Auf Wiedersehen

I have never been good at leaving. I have never been good at saying goodbye. And I had been dreading Thursday more than I have dreaded anything in a looong time.

Leaving the people and the place that has made the last few months so unbelievably great was something I didn’t know how to handle. A smart person once told me that one shouldn’t think too much, and I found that to be a good approach in this situation. So I decided that the only way was to not become my usual, nostalgic self, but focus on everything else than leaving. Besides, it helps that I am still a lousy planner – and had to stress around all day hoping to get everything done last minute before my plane left… My plan was that this would keep the waterworks from opening. And my plan (almost) worked.

I have to admit that I was a little bit unsure what I went to, and if things would work out, when I went to Tallinn in the very end of July. But all my scepticism was very unnecessary – this half year has been so great! I now have so many fantastic memories and I have met some great people.

And come to think of it, it doesn’t really matter that I am not good at leaving. Or that I’ve never been good at saying goodbye. Because, I’m not saying goodbye, but see you soon!

Spa testing

When I first arrived in Tallinn, I thought there is no rush to try to see everything, because I had plenty of time. And then time flew. And now just before leaving I remember everything that I should have done, and don't have time to do it. Happens every time!

But one thing I was determined not to miss was a real spa treatment. I couldn't live here for almost half a year and not test out the thing that makes hundreds of countrymen board buses and planes and head for Tallinn each year. Every time I have had visitors here and booked spa apppointments, something has gotten messed up with the booking and I have ended up with the "classical massage treatment". So a week ago I decided to book a real spa treatment that sounded just perfect for me - "energy enhancing treatment - the ideal cure against tiredness". It was going to last for two hours, and I was convinced that this was a real spa thing when I got a pair of those really sexy paper underwear thingys that I have heard so much about.. Then I was put in a capsule, before getting a body peeling. Then I got a body mask from seaweed that smelled absolutely terrible, was wrapped in a plastic something and left to rest for half an hour accompanied by a sound machine that played wave sounds - with the occational sound of what I am sure must have been a sheep.. Then there was massage, and my energy treatment was done.

It was very nice, I was very happy - and went home to take a nap.

Dentists and Leaving

Surprise!!! The lousy blogger is back :)

A lot of stuff has happened since I last wrote. Too much to go into detail. I have had visits from friends, and that has been great. I have been hanging out, having fun. Winter has come to Tallinn, winter has left Tallinn. I don't think there is much hope of a white Christmas here. Fortunately, I think it is at home. But Tallinn is doing it's best creating a Christmasy feeling with lots of lights, Christmas trees, and a market. And for the first time I have no exam to dread. But it's mixed feelings after all - because I am leaving Estonia in a week.

Today I went to the dentist. Traumatic experience. No, I am not afraid of dentists. But I am now afraid of my next visit to one. I had heard that going to the dentist is a lot cheaper here in Estonia. So I decided to take advantage of that. Equipped with a paper napkin around my neck and a pair of amazingly becoming goggles on my face, I was put in a chair ready for a check-up of my teeth. And all went well - I was even brave and said no when offered an "injection" to get through a particularly painful part of the treatment (yeah, brave - and afraid of needles...). Afterwards the dentist told me that everything looked well. I could still hear a "but" hanging in the air.. And yeah - "but, there are also bad news". Then he went on telling me that I need an operation to get my wisdom teeth out. He also told me some other gross details about the mentioned operation. Plus, that it will hurt for a week. Per tooth. So, my cheap visit to the dentist turned out not so cheap after all. Because now I have to get a second opinion in Norway. And maybe a third. And a forth. And a.. (I won't stop until I find one that says: nope, no need for an operation here!)

Tomorrow I'm having a kind of leaving party. And day-by-day, it is hitting me more and more that I'm going home soon. And though it will be good to get home, too, I am sad to leave. I don't think I'm ready to leave yet - time flies too fast. And what happens now? I really wish I knew...

Oksana reports from Tallinn

Wowwowwow, it's Wednesday evening already! Where did Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday go? Good thing is that it is almost week-end again... Last week-end my friend Kjersti was here, and that was great. We tested out the spa, shopping, and cafe facilities here in Tallinn. I had also impressed myself with my newfound planning skills, and booked a table at an Indian restaurant for Saturday night. Or at least I thought I had. But it goes to show - even when I try to plan it ends up failing. Because there was no reservation for "Hannah". Nope, sorry. But there was, however, one for Oksana. Also a table for two for 8 o'clock. And as Oksana still hadn't shown up at 20 minutes past 8, we started to suspect that there was in fact no Oksana and that the table was actually the one I had booked. Hannah - Oksana. Poteito - potato. I don't know what is worst; my planning or my pronounciation skills...

I am also almost done with my French classes. I still can't have the most exciting conversations in French - unless you want to hear me describe my room (which is, in fact, quite "interesting")or order at a restaurant - but I do think I can sense some improvement. But as my French skills are slowly improving, my Norwegian is going in the opposite direction. I have put a diagnosis on myself - I am language confused! All these Scandinavian languages, English, French, and Estonian is making my Norwegian sound like a strange mixture of Scandinavian - Bokmål - Dialect - Norwenglish, something I became painfully aware of last week end.

BØ!

Rumour has it I have been a lousy blogger lately. I have nothing to say in my defence. Just the usual, worn-out excuse that time is flying too fast.

Since my last update, November has arrived. Winter has come to Tallinn. And left. And come again. And - for the time being - left. Or at least the snow has left, the cold is still very much present. I am stuggeling a little finding a right temperature at the moment. I thought I had gotten used to the central heating system, but it turned out they just hadn't turned it on all the way yet. Because today I came home to a sauna! After spending some time in my room, I had to go for a walk, because it was so hot. But outside was so cold I almost froze my ears off... I am waiting for the snow to come. It makes it all so much lighter and a little bit warmer, I think.

Not a long post this time - I am way too tired to write anything useful right now. Good night!

Sleepy and Cultural Times

Last night we set the clocks one hour back, which meant one sacret hour more of sleep for me. That was also very nicely timed, because I seem to be coming down with something that I am trying to fight off by sleeping. I hope what I am fighting with is not the flu that is running around, even though the symptoms might bear a hint of that. But - optimistic thoughts - I think the sleep has cured it. After sleeping for almost 12 hours last night, I was exhausted after 4 hours at the art museum, and fell asleep for another 5 hours when I got home, I now feel slightly better.

My trip to the art museum nicely fit into my otherwise very cultural week. All cultural things like concerts, opera, ballett etc. are so cheap here, and some we are invited to for free through the embassy, so it is a nice chance to experience some things that I normally wouldn't. The last week and a half, we have had something called Norwegian Week here in Tallinn, that ended with a piano-Grieg-concert Wednesday, which was really nice. Then I went to my first ever opera on Thursday, to see Tosca. Opera was really different from what I had imagined - and in a good way.

But now I have been awake for almost two hours, and my eyes don't want to stay open anymore. It is time to get some much needed sleep ;)

Central Heating System

If anyone has anything favorable to say about having a central heating system in appartment buildings, please speak up. Because personally, I am quite puzzled! I can list several cons to this system, but not think of a single pro... And the cons are quite important ones; like it's environmentally unfriendly, it's unhealthy, and it's annoying.

