Ashley's Norwegian Adventure

The Early Bird Catches the Worm...

2008-06-18T17:09:00.006+02:00

...or in my case a moose! Last week I went hiking every day and decided to wake up early one day and saw a moose about 10 minutes from the lake down the road. I was approaching it on an incline and at first I thought it was a horse. As I got closer I noticed its ears were way too long to be a horses, so then I thought it must be a donkey. As I continued up the hill the legs kept getting longer and longer. That's when I realized it was a moose! The days before I was hiking through the backcountry and kept thinking this would be the perfect place to spot a moose and of course I see one when I'm 10 minutes from civilization and thinking that its a donkey.

I don't really know a whole lot about mooses. I knew it wouldn't try to eat me because they're herbivores, but all I really wanted to know was if they are agressive or not because it doesn't take a rocketscientist to decide who was bigger and if it ran after me it would probably trample me. Luckily it was it in a clearing so I was able to walk around it. Then as I started walking away from it, it starting following me! So I'm guessing they aren't very agressive. This is probably the coolest thing besides all the snow since I've been in Norway.

Just realized it was a moose

As close as I got to it

Happy Father's Day

2008-06-16T00:40:00.001+02:00

Hope you have a great day dad! See you in one week!!

>[:-)]

Happy Birthday

2008-05-31T14:55:00.005+02:00

Mom,

Or as we say here in Norway: Gratulerer med dagen! Hope you're having a great time at Tim and Heather's.

Love, Ashley

Watoto Children's Choir

2008-05-30T16:03:00.003+02:00

The Watoto Children's Choir came to Oslo yesterday, these children were so incredible. I've never seen such smiling faces on anyone with backgrounds like theirs. It just goes to show how much God's love can change a person. Watch this video and I'm sure you'll agree with me:

By the way they will be touring around Southern CA late February and March of next year.

So just what is Watoto? Here's some info I snagged from www.watoto.com:

Children brought to Watoto are from the most destitute situations. Many of these children have been abandoned and forced to fend for themselves at a very young age [AIDS and the civil war in Northern Uganda are the two most commons reasons]. Watoto gives these children the opportunity to develop in an environment where they come to understand their value. Watoto is improving the lives of these children. Watoto provides its students with Christian instruction, equipping these children to be Christian leaders and productive citizens of Uganda. This is proven by the hope and confidence displayed by those children who have become part of the Watoto family. Watoto is accomplishing its mission by focusing on the essential needs of orphaned and vulnerable children – specifically the spiritual, physical, educational and emotional needs. We believe that as the children are raised with Christian values, are trained academically and taught to over come emotional hurts, they will enter society equipped with the necessary life skills and moral values, enabling them to make a significant and lasting impact on the future of Uganda.

With over 1700 children in care, Watoto operates Baby Watoto and 3 Children’s Villages. This includes many individual homes in the villages and one large facility for the babies. Each individual home accommodates a house mother and 8 children. The facilities in the home for babies and in the villages have clean water, electrical power and an agricultural project that provides some food.

From the words of Joseph Chegum, one of Watoto's children:
Before Watoto rescued him: “After our parents died, we were the ones who were looking after ourselves. I was living with my older sister but she could not take care of us. We used to pick through the garbage to find anything which we could sell, and this is how we found money to eat."
After Watoto rescued him: "Life at Suubi is much better. I’m not worried about clothes or shoes. I’m not worried about food. It’s all here. At my old school we had to struggle to find money for school, books and shoes but here everything is much better.”

For the rest of Joseph's story click here.

Eurovision Song Contest 2008

2008-05-25T21:46:00.017+02:00

Saturday was the Eurovision Song Contest Finals held in Belgrade, Serbia. The Eurovision Song Contest is like American Idol, but only one music group from each country is allowed to participate. Aparently it is a very big deal here in Europe and has been going on since 1956. Also, they have the choice of singing in their own language or English...sadly most were in English. Oh my gosh. I almost forgot the most important information: there were absolutely NO commercials! I wouldn't even be able to fathom what TV is like without commercials unless I had seen it for myself. No commercials was definitely the coolest part, but now for the funniest part. Here are some of the videos that I thought were just rediculous:

Just a note: the volume will probably need to be turned down for each video.

Spain: Rodolfo Chikilicuatre- "Baila el Chiki Chiki"

France: Sebastian Tellier- "Divine" This guy is very French except for the fact that he is singing mostly in English

Bosnia and Herzegovina: Laka- "Pokusaj"

Germnay: No Angels- "Disapear"

Half the people I was watching this with were Germans and the whole night we were making fun of Germany because they did such a bad performance and had no life at all. We all decided that Germany would definitely lose, they came in 3rd to last just in front of Poland and the UK.

And now for some that I liked:

Turkey: Mor ve Ötesi "Deli" The lead singer looks a bit like Spock from Star Trek

Israel: Boaz Mauda- "The Fire in Your Eyes" If you're like me you're probably thinking "Since when did Israel move to Europe?" Well it didn't, but for whatever reason it is in the Eurovision Song Contest.

Finland: Teräsbetoni- "Missä Miehet Ratsastaa"

Denmark: Simon Mathew- "All Night Long"

Latvia: Pirates of the Sea- "Wolves of the Sea" It's the opposite of "The Pirates Who Don't Do Anything" by RelientK

Norway: Maria- "Hold on be Strong" They got 5th place and received points from 34 of 43 countries voting, especially the other Nordic countries!

And the winner is...Russia! Dima Bilan- "Believe"

Though I think the only reason they won is because of Evgeni Plushenko, the famous Russian figure skater who gold in the 2006 Winter Olympics. So this is just one more title for him to add to his resumé.

17 Mai, Hurra til Norge!

2008-05-22T22:04:00.009+02:00

A bit of history behind the May 17th celebrations:
In 1380 Norway entered into a union with Denmark due to Norway's poor economy and already weak political state. Over the years Norway lost all its independence and was subject to absolute monarchy by the Danish Crown. During the Napoleonic wars Denmark/Norway sided with Napoleon against Russia, Sweden and Germany. At the Battle of Leipzig in 1813 Napoleon was defeated by Sweden and Denmark was forced to give Norway to Sweden, which ended 434 years of union with Denmark. Even though Norway was now in a union with Sweden it was to maintain the status of an independent state, with its own constitution, national representation, its own government and the right to levy taxes. On May 17, 1814 the Norwegian constitution was adopted and was considered to be one of the most radically democratic constitutions of its time. To this day May 17th symbolizes Norway's independence and its democratic constitution.

Norwegians like to dress up for May 17th. These guys are wearing their national costume, called the bunad (note this picture was stolen from the guy on the left...it's not mine).

Side note: a bunad costs about $7000, but I should also add that they are made of wool by hand and have a lot of detail (note the bottom of the dress on girl to the left), they also come with matching jewelry, a shawl and/or purse for the ladies and a hat for the guys. Since the bunad is worn about 5 times a year (May 17, baptisms, confirmations, or weddings) it makes it a very expensive ensemble, but once they have one made they don't buy another (unless they outgrow it of course).

Some girls, also in their bunad.

However, if they aren't wearing their bunad the guys will dress up in suit and tie and the ladies will wear a dress or a skirt. I don't think I've ever seen so many people dressed this nicely in one place before, especially the children.

