Jul, Nisser, og Thanksgiving!!

Thanksgiving

So this year, I had two Thanksgivings:

Thanksgiving #1: On actual Thanksgiving Day

After school, I went over to MacKenzie's with her and our friend Martin, and we began to cook. We didn't have much to work with, but we made fried chicken, mashed potatoes (in a blender, it went well, actually), cookies (with ice cream), and stuffing that MacKenzie's family had sent her (those premade packages). Martin tried to make some sauce, but really it had wayyyy to much water and turned out a lot more like water--we never stopped making fun of him for that! Poor guy...Anyway, we ate together with MacKenzie's host dad and it was really nice and cozy. We played ping-pong and skyped with her family and just had a good time. I went home decently late and it was a good, cozy, small, low-key Thanksgiving.

Thanksgiving #2: The weekend after Thanksgiving

My host family had the really great idea of having some Rotarians and friends over for Thanksgiving Dinner, and MacKenzie and I would make all the food for them. MacKenzie and I decided this was a great idea and so we decided to do it. I went shopping with my host dad in Oslo earlier in the week to find some strange things, for example, pumpkin for the pumpkin pie, because we decided to make it from scratch. We also ate sushi in the city which was really cozy and nice! Here was a little sneak peek of what our guest list looked like for the coming Sunday:

• My two host families
• MacKenzie's first two host families
• The teacher that MacKenzie and I have Norwegian lessons from each Tuesday
• Our Rotary President plus his wife
• MacKenzie's Rotary President plus his wife
• A few other random Rotarians
• My counselor and his wife
• MacKenzie's counselor and his wife

It ended up being about 25 people--WOW!! We thought that we needed to make a lot of food. Norwegians don't exactly understand the M.O. one must take to eating Thanksgiving dinner, but regardless, we knew we had to have A LOT of food. We started out Saturday morning by going shopping. §1300 later...we started cooking. We had (and homemade, mind you) stuffing, cornbread, devilled eggs, three apple pies, three pumpkin pies, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, gravy, rolls, artichoke dip, tittebær jam (the closest thing we could find to cranberry sauce), peas, corn, yams with marshmellows on top, THREE turkeys, asparagus, and from what I remember, MUCH more. We cooked for 11 hours on Saturday and eight on Sunday--MacKenzie, Britt, Gunnar, and I were serious troopers. We really killed it on the food making (in a good way). On Sunday, everyone came over and we had to MAKE them start eating--probably because everyone didn't know everyone and they felt awkward. We told them the story of how Thanksgiving started and the traditions that surround it. We also read them the poem I Ate Too Much and if don't know what I am talking about, it goes like this:

I ate too much Turkey, I ate too much corn,

I ate too much pudding and pie.

I'm stuffed up with muffins and too much stuffin'

I'm probably going to die.

I piled up my plate and I ate and I ate.

But I wish I had known when to stop,

For I'm so crammed with yams, sauces, gravies, and jams

That my buttons are starting to pop!

I'm full of tomatoes and french fried potatoes

My stomach is swollen and sore,

But there's still some dessert so I guess it won't hurt if

I eat just a little bit more!

We all had a really good time together and it was really nice, but afterwards, we had to CLEAN UP which of course was just one big party, you know. It wasn't nearly as bad as I expected, however, so that was good. I had a TERRIBLE stomach ache for days because of eating so much dairy, though, so that was also fun. Anyway, getting away from my digestive problems...It was overall VERY successful and everyone was thoroughly impressed with our spread and the weird food we made. Everyone was super skeptical about the yams and marshmellows but are now in love so...go USA I guess! The one thing everyone told us was they did NOT understand how we could eat so much. And by we I mean MacKenzie and I. I'm just saying. We did America proud.

Jul

Jul i Norge! Christmas time here is a very special time of the year, as it is in most places. We have a quiz each day that the librarians send out about Christmas that everyone competes for, special TV programs like "Jul i Blåfjell" and "The Julekalender" that are cheesy Norwegian children shows--they are the best! And so funny :) Every night at six o'clock, everyone sits around and cozies up to watch Blåfjell and drink coffee :) My Rotary threw a holiday party where we ate Rakfisk with potatoes, lefse, beets, and drank coffee. Rakfisk is fish that has been buried in the ground and fermented, and then dug up again, but don't judge it by the sound, it is reaaaally good!

