Tag: Paris
Paris Trip ♥ [part 2]
[Continued from previous post]
Sunday morning we woke up early to go to Versailles. Our plan was to get there right before they opened at 10:00am so we could get there before a huge line formed. We again stopped at Starbucks on the way to the metro and got to the last station where we had to switch strains to head to Versailles. As we were looking on the board to see what track the train we needed was, a worker asked us where we were going. We told him Versailles and then he said this train to Versailles is not running on weekends in October and that you have to go back this other way on a different train. Thankfully, they had directions printed out on paper for everyone, which was really nice. So basically that put us back a whole hour and we finally got to Versailles a little before 11:00am and the line was HUGE! I do not even want to explain how long this line was because first you have to wait in a line to get tickets ( I would recommend getting them online) and then you go wait in another line (the huge line) to get into the actual palace. We got inside and did the whole thing. It was again beautiful and just amazing how old these places are and that they are still intact today. I had a hard time staying focused and continuing to listen to the audio guides they gave us. There were just soooo many people and none of them know where they are walking and always pushing and shoving, which kind of makes for a lesser quality experience. The biggest thing that annoyed me is it was impossible to get a decent picture of the “Hall of Mirrors” where the Treaty of Versailles was signed because it was packed full of people and their giant iPads taking pictures… After walking through the palace, we didn’t have time to see the gardens because Kailey needed to be back by 3:30pm to catch her train back to Germany and since we were all so hungry, we decided to have lunch in Versailles. I had this huge plate of pasta with a cheese sauce and ham. It was very tasty. Then we walked back to the train station and headed back to Paris.
One of the things we all wanted to try before we left were macarons. Unfortunately the place down the street from our apartment had some in the window and we thought we could get them on Sunday. It turned out they were closed, but McDonalds sells macarons in Paris. So Kailey really wanted to try them and I don’t blame her, so we stopped at McDonalds to try them. Let me just say from experience don’t have McDonalds macarons be your first experience with macarons. 😉 They were not horrible, but the ones we bought at an actual like bakery were 100 times better!
The rest of Sunday night we just relaxed in the apartment and went to bed early since we had to be up by 5:00am to get to the bus stop to go to Mont Saint Michel in the morning.
Monday was a long day, but in the end I’d say it was worth it. We woke up around 5:30am and struggled to get ready. 😉 We left the apartment and headed to the metro to go catch the bus to Mont Saint Michel at around 6:20am. We made it there with time to spare. Amber booked our tour, so she checked us in, while Courtney and I tried to find a coffee shop open that early. There ended up being a ‘brasserie’ open across the street that had coffee and croissants. I can tell you I have never had a fresher croissant than that one. It was still warm and fresh out of the oven. It was almond and so delicious.
Back at the tour guide place, that I can’t remember the name of, we waited around until about 7:15pm for the bus to arrive. At this point, I was not sure how to feel about to get on this bus with all these tourists – mainly obnoxious Americans. No wonder we get a bad rap; it’s because of people like these… more on that later. 😉
Anyways, the bus ride was approximately 4 hours there and we made one stop at a “tuck stop.” Mont Saint Michel is located off the coast of Normandy. [more information on what it actually is, look here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mont_Saint-Michel] I slept for about the first 2 hours on the bus and then the second half stayed awake because our guide started talking about the Normandy area, which I found very interesting. Also, I loved just staring out the window at the French countryside. It’s beautiful. We finally got to Mont Saint Michel at around noon. This guided tour included lunch so we had lunch at this place called Relais Saint-Michel. We were brought into this huge banquet room with many tables that were labeled for different tour guide companies. Right away at the table were croissants and cider from Normandy. Back to the obnoxious American, this lady who I’d say was in her early 60’s looked like she looks like an old Sandy from the movie Grease with quite the wild hair and an annoying high-pitched southern Texas drawl. The first thing she said to the waiter was, “I need some butter for this bread, (they were croissants) and I mean like a lot, like a pound of butter.” The waiter just stared at her for a minute contemplating if she was even being serious; he later brought her the butter.
