Norway!

For Christmas vacation I got to go on a trip that never in a million years would have happened if I weren't in the Peace Corps. I went to Norway! It was very exciting. After a 12-hour bus ride to Kiev, a few hours sleep in a noisy hotel right by the airport, a 6am flight, my plane being late, and my luggage spending an extra night in Amsterdam without me, I finally made it to Hell.


For real, that's the name this town the airport is next to. As I flew into Trondheim airport, I looked out over the snow covered landscape and this scene popped into my head:

My Great-great-great-great-grandfather: (Sitting in front of a fireplace in the middle of winter with a blizzard outside.)
Random Neighbor: My kid moved to America last year and says they don't get much snow there.
Grandpa: Family, pack everything. We're moving to America!
Next winter in Minnesota during a blizzard...
Grandpa: Damn it.


Anyway, Ingrid's mom was nice enough to pick me up at the airport (she also went to the store that night and got me a fresh pair of undies and a tooth brush, she's a good mom). This is the view from their living room.



It's a fjord and super beautiful. It was very lovely to look at every day. The one draw back to this view is that the bus into Trondheim is at the bottom of that hill.

So Ingrid and I got to hike it several times. Down and up. Both perilous as there was about six inches of ice that had attached itself to the landscape for the season. About the middle picture above with the two kids, I would like to note that this picture was taken at about 2:30 in the afternoon. Yes, that's when dusk started. Because Trondheim is so close to the arctic circle, in winter there is only sun from about 9am to 3pm. This often caused me to want to go to bed at 6pm.



This is Ingrid and me at St. Olav's cathedral, one of the most visited cathedrals in the world. It is gorgeous. We were able to go inside and see a music rehearsal, but pictures were not allowed inside. It was built in the 12th century.



We did a lot of walking around Trondheim and seeing the sites. Here's me in front of the iconic Norwegian houses by the river. We also went to the library, which has skeletons on display. I didn't take a picture because it seemed weird to do so, but you can see photos online (http://www.trondheim.com/skeletons/) and read about the history of the library.



We did find a little bit of America downtown in the form of a 1950's diner. I got a bacon cheeseburger and enjoyed every bite of it. Sooooo good after the Moldovan food.


Then came New Years! We spent the night out with Inrid's friends; had appetizers at Oda's house, went out for Chinese food (Sidebar: On-jon, the Chinese man in the picture, is Oda's boyfriend from Beijing and was in Trondheim visiting her. When we went to the restaurant he and Oda talked to the owner and convinced them to just bring us whatever they wanted to cook, so it ended up being really good food at a decent price), then to a party, climbed a hill to a tower where fireworks were, back to the party, then back to Oda's house where we had "toast" and slept until 1pm the next day.



There was man at the fireworks who commented "Oh, look, there goes my tax money."



I say "toast" because the Norwegian version of toast and the American version of toast differ greatly. In America, toast is warm bread with butter and jam. In Norway, toast is bread with whatever I feel like slapping on it today. So really we ended up eating toasted sandwiches. Still good.




The night before I had to fly out, Ingrid played a concert. Live Irish music. Not very common in Norway, but as long as there's beer involved, most Norwegians don't seem to mind much.




This picture is drawn on the bar at the pub where the gig was played. It's pronounced "Or-nah sigh" and is Norwegian for "it'll all work out" of "everything will be alright". Which is pretty much my motto for the next two years.