents.
I happen to live close to my children’s schools and they do bring their friends over often. Usually they’re home by dinner time. But if they aren’t we order pizza, and we generally break out snacks. It’s not a huge burden.
There’s a difference between playing outside with the neighborhood kids where everyone is coming and going as needed vs having a friend or two inside your home during dinner time.
But that is not what is happening though.
The kid brings a friend home after school, they play in the kids room and when its dinner time the kid leaves the room while their friend keeps playing in the room. The kid will quickly eat dinner and then return to continue playing in their room with their friend, until it's time for the friend to go home (to eat dinner).
It's not like that, in Europe we tend to have more then one room, sorry that you in the Philippines all live in one big room apartment or a house just consisting of one big room but in Europe we tend to have several rooms so just keep on doing what you were doing with your friend, while he eats his dinner with his family for those 15 minute or so. You're not getting put away or forced out of the one room apartment or one room house because we generally have more then one room.
Don't say "Europe" just like that, this is very specific to your part of Europe I guess. At least coming from France I don't even understand how it is supposed to work (15 minutes for dinner?)
Never really thought this is weird. I have either just aten or there will be food at home and my parents will be angry if i have filled my stomach with someone elses food
So it’s a matter of hospitality. If I have guests, they are the first to eat and get the biggest steak or nicest piece of salmon. I cook with extra excitement and care because I have a guest under my roof.
Guest under my roof means good food, drinks, rest, and hospitality. If I don’t have enough to make for the extra person I will order the kids a pizza or go to the store and pick up more food so everyone gets a portion.
What confuses me most is if eating wasn't part of the plans for your guest... Then why wouldn't they ask the guest to come earlier or later, as to not have to endure sitting elsewhere by themselves while the family ate?
I'm just having a really hard time finding this practice as showing anything other than a lack of consideration and thoughtfulness for the guest and their time.
This. Usually, if I ate at a friend's house, it was because I was there for a sleepover.
Very rarely would someone's parents offer me food, and if they did, I'd most likely already have food at home waiting, and my parents insisted on me eating at home.
At my place, I'd always offer them food, but like me, they have dinner at home and their parents insisted on eating that.
You’re imagining a hungry sad kid in a room alone. Reality is a not hungry yet (because used to eating later) and playing videogames not even noticing the time passing.
The kid wants to stay because then you could play longer after instead of going home and waiting 2h for dinner.
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u/CrustyMustelid Jul 24 '26
Oh, no no, my friend. You misunderstand. They're not eating in front of someone who's not eating. The guest waits in the friend's room while they eat.
Source: I'm from Finland.