Within about 10 minutes we were served our first course. It was a “Mère Poulard” omelet. It was very different and I couldn’t decide if I liked it or not, but here is a link about the history of this omelet. [http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omelette_de_la_m%C3%A8re_Poulard] (might need to use google translate 😉 ) The second course was salmon, rice and vegetables which was very good. I never thought I liked salmon or any non-crustacean type fish until I came to Norway. Then for dessert we had this Normandy apple pie. It was definitely not like an American apple pie, it actually reminded me of kuchen because the filling was a bit custardy. I thought it was good!
After lunch we hopped on the shuttle to take us to the actual Mont Saint Michel, which is basically this huge rock with an abbey built on top and adjoined by a super tiny town with a population of about 24.
Before heading to the abbey, our guide warned us about the long, many stairs to the top to enter the abbey, I was a bit worried. I had like the “Stairs of Death” from my 6th grade Wolf Ridge field trip pictured. All you Grand Forks kids will get that reference. 😉 The walk up was really nothing, and maybe she has to make it seem worse since it’s usually a lot of older people on the tour?? 😉 The only downside about the tour is you have to wait for everyone to get to the top before continuing on. Thankfully, our group made it up fairly fast and we started the tour. The guided tour was actually really nice. I don’t think I would have enjoyed the abbey without the guide. She gave us a lot of history and information that made the place a lot cooler. After the tour, we were able to walk around the “city” of Mont Saint Michel and by city I mean basically the one street with stores along it since the population is about 24. On the way back to the shuttle bus we got caught in a windy pouring rain storm for about 5 minutes. Then it cleared up and there was a perfect complete double rainbow right near the island. It was almost unreal looking. That for me, made up for getting caught in the rain. J We got back to Paris around 10:00pm and went straight to the apartment and to bed.
Tuesday morning, we got up early to go to the train station to see if Amber and Courtney could get train tickets back to Bilbao since they wanted to have the whole day in Paris and they did not want to fly back on RyanAir. After being unsuccessful at that train station, we were sent to this other one, but was told to just get right on this bus and it will take us there. Yeah, we spent about an hour trying to find this bus stop because we were told different things each time the bus that we thought we were supposed to get one came. Finally, after wasting our morning, they got everything figured out and we were able to go get lunch and then have our favorite Berthillon ice cream once more! 😀 We also did a bit of last minute Paris shopping, got real macarons (oh they were delicious) and then I headed on the metro to the airport and back to Oslo. ♥
I had such a wonderful time in Paris and could have spent another week there, but as my time here in Oslo is winding down, I was ready to come back. This last month and a half is going to fly by. Counting it, I only have 30 days that will be spent in Oslo. The other 12 or so days will be spent between Bergen, Spain, and Tromsø.
I hope my Paris blogs weren’t too long or boring and that they were enjoyable to read.
-Hannah
Paris Trip ♥ [part 1]
I’m splitting up my trip to Paris into 2 blog posts because it is getting really long. I don’t want to bore you with so much text at once and I really need to get a blog up today! 🙂 So this will be about the first half of my trip! 😀
Paris is officially my number one favorite city in the world. Previously, that spot was held by non-other than “the big apple”, New York City. In some ways, Paris has the big city feel that New York has, but with the lovely European charm, which is what makes it top NYC.
I arrived into Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport Thursday afternoon, picked up my luggage and headed to the metro to find our apartment. We decided to rent an apartment instead of staying in a hostel because with four of us, it ended up being cheaper and I liked the apartment idea better. We booked our apartment on airbnb.com about a month and a half in advanced. The metro ride from the airport to the stop nearest to the apartment took about 45 minutes. Unfortunately, Paris does not have the luxury of have the express train to and from the airport like Oslo has. I was a bit overwhelmed by how many people were on this metro on top of that I really had no idea where I was going, just following my directions from Google maps. 😉
Surprisingly, I made it to the apartment without any wrong turns and no problems at all besides figuring out which door was the right one. Thankfully, Kailey, who had arrived a few hours earlier, was already at the apartment and let me in. I graduated high school with Kailey and actually have known her since kindergarten. She decided to take a year off of school and is a nanny in Germany right now and I had posted a status on Facebook a few months ago saying I was planning a trip to Paris and anyone was welcome to come. She commented on it saying she was only a 3 hour train ride and would love to come with. The funny thing is, we had never hung out in high school outside of school, but we took 4 years of French together and always were in the same class.