The Royal Guard

(listen to the Norwegian National Anthem: Ja, Vi Elser Dette Landet)

May 17th is considered to be a day for the children so in Oslo, about 100 elementary schools parade past the Royal Palace with their flags and Musikkorps (marching band)

Often times the high schoolers will help by playing in the musikkorps or baton groups.

The russ even join in on the parades, note the "knots" on the girl's hat.

Looking down the parade route.

They are still coming after 2 hours...I didn't know it could go so long!

So, what did I do for syttende mai (17th May)? After attending the parade in the morning I went to a church service in the afternoon filled with Norwegian flags, patriotic songs and a patriotic sermon (all in Norwegian I might add). Some German friends told me after that in Germany the German flag would never be placed in a church. Which isn't so strange in the U.S., but I think it would be strange to sing "The Star Spangled Banner" in church. In the evening I went to a "17 Mai Fest"The festivities included Norwegian Folk Dancing (below) and swing dancing.

Believe it or not, I even participated a bit in dancing. Shocking I know!

It's Russ Season!

2008-05-11T14:07:00.012+02:00

Russ are the graduating high school seniors in Norway. The tradition basically consists of wearing red overalls (or blue, depending on what field of study they were in), completing tasks to get knots for their hats and partying with their friends to celebrate graduation from high school. Partying starts around the end of April and continues until May 17th (the national holiday). In other words its 3-4 weeks of drunken nights and dares to recieve knick knacks to hang from the tassle on their hat. Groups of friends will get together and buy (or rent) a bus, which they paint and deck out with elaborate sound systems, couches, TVs, a bar, ect. and go around town partying and completing their tasks. I'm convinced that one of their tasks is to try to keep me awake at night, since the like to party at the lake down the road from me and keep their music very loud. Some nights I can hear the music until the sun begins to rise in the morning (which right now is about 4:20 AM). It seems to be a pretty fun tradition, although I will admit I'm not a fan of the drinking, sex and other "crazy tasks" (for lack a better word) that go on, but once all that is taken away it sounds like one of the best celebrations I've ever heard of. If you want to know more about the tradition Wikipedia has a great article and Aftenposten (largest Norwegain newspaper) recently wrote an article about the drunken russ celebrations.

Rappelling in Kolsås

2008-05-08T12:58:00.009+02:00

Oslo from the top of Kolsås

Kolsås is a mountain ridge on the west side of Oslo in the city of Bærum. The mountain was formed from a volcano that lies somewhere near Oslo, it exploded some thousands of years ago and the lava pushed up all the rock and dirt from that area into a mountain. The mountain is made of different layers of rocks, one of the layers near the top is worth a lot of money in Germany to rock collectors. A rock the size of a couch cushion is worth twice as much as my car. I can't believe something so insignificant as a speckled rock is worth more than the one material object I rely the most (besides my computer). Of course a lot of things are worth more than my car, so its not saying much. Because of all the rock on the mountain it is one of the best climbing crags in all of Norway, in fact it was the very first place people started climbing in Norway. There are about 200 routes on the south face of the mountain. I'm guessing the mountian must be pretty famous because Claude Monet even painted it in 1895.

This is me going down a 32ft drop. Its not as scary as it looks; the rope, harness, and rock clamps together can take about 5000 lbs of weight (basically they could hoist a car up to the top of the mountain). Rappelling, or going down, was the most fun because it takes no talent or strength and is a whole lot easier than climbing back up. The only bad part about rappelling is that you have to climb back up again. I always thought you had to be really strong to go rock climbing, but, believe it or not, the only strength you need is in your fingers. Climbing up was only about 26ft because we started higher than where we climbed down. Rock climbing isn't as difficult as it seems, your toes are what hurts the most because you have to where special climbing shoes that are a couple sizes smaller than your regular shoes so they can fit into really small places. Supposedly the shorter you are the easier it is to climb (finally being short has its advantages!). The basic idea is to use your legs to hoist you up, so finding good places to put your feet is the most important part. Starting off was the hardest because there weren't many good spots my feet could go without slipping. I didn't think I was going to be able to climb up it at first, I thought the only way I was gonna get back up was if I walked up the trail on the side of the rock. I had to get a boost up higher and then it was pretty easy because the rock was more miss-shaped at the top. We only had time to rappel twice and climb once because we wanted to get a chance to rappel a steeper rock that was 114ft to the bottom. It probably took about 3 or 4 minutes to rappel the 114 feet. When we got to the bottom we had to hike back to the trail and passed a guy who had fallen or something, I'm not sure what happened because they were speaking in Norwegian, but I think he hurt his ankle.

The first picture is of the Oslo Fjord, which isn't really a fjord according to Norwegian standards. The second picture is looking towards the northwest at 8pm, even though it looks to about 4 or 5 in the afternoon.

Attack from a bee!

2008-04-24T22:03:00.005+02:00

Okay well, I didn't exactly get attacked by a bee, but it wanted to! I could sense his hostility, you know. It flew in through my window just after I closed the curtains. It was the scariest looking thing I've ever seen, even though it was only 1 inch long. (That's still a pretty big bee if you ask me! Maybe it was one and a half inches.)

Weather Update

2008-04-20T00:00:00.001+02:00

Well, the snow I talked about in the last post melted by that afternoon and I'm happy to inform you that Norway has officially entered the "warm" weather season. It was a blistering 51 degrees out today and I went to the store with sandals and a short sleeve shirt. I must really be accustomed to the cold weather because at home when it hits 65 degrees, I'm bundling up like its gonna snow. Going back to California will probably mess up my system now, whenever I hear its 50 out, I'm going to think its t-shirt and sandals weather. But knowing me I'll adjust to the 90 degree heat quickly and never want it to get any lower than that.

I Got My Hopes Up Too Soon

2008-04-12T11:08:00.003+02:00

Leaves are finally starting to come back on the trees and I thought that I had seen the last reminants of winter, which to be honest I was getting a little tired of it being cold all the time...and then this happened: It's the 12th of April and I wake up to it snowing outside! Snowing! In the middle of April. It's 80 degrees at home and its snowing in Norway. Who would have ever thought? I know in previous posts I explained how much I like the snow, well I guess my true colors have finally shown...I'm all Californian! I like the idea of their being snow, but I like it even better if I can just visit it whenever I want to.

Lutherstadt Wittenberg and Eisenach

2008-04-11T22:51:00.001+02:00

Nürnberg

2008-04-11T18:30:00.001+02:00

Carcassonne and Dachau

2008-04-11T16:11:00.003+02:00

Carcassonne is a city in the south of France, but it is also a Medieval City one mile from the train station. The Medieval City is a walled fortified town occupied from as early as 6th century B.C. Within the city walls besides the castle there are also several streets with restaurants, shops and hotels. Nowadays it is more of a tourist village than anything else because of all the tourist shops you can find there.