About a week ago they turned on the central heating system in my building. Now I have a massive cold, recovering from a headace, and I "fyrer for kråka" (Norwegian expression that is hard to translate - like "heating for the crows"). I cannot use heating very much because that tends to give me headaces. Which makes is quite unfortunate that I cannot turn the radiator off. So I have to regulate by opening the window to get some fresh airduring the nights. Hence the massive cold. And the warm, happy crows. Trying to come up with a better plan for the next two months..

Otherwise, everything good - but quite hectic - in Tallinn!

Vilnius-Weekend

Last weekend, Stine, Morten, Michael and I, went to explore the Lithuanian capital Vilnius. It was a great trip, and Vilnius is a very nice city - which after careful consideration ranks second on the list of "most-beautiful-Baltic-capitals" - after a very close fight with Tallinn about the first place, I have to admit. Vilnius should also consider being renamed "the city of weddings", because during the one Saturday we were there, we saw almost 30 weddings! Apart from that, we also had time for sightseeing, hanging out with the trainees in Vilnius, spend a few hours in the Sky Bar - testing out the drink menu while overlooking the city, and to try an unknown number of cafes and chocolate cakes and teas...

Since I have not yet learnt that taking lots of pictures of buildings only seems like a good idea in the very moment of taking them; I owe a big thanks to Morten who has understood the trick that pictures with people on them are a lot more fun when you look at them later...

Week and Future

Since I have seen a tendency that I seem to update the blog every weekend (or slightly after every weekend), I guess I can't break the tradition this week either. Every week seem to just fly by. I have tried to get into a rutine of working out again, and this week I tried a new form of training that I had a lot of faith in - swimming. For the first time I experienced one of the big drawbacks of not being a student any more.. You don't get the student discounts! Therefore, swimming does not seem to be something I can take up after all, it's one of the few things that are actually expensive here in Tallinn. But it's OK, it wasn't as much fun as I had expected either. Especially since I lost one of my contacts after 5 minutes in the water, and everything on one side just became a big blur...

I have also had time to practice my French a little bit more this week! Maybe the atmosphere of the little French cafe where we have the classes is doing it's tric after all - or at least it's so cozy that it makes it temping to go there and read.

On Friday I saw my first ever Estonian movie, Autumn Ball. It had gotten some prizes internationally, so I figured it was worth a try. It was a good movie, but very sad and depressing. So if it ever comes to Norway - be aware.

In addition, I have also started to think a lot about planning. That has never been my strong side. Usually I have trouble planning a week ahead, but I think I have done some sort of progress lately. I have at least been able to plan some trips, and my weekends ahead here in Tallinn. But then it suddenly became very clear to me that I have no plans after Christmas. I have always thought that sounded very good, but lately it has also seemed a little scary. Quite scary in fact. Since time is flying so fast, there isn't that much time to come up with a master plan either. So last night I started to look for an appartment to rent in Oslo. They were all scarily expensive. So if someone hears about a great job or a good place to stay in Oslo - send a pip my way...

Girls Trip to Riga

Last week end, Stine and I decided to explore one of the other Baltic capitals, and headed for Latvia and Riga on Saturday morning. As we had been thinking that we should get as much out of the day as possible, we booked the tickets for the bus at 6 am... Now, in hindsight, that was probably not the best plan. We got a few more hours in Riga that way, but were sleep walking through most of them.

Miracolusly, I had remembered to take my guide book along for the trip. According to said book, Riga should be the biggest and most cosmopolitan of the Baltic capitals. To be so big and cosmopolitan, it was surprising to find almost no people in the centre on a Saturday. Of the ones we did see, however, 80% were Norwegian... So many Norwegians that they actually provided an extra sightseeing bus with a Norwegian, recorded guide. So there we were, stuck for 1,5 hours in a bus with a group of middle aged Norwegian women who were sipping from their small liquor bottles, and listening to an over enthusiastic guide on the loudspeakers - who sounded more like he was telling a fairy tale than the story about Riga. But it was an interesting bus trip, and I learnt quite a lot about Riga. The rest of Saturday we spent in cafes, meeting trainees from Riga, and going to the movie theater. We stayed at the appartment of the Norwegian trainee in Latvia. With a lot more sleep than the night before, and the sun shining over Riga on Sunday - the impression of the city was also a lot better the next day. We walked around the old city, and we also hunted down what I think must have been the two things that made my guide book call this a cosmopolitan city. A miniatyre Eiffel Tower type building, and a bridge that on a good day might have a certain recemblance to the bridges in New York or San Fransisco...

Oh, and I shouldn't just make fun of my guide book - it also had an excellent tip: about a chocolate cafe that we just couldn't miss. After all - chocolate makes a girl happy, that is scientifically proved (and if it isn't, I'll happily sign up for an experiment).

It was a good, relaxing girl's trip to Riga - which is a nice city. However, it is not as nice as Tallinn. Objectivly speaking - of course!

What's with all this Whipped Cream???

If anyone asks me if I want whipped cream on my hot chocolate, my obvious answer would be yes! However, if anyone asks me if I would like whipped cream on my coffee-to-go, my obvious response would be ??? Only problem is - they don't ask. They just put it there. Like drinking coffee with a ton of whipped cream on top is just the most natural thing in the world. Well, to me, it's not. It's quite disgusting in fact.

I went to a coffeeplace the other day, orderning a latte with Irish Cream to go. While they were making my latte I was more busy people-watching than actually supervising what went into the paper cup. So when I got it it already had the lid on, and I tried to start drinking on my way out the door. Only, no coffee came in my mouth. I took the lid off to investigate, only to discover that over half of my cup was filled with whipped cream. The other half apparently consisted of 3/4 Irish Cream syrup, and 1/4 coffee... I decided that this coffee chain was weird, and decided never to use it again. Then yesterday, I was standing on an information stand about Norwegian Develoment Cooperation for several freezing hours. So I decided to go into the shopping mall to get a coffee and warm up. I asked for a latte, and waited impatiently for them to make it. Unfortunatly, it didn't occur to me to point out that I wanted a latte free of whipped cream.

Mistake. Huge mistake.

Nostalgia

Today I decided to have a completly relaxing Saturday. And what better way to spend it than to sleep the first half of the day for then to bring a couple of fleece blankets and a pillow into the living room and spend the second half of the day on the couch in front of the TV? The only small catch is that the TV program selection is quite limitied. It doesn't help to have 70 TV channels when over 90% of them are either origianlly in, or worse still, dubbed into Russian. But as I was aimlessly flipping through the channels I stumbled across something truly great: VH1 has a "Smells Like the 90's"-theme week end, playing 90's music videos non stop! It has made me really nostalgic sitting here hearing all there songs again, laughing, slightly blushing, and remembering the times when I was a teenager and these songs seemed to be the greatest things ever made... Right now they are showing Ace of Base's "The Sign" which (I'm sorry to say) was one of my absolute favorites for a brief, confused phase of the very early 90's. But the worst thing is not (though it is really bad) the song itself - but the hairstyles! (With the clothing style in a very good second place). Blushing slightly, I now remember the times when I used at least half a bottle of extra-mega-hold-hair-spray and mega-mega-hold mousse every day trying to make my bangs as high as possible. Jeez, it that really what I looked like..?

