Take a look at terms that have been rising up the Lycos search logs recently. Nestled between music stars-to-be like Lil' Romeo and summer blockbusters like Moulin Rouge appears the humble nation of Finland.
In fact, this Finland craze seems to be part of a whole movement upwards by Scandinavian countries. Have Lycos users finally come around to the joys of fjords, herring, and hours and hours of daylight?
Finland searches have grown steadily since the beginning of the year and are now about 170 percent higher than they were in January. Searches for Scandinavia have doubled.
Norway searches have grown a bit slower, but are now 60 percent higher than January, and Sweden searches are about 25 percent higher.
The interest in all things Scandinavian even extends to cities; Oslo searches are up 70 percent. The cities of Stavenger and Lillehammer also seem to have newfound popularity. We're also seeing growth in searches such as Norway hotels and Finland travel.
If you move a bit south, incidentally, searches for Denmark are about the same as they were at the beginning of the year.
Summertime is a beautiful time to visit Scandinavia, and Lycos users seem to be pretty excited now that there is sunlight before 2 p.m. over there. Maybe some of the folks who make golf our #17 term are looking to hit the links at midnight.
Lycos Travel has a number of excellent articles about all the Scandinavian countries. Perhaps my favorite story is this one from the essay on Finnish culture:
"Finnish humour often ties in the locals' love of a tipple with their legendary reticence to make small talk. This is demonstrated in the joke below, which features the stoic Finnish heroes, Pekka and Toivonen.
One day Pekka and Toivonen meet after a long time apart and they go to a sauna in the woods. They drink vodka for a couple of hours. Pekka asks how Toivonen has been doing. Toivonen says nothing, but continues drinking for a couple of hours. Then, slowly, he replies: 'Did we come here to babble, or did we come here to drink?'"
So stop your babbling, and tip a shot of vodka to our newly popular brothers in Finland and Sweden. Skøl!
The new Lycos 50 will appear on Wednesday due to Memorial Day.