Pictures from Paris

2008-04-11T03:03:00.002+02:00

Pictures from Edinburgh

2008-03-25T23:32:00.002+01:00

Spring Break Update

2008-03-25T22:55:00.002+01:00

Well, everything was going great until I missed my stop in Carcassonne (Sunday morning) and ended up in Narbonne (about 30-45 minutes east of Carcassonne). I made it back to Carcassonne and reserved train tickets from Carcassonne to Pisa, but platform 1 and 2 were right next to each other and I took the train from platform 2, not 1. Instead of going east toward Pisa, I went west to Toulouse and there was no way to get to Pisa that night or anywhere else for that matter, except Paris. However I wasn't able to get a connection to Munich (where I already had my hostel booked) until Tuesday morning. So, I waited for 10 hours in the Toulouse train station, took the night train back to Paris, paid $135 for a hotel (because all the hostels were booked) and took a train to Munich this morning. Now all is good and I can take the regional trains without making reservations (or worrying about them being all booked up). The only other change to the plan so far is I'm going to Dachau Concentration Camp in the morning so I could have more time there. I attempted to go to the Neuschanstein Castle tonight, but I was given the wrong info from one of the train attendants. He told me to take the train at 4:51pm and it was direct to Füssen (city where the castle is), but I ended up in Kempten (1.5 hrs by train from Füssen). Apparently "direct" actually meant change to a different train in Kaufbeuren. Oh well, I got a nice ride anyway. With all the train confusion I guess I forgot to mention something about the weather. Well, since I’m a lot further south than Norway I thought it was going to warm...at least 60 degrees…because the weather forecasts looked promising before I left. However, it’s been snowing, just a little though, not enough to anything major, but enough to make me wear 4 sweatshirts earlier today. Everything should go as planned from here on out (provided I take the right trains).

Carcassonne, a fortified midieval city

2008-03-24T13:49:00.003+01:00

The Eiffel Tower

2008-03-24T13:14:00.003+01:00

Eiffel Tower at Night

2008-03-24T12:46:00.003+01:00

Euro Disney

2008-03-21T00:29:00.002+01:00

Hello from Paris

2008-03-20T01:16:00.002+01:00

Pictures from Copenhagen

2008-03-14T21:31:00.001+01:00

Updated Spring Break Plans

2008-03-09T18:15:00.008+01:00

Finalized Spring Break plans, assuming the train schedules work out the way I would like them to: (traveling will be in red and sightseeing will be in blue)

Sun. March 16:

Fly Oslo(12:25pm)-Edinbourgh(1:20pm)

afternoon/night in Edinbourgh

Mon. March 17:

Edinbourgh

Tue. March 18:

Edinbourgh

Edinbourgh(10:30pm)-London(March 19 7:43am)

Wed. March 19:

~2.5 hours in London

London(10:28am)-Paris(1:23pm)

afternoon/night in Paris

Thu. March 20:

Paris (Euro Disney)

Fri. March21:

Paris

Sat. March 22:

Paris

Paris(10:56pm)-Carcassonne(March 23 7:39am) (near the Spanish border)

Sun. March 23:

~5 hours in Carcassonne

Carcassonne(12:52pm)-Marseille(4:39pm) (coast of France)

~1 hour in Marseille

Marseille(5:34pm)-Pisa, Italy(March 24 5:25am)

Mon. March 24:

~6 hours in Pisa

Pisa(11:44am)-Milan(3:50pm)

~1/2 hour in Milan

Milan(4:25pm)-Bern, Switzerland(7:54)

~2 hours in Bern

Bern(10:04pm)-Frankfurt, Germany(March 25 3:08am)

Tue. March 25:

~3.5 hours in Frankfurt

Frankfurt(6:35am)-Koblenz(8:10am) (train ride along the Rhine River)

~1.5 hours in Koblenz

Koblenz(9:48am)-Munich(2:31pm)

Munich(2:39pm)-Dachau(3:10pm)

~2 hours in Concentration camp(plus however long I want to tour the city)

night in Munich

Wed. March 26:

Munich(6:51am)-Füssen(7:52am) right on the Austrian border
~5 hours at Neuschanstein Castle and surrounding area

Füssen(1:06pm)-Munich(3:07pm)

Munich(3:16pm)-Nuremberg(4:23pm)

night in Nuremberg

Thu. March 27:

Nuremberg

Fri. March 28:

Nuremberg(5:21am)-Wittenberg(9:20am)

day/night in Wittenberg (most likely stay night in Berlin)

Sat. March 29:

Wittenberg(7:36am)-Eisenach(9:51am)

day in Eisenach and Wartberg Castle

Eisenach(2:06pm)-Berlin(5:00pm)

~6 hours in Berlin

Berlin(11:15pm)-Malmö, Sweden(March 30 8:00am)

Sun. March 30:

Malmö-Gothenborg(12:20pm)

~5 hours in Gothenborg

Gothenborg(5:45pm)-Oslo(9:45pm)

Then I'll be back home, have a day to rest and start with classes again on Tuesday!

Fun fact of the day

2008-03-08T23:17:00.002+01:00

I haven't had much time to sit down and post about Copenhagen because I've been finalizing spring break plans and working on a mandatory assignment for my math class. Anyway, I was talking to my dad today and he reminded me to set my clock forward tonight, BUT European countries don't start Day Light Savings until March 30th. So until the 30th I'll be only 8 hrs ahead of all you in CA, 7 hrs ahead of those in the Mountain time zone, 6 hrs for those in Central time zone and 5 hrs for those on the East coast. Basically I'll be one hour closer to you for the next 3 weeks.

Silly Norwegians

2008-02-26T15:48:00.002+01:00

Well, yesterday before my math class started one of the other students commented on how "very hot" the weather was outside. The high yesterday was only 43 degrees so when I heard him say this I couldn't help but start laughing. Since I've pretty much gotten used to the coldness here, it did seem a bit warm yesterday, but definitely not "very hot." I can only wait to hear what he says the weather is like in the summer...maybe I'll hear "it's scorching" or something to that affect.

Skiing Again!

2008-02-24T23:29:00.002+01:00

I went skiing again today with two girls from Australia and one from Wisconsin. I think I’m getting better, though I still have trouble with balance and going down hills. I fell more this time, but they were all intentional because we went down quite a few hills that were too steep for me and one fall I bent my pole a bit, so hopefully I’ll be able to bend it back. Also, we were going down one hill that wasn’t steep at all, but the snow was a little choppy because it’s been melting, so I ended up doing the splits down the hill and then lost my balance in the end. Even though the splits were pretty scary, it was fun once it was over and done with.

BOO NASA!!

2008-02-21T04:50:00.002+01:00

It is currently 4:57AM on Thursday morning and me and my friend Nick, from Minnesota, just got back from Sognsvann Lake where we attempted to see the lunar eclipse. NASA predicted that it would be visable in North America and in Europe, but aparently because Norway is so far north they forgot that it was part of Europe too. So, I'm blaming NASA for my lack of a lunar eclipse, even though it was a bit cloudy we should have been able to a glow in the sky because the clouds weren't that thick. Hope you took pictures of it for me in North America.