Anyways, I got up to the apartment and just kind of relaxed a bit. Traveling is sometimes really exhausting and all you need is a nice hour or so to just relax and not do anything. After catching up, Kailey and I decided to walk around the area of the apartment and do a little grocery shopping so we could have food for breakfasts; that way we would save money by not having to eat out for breakfast. We brought the groceries back and then headed out to go find a place to eat for dinner. We found a cute, typically Parisian-looking café to have dinner at. We both ordered Caesar salads, which were delicious minus the anchovies we picked off. 😉 After dinner we headed back to the apartment and waited for the other two girls to arrive.
I met Amber last year in my French class at UND and we knew we were both studying abroad this semester. We always talked about how we need to meet up somewhere while we are abroad and go on a trip together. We thought around the idea of Paris, since it was kind of half way between where we both are studying (she’s in Bilbao, Spain) and it’s French. We didn’t talk too much over the summer just a couple times before I was going to leave for Norway and same with her before she was leaving for Spain, but we always mentioned that we need to plan the Paris trip and it eventually was planned! I’m really glad it all worked out and we stuck to our words. A lot of times people will say “oh yeah, let’s go on this vacation together and blahh, blahh, blahh” it never happens. So it was cool that it actually worked out! Amber’s friend Courtney came with, who also goes to UND and is studying in Bilbao. Travelling and studying abroad is such a unique experience and gives you so many opportunities to meet people you would never.
They flew into Paris on RyanAir, so it took them a lot longer to get into the city since all RyanAir airports are never very close to the actually city. They arrived to the apartment around 9:45pm and then we went to the grocery store down the street so they could get some food for dinner. Even though Kailey and I had eaten dinner already, we ended up snacking on delicious French cheese [I’m in love with Camembert] and crackers. The rest of the night was spent sipping on wine and chatting away. 😉
Before our trip, I knew I wanted to have each day somewhat planned out or at least have an idea of what to do each day so we didn’t waste time deciding what to do in the morning. So me being the type of person, who likes to organize and plan things like this, I took charge and planned out our trip for the most part. I can tell you, that it was such a good thing to have. Even though we didn’t follow it completely to a tee, and that was not what it was for, it helped us a lot. I really recommend that if you are going to a city that has a lot of places to see and little time, make an itinerary! 😀 It helps!
Friday morning I planned for us to go the Louvre, so we woke up early enough to make it there within its first hour of being open. Side note: if you plan on going to see places like the Louvre, Notre Dame, Versailles, etc. GO EARLY! You may be kicking yourself in the butt for deciding to get up so early, but once you’ve gone to the places and then see the line outside waiting to get in when you leave, you will thank yourself.
The Louvre was really cool and of course got to see “La Jaconde” or the Mona Lisa in English. I had been told before of how small it is in person, so I was not really disappointed in it, but I can definitely see why someone would be shocked with the size of this painting, if they had not heard that before. We saw a bunch of other cool paintings and stuff and the building itself is beautiful. I was almost more in awe of the building than the paintings. I just love seeing old buildings that are still standing and in use after so many years, with such amazing history. After seeing the Mona Lisa and Venus de Milo, I was ready to leave because one, we hadn’t really ate breakfast, two, we had already spent about an hour and half in there, and three, it was getting so busy – and sometimes I just cannot handle people pushing and shoving not knowing where they are walking.
After the Louvre, we went to have lunch and since we were all starving, we decided to just go down couple streets to eat in a French restaurant. We all ordered the same thing to eat – Croque Monsier! It was delicious! In high school, we made them in French class a couple times, so I thought I had to try one in Paris. It was probably one of my favorite things I ordered while I was in Paris. It’s so simple, yet just so good.
We then headed on the metro to the Champs Elysées. Let me make another side note: the Paris metro is the EASIEST metro ever! As long as you have a map of all the lines and know where you are heading, you can get literally anywhere in Paris. We all bought the 5 day passes for zones 1-5 since that included getting to Versailles. If you are just going to Paris and not planning on doing Versailles, just get zones 1-3. It was about $80usd and included all metro lines and busses. The Champs Elysées is one of the most famous streets in Paris, if not the most famous. It has tons of shops, cafés and the Arc de Triomphe and Place de la Concorde are on this street as well. We spent the afternoon walking down the one side towards L’Arc de Triomphe and then took pictures by it and then walked back up the other side.
