Shared Roman cultural history. The upper classes in Romania likes going to Italy. Those with less money prefers often to go to Moldovia, a cheaper country than Romania, but very welcoming to Romanians. This I partly know because I have Moldovan friends.
I think Whizz Air from Hungary is part of the reason. You get extremely cheap weekend trips from Baltikum and eastern Europe to destinations such as London. My this is just a guess. I would have assumed, and I thought this to be the case, that Finland and Sweden were more popular destinations along with the most popular, the other Baltic countries (I know Lithuania is the most popular destination for Latvians).
But yeah, I think Whizz air, which is kind of a shady company to be honest (but I have used it myself, so while stating that, I didn’t mean to imply that it’s wrong to use it, just that their worker’s rights are not ideal), but so cheap that many including me have used it for various trips.
I remember the year before Corona, I spend 55 pounds for a trip which included a return ticket, to Gdansk from Ålesund in Norway. Too cheap almost, except it is expensive compared to some of their dump tickets…
Look at these prices: Flytilbud til Gdansk – Billettkampanjer Gdańsk - eSkyTravel.no
A bit less than 2 pound sterling to Gdansk…
Anyway, Whizzz Air have made traveling to some of the larger European city destinations ultra cheap. Probably much too cheap. But good for travelers of course.
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It’s not just holidaymakers though. It’s where people go to live. I’d be interested to know where Norwegians mostly migrate to (googles quickly) - Sweden is the answer rather boringly.
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Yeah, I think it would be more interesting to see if nr. 2 and 3 is not a Scandinavian country 
2 Denmark
3 Poland (huh?!)
Not many ethnic Norwegian migrate to Poland. I think that would be very few. I am going to google a bit now. But I am damn sure, Poland is not high on the list for Norwegians that do not view themselves as ethnically Poles (we have a lot of those working in Norway). Pretty sure, far more Norwegians go to the UK.
The Manchester United outreach program.
Cynical, callous and cruel
I 2019 ble det registrert 27 000 utvandringer fra Norge. En viktig forskjell mellom den tidligere utvandringen fra Norge og dagens utvandring er at flertallet av de som utvandrer nå, er innvandrere som har kommet til Norge tidligere. Det er særlig innvandrere fra andre europeiske land, som har bodd kort tid i Norge, som utvandrer i høy grad.
Source: Store Norske Leksikon.
Google translate: In 2019, 27,000 emigrants from Norway were registered. An important difference between the previous emigration from Norway and the current emigration is that the majority of those who emigrate now are immigrants who have come to Norway before. Immigrants from other European countries, who have lived in Norway for a short time, are particularly emigrating.
I have to google more to find actual numbers that we are actually looking for.
No, but as far as I know, without having yet found the actual numbers in Google searches yet, because there is a lot to read and most sources that pop up are not the ones I am looking for; most Norwegians migrate to Sweden and visa versa. But the UK are nr. 3 I think from memory. Not 100% sure though.
But historically and culturally, the UK have been a prime destination for work, but also marriage and more. Many settle there. But I have to google to find specifics.
Edit: Today, 80 percent of those who migrate from Norway are not Norwegians, but people who have come to Norway to work and more. This is why I am having a bit of an issue with the google searches.
I can almost guarantee that the numbers of Norwegians that migrate to eastern Europe is a mere handful though (perhaps even on one hand).
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I’ll let this be and maybe get back to it. Most statistics I find are not specific in terms for citizenship, ethnicity and culture etc. This causes a problem when I am looking for favorite destination of Norwegian migrants, and get results such as Poland, which is where all the Poles in Norway go, but not really where Norwegians go.
Most people who migrate from Norway have stayed in the country just for a few years.
There is also a clear tendency that not a lot of actual Norwegians migrate, but if they do, they go to USA, UK, France, Germany either because of studies (then a few will stay), or because they have been headhunted for specialized jobs that pays a lot (some of these will stay). We have no good reasons to migrate really on a macro level, so only a few do. But this is from memory now.