Norwegian Cooking Class

2008-02-20T16:27:00.006+01:00

This past weekend I went to a cooking class to learn how to cook simple and cheap Norwegian food from grad students studying nutrition. We used the kitchen of the school cafeteria, which was by far the coolest kitchen I’ve ever seen. They had racks of about 50 spring form pans, huge mixing vats that had propellers at the bottom to mix automatically mix the food for you and an electronic scale like the ones from a chemistry lab. We split up into three different groups, my group made Norwegian pizza, the other group made vegetable soup and the grad students made Norwegian waffles. We used pita bread for the dough; tomatoes, tomato paste, kidney beans, onions, and garlic for the sauce; and cheese, ham, green peppers, and olives for the toppings. It was probably the strangest pizza I’ve ever eaten, but surprisingly not that bad (even with the beans). The vegetable soup was also really good; it was the first time I’ve had fresh veggies since I got here. We finished off with Norwegian waffles, which are thinner that regular waffles and a lot less crispy. So they are more like pancake-waffles and go really well with jelly and brown cheese or jelly and sour cream (also strange, but tasty). Brown cheese is made from goat’s milk, the same way that regular cheese from goat’s milk is made, just stirred longer and tastes awful by itself but really good with breads and jelly (it basically counteracts for the sweetness of jelly). Waffles in Norway aren’t a breakfast food like we’re used to, but a snack usually with coffee of tea and are very, very popular as an after church snack. I think the one thing Norwegians consume more than coffee (which is drunk here more than any other country in the world), fish or bread is waffles. We did get to try a typical Norwegian breakfast too: breads with different types of spreads, like mackerel in tomato sauce, caviar (that came in a toothpaste looking tube), and chicken from a can (Norwegian spam). They were all really good and you couldn’t tell that the caviar was fish eggs, it just looked like mashed up meat. Other types of toppings for breads are crab or shrimp salad; a chocolate spread, kind of like peanut butter, only chocolaty; or even a boiled egg maybe with some kind of fish from a can. It was all really, really good and I don’t think I’ve ever had so much food in one sitting; other than Thanksgiving of course. I think my favorite part of the class, besides it being FREE, was the kitchen. So many cool gadgets to play with and the fact that I can say that I’ve cooked lunch in an industrial sized kitchen, which reminds me of the “Man’s Kitchen” built for Tool Time from the TV show Home Improvement (with Tim Allen), it was screaming “More Power!”

Pictures:

2 Hours, 15 Waffle Irons and 600 Hundred Waffles Later

2008-02-20T16:09:00.013+01:00

This past weekend I also went to Nordmarkskapellet, which is a chapel in the middle of the forest. It is 6 km from Frognerseteren (at the end of same T-Bane (subway) line that #6 Holmenkollen is on from the map of Oslo) to help out the 75th anniversary celebration of the chapel. So after my cooking class I drove up with Alv Holme, the brother of Børge Holme who was in charge of the celebration, and on the way there we saw a moose strolling through some farms, now you can’t tell by this picture because, of course, I forgot to turn the flash off, but there really is a moose there. So we made it to the chapel and I even though I made sure I packed PJs to sleep in, I didn’t think to bring a sleeping bag or blanket (luckily they had extras). I guess I didn’t get enough cooking from the cooking class because some how I volunteered myself to help cook dinner. After I began cooking I asked what I was cooking, but the lady in charge of dinner wasn’t very fluent in English, so she said I was making a “Spanish Dish.” Later I found out it was a stew/casserole; it was soupy with pieces of chicken in it and got poured on top of rice. So after my three course meal from the cooking class I had 1.5 servings of the Spanish thing. Of course I couldn’t not try it, even though I wasn’t hungry, I did make it after all and I don’t get meat very often (especially free meat, I bought six pieces (750g or l.65 lbs) of chicken a few weeks ago for $12.96 and that was on sale too, but it was boneless-skinless, so of course it’ll be more expensive). So the next morning I had Norwegian breakfast (bread with chocolate, cream cheese, boiled egg, …), I don’t know how I was even able to make room for it because I was still full from dinner. Then we had a flag raising ceremony and everyone sang the Norwegian National Anthem. Then we began making waffles out of the batter we prepared the night before. Børge said they were expecting 300 people (which is about how many showed up) so we were going to make 600 waffles. Since, I’ve never made waffles before I decided that now would as good a time as any to learn, so I grabbed some batter and made about 100 waffles. As you can see by the title, we had 15 waffle irons (I had three) and we finished in two hours, so that is 1 waffle very 12 seconds. You’d think that I’d be sick of waffles, but of course after the church service I had three waffles with jelly and brown cheese plus a piece of cake with marzipan frosting (though after the marzipan, I couldn’t eat another bite). The church service was led by the Prime Minister from two years ago, Kjell Magne Bondevik. It was all in Norwegian, but I had a friend from the Christian Union I’m a part of translate for me. However, I did sing along to the songs. After the service we had waffles and cake, Børge interviewed some people involved with the chapel throughout the years and we watched a movie about the chapel that was made in 1969. All in all, it was a really nice weekend, but the best part (besides becoming an expert waffle maker) came on the way home. I walked back to the T-bane station at Frognerseteren with two others who walked in; we walked right past Tryvannsstua, which was the down-hill slope that I almost fell over while skiing a few weeks ago. It really wasn’t all that big, but was really steep. Since it was late in the afternoon we got to walk during sunset and by the time we got to the T-Bane station we got a really nice view of Oslo and the Oslo Fjord at dusk. It is probably one of the best spots to get an aerial view of the city.

Pictures from the weekend:

Walking to Frognerseteren:

Tryvannsstua:

Riding the T-Bane:

Still Riding the T-Bane:

My first ski adventure!!

2008-02-12T20:56:00.001+01:00

Well, I've decided to rent cross country skis for the whole season and last Friday was my first time trying them out (also the first time skiing ever). It was very fun and very tiring. The hardest part was going up hill and instead of skiing I had to walk on the edge of my skis so the front ends were pointed out. There were some parts when I thought I was going to go down the hill backwards because my arms and legs hurt so much, but then I was reminded by one of my American friends that I went with: What goes up, must go down. So I kept going and going and going until we finally reached the top and after a while we crossed paths the down hill ski path. I went down part of it, but then the down hill path looked like it went straight off a cliff (but it was really just a super steep hill) and the cross country path went off to the right. But since cross country skis aren't made for stopping very well I had to fall before I got to the edge of the cliff of else I would have gone over. So, as we made our way down the not so steep hill I took off the skis and walked so I could rest a little and so I wouldn't have to worry about not being able to stop. Then we got to the bottom of the hill and I skied the rest of the way. Although we had to dash across another down hill slope while snowboarders and skiers were racing down past us. I didn't care if I got hit I just didn't want to start sliding down the hill because it was so foggy you couldn't even see the bottom. But I did make it across, and it was mostly flat with a little bit of a slope down. The very last part was up again, but it wasn't so bad this time. We spent a total of two hours skiing, but because I was so slow it was probably more like an hours worth of skiing.

My two American friends who helped me.

Part that I walked down.

Probably about 2-3 feet of snow still at Frognerseteren.

Path just at the end of our journey.

The three of us while waiting for the T-Bane (subway).

It was so foggy!!

Sami People's Day

2008-02-09T14:45:00.000+01:00

This is late in coming, but better late than never. Basically, the Sami are nomads living in tepees and following the reindeer migration. Last Wednesay was Sami People's Day in Norway, I know nothing about and it is only celebrated in the North becuase that is where the Sami live. So, here's some info, which I got from The Norway Post:

The Nordic Sami Council decided in 1992 to celebrate a joint Sami National Day, and the first was celebrated on February 6th 1993. It marks the date of the first Sami National Convention in Trondheim in 1917. This was the first time the Sami gathered around common interests, across national Nordic boundries. After 100 years of "Norwegianization", Sami spokesmen started working for a recognition of Sami culture, language and Sami rights around the turn of the century. The Sami language is again used in local schools, and a Sami Parliament has been established in Norway. The Sami are alsocampaigning for first rights to natural resources in their region. The Sami anthem and flag were approved at a Nordic Sami Convention in 1986. The Sami National Day on February 6th has been made official flag day in Norway, and the Sami flag is flown on all official buildings, alone or alongside the Norwegian flag. Around 40,000 Samis live in Norway, 20,000 in Sweden and 7,000 in Finland. In addition, an estimated 2,000 live in Russia.