We also did a bit of shopping and of course had to stop at the Starbucks! 😉 I, being the makeup loving person I am, had heard all about French pharmacies and their skincare and French makeup brands. So to say the least, I went a little bit too crazy with my makeup purchases… and I am going to end that at that. 😉 I also did end up buy a pair of jeggings and shirt from the H&M there as well.
After a long afternoon of walking around and shopping we went back to the apartment to relax and then got ready to go out. Amber and Courtney had booked tickets for dinner and a show at Moulin Rouge and Kailey and I chose not to go and went out for dinner and walked around the Eiffel Tower at night. Seeing the Eiffel Tower for the first time is surreal, well at least for me it was. It’s such an iconic landmark of Paris and France and a place I’d never thought I’d be able to visit at only 19 years old, on my own with friends. At night when it’s all light up is breathtaking and indescribable and I could never get sick of just staring at it. 😀 It’s just beautiful!
Saturday morning again we got up early to go to Notre Dame, but not without first stopping at Starbucks right before getting on the metro. Last fall, I had an obsession with Pumpkin Spice Lattes from Starbucks and being in Europe, I really didn’t think I would be able to find them… not sure why. I even had my mom send me the Starbucks instant pumpkin spice coffees. Well anyways, we walked up to this Starbucks and smack-dab right at eye level, is a sign for, you guessed it, PUMPKIN SPICE LATTES! 😀 I almost had a mini heart attack from the excitement, not even kidding. 😛 I even ordered it entirely in French! That was a proud moment as well. 😉 Oh and the barista was real cute! 😀
[pumpkin spice excitement pic]
We walked up to Notre Dame with Kailey’s phone playing songs from Disney’s Hunchback of Notre Dame and we were not ashamed of that… 😉 Hahah It was again beautiful. I really should get out a thesaurus and find some other words to describe all these places in Paris, but they all were just beautiful. Thankfully, we got there earlier enough so the line moved pretty fast to go inside and we walked around in there as well.
We then headed to Île Saint-Louis, the other island connected by a bridge to Paris, where they have this, at the time, “supposedly” greatest ice cream ever. We decided to have our ice cream before lunch since we were already in the area to get it. Let me just tell you, that ice cream did not disappoint! I had been told to get the vanilla because it’s the best, from a fellow student at BI who’s from Paris. I am not usually a vanilla person at all, so I opted for a scoop of chocolate of course and vanilla, to try. Let me tell you it was the BEST ice cream I have ever had by like a million and I never say things like this, but the vanilla was better than the chocolate! 😀 Seriously, if any of you reading this are ever in Paris, you have to get Berthillon ice cream; you will thank me later. It was so good; we ended up going a second time, the last day we were in Paris. 😉
After enjoying our ice cream sitting on the bank of the Seine, we decided to head to Les Invalides to see Napoleon Bonaparte’s tomb and go to the army museum there. The army museum there was really cool and had World War II exhibit thing, which was really cool. I found it interesting to go through a museum like that, looking at the war in sort of their [French] eyes versus, like an American museum’s perspective.
The rest of Saturday afternoon was spent walking around Paris and then we went back to the apartment. Before going to eat dinner, we decided to go to the Centre Georges Pompidou. We knew we wanted to eat dinner in the Le Marais area of Paris and that museum was right near there. We got there around 7:00pm and the museum closed at 8:00pm, but we were okay with that since we didn’t have to pay to get in. A lot of the museums in Paris are free for anyone under 25 with a European Union residence permit; sometimes they even included Norway in that. 😉 So that was a really nice not having to pay for all these entrance fees. I am not the biggest fan of museums, but I love art, which is kind of strange. But I really liked this museum because all the art in it was extremely modern and very different. Some of the pieces really made you think and were so unique. I liked it a lot and the building itself is super unique from the outside.
