That's Norway

On Monday Astrid decided to clean the office and move some shelves, so I spent my morning in chaos till I left for Småbarnstreff. Nobody showed up as I expected it. That way we closed earlier and I could go back to the office to help. But instead of joining Astrid sent Oleksandr and me to the tax office to fix his papers and afterwards we had to check four shops in town for bike helmets, locks, bells and lights (our bikes have neither one nor the other). Unfortunately none of them had it in product range. So we went back and looked for those things in the internet, so that Astrid can order it. By that time it looked a lot better in the office, but there was still one cupboard left and Astrid told me that this is actually a task for me – she already figured out that I really enjoy throwing away unnecessary things and to put some order into everything ;)

My next day in the canteen has been very easygoing because there was not much to do this time. We only prepared some vegetables for a stew which was refused by most of the students – vegetables might be dangerous – but that way there was more left over for me. And it was delicious, trust me! So I could go freshly strengthened to the German class and help the students to understand what happened during the Second World War as well as to the office afterwards. We met to discuss our weekly schedules because Astrid wants us to create them ourselves from now on. So we had to think about the different tasks that are available and divide them between us volunteers. It took some time until we finished and I could almost leave the house again when I got there because the ‘spåkkafè’ took place for the second time. It was nice to spend some time there and actually I could talk little Norwegian this time, which was much more fun. Now I am even more motivated to learn this language :)

After the knitting group on Wednesday the others and I have been to Open skule once again to help Hilde-Kristin cooking for the students. Unfortunately everything has been out of the package again. I started to discuss this way of cooking with Hilde-Kristin and the others entered into dialogue on the subject because they have the same impression about this ‘manufactured goods culture’ in Norway. She has not been aware of that, but finally she agreed. In her opinion it results from the mealtimes. In Norway you usually have breakfast (frukost) in the morning, a snack (matpakke) at noon, lunch (middag) in the afternoon and a light meal in the evening (kvelds). But the students go to training around lunchtime and that way it has to go really fast. Moreover there is no butcher or baker in this town which makes it even worse. The problem in Open skule is that we do not have the time to cook with fresh ingredients and it would be very expensive. So we cannot change it, but in my opinion this is a serious problem. Sometimes I wonder if Norwegians know what a delicious meal is… But at least the students ate the food this time – topsy-turvy world.

Later while cleaning up everything Hilde-Kristin tried to figure out what to do about the Norwegian class because she heard from Astrid that I am not satisfied at all, but we did not find a solution… Unfortunately the class has not been better the next day as well as on Friday, so I just worked on my own with the online program all day. The Norwegian teacher was really surprised when he saw my papers with all the notes about what I learned so far because I put so much effort in it. Either he is just not used to students willing to learn or he doesn’t expect them to be…but why are we in that course then? However, even during the international café in the evening I continued learning Norwegian. We only had two visitors and Torill and Anton, the leaders of the café, took care of them after we prepared everything. Oleksandr joined me and together we tried to understand this language :)

My weekend started with the movie ‘Inferno’ with Felicity Jones and Tom Hanks on Friday evening. I went to the cinema for the first time (for free – volunteer bonus :D) because Barbara asked me to join. It was not exactly my favorite genre, but it was okay and I spent a nice evening with the others. The next day I accompanied a Norwegian guy called Terje to distribute food to elderly people who cannot look after themselves anymore, but want to stay at home. It is a project of the community with the purpose to balance the number of people in retirement homes, and Frivilligsentralen takes care of the drivers. I already got to know Terje during the Opera and he invited me to come along. It was really nice to see more of Eid commune while sitting in the car and learning Norwegian at the same time. One day I can drive myself if I want to (and I really want to!!), but first I have to get to know the route better – some places are really difficult to reach, so I was just looking this time. Anyway I enjoyed the trip as well as the one afterwards with the bicycle. I drove deeper into the valley, away from the fjord, which was really nice too. But after some time there hasn’t been a bikeway anymore and soon I was sick of driving on the road with all these cars coming along, so I had to turn… But today I went up the mountains to see my place from the top and it was just amazing. The weather was still good (from Wednesday on it is getting really bad…), so I took the chance. And now I know where all the Norwegians are on the weekends…the streets are mostly deserted, but I met so many people up in the mountains. Very funny :D

Ha ein fin dag!

Alisa