Every night, when the clock reads exactly 10, the windows in the dormitories of Uppsala in Sweden open and an entire neighborhood cries out.

This phenomenon is called the “Flogsta Scream” and is one of the most bizarre yet beloved traditions of Swedish student life.

It is an unusual ritual, performed almost every night in the Flogsta district of Uppsala, in which people lean out of their apartment windows at the same time and scream.

The screams last from a few seconds to ten minutes, and are never the same.

How it started;

The roots of the cry are not entirely clear. Some claim it all started in the 1970s or 1980s by students in the physics department in Uppsala who were trying to kill their stress and anxiety during exam season, while others claim the cry began as an informal tribute to a fellow student who committed suicide.

Flogsta’s scream went viral worldwide in 2014, when it was posted on Reddit and then spread via MTV’s website.

Although the tradition originally started as a cause for stress and the need to vent, for many students today, it is just a funny, almost ritualistic, moment of social connection.

As described by a former Flogsta resident, Arvid Cederholm: “I don’t remember it happening every night, but if someone started it, others joined in. It was more of a fun thing than a stressful thing.”

For a young student living alone for the first time, in a new city and away from his family, the cry of Flogsta can be more than just a game. It’s a symbolic integration into the community.

The tradition continues to this day and has been extended to other Swedish universities.

Other cries outside Sweden

The “cry” is not limited to Uppsala.

In Lappkärrsberget, near Stockholm University, there is the Lappkärr Cry, which takes place every Tuesday. In the Delphi neighborhood in Lund, students howl at 11 p.m., in a tradition called the “Delphi Roar” or “Elvavrålet” (the “roar of eleven“).

Very quickly, however, the cry was mistakenly turned from a local custom into a Swedish tradition.

Several people believed that if you shouted from your window in any city in Sweden, someone would answer. Of course, this is not true in all cities in the Scandinavian country.

That is, one cannot, for example, appear in the centre of Gothenburg, start screaming, and expect a similar reaction from the people there. It will just annoy the Swedes…