Saaremaa

Yesterday I came back from a two-day trip to Saaremaa (the biggest island in Estonia), arranged by the Ministry of Agriculture. We got to learn about windmill energy, organic farming and soap making, the challenges for the fisheries, and also eat a lot of good food, get to know some really nice people, live in a great hotel - and also to visit a biowaste handling factory where they use the waste from 40 000 pigs to make gas, electricty, and fertilizer. Although used for a good purpose, it was unfortunate that there was no way to take away the smell from the waste of the 40 000 pigs... Anyway, here are some of the kodak moments caught in Saaremaa

Apple-Pie-Happening

Yesterday ,Laura, Morten, and I invited people over for an applecake-eating-experience of huge dimensions. Inviting guests over for something eatable, however, also requires a few preparations - which in a foreign country can take a little longer than one is used to...


Laura googled apple-pie to find some tempting recipies. She found four very good ones, and, since I get off work first, my job was to go to the supermarket to find the ingredieces. Now, that doesn't sound too hard, does it? Well, it can be.. when everything in the store has some Estonian name very VERY different from the Norwegian one. Even though Laura had translated some of the igrediences needed into Estonian, and some helpful supermarket employees did their best to help, it still proved to be quite a challenge. Still, one hour later - I was on my way home; ready to bake, and with only two wrong things in my plastic bags!


Baking was fun, but not without it's challenges. Our kitchen doesn't have all the equipment that could have been desired for making four cakes - but Laura convinced me to see the possibilities rather than the obstacles. And even though a electric mixer would still be preferable for making whipped cream, at least I discovered that my upper arm strength is a lot better than initially believed; I made the whipped cream into butter by mistake...


But still, the cakes turned out really good, the company was great - all in all a very successful apple-cake-happening!

In Over my Head...

Yesterday seemed to be the big day for challenging myself. I am not quite sure how well I handled the challenges.

I have been saying lately that I want to take a language course to improve my French. I take that back. I am now saying that I want to take a language course to learn some French. See, yesterday was the day for the French language level test. Even though it is 6 years since I last spoke a word of French, I didn't fear the test too much. I had the French books from high school in my bag, and after work I went to a French cafe - secretly hoping that the atmosphere, the cafe au lait, and the fairly close presence of the grammar books would whipe away the devestating effect the last six years have had on my language skills, and that it would all come back to me in mysterious ways. That is what you call wishful thinking. And let me tell you something; it doesn't work!

I showed up for the test convinced that it would take max 20 minutes, and be the type where you checked box a, b, or c - whichever one seemed more likely or convenient. Then the test started. Everything was of course in French, but I understood that the test would consist of four parts. EH?? Part one - dictation. Auch! Part two - crossing of boxes. OK, "prepared" for that. Part three - write an essay. WHAT?? AUCH! (could it get any worse? Oh yes it could..) Part four - conversation with the teacher, one at a time. AAAAAAAAAAAUCH! OK, so I can understand some things, but I have no words to answer with, except "tres bien" and "merci". And the teacher didn't speak a word of English (or so she said at least). The whole thing took almost two hours. And the result didn't make me very optimistic. Apparently, my written stuff is "pas mal", but the oral part was crappy. No, she didn't say crappy, but she would have if she was less polite. Maybe she even did say it, I only understood half of what she said anyway. I wonder what I have gotten myself into. But I really want to learn French. Wouldn't it be great if I could just snap my fingers, and voila - it was already there?

Rock and Helsinki

The weeks just fly by these days. I have heard that they do that faster the older you get, but I choose to believe that they also fly faster the more fun you have. Because there was a lot of fun stuff happening also last weekend (and week). I had a visit from my mom and her cousin, I took a Norwegian rock band out to lunch, dinner, and the pub, and I went to Helsinki!


The rock band in question was Heroes and Zeros, who were here to perform at an event called Nordfest (organized by the Nordic embassies here in Tallinn and some others), where one up-and-coming rock band from each of the Nordic countries were playing. The Norwegian band had won the Urørt-competition for new bands in P3. I really liked their music, and they did a really good live performance too.





And on Sunday it was time to go abroad! Helsinki is only like 50 km away. Too long for a swim, but short enough for a convenient boat trip. And during the summer there is even the super-fast-boat, that takes only an hour and 45 minutes. Inland-animal that I am, I was a little bit sceptical to get on a boat, but the travel sickness pills did the trick.. On the little boat on the way to Helsinki, the waves were pretty big. On my search for breakfast (read: chocolate) in the tax free shop, I almost knocked over all the stuff in the shop because I could hardly stay on my feet. I think I would have walked more steady even after a bottle of vodka than in those waves... But we got to Helsinki, and had a great time there. I even got to meet up with Marjaana for a little while. On the way back we had the bigger boat - the cruise boat if you want - with the big buffet.. I got to show my enormous appetite for chocolate realted dessert to the whole diplomatic association (lot of laughter), before I rolled over to the piano bar to enjoy the rest of the trip back to Tallinn.

Fort Knox

Getting into, or out of, our appartment lately, has been like trying to enter Fort Knox. This place is hard enough to get into in the first place - with three different keys in three different parts of the building, plus having to work up the nerve to take the tiny, Soviet-style elevator (which isn't too hard if you think about all the stairs you have to climb in 30 degrees otherwise, actually..). Lately, though, there has been an additional obstacle to getting into or out of Fort Knox appartment 27. The key doesn't work! And believe me, it isn't that much fun to be in your appartment trying to unlock the door from the inside, realizing that you might be stuck inside on the 5th floor with no way out. It isn't that much more fun to come home in the middle of the night with a flat battery on the cell phone, and really needing the bathroom, realizing that you are stuck in the tiny hallway where the lightbulb doesn't work, either. But it does make some pretty funny excuses for why you are late for work, or turned up to an appointment 15 minutes too late...

Today, we had had enough of Fort Knox. Patience is a virtue I don't possess, especially at quarter to nine in the morning trying to get out the door and to work. So today we contacted the landlord.. Who straight away dealt with the problem; by unlocking the problematic lock, and locking the bottom one instead. The one that we don't have a key to, that is. So when I came home with all my groceries and picked-up dry cleaning; Fort Knox wasn't just difficult, but impossible to enter. After some hectic phone calls the landlord came 10 minutes later - speaking only Russian. I think she was trying to say that we must have that key, and I was trying to say that no, we absolutely did not have that key. But after a lot of njets and pointing and head shaking - we came to an agreement and Morten discovered the hidden keyes.

And tomorrow - I have no excuse for being late anywhere.

Dream Weekend

Friday afternoon.
Home from work.
Nothing that HAS to be done, nothing that SHOULD have been done. (Except relaxing.)
Temperature of 30 degrees, sun from a cloud-free sky.
Grab a few things, go to the bus station.
Sit on the bus for a couple of hours.
Arrive in a beautiful little town, staying in a great appartment close to the beach.
Going to a restaurant to eat some great food affordable on a student budget.
Sleep.
Going to the fresh fruit and vegetable market to find something for breakfast.
Discovering that the beach is 1 km of fine graided sand, and that the water is amazingly refreshing.
Having a barbeque and wine with friends in the great appartment.
Going to a disco on the beach, cheap drinks and good music.
Taking a morning swim in the sea on the way home at 6 a.m.
Catching a couple hours of sleep.
Spending Sunday on the beach, in cafes, relaxing.