There is a Norwegian word: Koselig, and it translates to something like "cozy," but not quite. It is the feeling of an atmosphere where you are with really good people, just having a good time, or baking cookies all day, or sitting by a fire with wool socks and a cup of hot cocoa--that is koselig--not really sure how else to describe it. I would say Christmas in Norway is really "koselig." Everyone bakes gingerbread and just has a really good time together--Norway has a LOT of special Christmas food--maybe they just missed out on Thanksgiving :) No but they eat a lot more fish, which is GREAT because the fish here is incredible. But but enough about fish. Nom: :)

But every year in the U.S., my mom (and sometimes friends), and I set up a little village with figurines and buildings and that is really cozy as well. I remember every year we put little "gnomes" in the "forest" area, but this year, I found out these "gnomes" were actually Norwegian "Nisser"! The TV program "Jul i Blåfjel" is a show ALL about them! Here, my entire childhood tradition and I have only found out NOW where they come from! Here are the Blåfjell Nisser:

I'll keep you all posted on the Christmas thing because it is still happening, but we are travelling to Bergen next week for Christmas with the Grandparents, so I am excited! Som vi sier på Norsk, jeg gleder meg!

Museet

So my host mom and I took a little trip to Folkemuseet near Oslo and just walked around for like four hours--it was pretty incredible! There are just so many things to see! It is an outdoor museum where they have moved a bunch of old buildings from all over Norway to one place to accurately show how things were back in that time.

Each building has a little history chart about where it originally was, how old it was, and what it was used for. It looked like the Norway in DisneyWorld! Although everything here sort of looks like that, I must say. They had a huge market where everyone sold their own handmade items--people were weaving and knitting and creating their own wool string to make clothing with--it was pretty incredible!

They even had a little church-type house where everyone could join in and sing Christmas carols :) There was also a section devoted to show how the Samis live way in the North. If anyone doesn't know who the Samis are, they are the native peoples of Norway. I have a nice picture of the cool houses they lived in here! :

I bought a bunch of gifts here at this museum, so go ahead and ask my family after Christmas what they got if you are curious :)

Oslo

I was in Oslo with all the other exchange students the other weekend, which was incredibly fun, I might add. We went to Vigelandsparken in Oslo, and ate sushi at a random sushi shop--it was really good!

Vigelandsparken:

We also walked around Oslo and were just together. That is the amazing part about exchange students--when there is nothing to do, we FIND something, and we always have a good time together: ) For example, we find random things like "ghetto" bathrooms to find entertaining:

We also saw the Rådhus which was really cool with really cool Norwegian artwork which is quite unique, if I do say so myself. Here is a little sample:

Sverige

So last Saturday my host family and I went to Sweden and shopped--not an uncommon thing for Norwegians to do because everything in Sweden is WAY cheaper than Norway! Sad, right? Well, anyway, we went and bought MASSIVE amounts of groceries, I got a few clothes, and my host sister and I got our candy fix and THEN some. I did send about half of it back home, but I think I may still be set until the end of my exchange, AT LEAST, and it cost me virtually nothing! Sweden is a wonderful magical land of cheap but still delicious candy. When we got home from a WHOLE day in Sweden (the border is only about an hour and a half away from our house, so we didn't really go that far, and no one at the border check anything, mind you), I got home to my friends Marte and Tale, and we baked Swedish Kladdkaka, so it was a veryyyy Swedish day! We also watched a few episodes of Epic Mealtime on youtube, and then discovered Average Swedish Mealtime which is possibly even funnier!!!!!!!!!! Check it out if you are interested :)

IKEA

A little later in the day this past Sunday, my host parents asked if I wanted to take a trip to IKEA, which if you didn't know, is a giant store that has EVERYTHING. The best part, though was that since they were just shopping for curtains, I just went around and looked at everything, and they have these sample premade rooms such as a model kitchen or something that are so cool because they are themed and have all the things a normal kitchen would have and are modeled like a kitchen that people were just recently baking in or something, and it is just so cool and cute and fun! I heard we got one in Denver so maybe it isn't so special, but I thought it was!

Well I hadn't written anything in quite some time, so I filled everyone in on the highlights, but I hope it was a good fulfilling issue of my life! Haha. Well. By the way. Did anyone hear about Norway running out of butter?!!!!!!!!! Because it happened!!!!!!!!!! OMG!!!!!!!!!!!! We bought some in Sweden so it is okay but seriously! How does a country run out of butter! We had to borrow from Denmark!

Å slappe av, å besøk litt, å regne, å lære

To relax, to visit a little, to rain, to learn is what I have titled this blog entry. This describes my last few weeks in Norway quite well, I think. The first week after language camp, I had a week in northern Norway, all the way up in Bjerkvik, near Narvik. See here to see how far north we were!

I was up there with my host sister to visit my host brother, Joakim, and his girlfriend. We stayed with them and their dog, too, whose name is Copper. He is super cute but sometimes can be a big pain. That's all fine and good though, because it was a great, relaxing week. Karine and I also made homemade chocolate chip cookies--not common in Norway.

