Humbug

Winter break is over, and classes have started back up again.

Due to financial reasons (read: tickets are expensive), I decided to stay here in Bø for the entirety of break.  The hope is that I will have saved the $1200 on round-trip tickets in order to 1) afford life in this country and 2) be able to travel somewhere this semester.  I don’t know if either are possible, but I’m going to try.  As I’ve said before, food here is incredibly expensive.  My friend Pierrick even took a four hour drive one-way to Sweden to purchase groceries (primarily meat).  To celebrate Christmas on my own, I purchased a 1,4k ham (3 lbs).  That piece of meat alone cost me over 160 NOK ($28).

Almost no one was here for the majority of break, and there were a number of days where I was the only one in this building.  And in the times when there were people here (that I knew), there wasn’t much hanging out for some reason.  I was the recipient of a lot of pity over the holiday season, but I have to say that it wasn’t as bad as people thought it would be.  I wasn’t personally worried about it, but others were, and for their compassion, I am grateful.

I did get a bit of cabin fever, though.  That’s for sure.  I would be tired and restless at the same time.  My sleep schedule became completely inverted.  There were numerous days where I did not go to bed until between 6 and 10 AM.  I would frequently wake up sometime around 6:30 PM.  There were many days in which I did not see the sun at all (not difficult when it barely comes up in the first place).  It took me a couple of all-nighters to remedy this situation, but now I’m about back on track.  Lately, I’ve been having a different sleeping issue, though.  This morning, for example, I woke up at 8:30 AM – not a bad time to wake up.  The problem, however, is that I went to bed at 2:45 AM.  That’s not enough sleep.  I guess I’ll try to nap later.

I did call my family back home.  The only part of the break where I was bummed out about being here and not home came when I called home.  It was a bit disheartening to hear all of the family gathered into a few Christmas celebrations.  But it was nice talking with them nonetheless.

For New Years, I was invited to Skien to hang out with my friend Gunnar, but ended up turning down the offer in order to save some more money until I get the loan money for this semester.  It’s not much, but it’ll help.  Instead, I opened my curtains and watched the people of Bø celebrate the New Year with a rather impressive fireworks display.  Houses on the sides of the mountains all around Grivi launched their own little displays, and collectively, it was quite a nice sight.

I also participated in an online marathon for charity put on by the folks at ExtraLives.org.  They are definitely doing some good work, particularly when you consider that they’re only high school seniors.  After almost 81 hours of solid Zelda gameplay (they played several different games, including the horrible CD-I games), the guys had raised over $12k.  I was happy to donate my $10 and be part of the marathon.  With the money they donated to Free The Children, they are able to fund the building of a small school house (or build on to an existing school), stock the school with books and furniture, train teachers to run the school, and create a lunch program for the students for two whole years.  Absolutely amazing.  Now if only they could get the triforce on there…

Other parts of my break included (in no particular order):

1. Runes of Magic
2. Misc. video games
3. Reading
4. Writing
5. Movies
6. TV (see below)
7. Ham
8. mam!records

I watched a surprising amount of TV, often while playing games or doing other stuff online.  I watched:

1. Pokemon: Indigo League (the original season, all 82 episodes)
2. It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia (all seasons)
3. Frisky Dingo (all seasons)
4. Scrubs: Med School
5. MythBusters
6. Modern Family
7. Lucy, the Daughter of the Devil
8. Cheyenne Cinnamon and the Fantabulous Unicorn of Sugar Town Candy Fudge
9. Pawn Stars
10. Devil May Cry: The Animated Series (all episodes)
11. Cavemen
12. The Increasingly Poor Decisions of Todd Margaret
13. etc, etc, etc – this list is starting to get embarrassing…. It was a couple of weeks alone in Norway.  What do you expect?

Well, after that whole deal, I’m happy that people are finally here in Bø again.  I had my first classes this week – Norwegian Literature After 1900.  Recently, I had been doubting the progress I’ve made in my Norwegian education, but the start of this class has given me some much needed confidence.  Last semester, I had signed up for this same class (except it was based on literature before 1900).  I attended the first class or so, and found that I could understand nothing that the professor said.  I dropped it in favor of an independent study making up for the lack of linguistics at the college here in Bø.  This semester, I expected to have trouble understanding the teacher, just like last time.  But lo and behold! I could understand her – mostly. Definitely what I needed.

That’s about where the encouragement ended, however…  We started off our Norwegian literature course by reading Swedish, among all things.  It wasn’t too bad, but I certainly did not understand much of what I read.  The story we read was Alexander Skarsgård’s Att döda ett Barn (To Kill A Child).  At only two pages, it was a really great piece.  It certainly inspires me to write more.

The second day of this class was even more discouraging.  This time, we have a different teacher.  I forget his name at the moment, but he speaks a dialect that is very far from the one I learned.  The Norwegian students have even told me that they have trouble understanding him.  He also writes in nynorsk, which is a different writing system than what I learned (bokmål).  Luckily, he writes on the board for us to take notes from.  It would be a great help, but he writes in some of the worst cursive I have ever seen.  Combine that with words you’ve never heard in a writing system you’ve not used much, and it’s all Greek to me.

That’s enough for now.

A Package From Home

I finally received the package my mother sent me one week ago, and I decided it might be nice to make a list of the things she sent me.

• 7 x 5.6 oz Knorr brand Rice Sides
• 10 x chewy chocolate chip granola bars
• 4 x ping pong balls
• 10 x single serving oatmeal
• 1 x 17.5 oz Frito Lay brand corn chips (1 week past use-by date {but still delicious})
• 10 x Create-A-Dino fruit flavored snacks
• 2 x 30 count cough drops
• 1 x Oral-B tooth brush (from Dental Associates)
• 1 x cork screw / bottle opener combo
• 1/3 x bottle of chili powder
• 1 x 50 m Oral-B dental floss
• 1 x 3 oz deodorant stick
• 1 x small screw (why??)
• 1 x beard trimmer (I’m in need of a trim)
• 6 x mechanical pencils
• 1 x green Sharpie
• 1 x container of pencil lead
• 1 x 1.75 liters Premium San Juan Liqueur made with Virgin Islands Rum (80 proof)

Thanks Mom!  (I wonder if she knows the difference between rum and rum-based liqueur…)

In other news, tonight I will be seeing Earth Died Screaming (while I lay dreaming of Tom) – a tribute to Tom Waits.  Hope and I failed to get our tickets ahead of time, so it will cost a bit extra.  But I’m still stoked to hear some Tom Waits songs live.  I sure hope this band doesn’t mess it up!

Earth Died Screaming (while I lay dreaming of Tom)

~a tribute to Tom Waits~

You are invited to a murky whiskey-evening where musicians from Trondheim’s metal, rock and jazz scene come together with a common denominator: Tom Waits. The band will create a dense atmosphere with their great interaction, great songs and wonderful drive. Vocalists Stian Leknes and Marita Rostad will be playing up to Tom’s dancing with good friends from Trondheim’s music scene. Stian is the lead singer of the Trondheim-based metal band Manifest, while Marita is best known from the city’s jazz scene, and with the album “Silent Sunday”.

Take your gutter humor and meet up!

That’s my rough translation of the description of the show.  For 150 NOK ($26.71), it had better be good.  The show starts at 9:30 PM at Grillen (“The Grill”).