I could be discribing a dream weekend scenario.
I am actually discribing my weekend in Pärnu.

Yeah, life is good.

Facade

They are renovating the facade of the Soviet style building I live in. What I think that entails, is that they are applying an extra coat of grey concrete. Now, I don't mind this place being treated to a slightly darker shade of grey. The thing is just, these construction workers just have seriously strange working hours. That crash with mine. They work only Saturday. Mornings. They start walking around outside my windows on the 5th floor a little before 7. And yelling messages down to their co-workers on the ground non-stop. This week they decided to turn up on Friday too. Just to make sure I didn't get an overdose of sleep or anything.

Tallinn Update

First week at work is over, and so far I have to say that my theory holds true: Weekends feel a lot better and more relaxing in working life than in student life. I think the main reason for that is simple: no bad conscience for things that should have been read, should have been written, or unprepared exams coming up… (To all of you who have been working for a while and are probably rolling your eyes at me right now – let me live on my illusion, reality will hit me soon enough).

As you might have read between the lines by now, my weekend in Tallinn has been fantastic. The sun decided to reappear just in time for the days off, and after a movie and some research of the nightlife in my new home town Friday night, the beach was a fantastic place to be on Saturday afternoon; swimming, reading Harry Potter, and listening to old hits over the loudspeakers. We had invitations for a concert on Saturday afternoon, and decided to go and see what that was all about. It turned out to be a operaish kind of concert, attended by us and quite a few pensioners… I decided that I was not quite ready for that kind of high-culture yet, but maybe in 30 years or so.

Sunday was nice and relaxing as we decided to walk around the old town catching Kodak moments and testing cakes at a really cute café. There are a lot of great cafes and restaurants here, and the scary thing is that it is almost as cheap to eat out as to make food at home. This is simply dangerous… I have been thinking about going jogging in the park close by, but so far I have left it with the thought...

I ended the weekend watching the sunset and having drinks at a bar on the 25th floor of the SAS hotel, with a view all over Tallinn, with my flatmates Laura and Morten. Here follows a few snapshots of there, from the Old Town, and the rest of Tallinn

(I wrote and saved this post a couple of days ago, but I am too lazy to make a few changes to it even though it is Tuesday already, so I am just posting it as it is...)

Experience

Day One

So, finally I'm in Tallinn.. I arrived last night, and on the way here I thought about that I am actually closer to home here than I was in Tromsø. The flight is shorter, and a lot cheaper, too!

I have now gotten settled in my new appartment, and had my first day at work. Both the appartment and the job seem really good! And the city has showed itself from it's best side, with a blue sky and bright sun - finally I found the summer ;) So after work I went around the city a bit, or actually a bit longer than expected... My colleague showed me the supermarket, but then the way back from there was up to my map and me. We didn't really manage. Not at all really. (Some things never change...) After about 20 mins I ended up exactly where I started. And had to try again... Oh well, the weather was great, the city really is beautiful, and a little sightseeing was good (and would probably have been even better without my bleeding blister...). And I found my way home!

And now I am sitting at home reading the city guide that I bought, deciding what place to explore next. On the page I have gotten to they provide some key phrases in Estonian. They have chosen 27 important words and phrases (including the numbers from 1-10), ending with "will you marry me?".. Key phrase indeed..

Harry

Jeg er nå halvveis i den store viljestyrketesten. Eller faktisk ikke helt halvveis en gang... Klarte aldri å somle meg til å forhåndsbestille den siste Harry Potter boka. Det viste seg å være en stor tabbe. For når jeg etter en hel dag med flytting ikke orka å dra til Røros klokka 01.01 på fredag kveld, men bestemte meg for å dra lørdag formiddag i stedet, var Harry utsolgt. Ganske harde nyheter for en Harry-fan som meg. Så nå får jeg ikke kjøpt boka før onsdag morgen. Og i løpet av den tida må jeg prøve å stå imot å åpne linken til Harry Potter-diskusjonen med "OBS: avsløringer" på VG nett... Og DET er ikke enkelt! Og det ender vel med at om jeg klarer å stå imot må jeg bare bla opp på siste side med en gang jeg får boka. For jeg har lest på VG nett at den siste setninga visstnok er perfekt. Åh, nysgjerring ja. Viljestyrke, viljestyrke, viljestyrke...

Jakter på Sommer'n

I begynnelsen av juni var det hetebølge med over 30 grader flere dager på rad, og det føltes som om det aldri kunne bli no annet enn sol og finvær. Men det kunne visst det... Etter at hetebølgen ga opp, har det bare regna, regna, og regna litt mer. Og jeg har jakta på sommer og solingsvær både i Køben, i Oslo, på Sørlandet, i Dublin, og i Nord Østerdalen, uten noe særlig hell.

Men selv om det ikke er strålende solskinn, er det jo sommer likevel, og grillmiddag på verandaen må man ha uansett! Da er det godt at man har en overbygd veranda, og et ullteppe å tulle seg inn i, og at det er sånn rimelig temperatur selv om regnet pøser ned samtidig :) Nå håper jeg imidlertid at regnet har gitt opp litt, har i hvertfall fått gått en dag i fjellet idag uten å bli bløt. Håper og at jeg skal få i hvertfall en dag med soling på verandan før jeg drar igjen. Men enn så lenge fortsetter jeg jakten på sommeren, og i morra er det i Trondheim det skal jaktes. Aftenposten har meldt sky med en sol bak, og jeg er optimistisk som få...

Top of the Mornin' to ya!

I have just come back from Dublin. For some reason I love Ireland, with it's cute brick houses, green fields, cozy pubs, and pints of Smithwichs. But most of all I love the Irish accent. I think I could just close my eyes and listen to it all day. (If anyone shares my facination for this beautiful language, I really recommend "Irish Language Lab" on YouTube).

So when I saw that Ryan Air had really cheap flights there, I decided that visiting a friend in Dublin would be a great summer vacation trip! And it was :) Ryan Air was an interesting experience, though, with 150 Norwegians without a sense of "queue culture" battling for the best places in line to secure a good seat on the plane. That kind of situation can bring out the competitive spirit in anyone! Well, after a couple of hours in a half good seat (I have to work on my tactics), I finally reached Dublin. Friday I spent wandering around the city, doing a bit of shopping, a bit of cafe-sitting and people watching, and I even visited a museum (quite proud of myself!). In the evening my friends got off work, and we went to the pub for a real Irish pub-meal and of course the much longed-for pint or two of Smithwichs. On Saturday we rented a car, and drove a bit out of Dublin, to see some see-worthy places outside the city.

I had a great time in Dublin, but now it is time to be home and re-pack my bags - the departure date for Tallinn is getting close! I am excited to go - especially after going to an internet publishing course on Monday and meeting many other people who are also going to be interns at different Norwegian embassies around the world, and also realising that my job of updating the embassy's homepage will not be as complicated as I feared!

BØ!!!

BØ!!! The blog is alive!!