These last few weeks of school, it has gotten significantly darker. I wake up, and it is pitch dark, and when I go home from school, there is just a little light out. The moon comes fast, around 5 or so. I have had my zumba-pilates class every Thursday with some friends, and Norwegian lessons every Tuesday with MacKenzie. It has also been raining a lot here but...thus is the life of Norway.

We visited Oslo two weekends ago!! I decided that I love that city. It is soooo beautiful! It was MacKenzie, me, two other exchange students, and we also met up with some of my friends from school for coffee. We almost saw Snoop Dogg outside of a shoe store except for the MANY Norwegians crowding in to sneak a peak! We found the crazy ghetto corners and the tent cities!! We went into an ice cream shop where we were served ice cream by a Swede who thought we were gærn!!! That night, I went to my friend Lilly's 20th birthday party for a bit and met more neighbors that I didn't even know I had.

The next day, Gunnar (host dad) and I went to Rotary's district conference. It was really entertaining--they had people from Germany and a few other countries that spoke about Rotary in their countries, and a few motivational speakers--one guy who lost both his legs when he was young! They also talked about how Rotary can be better known worldwide by using the web. I was also at the Rotary meeting this week--and they had such a great presesntation about an organization in Sierra Leone that was for children who had no home or could not go home to live and eat and go to school--go Norway! They paid for practically everything! It was sort of cool to see something I could see myself doing at some point--and be using my Norwegian!!

We were in Drammen for Entreprenørskap two days ago and we had a presentation about how to go further with our business idea--we are working on creating a business that sells a product. This also means I got to miss my math class...yes I will make it up later I promise! The speaker (OF COURSE) picked on me to do a demonstration--that was interesting. It becomes really complicated when they don't know you are an exchange student and just assume you are Norwegian and will understand all the words that comes out of his mouth!! It's fine though--classmates helped me out! This is our idea--a water bottle with a filter so you can drink from rivers and stuff, although I'm not so sure how we will do it, but we'll see!!

Pretty much every school in Norway participates in something called "O.D. Dagen" which stands for Operasjon Doksworth or something. It means that every year kids take a day off school and raise at least 80 dollars towards an organization. This year the organization was for kids in Rwanda that need money to live and go to school--especially girls. MacKenzie and I decided that instead of just working at home for money like many Norwegian kids do, we would bake cookies and sell them! Homemade chocolate chip cookies are NOT common here. We baked for 4 hours and made more than 80 cookies!!! We made peanut butter, chocolate chip, oatmeal, and many combinations of those. We made them with Norsk Sjokolade, so they were even better! We sold them for 20 kroners each and made around 1000 kroners!! That's almost 200 dollars! People realllllllly like cookies! It was also a lot of people's first try at homemade cookies! How crazy is that?? Chocolate chips are nowhere to be found over here...This is MacKenzie and I as we baked our cookies!

Jeg skal skrive slutten på Norsk fordi jeg er i norskfag nå, og dere kan bruke google oversetter å forstå hva jeg har sagt. Jeg lærer Norsk hvert dag, og det er derfor at jeg kalt blogg innlegg "å slappe av, å besøk litt, å regne, å lære." Også, hvis dere er norsk og dere leser hva skriver jeg, unnskyld for min dårlig gramatikk!!! Hade og håper at dere har lest hva du letter etter.

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Språkkurs!!!

Okay so am creating a separate entry for the week of Språkkurs, or Language Camp, because that is just how special the week was. I will try--to the best of my ability--to create a play-by-play on each day at the camp!

Day 1: MacKenzie and I took the bus from Drammen after a sleepover to Kinsarvik. BUT it was not as boring as that one sentence just made it sound. We thought we were going to be the only ones on the bus for six hours, but as we rode on more and more exchange students got on the bus and we got to all meet much sooner than expected! We got stranded where we were supposed to switch buses at Odda Terminal for a few hours. Eventually we called the Rotarians and got one of them to pick us all up, there were 11 of us and no bus was su

pposed to go that day! Finally we arrived at the hotel and met everyone else, ate dinner, and met our teacher for the week. After that, Ellen (exchange student from Florida), MacK

enzie and I walked to a gas station and bought snacks--this was actually kind of surprising because it was open on a Sunday night--NOTHING is open on Sunday in Norway! Ever!