After that we had a nice dinner outside. I had this sort of lasagna thing that was actually really good, but reminded me of sloppy Joe meat. 😉 [Sorry to any non-North Americans reading this, you probably have no idea what sloppy Joe’s are. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sloppy_joe ] After dinner, we walked around the area in search for Crêpes because you have to have a real French Crêpes when in Paris. We all ordered one with Nutella and bananas. It was soooo good! 😉
I’m going to stop here for now and will post the 2nd half of my trip in a few days, so stay tuned for that! 😀
-Hannah
‘Fall’ing into Winter
Again like my last post, this week hasn’t been too exciting. I literally have exactly 2 months ( and 1 day) left in Oslo, which makes me quite sad. ;/ Though I do look forward to being home for Christmas 😉 This past week I’ve basically been to class and did a bunch of school related stuff. I’ve also been thinking a lot lately about switching my major…
That sounds crazy, but really it isn’t since I’m not that far into my degree anyway. Obviously, I am sticking within business [I can’t see myself in any other profession], but I definitely am starting to think economics is not my thing. I mean, maybe it’s because I just go unlucky and have the worst teacher here for microeconomics or it’s just not what I really thought I liked. I really enjoy my Organization and Change class here at BI and find myself enjoying the lectures and the topics. To be honest, I’ve always thought HR (Human Resource Management) was ummm…. well kind of a dumb thing to study, but in reality it’s not and every company needs HR people. So who knows what I’ll end up doing, but we’ll see. 😉
Friday night was my friend Ira’s birthday party. That was quite the fun night, to say the least! 😉
The weather here is definitely starting to change and feel more winter-like, which I happen to love. Everyone is complaining about how cold it is (40ish°Fahrenheit), when I really don’t think it’s that cold. But I’m a North Dakotan and I know what cold really feels like and this is not cold. 😉 For all the non North Dakotans reading this, the average winter temperature in Grand Forks is somewhere between 2° Celsius to -20° Celsius. It actually was snowing earlier this morning, but melted before it hit the ground.
Speaking of winter, I’ve decided to go to Tromsø with my friend Ira and her roommates in December right before I come home. Tromsø is one of the farthest north cities in Norway and is considered part of the Arctic Circle! Read about it here 🙂 http://www.visitnorway.com/en/Where-to-go/North/Tromso/Key-facts/ We’re going December 17th-20th and my flight home leaves early on the 22nd of December. My plan is to have most of my stuff packed before I go, so I can enjoy my last full day in Oslo.
We had a really lovely fall with bright colored leaves on the trees, but now a lot of the leaves have definitely started to fall. The pictures below were taken at Frogner Park a little over a week ago.
In other news, I am going to 
on Thursday! & OhhhMyyyGoddd I cannot wait ! 😀 Paris is that one city in the world for me that, for as long as I can remember, I have always wanted to go to. I took French 4 years in high school and a year in university, but I’m awful at speaking it (in other words, I can’t speak it too well) hahah but I can read and write a lot better. I’m feeling like I should brush up on my French before I go, but hoping some of the basics will come back to me once I’m there. 😀
I’ll leave you with some pictures that I took the past couple weeks and I promise the next post will be just wonderful and full of pictures and my time in Paris.
My aunt sent me all the pictures they took when they were here visiting me. So I thought I would add one that they took, since I don’t think I posted any with them when I wrote about them visiting. 🙂
[random] “Stories” :)
This blog post is all over the place with random stories, so I apologize for that. . 😉
Lately I’ve had a lack of motivation to write my blog. Maybe it’s because I’ve been using all my writing ability on my Business and Professional Ethics term paper? 😉 Anyways, maybe I’ll update you on school. Classes are going okay. I still can’t say I’m use to 3 – 4 hour long classes meeting only once a week. I just can’t get used to it. I would much rather go to class for only an hour or hour and half multiple times a week. I actually really enjoy 3 out of the 4 classes that I am taking here. We had a really cool presentation in my Social Entrepreneurship class about social innovation today. I really enjoyed that. I can’t say I enjoy my microeconomics course. I cannot understand anything the professor says due to his really thick accent and quiet voice in a big room; I even sit in the front. He doesn’t explain anything he teaches and he just shows us notes that look like they’ve been written years ago in sloppy handwriting. The way the courses here are set up is that there are no assignments during the semester – so the grade for the course is just the final exam so I have no indication of what my grade would be right now. I’m definitely thinking I’m probably going to have to re take this course when I get back to UND.