Pictures of the Day

2008-02-07T15:22:00.000+01:00

Hill of houses looking from Ullevål Stadion towards Kringsjå

Taken on the T-Bane (subway), the tall buildings in the background is where I live

A river leading into Sognsvann Lake and melting the ice

First day of sun in a week!!

The island in the middle of the lake. Yes, I walked across the lake to the island!! Can you believe it, I've walked across water (just don't tell anyone that it was under 6 inches of snow and probably just as much ice).

Fjellbirkeland/Kringsjå Studentby (student village)

2008-02-07T00:21:00.000+01:00

I live in Fjellbirkeland Studentby, which shares the same village as Kringsjå, so I usually just say that I live in Kringsjå (although I think Fjellbirkeland is whole lot more fun to say...you should try it: f-j-e-l-l-b-i-r-k-e-l-a-n-d), plus not many people know where Fjellbirkeland is, so I end up saying that its in Kringsjå anyway. Living in the outskirts of town definately has its perks: more trees, less people, and closer to the lake and hiking trails. Another perk is that Kringsjå is 10-20 feet higher (in elevation) than the city center, which is part of the reason I think Oslo feels like a mountain town. Being higher in elevation means one thing: MORE SNOW!! If it is raining in the city center, it may be snowing in Kringsjå. But also, if it is snowing in Kringsjå there is no way to know what it is doing in the city center. Here's what a day in Kringsjå would look like if you were here.

It's probably important that you know know where you are going, so take this map along with to guide the way:

This is the view of Kringsjå from the T-Bane (subway) station (taken weeks ago before the last snow storm came through)

I'm not sure what this building is, but I'm guessing maybe a convenience store.

This is my building, #58. Note the yellow around the windows.

Cool tree next to my building. It makes me feel like Christmas.

Another cool tree, I really do think that snow makes everything look 150% better (especially things that look dead)!

Rock with a plaque of some guys face, don't know who though. Looking towards Kringsjå and away from Fjellbirkeland.

On my way to towards the T-Bane, but looking at my building (after the one with blue windows that's on the very left) and others in Fjellbirkeland.

Stairs up to the parking lot, looking towards the T-Bane.

At the top of the stairs (the building on the right is where I do my laundry)

Car in the parking lot with 6-7 inches of snow on top.

Looking down at the Kiwi (grocery store), Posten (the post office), and my postboks (mail box).

Closer look at the Kiwi, Posten (inside the Kiwi), and my postboks (just left of the Kiwi)

Looking back up at the other side of the Kiwi

These bikes also have 6-7 inches of snow on them, might be kind of hard to take a ride today.

To the right (but not in the picture) is the reception and look out is more residences in Kringsjå.

Looking away from Fjellbirkeland towards the reception, also looking at the same clearing as in the previous picture, just from a different angle.

Picnic benches one building away from me...I'm beginning to really like the snow, but only when there is a lot of it.

Just more buildings in Kringsjå

Looking towards the rest of Kringsjå. The small building in the middle is the student reception. The taller one's on either side are residences.

Two of the playgrounds for the nursery schools in Kringsjå. Its very strange because the student villages are supposed to be only for students at the University, but I guess there are enough people who have kids to need 5 nursery schools in one student village. I guess those in graduate programs could have kids, its still odd to see small kids in a student village.

The sports school up the road towards the lake.

Oslo og Sognsvann

2008-02-06T00:14:00.000+01:00

The Royal Palace

Even though Oslo is the oldest Nordic Capital (more than 1000 years old), most of the buildings downtown don't seem that old. The oldest part of the city (that I know of) is maybe Akershus Slott (Akershus Castle) which was built in 1290. Everything else is probably about 200-300 years old. After being in Oslo for a while I tend to forget that this is the capital of Norway, its more like part city and part mountain town. The downtown area is pretty busy everyday of the week except Sundays and consists mostly of the area surrounding the blue dots on the T-Bane(subway) route from the picture on the previous post. Karl Johans Gate is one of the main streets in town:

Here's the view of it from the Royal Palace looking towards the city center. The road may look red but its actually tiny pebbles spread along the street so that you don't slip on the melting snow. A truck that looks like a street sweeper goes up and down the streets after each snow fall and shoots out the pebbles. In the outskirts of town (like where I live) a tractor will plow the roads and then spread the pebbles (kind of like how farmers spread their seed). A tractor will also come trough on the sidewalks, but instead of spreading pebbles, it spreads salt which lowers the temperature that the melting snow will freeze at. (There's your chemistry lesson for the day). Most of streets surrounding Karl Johans Gate are business type of buildings, but further out you get the more residential it becomes. There are two main shopping malls in the city center where you can find just about anything (even a grocery store). However, all the stores are specialty stores (ie. electronics, hardware, shoes, sporting goods, books, etc.), there is no such thing as Target or Walmart here. There are only two stores that go above and beyond the specialty store status, IKEA (pronounced E-key-a not eye-key-a) and Clas Ohlson. Of course we all know what IKEA is, but I'm guessing you've never heard of Clas Ohlson. It is probably the closest thing to Walmart in Norway, the difference is that it doesn't sell clothes or food, but carries most everything else.
This is another view of the beginning of the dowtown area, just one stop from the University. I must have taken this picture on a weekday, because Sundays are pretty dead. Even though 85% of the population are clasified Christians, only a small portion of these people actively attend church. Most people go skiing on Sundays or just stay home because there is nothing else to do; all the stores are closed. There may be the occasional Navarsen (like 7-11) or café open, but everything else is shutdown. Grocery stores even stop selling alcohol at 6pm on Saturday nights, which some of my international friends found to be extremely inconvenient the first weekend here, but I think its pretty cool. I'm sure this tradition originated from resting on the Sabbath and has been kept around to have one day where you can't do anything, but stay home with the family (or go skiing). I wish stores in the U.S. would be closed on Sundays, good thing we have places like Chick-fil-a around that find this to be an important tradition. Of course this is just one of many things that I like about Oslo. My favorite thing, by far, is Sognsvann Lake just 10 minutes down the road from me. Here is two views of the lake: the one on the right is of the island, but since its there is about a foot of snow on top of the ice you can't tell, and the other is from the dock looking out across the lake. Both of these pictures were taken on pretty foggy days, but I don't know why one looks blue and the other looks grey. I think it may be because the blue one was right at sunset and the other was a couple hours before sunset, but thats just a guess. It takes me about 1.5 hours to walk around the lake, of course this includes stopping to take pictures along the way, dogding puddles from melting snow and walking to and from my room. I'm going to make it my goal to walk there once a day for the rest of the semester. The main reason I want to do this is #1 it gets me out of my room and #2 I want to make a time lapsed video of pictures taken each day from different spots around the lake to see the change from winter to spring to summer, which I'll put together and post once I get back home. This is one of my favorite pictures taken on my walk the other day, it might be a little difficult to have a picnic right now, maybe in a few months.

Here's another view of the path. Most of the snow on the path has turned to mush since Sunday, so it doesn't look as nice anymore.