Day 2: We woke up early--7 am or so, went down to breakfast and made our matpakke at the breakfast buffet. Norwegian hotels have much better breakfast than US hotels, in my personal opinion. They have brødskiver and pålegg--I don't really know how to spell t

hat second one but basically brødskiver is a one piece of bread sandwich which you add pålegg to, påleg

g being any ingredient you could use on a brøskive. As you can see, my Norwenglish gets much worse every day! We went to class and started working through our workbook and lea

rning pretty basic phrases in Norwegian--Jeg heter, jeg kommer fra, jeg bor i, etc. We als

o learned a song called En Solskinnsdag--great tune! Listen to it here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZ2py68JPkQ&feature=results_video&playnext=1&list=PL9F54AA65362C9553

We all took a trip to the store because, well, we are exchange students...aka we eat A LOT ALL THE TIME. Just saying. We had school from about 8:30 am to 6 pm with a few breaks. Th

en we had middag(we ate fishcake...more like I ate fishcake and just a few others. Most kids didn't touch their plates) and had vennskaptid (friendship time) where we all did some sort of friendship circle thing. Then we began to prepare what we planned on performing for the Rotarians on Sunday at the district conference. MacKenzie and I decided to perform a r

ap to Eminem's My Name Is and just change the words-- if you look it up the original is pretty vulgar but our version is really nice don't worry :) Here are the lyrics we wrote:

Hei! Jeg heter (hva?) Jeg heter (hva?) Jeg heter (hva?) MacKenzie! (x2)

Hei! Jeg heter (hva?) Jeg heter (hva?) Jeg heter (hva?) Anne.

Excuse me, can I have the attention of the Rotarians, for one seco

nd? Hei kids, do you like to travel (yeah yeah yeah!) do you wanna go to a different country and do exactly like I did (uhuh!) Live with a host family and get homesick (ja ja!) Pack your life up and get lost in the airport?(ha?)

My brains deadweight, I'm trying to learn this language straight but I can't figure out the difference between æ, ø, å.

And the teacher says 'jenta, snakker du Norsk?' (uh uh) 'Men du forstår meg, så du er flink!'

Well since age 12, I've felt like I'm someone else because I lost my original self in the fantasy of somewhere else.

And now I'm in Norway and Jeg lærer å snakke Norsk, they sent me h

ere and now I'm chillin at Språkkurs!

I eat a fat pound of Lefse, ski off my weight, faster than a Norwegian born with skis on his feet, ikke sant? Jenta snakker du Norsk?

Ja men bare litt! My club sent me here to say hello to y'all!

Hei, hva heter du, hva heter du, hva heter du? (x2) Rotary!

So anyway that is what MacKenzie and I worked on most nights from like 7-9 o'clock. Everyone got a little distracted because the Brasilians were practicing their dance for the performance and then they started teaching us all to dance--it was really fun! Then we all hung out until curfew (okay after curfew), and played games. I swear unless you are an exchange student you would never discover such childish games and enjoy them HALF as much as we do. Hand cla

p games, 'whodunnit' games, and just all sorts of stuff I never gave enough chance because guess what--they are really good bonding slash passtime games!

Day 3: We went through the same morning routine today, class at about 8:30--we learned about Ingeborg and Olav and their story in our book--very cheesy, typical textbook learning

story. We took a walk through the forest two by two--searching for different types of vegetation and stuff. We were supposed to speak only in Norwegian, but I was paired with Ang

ela, who comes from Taiwan and is just learning to speak English, so we didn't speak a whole lot of Norwegian together. Østein, one of the teachers, walked with us for a while, and after that, we walked along and just got to know each other. She is experiencing A LOT of new things this year--hopefully she will go back home knowing two languages, I think that would be p

retty cool! Mandarin Chinese is completely different from English and Norwegian, so she definitely has a huge challenge, but I think she is going to do great :) We walked through the forest and I taught her names for some of the different things like forest, sheep, rock, water, etc. It was really nice :) We got an awesome picture together, too, which she will hopefully post soon. After a while all the kids met up on the walk and we all went together to this HUGE waterfall to take pictures, videos, and just have fun.

It was SO beautiful there--just like everywhere in Norway, bu

t the waterfalls here are really incredible because they just come right out of nowhere on the fjords and spill into the rivers and sea and everything. It is just really cool to see. That night we had a little more class, ate dinner, and raced peas by blowing on them with straws..I am sad to report that my team lost. We didn't really rehearse that night, but we all hung out and played more games, talked, and just had a great time. We decided all to walk around what there was of the town for a bit and found out that there was a small area of cabins where a bunch of kids were staying for a school trip, but it was crazy because all we saw were tons of kids running around without parents. We thought we had found Never Never Land or something! Of course, some of them spoke some English and started cursing at us...that is one of the downers of being exchange students ESPECIALLY from the USA--nobody really likes you at first. It's okay thou

gh, it always gets better :)

