What is this? October?!

After watching Melodifestivalen, you've certainly noticed the abundance of pink stuff everywhere. What is up with all the pink gear? Balloons, feather boas, ties, lights, glittery hats... The crowd always seems to be bedecked in a sea of pink. Is this October or something?

YouTube screenshot/youtube.com

If you didn't know better, you might think you stumbled upon a Breast Cancer Convention in October with all those pink balloons waving in the air. Or, seeing all the pink hats and boas, you might think the crowd was waiting to be inducted into the Red Hat Society. It's not either one. It's just Mello mode.

Melodifestivalen is about having fun and enjoying the party-like atmosphere. And when you're in Mello mode, you don't care what others think. Such an outlook can be the opposite of a typical Swede at times. And maybe that's why people in the crowd enjoy dressing up in crazy pink garb and waving scribbled handwritten signs. Melodifestivalen gives Swedes tacit consent to break out of the ordinary and do silly things, if only for a few hours - at least until they have to get back to work and school on Monday.

It took two girls to hold up this poster for Anton during the Friday March 8th practice for the final show.

If you're wondering about the origin of the pink color, it all started in the northern city of Umeå. The city started the trend, but the city of Skellefetå brought it to the next level. In 2006, city planners trucked in a huge pine tree, placed in smack in the center of town, and flocked it head to toe in pink. From that point, pink has been the unofficial color of Mello. A city official from Skellefteå had this to say, "We painted a Christmas tree in pink; we chose pink as the schlager colour and tried to dress the city in pink. It looked like crap... but the point wasn't to make it look good, it was meant to create publicity...and it sure did!" (Andersson and Niedomysl, 2008).

Maybe Karlstad took their cue from Skellefteå when they dressed up the ugliest statue in the country in Melodifestivalen garb...

Andersson, Ida & Niedomysl, Thomas. Clamour for Glamour? City competition for hosting the Swedish tryouts to the Eurovision Song Contest. Royal Dutch Geographical Society. Vol. 101, No 2. pp. 111-125. Retrieved from EBSCOhost databases. 09 February, 2013.

The Sportlov Effect

Viewer numbers from round 3 in Skellefteå were released a few days ago. It was the most popular round three in history with almost 3.5 million viewers. This doesn't count anyone watching it online, either. Week three numbers tend to drop a bit. There's a concrete reason for this and it's called sportlov.

Sportlov is a vacation week during winter. Different cities schedule it during different days. Kids are out of school and many parents take time off with the kids. The idea is to get out and do some sports, hence the name. Not much can pull people away from the song contest, but this does. You know something is popular when it can draw viewers away from Melodifestivalen.

Swedes love their music. They are also serious about their sports and vacation.

Skiing is a popular sportlov activity

Niclas Ström/imagebank.sweden.se