Okay, one last picture. Oh how I just love seeing the snow on the trees!! It looks so much better than the fake flocking we can get on our Christmas trees.

Map of Oslo

2008-02-05T23:39:00.000+01:00

*this isn't a complete map of Oslo, just the part that I spend most of my time in*

The city of Oslo is contained within all the red lines in the map above, the red lines separate the different neighborhoods of the city. The orange lines are the routes for the T-Bane, which is the underground or subway, the black dots on the routes are the above-ground stops, and the blue dots are the underground stops. It may be called the underground, but only 5 stops are actually underground, strange isn't it? It's actually very nice that way because I'm able to see most of the city that I'd miss if I were underground.

Sognsvann Lake

Krinsjå Studentby: the student village where I live

Sogn Studentby: where most the international students live

Ullevål Stadion: where the national soccer team plays

Universitetet i Oslo: the main university campus

Holmenkollen Ski Jump: 30 min. ride from the city to the ski jump

Vigelandsparken: Sculpture park displaying the work of Gustav Vigeland

Norsk folkemuseet: Norwegian Folk Museum

Vikingskiphuset: Viking Ship Museum

Kon-Tiki Museum: See the "First weekend in Norway" blog for more info.

American Lutheran Church

Royal Palace, National Theater, Original University Buildings, and Karl Johans Gate: Karl Johans Gate is mostly a pedestrian walking street lined with shops that leads from the Royal Palace to Oslo S, which is the main subway/train/bus station

Akershus Slott og Festning: Akershus Castle/Fortress

Fastelavenssøndag and the American Lutheran Church

2008-02-03T23:54:00.001+01:00

This past Sunday was Fastelavenssøndag here in Norway. Basically, it is the celebration of the last Sunday before the season of Lent begins. Though, the only way it is celebrated is to eat Fastelavensboller, which is a roll/bun/biscuit with whipped cream in the middle. It’s kind of like a donut from Kripsy Kreme, but not as tasty because Americans like to make everything sweeter or with lots of spices and Norwegians like to take out the spice or sweetness. So, my Fastelavensboller was a semi-hard biscuit with tasteless whipped cream, but some of the other Fastelavenbollers looked better (that's what I get for waiting until most of them were gone!).

For the past two weeks I've been going to the American Lutheran Church (the week before that I went to a church service in Royal Palace Church!). The church was founded in 1958 because of the vast number of Americans in Norway after WWII that wanted to have an American Church in Oslo. Today, the congregation is mostly an international crowd, because it is one of the few churches in town that holds services in English. The average Sunday attendance is probably between 80 and 115 and it’s kinda nice to see the American Flag every week up by the pulpit, what a nice comfort from home! The pastor is from the Pacific Northwest (I'm guessing Washington or Oregon), I don't know how long he's been in Norway, but I do know he was once a pastor in Germany. I like the church for the most part, it has the traditional liturgy that you'd expect from a Lutheran Church, you know the "Lord be with you" "And also with you." Here’s just a few more thoughts about the church: I’m sure most of you at Crown of Life think we have a small choir. Well this church really doesn’t have any choir, it’s just a group of people who get together an hour before the service to practice a few songs. The first week it was seven people, including the pastor who doubled as the guitarist and another man who also played the banjo (which was kinda cool), but this past week there was only five people. For being small they sound pretty good though. One thing I like about it being an American Church is that the American Flag is up by the pulpit, it’s a very nice thing to see every week. It’s weird what type of things you take for granted and never think its something you’d miss until you don’t have it anymore (like the American Flag or the size of paper, which I’ll save for another day). Well, while proof-reading this blog I noticed I may be getting a little long-winded as well, so I’ll return tomorrow with what the city of Oslo is like…

The Biggest Snowflakes In The World!!!!

2008-02-01T11:03:00.000+01:00

This is what it looked like when I woke up today. I'm pretty sure these are the biggest snowflakes in the world, and they say that everything's bigger in Texas, well I guess they've never been to Norway!!

Here's a picture so you can see, up close, just how big they were...

I think there is about 4-5 inches of snow on the ground right now and it is suposed to snow throughout the night, so we should have a lot more by morning. It is so exciting, all I want to do is stare out the window and watch it (must be because I'm from California or something). What a great way to start Febraury!!! The only problem with the snow, or rain for that matter, is that it melts on my glasses and makes them hard to see through. Another problem is that whenever I walk in a building or get on the T-Bane (subway) my glasses fog up, because when I'm outside they get cold and then I walk inside and its like an instant sauna in front of my face. I'm not sure which is worse, wet glasses or foggy glasses...maybe I should have gone with contacts!

Tentative Spring Break Plans

2008-01-31T19:29:00.000+01:00

1. 16 March: Fly from Oslo to Ediburgh, Scotland to visit my friend Megan

2. 16 March-18 March: Edinburgh

Take the train from Edinburgh to Paris, arrive in Paris at 2PM

3. 19 March- 21 March: Paris

Take the train from Paris to Southern Germany

4. 22 March: Dachau, Munich, and Nuremberg

Take the train from either Munich or Nuremberg to North-Eastern Germany

5-6. 23 March: Wittenberg and Berlin

Take the train from Berlin to Malmö, Sweden. Then from Malmö back to Oslo.

These plans all depend timing the trains right, so if things don't go as planned I'll have to cut out Southern Germany or North-Eastern Germany.

So Just How Expensive Is Norway Anyway?

2008-01-29T19:57:00.000+01:00

I guess the title is pretty self explanatory, so lets find out how much I'm paying for things here in Norway!! Just keep in mind that most of the food I buy is store brand ... so its the cheapest and least tasty. Couple things to point out: 1) NOK= Norwegian Kroner a.k.a. the Norwegian currency 2) I'll put the Norwegian translation underneath the item so you can learn some Norwegian at the same time! 3) When listing prices, instead of putting a period before writing the change, Europeans use a comma. So something that is one dollar and fifty cents would be written 1,50 . If I didn't know about this before I left home I would have thought they forgot a zero at the end and it was really supposed to be fifteen hundred dollars.

Monthly Transportation Card___NOK430,00__$81.13
Studentkort

This isn't a bad price for a month's worth of transportation. This is just the student price though, the regular adult price is NOK730,00 or $137.74. I usually spend $60 on gas each month, then if you add insurance, registration, and repairs it comes out pretty even. Plus I don't add wear and tear on my car!

Set of 3 Pots____________NOK75,00____$14.15
Gryte

This was also a real good deal, since all the other pots were going for NOK120 - NOK300 or $22.64 - $56.61

Hairdryer_____________NOK99,00____$18.68
Hårtørrer

This was the cheapest hairdryer I could find, it may not seem that expensive considering how long they usually last, but this really should have been a $5.00 hairdryer because it doesn't work that great

Set of 3 Tupperware containers_NOK29,00__$5.47

Measuring Bowl_________NOK29,00_____$5.47
Litermål

Laundry Soap(2L=.5gallon)_NOK25,90____$4.89
Tøymykner

Load of Laundry_________NOK10,00____$1.89

Calendar______________NOK94,00____$17.74
Kalender

Postcard______________NOK6,00-10,00__$1.10-1.89
Prospektkort

Stamp (letter)__________NOK21,00_____$3.96
Frimerke

Stamp (postcard)_______NOK11,00_____$2.08
Frimerke

DVD (new release)_______NOK200-250__$37.74-47.17

ATM Fee_____________NOK5,30______$1.00

Birthday Card_________NOK24,00_____$4.53
Fødseldagkort

English-Norwegian/Norwegian-English Translation Book
NOK 175.00___$33.02
Engelsk/Norsk skoleordbok (or school word book)

Most of the translation books were only English-Norwegian or Norwegian-English, it was hard to find one that went both ways. Its not a very extensive book, so sometimes I'm left to guess what something means, but the coolest part about it is that it has a Calvin and Hobbs comic strip every couple of pages.