Day 4: We went to school, breakfast, same time and everything. We continued working in the workbook and singing En Solskinnsdag over and over--we all seemed to love it! It was just a fun, happy song to sing! After lunch we got the option to hike further up on the trail we had gone to the day before, stay in class and sort of just hang out and work on a little Norwegian, or to go to the pool. I chose to go to the pool with like 13 other kids. It was NOT a warm day out and the water wasn't really warm either, but it was SO much fun. Like I said before, exchange students just find things to do. Where most kids would have complained about the water, talked in small groups, or done nothing in the pool, we all had chicken fights, played Marco Polo, and a dozen other races and games. We were all really sad to have to leave the pool after an hour tha

t truly flew by. Being an exchange student among many others and being willing to parti

cipate is honestly the best thing in the world, in my personal opinion. After that we went back and showered, had a little more school and dinner, and played more games together. We all sort of got into the habits by now of just going to each others' hotel rooms until someone told us we had to leave and then going to the next one...we're such bad kids! Just kidding and we never really stayed up THAT late...mostly. Everyone made plans to get up early (6:45 aka COLD) Friday and go jump in the fjord together. Calvin--one of the Canadians--, MacKenzie, and I stayed up late and just sort of hung out and talked--really chill evening and I really enjoyed it a lot! Also, Calvin looks really good in MacKenzie's french robe, as everyone found out that day! I have pictures to prove it! Although I'm sure he would appreciate it if I didn't put them

here :)

Day 5: Same morning routine as far as I remember, except we all decided it should be pajama day at school, but the funniest part about waking up with MacKenzie is she ALWAYS wakes up in some sort of panic, whether it is rational or not. Usually she would get up first and then shower, then start bugging me to get up in some really random weird way, but a few times when we woke up, she would basically say 'ANNE WE ARE SO LATE WE HAVE TO GO WE HAVE TO GO WE HAVE TO GO' and that is what happened when we took a nap during lunch on day 6. We overslept until about 2 minutes before class and she woke up in SUCH a panic. I just kept saying 'but it's HOTEL school it is okay if we are a little late.' It was quite comical, actually. Anyway, back to day 5. When we went to breakfast and then to class in our pajamas, our teacher was PISSSSSSSED. She told us that it was impolite to go around a hotel in pajamas although none of ours were inappropriate. She made us all go and change because 'Norwegians don't go around in their pajamas.' That is all good and fine except for the fact that Norwegians sleep in their underwear for the most part so I can see how THAT might be offensive. Oh well. She wasn't mad after we changed anyway. We all took a walk to a place where we were going to have a barbecue and just sort of hung out and talked, Angela, the girl from Taiwan, got her first hug from a guy--one of the exchange students. It was a really exciting moment for everyone! Seriously it was. Someone threw something at the ceiling of the shed we were eating in and a bunch of mysterious dry poo fell from the ceiling and landed all over me--not kidding. I felt super duper after that! But then we kept walking after our lunch and ended up at a gokart course! Lucky us, Rotary had arranged to let us drive Go Karts on a course!! We got to race each other and almost everyone went twice. It felt just like Mario Kart--even when you spun out on corners it looked and felt exactly like slipping on a banana peel!

Some of the kids had never driven in their life so it was SERIOUSLY exciting for them.

All of us who had driven were just craving a little driving so that went really well too! It was seriously a blast. After that, we all walked back to the hotel and I got into a really interesting conversation with the girl from Wisconsin named Savannah about Amish people--apparently there are a lot of them over there in Wisconsin! Who knew. By the way--Savannah doesn't even really LIKE cheese very much so there you have it, she kicks Wisconsin stereotypes' butts. So that night we all performed what we had of our rap, skit, or whatever we were doing for the show and worked more on what we needed to practice for it. Calvin became MacKenzie and my personal DJ--we felt like true G MCs. Definitely. We also had a little more school before dinner but I don't think we did very much, just worked from the book again. Then we stayed up and hung out, and I learned how to do some of the Brasilians' cultural dances, and then went

to bed--I was pretty tired and had to get up early to swim in the fjord!

