Sami, dressed in traditional clothes, walk through downtown Stockholm November 23, 2007. REUTERS/Scanpix/Bertil Ericson

Now this is one of the stranger Olympic stories floating out there. When Norway didn’t jump out to a strong lead in the medal standings in Vancouver’s Winter Olympics, the Norwegian broadcaster NRK asked a Sami shaman what was going wrong. The Sami are indigenous people to the Scandinavian Peninsula, and the shaman speculated that it was the Canadian indigenous people who had cursed the Norwegian team over B.C. fish farms:

Eirik Boie Myrhaug is quoted as saying that Indian magic might be behind Norway’s Olympic setbacks. He suggests some B.C. chiefs might have cast an evil spell on the Norwegian athletes.

As NRK notes, several B.C. chiefs did stage a 29-hour hunger strike this week to protest the 29 Norwegian-owned fish farms in the Musgamagw Tsawataineuk Tribal Council’s territories, located in the Broughton Archipelago north of Vancouver.

[...]

One of the hunger strikers was Chief Bob Chamberlin from Gilford Island near Port McNeill, who denied having any mystic influence at the Olympics.

Chamberlin said he doesn’t want to be disrespectful to another people’s spiritual leader but that he can’t take credit for influencing the outcome of Olympic events.

“I can honestly report that I do not possess this kind of spiritual power he’s suggesting that I do,” Chamberlin said.

“If I did possess such a power, I don’t think I would be directing it at the Norwegian national sportsmen. I think I would direct it towards the fish farms.”

For the record, Norway is in 3rd place with 10 medals, which is ahead of Canada. Coming off an 8-0 loss in Men’s ice hockey to Team Canada, Norway took Team Switzerland to overtime today, losing 5-4. That’s the same Switzerland that took Canada to a 3-2 shootout loss. So perhaps our shaman curse is wearing off.