Spiral Notebook_______NOK25,00____$7.72
Spiralblokk

Candy bar___________NOK7,90_____$1.44

Sandwich Bread_______NOK25,90____$4.89
Sandwichbrød

Eggs(1dozen)_________NOK20,90____$3.94

Milk ______________NOK11,40/L__$8.14/gallon
Ekstra Lett melk (fortified with vitamin D beacause of the little amount of sun light)

Norvegia(1kg=2.2lbs)___NOK68,90____$13.00

This is a white cheese, is less mild than cheddar, and is used in place of cheddar
Cheddar cheese is a very rare commodity, I've only found it in one store and I don't remember exactly, but it was going to be about $6.00 for 0.5lb

Gudbrandsdalsost(1kg)__NOK54,00___$10.19

This is a brown cheese that is a bit sweet and is used mostly on bread or waffles

Lettuce_____________NOK12,19___$2.30

Potatoes(1,5kg=3.3lbs)__NOK19,50__$3.68

Apples______________NOK19,00/kg__$1.63/lb
Eple

Oranges_____________NOK17,46/kg__$1.50/lb
Appelsin

Chicken(fresh, 240g=.5lb)_NOK44,50___$8.40
Kylling

Ground Beef(400g=.88lbs)_NOK35,00__$6.60
Kjøttdeig

Hot Dogs (18count)____NOK22,00____$4.15

Frozen Pizza_________NOK16,00-38,00__$3.02-7.17

Can of Corn__________NOK6,00-13,00__$1.13-2.45
Mais

Sugar(1kg=2.2lbs)_____NOK13,40____$2.45
Sukker

Jello_______________NOK9,90_____$1.81
Gelé

Corn Flakes_________NOK14,50_____$2.74

Cheerios___________NOK26,00_____$4.91

Rice(2kg=4.4lbs)______NOK12,80-20,00__$2.42-3.77
Ris

Spaghetti Sauce_______NOK9,90____$1.87
Pastasaus

Spaghetti Noodles_____NOK8,00____$1.51

Macaroni___________NOK8,90____$1.68
Makaroni

Soup______________NOK5,90____$1.11
Suppe

Powdered soup is very common here, why I don't know, but Campbell's soup is only sold in one store and is NOK19,90 or $3.75 a can.

Strawberry Jelly______________NOK13,90____$2.62
Jordbærsyltetøy

Peanut Butter_______NOK18,90____$3.57

Chips_____________NOK15,50____$2.92

Lays Potato Chips are called Maarrud and they have a salt and pepper flavor which are paprika good. Another type of chip is paprika, which is also pretty good. But no salt and vinager :(

Shampoo(.5L=17oz)___NOK7,00_____$1.32
Herbal Essence(340ml=11.5oz)_NOK38,00__$1.17

Ziploc Bags(15count)__NOK23,00____$4.34

Toilet Paper________NOK11,90____$2.25
Taolettpapir

Paper Towel________NOK13,90____$2.62
Tøkerrull

The name brand toilet paper and paper towels are more than double the price of the store brand ... and let me just note that store brand toilet paper is nothing like Charmin

Gasoline___________NOK12,06/L__$8.61/gallon
and we complain about $3.00/gallon (I'm note sure if this price is right, the last time I saw the price for gas was a few weeks ago, but its close)

McDonald's
Hamburger(the normal $0.79 one)__NOK18,00__$3.40
Medium Fry________NOK24,00____$4.53

T.G.I.Fridays:
Hamburger_________NOK120,00+__$22.64

Basically I never eat out and how I miss eating Hamburgers!!

Grocery stores (in order of cheapest to most expensive):
REMA 1000, Kiwi, Rimi, Meny, ICA, BunnPris
ICA and Meny typically have bigger stores, which means they have a wider variety of food (like Campbell's and cheddar cheese) and are more expensive so they can import the rarer foods.

Well, hope this sums up what my shopping experience is like.

The University Tour

2008-01-23T16:16:00.000+01:00

Tour of my Apartment

2008-01-23T15:09:00.000+01:00

Please feel free to leave comments on any of the posts. Tell me what you think or ideas and stuff you want to hear about.

Strange Things and Lessons Learned

2008-01-21T23:28:00.000+01:00

Since I've been here 2.5 weeks I thought I would talk about differences between Norway and the U.S. and some things that are just plain weird. Of course they're only weird to me, but to the people who live here, everything we do back home is probably just as weird.

1. Paper or Plastic? First of all grocery stores here are very small compared to the U.S. and instead of a bag boy asking if you want paper or plastic, the cashier asks you if you want a bag, charges 70 øre for the bag (which is the equivalent of about $0.12), and then you bag the groceries yourself. It took me a about a week and half before I learned this one, so now I take my own bag when I go shopping.

2. Cars Of there are the normal brands: Nissan, Toyota, BMW, Volkswagen, Honda, etc.. But who would have ever guessed that the U.S. made Ford, Jeep and Chevrolet in foreign countries? Not me! One thing you don't see here is big SUV, especially Hummers, and boy what a nice change of pace it is too.

3. 7-11 One thing that blew me away more than Ford and Chevy, is the amount of 7-11's here (there are approx. 200 7-11s in Oslo). It's almost like the amount of Starbucks or McDonald's that we have back home! The only difference is, they're expensive!! It cost about $5 for two taquitos...oh and here McDonald's doesn't have a dollar menu either (a $0.79 hamburger at home is $3.00 here!). :(

4. Taxi Please! Now I'm sure we're all familiar with the yellow taxis with advertisements plastered all over them. Well, not here. Norwegians go for the classier approach ... a ride in a Mercedes Benz. Now hows that for style! It's not just Norway either, London was the same way. Even the big 12-seater taxi buses are Mercedes!!!

5. Winter Time Now we all see (and laugh at) the girls in Southern California who wear big jackets, Ugg boots (or even flip flops), and mini-skirts (of all things) in the middle of winter, when its 50 degrees out, pouring rain and are complaining because they are freezing. Well, they wear skirts in Norway too, except here it really is freezing outside and they do it with a slightly different purpose, which isn't to draw attention to themselves. Most of the girls I've seen wearing this style clothing aren't wearing mini-skirts, rather knee length or a little shorter type of skirt (with some kind of thick tights or nylons) on a more professional basis, whether it be for work or special outing. Whatever the reason is it makes me feel like such a wimp, because here I am with my long pants, a double layer of socks, jacket, heavy coat, gloves and something on my head and still standing there shivering because its colder than I'd ever like to know about.