Okay now on to things that are a bit more happy and exciting. Though I do feel like my portrayal of studying abroad in all my previous blogs has been portrayed as almost “perfect” all fun and no bad experiences so far. (**knock on wood**) 😉 But it has, so far, basically been that way, which is amazing and I am so thankful for how well everything has worked out and for being in such a good place.
A few cool things I’ve done this past week was on Thursday I went to the Opera and saw a ballet with Sara. I had never been to a ballet before so I had no idea what to expect. It was actually very cool! And inside the Opera house is just about as cool looking as the outside. We got a very good deal on the tickets, 100kr for good seats, minus the fact they were “bar stool” seats. Luckily enough it wasn’t sold out and there was no one sitting in the row below us, so we moved down to sit in the comfortable regular seats half way through.
The ballet consisted of three main parts with 2 intermissions. The acts or dances were all very cool and it’s actually amazing to think about how a ballet is essentially a story being portrayed by just dance and music. After the first dance was over, the audience gave a very lengthy round of applause. In fact, I’ve never experienced a situation where people clapped for that long. I am not kidding when I say they clapped for almost 5 minutes after each act. I almost couldn’t take it seriously, because it was just so much clapping!! hahah 😀 The dancers would come back on stage and the audience would clap, then they’d close the curtain (audience still continues to clap), then raise the curtain again and the dancers would bow. This repeated 3 or 4 times after each dance. It ‘s definitely either a big cultural difference or that’s what people always do at ballets? I do not know. 😉
I don’t think I mentioned this in my previous blog, my friend Sara and I booked a little weekend trip to Bergen for late November. We both said we have to go somewhere else in Norway besides Oslo to see the true beauty of this country. Everyone suggests Bergen as the place to go for a weekend. So I’m looking forward to that trip.
OHHH!! I also booked a flight to Spain in December to visit my friend Amber who is studying abroad there this semester and also one of the girls I’m meeting in Paris. I have a week “off” before my last final and it’s one that I can’t really study for, since it’s a group written exam. So I decided I needed to go somewhere since everyone else here will be busy with either exams or going home already. I’m excited for that trip as well!
Speaking of exams, it’s crazy to think that I’ve been here for 2 months already and my time here is almost half over… 
It literally feels like I just arrived last week. It has gone by so incredibly fast and I truly love it here! I am so glad I chose to come to Oslo. Though I do look forward to going back home and seeing everyone, I’m going to not want to leave Oslo.
Last Friday night, I had dinner with a lovely Norwegian family. They are really distant relatives of one of my moms best friends and I was able to meet Stein and his daughter Helene, who’s my brothers age, earlier this summer when they were in Grand Forks. One of the first days I arrived in Oslo, Stein showed me around Oslo and had said one night we’ll have to have you over for dinner. We finally were able to fit both of our schedules and they picked me up on Friday. Funny side story: I texted Helene and asked her what color car they were in. She replied, “The craziest car you can see! Green one.” So I just expected some maybe weird shade of green car. I go outside and walk to where they said they were picking me up and it’s a green HUMMER! hahah I’ve never ridden in a Hummer before, so that was super cool. Before we went to their house for dinner, he had to stop at work to lock things up for the weekend. I can’t really explain what his job is, but I think he’s a contractor and builds houses on islands in the Oslo fjords or something similar. We took this little boat to one of the islands he was working at. That was neat as well. 😉
After a bit of a rainy time on the island we went back to main land and headed to their house. Their house was beautiful! I wish I would have taken some more pictures, but didn’t want to awkwardly take pictures of their house. 😉 We had tacos for dinner, which I guess is the “thing” to eat of Friday nights. 😉 They were very good since I can’t remember the last time I had tacos – definitely before I got to Oslo. We had a nice meal and it reminded me of home, which is a nice feeling. 🙂
After dinner and dessert, Helene, Henrik, her brother who’s actually just a few days younger than me, and I hung out the rest of the night. 😀 & They tried to teach me to count to 10 in Norwegian, but I have the hardest time pronouncing anything in Norwegian. I didn’t get past learning “two”. hahah It was a really nice having kind of a “family” night and I definitely thanked them for having me over. They’re all super nice people!