Jeg oppdaget plutselig at det er nesten to måneder siden jeg har skrevet noen ting her... Det har sannsynligvis noe (eller alt) å gjøre med at disse to månedene har vært innspurten på masteroppgaven, og etter en hel dag stressende og irritert foran pc'n, var ikke det å sette seg ned å skrive en blogg på kvelden særlig fristende. Ikke fristende i det hele tatt, for å være helt ærlig.

Men det har også skjedd masse disse to månedene. Alt for mye til å skrive om alt, så jeg tror jeg holder meg til det viktigste: Jeg er ikke lenger student!!! Jeg vet ikke helt hva det betyr at jeg er nå.. Voksen? Arbeidssøker? Arbeidstaker?? Jeg vet ikke helt hva jeg synes om det... I løpet av mine seks år som student har jeg alltid tenkt at jeg kommer til å finne ut hva jeg vil bli når jeg blir stor i løpet av studietida. Men jeg har klart å bli stor uten å fortsatt ane hva jeg har lyst til å bli... Tricky!

Men jeg har i hvertfall fått en jobb i fram til jul - jeg flytter til Estland og skal jobbe som praktikant på ambassaden! Det blir spennende. Da får jeg i hvertfall teste ut en av mine mulige ideer om hva jeg vil jobbe med når jeg blir stor, og jeg gleder meg veldig. Så får alle interesserte følge med på bloggen for oppdateringer og sprell i Tallinn :) De som vil ha adressen min og det nye telefonnummeret får sende meg en mail - jeg vil ikke legge det ut på nettet.

Men nå skal jeg på årets første lille ferietur! Jeg og Kjersti skal til København en tur - jeg gleder meg! God sommer!

Career Choices

Student life seems to be coming to an end in a few weeks, and I guess it is time to grow up and get a job. This does however undeniably sound a little frightening to me, so much so actually, that I have been playing with the idea to sign up for a year of studying something somewhere. I don't really mind what and where, but I would prefer if an easy subject and a nice, sunny beach were involved... But well, I guess I have to face the fact that working life is inevitable some time in the nearest future. And although I haven't gotten much closer to an idea as to what I want to work with, a couple of incidents latley have at least suggested a cople of career paths I shouldn't go for.

One of those is anything that has to do with maths. It is a known fact that whenever I write something, I go for the "what can be said with one sentence can definitely also be said with ten"-approach. Then I always face the problem of what to cut out to make it short enough. This time the thesis was max 70 pages. So when I added all my chapters, I had 8+12+16+34 = 80 pages! At least that's what I thought for a whole week - being reallyreally stressed about having to cut 15 pages (as I did not have intro or conclusion yet). Until one day I took at look at it again, adding up the numbers... and got 70! Grrr.. all that stress for nothing!

Another plan I have had lately is to go to Switzerland or France to learn French in the fall. Fooling myself into believing that my French from high school would be a good enough base, I found a perfect school in Lausanne. It did not exept beginners, but then - as I said I had French in high school. So I wrote them a little e-mail in English, asking what level of French was required. A few hours later, they sent me a loooong reply - all in French. Although I didn't understand a word of the e-mail, I put two and two together (see, I know a little maths!) and realized that that probably suggests that my level of French is far from the required...

So that plan had to be abandoned even before it started. I guess it is just back to waiting to see if one or two of the few places I applied for a job from choses to call me in for an interview. Other suggestions are greatly appreciated!

Back in Business

Hvordan kunne påska finne på å gå så fort? Eller forresten, hvordan kan tida i det hele tatt finne på å gå så fort?? Jeg skulle gjerne funnet en metode for å få tiden til å gå dobbelt så sakte de kommende to ukene, eventuelt må jeg finne en måte å jobbe dobbelt så effektivt på. Egentlig trenger jeg begge deler. Og ingen av delene virker veldig sannsynlig. Jeg og oppgaven er i bitter kamp mot klokka, og det er close race...

I dag har det vært back to business, back to Blindern. Tida har gått med til å prøve å få skikk på oppgaven, og å prøve å formulere litt jobbsøknader. Egentlig burde jeg fått jobb som vandrende reklame for Idun ketshup etter de to dagene jeg var ute i påska.. Men jeg tror ikke reklamebransjen er no for meg egentlig. Vel, jeg er positiviteten selv idag merker jeg. Tror det er på tide å rydde ut av baggene med klær jeg har fått vasket hjemme i påsken og sløve litt foran TV'n med en stor kopp kakao. Det hørtes ut som en plan det. Off I go.

Påskeferie!

Jeg hadde bestemt meg for å ta en skikkelig skippertaks-påske med oppgaven, men nå har jeg bestemt meg for at skippertaket er slutt! Jeg vil ha påskeferie! Eneste påsketuren jeg har tatt så langt er en tur rundt Sognsvann forrige søndag, og det er rett og slett litt for stusselig når man først er i fjellet og sola skinner. Så langt har værgudene forsåvidt vært på min side, for det har ikke vært særlig til vær å være ute i likevel. Det har jeg egentlig vært svært fornøyd med, selv om jeg tror jeg er en av de få påsketuristene i fjellheimen som faktisk synes at det er best sånn. Men nå er jeg rett og slett så lei av oppgaven at jeg ikke lenger kan holdes ansvarlig for hva jeg kommer til å gjøre mot den stakkars datamaskinen min hvis jeg blir sittende en dag til, så jeg lar oppgave være oppgave, vind være vind, og har bestemt meg for å lufte telemarksskiene (og meg selv, for den del) og dra til Trysil på påsketur i ettermiddag. God Påske!

Ja til Gratis Kaffe

Jeg vet at et smil eller et lite hei eller en eller annen vennlig ting noen gjør kan forandre dagen til noen. Jeg visste ikke at det samme var tilfelle med en kopp kaffe. Derfor vil jeg gjerne få takke mannen på Shell på Ekeberg for å ha vært så snill og gjort dagen min betraktelig mye bedre.

Etter å ha slitt meg opp etter en natt nesten uten søvn på grunn av vond hals og dett dese, holdt jeg på å miste trikken som skulle kjøre meg på andre siden av byen for å ha et intervju jeg hadde grudd meg til ganske lenge. Forkjølelsesmedisinen (mirakelkur fra Namibia..) gjorde meg søvnig, og jeg måtte kjøpe billett på trikken - noe som er mye dyrere enn å kjøpe på forhånd. Vel fremme viste det seg at jeg og intervjuobjekt ikke var helt enig om hvilken dag vi hadde avtalt, og dermed måtte jeg snu med uforrettet sak og følte at jeg hadde kastet bort flere dyrebare timer på morgenkvisten, ettersom jeg ikke hadde sittet på bibloteket og surfet og stirret tomt på dataskjermen slik jeg vanligvis gjør. Men pengebevisst som jeg har blitt på mine studentdager, bestemte jeg meg for å spore opp en billett før jeg gikk på trikken tilbake, slik at jeg tross alt ikke skulle tape for mye på denne bomturen. Det enesete butikkaktige jeg fant var en Shellstasjon - som selvfølgelig IKKE solgte sporveisbilletter. Humf. Så jeg fant ut at jeg fikk kjøpe meg en kaffe som forhåpentligvis kunne motvirke noe av bivirkningene fra det namibiske wonderdrugget.. Og når jeg kom fram til disken syntes han i kassa så synd på meg som ikke fikk kjøpt trikkebillett og antakeligvis så en smule stusselig ut, at han ga meg latten helt gratis!! Der og da reddet han noe som virket som en nokså håpløs dag - men som virkelig bare ble bedre og bedre mens jeg vandret to trikkestopp bortover i strålende sol, fast bestemt på å spare nye åtte kroner.