Day 6: I got up at 6:30 to be ready to swim in the fjord at 6:45. Only four of us showed up to go--Juliana from Brazil, and Taylor and Kiersten from Canada. It was impossibly dark out so we couldn't see where it was deep in the water and where it was shallow. We spent a good half hour just looking for a place to jump in. Finally we just decided to take a literal leap of faith and just go! Juliana decided that she didn't want to go because it was too cold, but the Canadians and I jumped in and yes, it was freezing, but well worth it to say we had done it. I got back and took a nice hot shower...it really was very nice. This was the day that MacKenzie and

I overslept during our break time and woke up in a panic, to find ourselves suddenly outside with the other kids playing games like some Norwegian outdoor version of Twister, a game where we tied balloons to our feet and tried to pop other peoples, and one where we tossed coins towards a line and just saw who got closest. After that, we went back to class and had more arbeidsbok time. We also got a tour of a factory that makes silverware and stuff--just for random fun I guess. It really was pretty interesting to see though, and we all got free lobster forks. That night, we performed again what we were doing for the Rotarians and the Australian, Argentinian, and other Brasilian exchange students got there so that they would be there for the district conference! It was really fun to meet people that had been there for around 8 months. Some of them understood but didn't speak Norwegian, some of them were AWESOME at speaking Norwegian, and some of them spoke ONLY Norwegian--not any English. Tor was also there, a rebound exchange student who had just spent a year in New Hampshire. So we basically spent the evening playing around and meeting the other exchange students. We also all decided to jump into the fjord AGAIN all together since most people were too tired to get up in the morning to do it.

A few of us stayed up late and just hung out and talked until we had to go to bed, just to get to know the kids that had just arrived at the conference. Finally we were exhausted and fell right asleep.

Day 7: Day seven was one of the best days of the entire week. We got up, knowing we didn't have school but had some sort of outdoor activity--that was all they told us. We packed lunch and just all met in the lobby in our 'outdoor clothing.' Most of us had no idea how to dress although what I brought turned out to work just fine. We were driven by bus at 10 o'clock to a spot near some mountains, and played 'Mafia,' a really fun game, along the way. When we arrived, we were presented with a series of belts and helmets we had to put on, along with a contract that, as said by the guide, 'basically states that you are hundreds of meters up, and if you fall, your life would be over.' Of course, we all signed. We all went to an area where we were supposed to just 'train' how to use the climbing equipment, going up slippery rocks and such. What we ended up doing was climbing these super steep tracks next to this HUGE man-made pipeline that was still in use today. Some people were a little hesitant and almost took the trail up instead, but decided it didn't look that bad. Once we thought we were almost done, the guide told us we were going to be climbing on these staple-like things sticking out of the rock in order to go the rest of the way up. The thing was that they were just hanging there--we started going and realized we were essentially just dangling vertically from the rock, hundreds of feet above ground.

DON'T WORRY it was totally safe, we had harnesses and areas to clip in on and everything, but it was SCARY and SO MUCH FUN. We were on there for a good 4 or 5 hours or so and let me tell you, we were all SUPER proud to say we had scaled a MOUNTAIN, and then completed the hike up for like 20 minutes after that, gone through an old mine, and just had a blast. Then we had a barbecue at the top of the rock, and hiked down. I chatted with Kiersten on the way down who is French-Canadian, so we spoke in French for a while :) It was really nice considering my French has NOT been its best since trying to learn Norwegian. When we got back to the hotel we practiced one more time for the Rotarians, and then played about a million games of Mafia. Once it was getting close to curfew, we all resorted to the 'hanging out in each others' rooms' thing, and kept that going until we were all too tired to stand considering our extreme outing the same day. Up in one of the rooms with a balcony, we discovered some drunk kids out in the street shouting curse words at some of the Rotarians probably just because they were drunk. One of them definitely thought they were an airplane, too. It was pretty entertaining if I might say so myself.

Day 8: So we all rose, extraordinarily tired from the night before, and got ready for the conference with the Rotarians. We had a really great program involving the Brasilians dancing, the South Americans dancing, MacKenzie and my Rotarian rap, Angela singing in Mandarin, the French girls singing, a play of little red riding hood, the Vegimite song by the Australians, and a bunch of kids singing Alt for Norge. We also all sang En Solskinnsdag. After that, we all said a REALLY sad goodbye to each other and took the bus home. It was a long ride, MacKenzie and I talked with the other exchange students, and watched Gilmore Girls a little. We mainly just talked about how great the week was and how much we felt more like exchange students.

As you can see, I had a week of SERIOUS fun and probably learned like, not very much Norwegian, but I learned a few things, and I had SUCH a great experience. It was seriously so much fun and the best week I have had here in Norway so far--can't wait til the next time all of us exchange students meet again!