Lukashenko might actually have unintentionally achieved what German and Polish politicians have struggled with recently and brought the two sides together. There’s nothing like a common enemy to help bury the hatchet.
Not for long of course.
It is going to get worse. There are rumours now that the KGB are seeking to arm some of them, which will make the situation just terrible, though I don’t know if that is true.
I mean, I have written a bit about this previously but I I don’t know if I want to write another long post in English. I also assume it will lead to a notable digression about Geopolitics, but that is ok I guess.
To be clear, I am very critical of Poland and the Baltic states, as well as particularly Hungary’s, refugee policies, but it’s damn complex now due to Lukashenko’s actions.
So, that having been said, I am just google translating a Norwegian post I made just to comment on your post.
English will not be incredibly good because of G-translate, but that’s okay. Also, obviously I am giving an answer to another guy (he said this was 100% the responsibility of those who don’t let the refugees in, aka Poland):
I suspect that you have not fully understood this particular refugee route in terms of your answer, especially when you write 100 percent. I would recommend that you check this in depth. Then I agree that Poland and the Baltic countries bordering Belarus should receive far more refugees (they take in very few), but that is in a way a different matter, because this is actually complicated geopolitics aimed at Belarus geopolitical opponents. The whole escape route is bullshit and a false terminus where desperate people are used as chess pieces by Lukashenko with the knowing intention that none of them will get asylum through this (which is the whole point behind this). It is state-controlled human trafficking where the KGB, through false front companies, has set up one-way tickets to Minsk for refugees and migrants to travel, and then to ship them to their borders against their rivals as a weapon. The refugees were then driven to the borders, beaten up and chased against neighboring countries. It’s not at all as simple as it looks like you think.
In fact, it is extremely important to get out information globally that this escape route is false and a destination to hell. I think it is far more important to warn refugees who put all their finances at risk that they are being cheated by the KGB than to point the finger at the poor refugee policy of Belarus’s neighbors, as they will never in the world let them in no matter what you and I think they should, when they perceive that Lukashenko uses refugees as weapons against them. This is because geopolitics has its own logic and psychology. If an enemy attacks you to harm you socio-politically and socio-economically, there is no state on earth that would have accepted it and eased restrictions so that the enemy gets easier conditions. Then you can say that it is immoral and I agree with that, but geopolitics and security policy have never been ethical and will not be so in the foreseeable future.
Therefore, the best thing one can do in this case if one has good morals, in my opinion,is to warn loudly those who are in the camps in Iraq and other cities, where the KGB has now begun to operate, that they are totally fooled by one exceptionally cynical state apparatus disguised as private companies that sell expensive one-way tickets to Belarus, with the aim that they will then be chased against Belarus’ western borders after they have landed. Because in Belarus they do not get asylum, which is the whole point.
@craigjohnston , most of my post was missing because issues with google, but it’s just more of the same. In any case, if you you or others have ideas how to solve such a situation then I would like to know.
This is from only 2 days ago.
Listen to their voices, it is heartbreaking.
Bird view (contains video):
Then compare it with this:
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The entire situation is beyond disgusting and I have been following it for a while. But I don’t know what else to say but stating that it is completely disgusting and I don’t know how to solve it. Because as long as Lukashenko is using them as a weapon, no state is going to let them in. It is very painful to watch. Most of these people have payed the KGB through front companies everything they own in terms of cash, sometimes taken up large loans, to be able to afford the journey. Bellarus is actually earning money from them as far as I understood. Then they arrive in Minsk. Shipped then to the border with Poland. None of them knew they were going to be used as chess pieces when they left Iraq and elsewhere. They were lured there with cheap travel tickets and visums to Belarus.
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Just out of interest. Which country has a coherent and humane migration policy?
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The answer is very simple: none (apart maybe from some rare countries who don’t experience massive refugees influx). As a rule: the more refugees there will be, the less human these policies will be.
The UN projects the potential of one billion of refugees for 2050 if things go ahead as currently (mostly climate refugees). Looking forward to the coherence and ‘humanity’ of the policies which will be applied by then…
How very…Nigel Farage-y