Så, der er den, historien min om hvordan en snill mann på Shell kan redde dagen med en gratis kopp kaffe. Ikke spesielt interesant, og kunne sikkert vært fortalt på en heller enn 16 linjer, men det ville betydd at jeg faktisk måtte skrive noe på oppgaven min. Og det er mye artigere å skrive om kaffe, og ikke minst å skrive på norsk, så alle setningene bare rant ned på papiret. Jeg klarer ikke å si med få ord det jeg kunne ha sagt med mange. Hvorfor kan jeg ikke overføre den samme effektiviteten til oppgaven? Hvorfor?

Frognerparken Sunday

The weather forecast promised us a perfect Sunday, and for once they were actually right!Rachel came from Tromsø for the week-end, and that was great! Sunday we went to Frognerparken with Vibeke to enjoy the sun. We were there for almost two hours, it was so nice and warm and relaxing. I didn't get a sun burn either, which means that the March sun is probably not so strong, but still warm. Just the way I like it!

SOL!

Sangen som jeg har hatt på hjernen helt siden jeg gikk til skolen i morges passer egentlig veldig godt både til det strålende vårværet i hovedstaden, og hva det har gjort med humøret på lesesalen :)

Sol ute, Sol inne,

Sol i hjertet,

Sol i sinnet,

SOL, BARE SOL!

Ha en strålende dag alle sammen :)

Spring!

Finally, it looks like spring has arrived! I always say that winter is my favorite season, and I still believe it is. It's just that when spring comes, I am not so sure anymore. Because I love spring. And then I love summer too. The only season I don't really like that much is fall. Everything's getting darker, it's raining, it's right between football and ski season, vacation's over and it's back to school.. But spring. Spring's great. Every day is getting lighter, and the sun's making everything bright and warm. Every winter I manage to forget the magic of the sun. Which is good I guess, because that just makes it that much more surprising and fantastic every year.

But still, spring is not my favorite time of year. And I have good reasons for making that statement. Because spring also means that exams are getting closer. Still a lot to read, too little time to read it, and I catch myself wondering what on earth I was doing all those dark winter days that I should have spent reading. Instead I find myself not looking forward to spring time, because I know it means a lot a of stress, coffee, and week long struggles to meet the dead lines. I don't really look forward to May 17th or to my birthday, because they always have an exam waiting around the corner. I knew that that was the way it was going to be already in 9th grade when my dad woke me up on my birthday (end of May) saying: "Happy Birthday! It's time to get up! You have your first exam today. And by the way it's snowing.." I am mad at exams for ruining the spring experience for me. But next year! No more studies, no more exams or thesis to finish! Just spring. Great.

Do Not try this at Home..

I think the cooking-genes have skipped my generation. So many times I have tasted something really good, and decided to try making it for dinner. So many times, so many dissappointments. And I have just added another unfortunate attempt to the list...

You see, I have found my new favorite coffee. It is a sweet chili coffee, with chocolate saus and chili powder. Only problem is, as far as I know, the closest place I can get this coffee is Jessheim - half an hour away by train. And paying over 70 kr for the train every time I want this coffee is a little inconvenient. But how hard could it be to make it myself? VERY hard apparently! I think the amounts of chili powder and chocolate saus require careful considerations to get right. Apparently, I was a little too generous with the chili part... I took one sip, and then I had to drink one whole liter of milk and several spoons of chocolate saus just to try to stop the fire in my mouth. But it still burns!

So, if anyone knows somewhere I can get sweet chili coffee in Oslo, please let me know! Same aplies to those of you who have any good ideas for how to stop the fire if you've eaten/drunk somethink with a little too much spice in...

Camels

For those of you who didn't know, I am worth 5 camels. Only 5! I'm a little offended. Especially because I am lucky if I get sold for 5 camels, because apparently that requires a desperate and entusiastic camel seller or a market drier than the Sahara. But if I had been a platina blond E-cup who wanted more than 10 children, I would have been worth over 40 camels. It's not fair!

How I know this? Well, see, I have started to take some personality tests on the internet (of course I have, I can't be writing on my thesis for 8 hours straight can I??). What I have also found out is that if I was a desperate housewife, I would be Susan Mayer. I am "pretty urban". My mental age is 28 (only 3 years older than my real age, I'm not too worried..). If I was a candy I would be "søte bjørner". And if I was an element in the periodic system, I would be oxygen.

So there it is. That's me in a nutshell.

Og Jula varer helt til Påske..

Or almost at least...

Today, March 5th 2007, my landlord decided to take down the Christmas tree outside. It's almost a little bit sad.

Sushi

Friday night I went out with some friends to try sushi for the first time. One of the interesting questions of the evening was: can a person who doesn’t like cooked fish actually like raw fish?? Sounds like a mission impossible, but - turns out – it’s not!!

After watching a lot of World Championship skiing from Japan, where NRK very creatively makes almost every Norwegian athlete try sushi for the first time; all the grimaces on their faces should have turned me sceptical. But no, they have only made me more curious, and I figured that now was the perfect time to test…

It turned out to be quite a fun experience. Once we got there the waitress told us that there probably wasn’t a table available, but that she would check. Then she came back and told us that there was one. And guided us all through the room to the back of the restaurant, where she told us that we had to take our shoes off. What?? Yes, take your shoes off, please! Then she opened a door, and it turned out we got the VIP room! And then I understood why we had to take our shoes off – because we were going to sit on pillows on the floor with our legs in something like a hole under the table. And they only gave us chopsticks to eat with… Fortunately we had plenty of time.. :)

Well, the conclusion is: sushi is good stuff, I like it because it doesn’t even taste like fish!

Occupation: background noise-maker

Tonight I have been in the audience for the recording of the TV-show Rikets Røst. I haven't seen the show before, but since Berit had free tickets, I thought why not? Turns out that was a good desicion!

They told us that we were only there for background noise. Our job for the evening was apparently to make this sound so funny that people in front of their tellys would look up from their newspapers or pizza slices thinking that this was something they shouldn't miss. This job suited me just fine. A couple of hours of laughing - not bad if you ask me! And they also gave us a free beer! I had made a promise to myself, as I woke up slightly hung-over this morning, that I would never drink again. But as I am also president of the short-memory-association (or at least a strong candidate for the position) those kind of promises never seem to work. And anyway, what student can turn down a free beer?

The show was a positive surprise. I think I might have to start watching this program. I would at least recommend turning on TV2 at 21.45 tomorrow. I have already decided to repeat the success of working as backround noise. The tickets for the recording of Nytt på Nytt sometime in April are already booked - and I think it'll be a lot of fun!

Frustration Attack

Ohwww!!!

Another day at the library.
Pages produced: none.
Sentences produced: next to none.
Ideas about what to include in thesis: quite a few.
Ability to get them down on paper: absent.
Motivation: apparently gone with the chapters I sent my supervisor last week.

Hoping it will reappear tomorrow.