6. Education and Money Its funny because in the U.S. you usually hear parents saying that they should start putting money away for little Johnny's college tuition 5 years before he is ever born, right? Well, that's one thing that Norwegians don't have to worry about. Free education is the way for them, yes that means k-12, college, graduate school; you name it, the government pays for it. However, the higher you go in the education system, the more competative it gets. Now I'm only making a guess here, but it's probably something like the competition of getting into Yale or Harvard and could possibly be even higher. Hows that for a worry free life? You know I shouldn't forget to mention that taxes on regular stuff like laundry soap and clothing are a bit steep...hows 25% sound? But don't worry, its only 14% on food. A whole lot more than 7.75% in California isn't it? I'm guessing that's why Norway (and Scandinavia itself) come off to be so darn expensive. While we're on the subject of shopping and money, one thing I do like about their system is that when you see a price for something on the shelf, the tax is already included. You don't have to worry about adding in a couple of extra Kroner (the Norwegian currency) for tax like we do in the U.S.

7. Keeping Up With The Jones' A week ago I went to a church service led by the chaplains of the university in the Royal Palace Chapel and afterward we all went for coffee at a cafe near the Palace. While we were sitting there I was talking with one of the chaplains and she was telling me different things about Norway. We were talking about cars and I mentioned something about how nice it was not to see any a Hummers around, because at home Hummers are a symbol of how much money you have more than anything else. And she said that people here don't go around flaunting their money by buying fancy cars or big expensive boats, but maybe they live in the nicer part of town or own a cabin in some other part of Norway as a vacation house. They just don't go trowing their money around like they are king of the world and if they do, they pretty much get slapped in the face by their peers. So there really is no "keeping up with the Jones'" here in Norway and I think that's pretty cool. Basically, everybody is their own Jones' and they only have themselves to keep up with.

8. One last thing I want to add is about the sun. Every time I see the sun out I get so excited because I think that it won't be as cold outside and I don't have to wear my big coat, just a couple of small jackets will do. Well, I'm wrong, the sun means nothing!! Except the fact that there are no clouds in the sky. Even though the sun may be out shinning its bright sunny face, its really just out to get me, because then I go outside, with my less than usual protection against the cold, and end up coming home barely being able to move my bright red face nor my bright red fingers. So just remember, even though the sun is out in January and at home that means pants and a light jacket it is not the same for Norway. Also, it could be the fact that there is no more snow on the ground that is playing tricks on my mind, but that is a task to uncover tomorrow.

2008-01-17T13:11:00.000+01:00

The view from my window (Jan. 6)

It's Snowing!!! (Jan. 12)

More Pictures

2008-01-16T23:18:00.000+01:00

First Weekend in Norway (3 Jan- 6 Jan)

2008-01-16T17:24:00.000+01:00

Well, being in a new country has its ups and downs. Of course there's a language barrier, but it's all very new to me (especially the snow), so its more ups than downs. The hardest part when I arrived was figuring out how to get where I needed to get to, because I'm so used to someone being at the airport to pick me up and not needing to take the train here and the subway there. Anyways, when I finally arrived at Kringsjå (my student village) I got to choose which apartment I wanted, now one thing you have to understand about student housing in Norway is that they can share apartments with guys and girls. Some apartments are shared between two people and others are shared between eight. The ones I got to choose from were two person apartments and all had males already living in them, so my choices weren't the best, but of course I chose the one in the building with the yellow windows!! After getting all unpacked the next day and shopping for a couple days of food, I met some people from the U.S. and went museum hopping with them that Saturday. First, we went to Vikingskipshuset, or The Viking Ship Museum which housed two Viking ships, the Gokstad and the Oseberg. After gazing at these massive ships, wondering what it would have been like to travel the seas in such simple ships, we walked up the road a bit to the Norsk Folkemuseum (Norwegian Museum of Cultural History). Since it had started snowing we decided to come back another day when the weather would be nicer and when we would have more time to walk around. Then we rode the bus down to the edge of the water and went to the Kon-Tiki Museum which displays Thor Heyerdahl's expeditions to Polynesia and Easter Island. He was studying the Polynesians' origins, guessing that they sailed from Peru to Polynesia on rafts. Since he couldn't prove this was true he decided to make the journey himself and if he could make it in a raft, then the Polynesians could have too. He used this same principle (if you can't prove it, do it yourself) in studying the mystery of the statues on Easter Island. After our museum tours we walked around downtown, went to the store to buy more food and went back home. I'm not used to wearing so many layers when I go outside yet, I feel like a big ball of laundry that's waiting to be folded and put away. The sun setting at 3:45pm still gets to me too, it makes it seem as if I should be going to bed at 6pm. Well that's all for now!

Pictures from London

2008-01-16T00:47:00.001+01:00

London

2008-01-14T18:14:00.001+01:00

After my 10 hour flight from LAX, 2 hour rendezvous at the airport (customs, baggage claim and left baggage) and 1 hour subway into the city, I finally made it to my hostel; which provided a cheap bed, warm shower, noisy street, gross breakfast, but most of all a beautiful city and a place to lay my head at night. I only had one day to see everything in London so I wasn't able to spend much time in any one place, which was good because I wasn't able to spend a lot of money. First off I went to the US Embassy (which was the largest of all the other countries), then walked the wrong direction to the British Museum and stopped there to see the Rosetta Stone for Uncle Rick. The stone contains a decree written in Greek, Demotic, and Egyptian Hieroglyphics and was used to translated the Hieroglyphics on the pyramids and Egyptian artifacts into Greek. After my brief stop at the the museum (which was free, by the way) I made my way to St. Paul's Cathedral, which you might know from the song "Feed the Birds (Tuppence a bag)" from the movie Mary Poppins. It was very big and apparently you can get a very nice view of the city from the top of the dome, however it was pretty cloudy so I didn't want to spend to go up. Next I made my way to the Tower of London and Tower Bridge, which were both my favorite. The Tower of London was a fortress built in 1078 and is equipped with a high wall and moat (filled with grass today) for protection. It looked a bit out of place to see an old castle in the middle of the city, but was also really cool because it's not something you see everyday in the U.S.. Then I walked across Tower Bridge, found a cool little side street made of cobblestones and walked back across the bridge to continue on my way towards Big Ben, Houses of Parliament, and Westminster Abbey. Now, in every movie I've seen that Big Ben has ever been in (mainly Peter Pan and National Lampoon's European Vacation) it looks rather large, but don't be confused it would only stretch goal post to goal post (if laid down flat) on any football field. Doesn't seem very tall does it, but then again, neither is the Statue of Liberty. Right next to Westminster Abbey was a smaller church, St Margaret's Church, (with really cool sundials) that buried people in the walls, like a mausoleum. I can't even imagine what it would be like to be sitting in church, lean against the wall and the see the words "Here lies Sir Larry beheaded for robbing his neighbor" inscribed on the wall, talk about creepy (I guess it would keep people from stealing though). Then I walked through St James Park to Buckingham Palace and lucky for me the queen was home. I didn't stay too long because the sun was beginning to set and I had to wake up at 2AM to catch my shuttle to the airport. So I went to the Norwegian Embassy to get a map of Oslo, had dinner at Subway, packed my bag and went to sleep. My shuttle came about 15 minutes early so the driver gave me a quick tour of London, which was really cool because I didn't get to see any of it at night. We drove past Hyde Park (which is like Central Park, just smaller), the Marble Arch (moved from the entrance of Buckingham Palace because the queen didn't like it), Piccadilly Circus (like Time Square), Big Ben, Houses of Parliament, Buckingham Palace, the Hilton to pick up another family and finally the airport. All in all London was very nice, I probably could have spent a whole week there, but Norway was waiting my arrival...