Hvordan det er å være utveklingsstudent

So I started to write this with the intent to start speaking Norwegian. I was thinking about what to write and how to write it in Norwegian completely forgetting the fact that I was doing my blog in English--so that is an exciting thing! I officially don't know which language to use anymore! I haven't written in a while but I intend to write a little more often so I can document the goings on over here in Norway. First thing that I haven't shared with you all--it was my birthday September 14th, so I got to experience a real Norwegian birthday! I got a really nice gift from my host family, heard the 'Grattulerer med daggen' song, and ate AMAZING Indian food--spiciest thing I've had since I've been in Norway besides stark kebab. I also was wished happy birthday by SO many people at school--it was really exciting and ni

ce to know that my classmates remembered my birthday even though I hadn't said a word about it--facebook is an amazing thing when you are an exchange student! Here is a photo of my

host family at the restaurant:

So the next thing I have to write about is my trip to Averøye with Gunnar, my host dad. I spent five days travelling and visiting from Oslo to Averøye--it was a ten hour drive! Gunnar's brother was turning 50, so there was a big family birthday party and since I am an exchange student--of course I got to go :). We drove past Lillehammer, did a wonderful hike to these white stones that have kept earth underneath them from eroding that are called Kvitskriuprestene, or white priest stones, and just had a really great time touring around Averøye and Kristiansund and surrounding areas--it was a really cool place! We took the fjelltur on the w

ay back--mountain trip. Driving through the mountains was seriously mind-blowing. Sometimes I feel like I'm just in some sort of fantasy adventureland or something--Norway is a spectacular place. We ate at a restaurant in a fjord on the way back and let me tell you--the fjords are seriously amazing--they just have a really mystic feel about them. I love it! The first picture is of Kvitskriuprestene, and the second one isn't a fjord, but it was a really cool bridge we fished by! The third photo is a fjord--FREAKIN MAGICAL! I'M TELLING YOU!!!!!!!!!!!

So overall, that was an amazing trip. The other cool thing is that in Averøye and surrounding areas, they speak a dialect of Norwegian, so I was really challenged to understand what they said. I think it was really good for me, though, because after I came back, this dialect of bokmål seemed much easier to speak and understand! I felt like I could say and hear so much more. After the trip I went to school for the rest of the week after another ten hour drive. Then, this last week, we had our exchange student language camp, which I really think deserves its own entry, so I will make two entries pretty close to each other! Anyway, enjoy the photos and check out my facebook page for more!

Uke fire i Norge!

As I am mid-way through my fourth week in Norway, I begin to write this blog. I'm not exactly sure what everyone is interested in hearing about specifically, so if you could let me know in the comments it would be greatly appreciated! My host sister would also like to make sure you all know how awesome Norway is because it is really really really really awesome here--just a side note! So this is my second week of school, and even though I still don't have a school computer, I am working on getting one very soon! I am finding that my Entreprenørskap class may be my most challenging subject, and the most fun. In this class we shall create a business and an object to sell, and then basically set up a mock business until May, according to all rules and regulations, and then we shall close down the business in May after some sort of presentation or competition thing. The best part about the class is that the teacher speaks fairly quickly, but I can understand her, and the students speak in all Norwegian almost all the time. I get no English feedback and it is left up to me to figure out what is going on--I LOVE THAT. My teachers are beginning to understand that I really do want to learn Norwegian, and I can understand a lot of what they say.

MacKenzie--the other exchange student from the U.S.--and I have Norwegian lessons from a retired teacher every Tuesday, and I find this very helpful also. We go over vocabulary, verb conjugation, Norsk regler, and just plain speaking Norwegian. We have also had a chance to talk about Norwegian culture and customs. This is a picture of my school from the street:

My host dad and I have been swimming in the ocean a lot lately, med brenmaneter (jellyfish), and I have been running as much as possible while the weather is still nice--and by nice I mean not snowing. It has been raining quite a lot lately, but today vær var så veldig fint! (the weather was awesome!). It was sunny and nearly hot around 4 o'clock!

So I am going to explain a random custom in Norway in my blogs if I have one to tell. The first one I shall talk about is the way one tells time in Norway. Although you can say 11:30, most people won't say it that way, they will say (in Norwegian) half twelve. If the time is 4:38, they will say eight after half before five, or åtte over halv fem. If the time is 9:15, you would say quarter after nine--kvart over ni. If the time is 6:21, you would say ni på halv syv. It is pretty simple but it definitely took me some time to figure out how it worked, and I am still learning.

I am coming along in Norwegian, but I learn new things every day, and I can tell it is going to take some hard work to be considered fluent in the language. However, I truly love the language as well, so I don't mind the challenge. Anyway, I'm not really sure what you are interested in hearing about (the four of you that are subscribed to my blog...lol), but let me know, and I can tell you more about things you may actually know nothing about. Oh and by the way, they have no mint oreos, no Rootbeer, and no Reeses here so....send gifts! Oh and spicy food is pretty irregular so send me some tapatio por favor!

Best cookie ever!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (I miss it)

Signing off!

Posting from School

Some of you may ask: Anne, how is it that you can post from school in the middle of the day?

Here is my answer to this FAQ: I have randomly spaced open hours and everyone here has a computer at school provided BY the school. Public school, mind you.