Untill then, no use sitting here.
I'm leaving.

Fun (but Exhausting) Times in the Life of a Sports Fan

Finally the World Championship in Nordic Skiing. But what were they thinking when they decided to host it on the other side of the world?? In another time zone? That means a lot of early mornings for us sports fans in ski-crazy Europe! In one way it is good though... It gets me up in the morning (at 6 am!!), and it's done so early that I can still make a pretty early start on the thesis writing business. Good thing about being a student I guess. Very flexible starting times.. Bad thing is that it also means an early start in the week ends.. You really know you're a sports nerd when you get up at 6 am on a Saturday to watch some cross country. Today I've just been exhausted all day...

It is also a time of priorities.. A time when the qualification for the ski jumping competition the next day seems a lot more important than getting the second chapter of my thesis done and shipped off to my supervisor. After all, the World Championships is only once every second year! I guess the thesis is only once in a lifetime, but it is for sooo many weeks, and I'm already so tired of all the writing, reading, analyzing, frustration attacks, writing blocks, and dictionaries - that it feels like I've been working on this forever. Therefore, my priorities are simple. The fun wins. I'd choose something fun and exciting over frustrating and annoying any day. Ooops.. Maybe that's why I'm struggling to get this thesis done on time... Which means another semester of writing, reading, analyzing, frustration attacks, writing blocks, and dictionaries...

Support Membership, Bye Bye!

I wonder if this is a coincidence. But on Saturday I decided that it is time to quit being a support member at SATS, and revive my membership. The first unpleasent surprise was when I talked to the (cute) guy at SATS who told me that transferring my membership meant that I also had to start paying Oslo prices. Whatever that means. That means expensive, he told me. Oh. OK. I had no choice. I signed up for a year, and now I'm paying the price (bad pun intended). But this sudden jump in membership fee also kind of pushed me back on the treadmill because I felt too guilty wasting the money, which is good I guess.

Because I don't wanna be part of the ugly statistics I read when I logged on the internet this morning. It said that SATS earns 70 MILLION KRONER a year on people who are just what they call "support members"!! As if that was not enough; the article even called us sofagriser ("couch pigs"??). I refuse to be one.

Therefore I am going there again tonight, even though I really can't move after Saturday's work out, and I have already had an unintended work out this morning (note to self: the one extra minute of sleep in the morning is not worth the sprint to catch the subway in high heels).

Problem Solved!

Since I have been complaining so much about my poor TV lately, I feel that it's finally time to give it some credit. Because it works!!! I now have 4 channels, and a DVD that speaks English! The trick was just to carry it into one of the other rooms, get the channels there, save them, and then carry it back to my room. Obvious, right!?

Oh, and Happy Friends Day everyone!

Technical Problems

I have always known that I am not best friends with all sorts of technical equipment. It is like the technical stuff somehow knows that I have no idea how to make it work and so it decides to have some fun with me and simply not work properly.

But my new TV really gets the award for strangeness. I have complained for a week now that it refuses to show me anything but NRK1 (which is OK for winter sports during the week-ends, but can get a little boring during the rest of the week..). So I'm watching a lot of DVD's instead (the thing has a built-in DVD player!). And guess what? For some mysterious reason, it has now started to show all the DVDs - dubbed in German!

PS: Carrie Bradshaw should keep speaking English. German doesn't suit her.

En Superdistré Persons største Skrekk:

Smekklås på ytterdøra!

Productive Sunday

Today has been what I would call a very productive Sunday. After four days of working at the education fair trying to convince young, future students that Tromsø is the place to be (no, it's NOT that cold. No, mørketid is NOT that bad. No, it's NOT that far away!), all the stuff I had to do to decorate my room has just gathered up until I had to tiptoe between all the piles to get from the sofa, to the desk, to the bed, to the door. So I decided that today I just had to do something about it. It was time to find the sewing machine and start making my room somewhere I could actually be. So I have spent today sewing, watching sports on TV, and covering my sofa that was screaming late 80's - early 90's with some linen colored fabric. That was more comlicated than it sounds. For a while there, I thought that there is some bad technical aura in my room, since my TV refuses to take in anything but NRK1 and now my sewing mashine is also acting weird. But it got better. I'm counting on my TV doing the same.

PS: My upstairs neighbor has spent his whole Sunday practicing playing the guitar. I'm really counting on him being a fast learner.

Ikea,Ikea,Ikea

Moving is kind of exhausting. Fun, but still exhausting. All this packing, repacking and organizing.. I love decorating my room, but I don't like this mess of stuff I can't find the right place for while decorating. But now I think I'm on the right track. As usual, IKEA did the trick!

The IKEA transport people brought my bed yesterday. So for the second time in under a year, I had a "flatpakket" bed and a manual full of smily faces from IKEA.. I could only hope that it would go better than last time! But I faced a problem already on the first smily picture on page one - apparently I needed tools to put this piece of furniture together, tools that IKEA did not provide.. After a few minutes of frustration I got to borrow some tools from a friend, and voila! Definitely a better result than my former attempt! And finally a place to sleep, even though the bed was not as comfortable as it was at IKEA. Maybe I was just so tired when I was there that I could have fallen asleep anywhere.. :)

So my room is slowly but surely starting to look OK. As I said, I love decorating it, but one thing is to get a great idea of how you want it to look - quite another is to try to make that happen on a student budget ;) That requires quite a lot of creative thinking, and sometimes the thinking gets a bit too creative for its own good, because solutions that seem great in my head don't always work too well in real life... But hopefully, my Africa style room is up and running quite soon!

Love is in the Air?

Lately, I have recieved a few e-mails with the subject heading "Love is in the air". Every company seems to think that that will sell their stuff, everyone from SAS Bråthens to the shampoo-and-stuff-place I get newsletters from. It makes me kind of mad. Because it doesn't seem to be much love in my air (again; not bitter - noooo).. And then I got it. I realized why they all come up with this "fantastic" slogan right now. My absolutely least favorite holiday is coming up; Valentines Day. Oh joy.

Night Bus

The night bus from Oslo is a good way to get home, except when the following happens:

1) Someone falls asleep right away and snores so the whole bus shakes
2) After two stops someone comes and ask to sit next to you, resulting in that you have to take one of you two heavy bags on your lap for hours
3) A group of young people who have been on the "like most exciting trip ever" comes on at Gardermoen, sit right behind you, and watch movies from their trip on the computer while
explaining and laughing - loudly.

Last night, all of the above happened.

Bitter? Nooooooo

Suomi. Finland. Oslo.

Long time, no update. I can explain. I have been on vacation! One and a half week with lots of fun before it’s back to the books for a few months... So here is some of what I’ve been up to for the past week or so.

Last Sunday I moved from Tromsø, but took a “small” detour through Finland before ending up in my new home city Oslo. After Tromsø, the first stop was Kolari in Northern Finland, where I got to experience real winter for the first time this year. Somewhere between 20 and 30 degrees - minus. It was great. I have missed the winter so much this year. And when we asked the people in the hotel if there was an ATM in town, they told us that there was one a 4 km walk away. We optimistically started walking, the cold snow making the familiar squeaking noises for every step, and I have to say that 4 km seem a lot longer in the cold! When we finally found the centre, we also had to find a pub to defrost, and order a taxi back. Real winter cold is great (yes, I AM serious) but must be enjoyed in limited potions.

