Sweden and Norway (Denmark too) have had a contentious history, one invading the other and occupying them at various times. Just because it happened hundreds of years ago doesn’t mean its been forgotten.
And they make some mighty fine meatballs.
Have them with mashed potatoes and gravy on a cold night.
The town I grew up in had a Norwegian-Swede divide, which also had an actual geographic component to it. I was a little kid when we moved there, and thought there was no difference until I was corrected by some grownups. I found this hilarious because - to a young outsider - these people could not be distinguished from one another except on Sunday mornings prior to about 1980.* The Anglos, Germans and Dutch considered the lot of them to be “Scandis,” which outraged Swede and Norsky (and probably the Danes) equally.
*In the mid-1970s, the “Swedish” church started to soft-pedal the Gospel and crank up touchy-feely, social issue humanism. Many fled to join the “Norwegian” church. Integration ensued, and now nobody under 65 wants to eat either lutefisk OR lutfisk.
I’m 1/2 Swedish so I suppose that makes me only half bad...
At least it’s different countries. In Ireland you need to be from the “right” county or you are the enemy.
My dad grew up in a small Minnesota farming community with a town of a couple hundred people. The town had (still has) a Norwegian Lutheran church and a Swedish Lutheran church. Dad always said the two churches could never join together: “The Sweeds sing two hymns, and the Norwegians sing three. There’s just no way to compromise.”
I’ll admit, though, last fall for my aunt’s 100th birthday party, she invited the whole town, including the Sweeds.