So, I have begun school, and I am learning my way around the Norwegian school system. It was quite difficult to get all my classes lined up and I still have a few holes in my schedule, but they should hopefully all be worked out by next week! The Voldens have set me up with an old teacher who has tutored exchange students in the past to speak Norwegian--this will be very good with me! I am going with another exchange student from Washington State, her name is MacKenzie. There is another exchange student, Zordano, from Italy. Cool name, eh?

The subjects I am taking are R1 Math, Norwegian, History, Entrepreneurship, Advanced French, Sociology and Social Anthropology, and P.E. I have all of these classes 3-4 hours a week, and am really enjoying all of the ones I have had so far. My french teacher tried to make MacKenzie and I memorize everyone's name in the class...that didn't go so well. Norwegian names are not all common names we have in English. For example--I don't know how to spell this--but one kid's name was Jåkon (pronounced Ho-ah-kone) which is a typical Norwegian name.

Yesterday, or å går på Norsk, I was informed by Brede (a boy I know who lives in a town called Tøfte) that Buskerud, which is my Norwegian district, is the "ghetto" of Norway, with gangs and all that, and that his town is the "ghetto" of Buskerud, and Røyken Videregåndeskolen is the "ghetto school" of the "ghetto district." Simply put, Norway has REALLY nice ghettos.

I am meeting new people every day from all over the world and truly enjoying myself. I have been running on some of the trails around the house, and they are seriously gorgeous. I am AMAZED by the amount of trees in Norway. Seriously. It is insanity. Breathing is so easy! Well I'm sort of kidding--you wouldn't really notice the breathing...but the trees are seriously flourishing. They have these slugs here that are apparently really bad for the forest and have no natural enemies, so if you see one you are supposed to kill them. I saw my first one the other day. Let me tell you something. THEY ARE HUGE SLUGS. With fairly thick skin. So my advice? If you're going to kill it, don't stop on it. Get a large stick and stab it, then run away as fast as possible so you don't have to watch it die....it's pretty gross. Here's a photo of one!

I think that's one of them, anyway. They're seriously disgusting. I thought I was going to have nightmares after killing that first one. They're pretty gross. But in killing one, I have eliminated 400+ that would have been around next year!

But to end on a good note...here is a picture of the Norwegian Flag...go Norway!

Let it Begin!

The beautiful towns of Norway <33

So I arrived early Sunday and was greeted by an amazing host family, the Voldens. We first went into town to see about my Residency Permit and a bank account, both of which we are still working on. When I say we went into town, we went to Drammen, a nearby city. When I flew in, we drove through Oslo, though, which is a pretty cool city on its own.

Next, we went to the Volden's summerhouse--right by the ocean! It was SO gorgeous out there, really it's beautiful everywhere here! We sat around, played board games, swam in the sea with the brenmaneter(jellyfish), I didn't get stung! and my host sister, Karine, and I made kakke(cake). It really was so fun :) We went out on the boat one day and spent a "day at sea" climbing rocks and swimming on a rocky island somewhere in the middle of the Norwegian sea. It was truly pretty astounding--the scenery here is AWESOME.

I really love my family, the food, the activities, and am having so much fun! Just the other day, we went to Høyt og Lavt land which is called "high and low la

nd" where we climbed through the trees and ziplined through the forest VERY high above the ground! It was crazy fun :) We have been speaking quite a bit of Norwegian--what I can, anyway. I am learning a lot, though! I am definitely learning to GO WITH THE FLOW. Half the time I have NO idea what we are going to do and I just have to be independent and be ready for whatever may happen--it is an amazing feeling.

Anyway, I could write more, but I need to go back to being utvekslingsstudent! Best wishes to all and I miss you dearly as well, even though I am having the best time :) By the way, here is a cool picture--it is a Viking ship they are re-building for placement in a museum as an artifact. It is a replica.

Nærsnes, Norway

Hey Everyone!

So I set up this blog as an easy way for you all to follow me while I spend my year in Norway! I am doing a Rotary Yearlong Youth Exchange with Rotary 5440 in Steamboat Springs, and am headed out around 10 am this Saturday! My first destination is a language camp, and I will be living with my first host family in a suburb of Oslo called Nærsnes. According to my host sister, Karine, we are 200 meters from the freezing ocean, so that is pretty cool.

I am currently in the process of packing, and let me tell you, packing for a year abroad is REALLY difficult! Not to mention saying goodbye to everyone. It definitely is starting to set it that I'm leaving, and I am more than excited, but I really have no idea what to expect when I get to Norway, so we'll see!

Please feel free to comment as my year goes along, I would love to hear from you!

Ha det bra,

Anna