Rovaniemi, or Winterwonderland as I now like to call it, was almost as cold, and had lots of heavy snow on the trees with that beautiful glow to it that only 25 blue degrees can give. Surely, this kind of Christmas card is beautiful to look at from inside a warm kitchen, but it is even more fun to be out there experiencing it. Marjaana’s friend Jenni had a snowmobile that we just had to try out before we left. As they say, bad weather doesn’t exist, only bad clothes (well, it sounds much fancier in Norwegian, when it rhymes…). But as we got to borrow a lot of good clothes, we had no problems facing the cold. As we got out I thought that Jenni was going to drive us around with the snowmobile – but I was wrong; we got to drive ourselves! It was great, I felt so free, and like I was flying across the frozen lake – until I glanced down and realized I was going the amazing speed of 15 km/h! I felt a little bad, and got the thingy up to almost 30 km/h, but then it felt like it was taking off from the ice and I had to go back to a safe 15… But it was a lot of fun! In Rovaniemi I also found out that all the pool-playing skills I thought I’d picked up in Namibia had magically disappeared (or maybe they were just imagined in the first place…). And I got to meet Santa Claus! I had heard rumors that he actually comes from Rovaniemi, and after having seen his village, I am almost convinced. Even though he said something else every Christmas Eve he came to my house when I was a kid… This leaves me with a problematic question: Can Santa lie?

After two days in Rovaniemi, we got on the night train that would take us South to Helsinki, where I woke up the next morning. I got to do some shopping, sightseeing, sauna and hair dressing in the capital, and then went to Marjaana’s family’s summer house for a couple of days. It was a great place situated right by one of Finland’s many lakes, and a great place to relax! I even got to do my first skiing for the season!! It was only for a couple hundred meters, but still – it counts! Then we went back to Helsinki to have a party Saturday night. It was a great time, and after a couple of glasses of wine I kind of forgot that I would have to take an early plane the next day. And they had a lot of tasty shots at the bar we went to.. someone told me that everyone has to experience at least one hung-over flight, and I have now experienced mine. Well, to look at the positive side of it – you save a lot of money going through the tax free shop that way, because it isn’t even remotely tempting to stop by the alcohol section..

Well, after a great trip to Finland I have now spent two great days in Oslo. Yesterday I took a look at my new room, and started thinking about how I am going to decorate it.. That’s always fun! So tonight I’m going back home to get all my stuff – and then I will move to Oslo! Jippi!

Moi moi.

I Miss Namibia

I finished my transcribing yesterday. That means it is now time to start writing the two first chapters of my thesis. Only it's not very easy to just start writing. Or better said; it's not only-only (the expression "bare-bare" comes in handy so often.. if anyone finds a better translation than Petter Solberg I would be very happy:) to start writing. So I have been sitting here trying to find information about Namibia online. So far it has only resulted in one thing: I miss Namibia. A lot.

Queen of Excuses

House work might be dangerous!

I decided to clean the whole appartment yesterday, so that it wouldn't be a lot of stress doing it right before I move.

Today I feel beat. Totally. Really tired and can barely keep my eyes open. Now; this could have several reasons; some possible ones being Saturday night party, a too optimistic effort at SATS, or just the simple fact that today is Monday. But I choose to blame it on the cleaning. I think that everything that could possibly be blamed on house work, should be.

In this case, I more spesifically blame it on the detergent, Salmiakk. I wanted to get the shower completely clean, and was really proud when I discovered a mix of cleaning detergants that actually worked (yes, I do admit that it is quite scary that I could feel so happy about a break through in the department of house cleaning. It will never happen again!), so I took my bucket of water and huge amounts of salmiakk into the shower, and stayed in that 1m x 1m space cleaning the walls and floor for 10 minutes. What I didn't think about is that Salmiakk is quite strong, and after the 10 minutes I felt really weird and dizzy...

So, I think that's why I forgot all my transcribing stuff at home this morning and have now spent 4 hours in the library doing - let's see - nothing!! So be aware of housework :)

Moving

It isn't "only-only" to move from Tromsø to Oslo. Not on a student budget and without a car. But with some creative thinking and help from good friends, it doesn't have to be that expensive after all..

After sorting through my stuff and throwing away eveything I thought I wouldn't need or want anymore, I was left with two mighty heavy boxes ready to be shipped off from the post office. The biggest problem would be to get them the 500 meters from the appartment to the post office.

It turned out not to be such a big problem after all. After spending a few days thinking about how expensive it would be to take them in a taxi, I suddenly got an idea while shopping the other day: why not borrow one of ICA's wonderful shopping carts? So today Marjaana helped me, and we conqured all the challenges King Winter decided to present us with - snowy, icy, and bumpy roads - and the boxes are now at the post office safe and sound. Now I only have clothes, shoes, skis, and books left - and I have plans how to get them all down to the capital :)

What NOT to do..

... when recording an interview:

Yesterday I finished transcribing one of the interviews. Today I was going to start a new one. Only I have now learned lesson 1 about recording: It might be an idea to put the recorder close to the interviewee, and not very close to oneself... This is hopeless to transcribe. My (fake) laughter is really loud in my ears (and the laughter hasn't gotten any better since yesterday), so I have to turn the volume way down to prevent myself from becoming deaf. Then all the response I can hear is mumble, mumble, mumble. Oh, but it is apparently some very "funny" mumbling, because it's interrupted by a (fake) laughter quite frequently. Ouch.

And double ouch; I didn't know that I sound just like Janice in Friends!

The Doubtful Joys of Transcribing

1. I get to hear how bad my fake laughter really sounds... (I have to work on that)
2. I have confirmed that I have the memory span of a goldfish (seriously, I can remember a sequence of like 5 words max. This takes time!)
3. I have discovered that Namlish is even more difficult to understand on tape than live
4. I understand that I have to drastically cut down on my use of the terms "oh really?", "oh?", "oh yeah?", and "aha!"

New Year. New Possibilities.

So, 2007 eh? I can't really believe it. I started the year up North in Tromsø, and had a nice New Year's celebration with Rachel, Marjaana, and Panama. Just as I suspected, New Year's in Tromsø with all the fireworks lighting up the Mørketid sky was quite fantastic to see, and also a big 2006 made out of burning candles up in the mountainside under the Fjellheis that magically changed into 2007 at midnight was great. Then we danced the new year in at Cirka, which was fun!

I think, and I hope, that 2007 is going to be a good year. You can never tell the future, I guess, but I do know that this year is going to be one full of changes and travelling for me. I start of by going to Finland for a week in January, which I think will be great. Then I am moving to Oslo to work on the last semester of my thesis. It will be quite strange and sad to leave Tromsø, but I am also excited about living in the "big city".

And then probably more changes.. This spring is hopefully my last semester as a student, which means that 2007 will be the year that I will probably have to get a real job. Scary scary. I was thinking that somewhere along all these year of studying I would figure out what I want to do when I "grow up", but that hasn't happened.. So it is going to be quite exciting to see where I am when September comes. My big plan is to move abroad and learn a new language - french mybe - and take some time off from studying and committments. That is my plan right now. But as we all know - plans change. Especially mine. That's what's so exciting about the future :)