On Tuesday afternoon I was walking to the train and this older lady stopped me and asked me ‘what time it is’, in Norwegian of course. I politely told her I didn’t speak Norwegian, which I really wish I could speak because it’s such a cool sounding language. Anyways, she couldn’t believe I wasn’t Norwegian. She said, “that’s the reason I asked you because I thought you were Norwegian.” The rest of the way to the metro, it’s about a 10 minute walk, she just kept going on about how I look so Norwegian. I love when that happens and always take it as a compliment! 🙂
I don’t really have anything else to update on that I can think of, so I think I will end this blog here. 🙂 Thanks for reading!
-Hannah 😀
P.S I’m going to PARIS in exactly 2 weeks from today and I’m super excited for that!!
15 Things & Packing Tips!
Long time, no blog! I haven’t written in over a week mainly because I haven’t done anything too cool or out of the ordinary here in Oslo. I’ve basically went to my classes, did school work i.e. reading, and hung out with friends. Ooooohh! I’m officially going to PARIS! 🙂 I booked my flight and rented an apartment for the time we will be there. I don’t think I’ve ever wanted to go to a specific city as much as I have always wanted to go to Paris! I’m meeting up with my friend Amber, who is studying abroad in Spain this semester. We actually met in my French class last year at UND. A friend of Amber’s is also coming with and then Kailey, who I graduated high school with, lives in Germany and is meeting us in Paris as well. We were in French class together all 4 years of high school. Our tip is planned for the end of October and I cannot wait! 🙂
I’ve decided to do something a bit different with this blog because like I said I haven’t done anything too out of the ordinary this past week. So I thought I shall do a sort of “15 things” post. I have three categories: “Things I’m Glad I brought”,”Things I shouldn’t have Brought”,”Things I Wish I Would’ve Brought”
THINGS I’M GLAD I BROUGHT:
1. My Nike running shoes! The only comfortable pair of shoes I brought with me and so glad I did. I would tell anyone who’s studying abroad make sure you have a good pair of shoes for all the trips/touristy stuff you do – they usually require a lot of walking!
2. My backpack! It’s a good dual purpose item that all study abroaders should have. The obvious use is for school, but it’s good for just weekend trips when you don’t need to pack for more than a few days. It’s so much easier than lugging around a big suitcase.
3. My water bottle! Good in so many ways. Buying bottled water in Norway is freaking expensive and you basically are getting the same water from the tap as you do in the bottle, so you save a ton of money. Plus it keeps you hydrated 😉
4. My makeup and enough to last me while I’m here! Okay so of course this one only pertains to girls and girls who love makeup. Most people would say to just buy it in your country abroad. If it’s going to cost you the same price as back home than definitely save the room in your suitcase, but check that out before you leave. I was looking at makeup at a store the other day, for a basic Maybelline concealer it was like $16. An Essie nail polish purchased at H&M was $18. You could get both the concealer and nail polish in the US for the price of just the concealer here.
5. Adapters/Converters! Buy a good converter for your laptop and then a few converters before you leave. It will save you money and the hassle of trying to find one abroad.
THINGS I SHOULD NOT HAVE BROUGHT:
1. So many sandals! My advice to you, think about the weather for the whole time you’ll be there, not just the first month. You can’t wear flipflops in the winter 😉
2. My Columbia fleece! This is just a personal preference, but whenever I wear mine (I’ve only done it twice) I feel like such a foreigner… I don’t know why. People don’t really wear them here.
3. PINK yoga pants/capris! In the United States, for the most part, it’s acceptable to wear yogas as basically pants. Here, that is not a thing. Yoga pants are strictly for the gym. I’m glad I have a couple pairs, but I definitely brought too many.
4. My ‘big’ camera! Again, this one will be probably just my personal preference, but truly ask yourself, will you really use that camera if it’s so big. I haven’t used this camera once and I’ve been on a couple little trips where I could have taken pictures with it. It’s just too bulky to carry around in it’s case and honestly my little point and shoot camera is just fine for me. If it was an actual DSLR camera, I’d probably have a different opinion.
5. Bootcut/Straightleg jeans! This is probably the biggest thing I regret bringing. All my jeans I have with me, would be considered “in style” back home. Here? Definitely not. NO ONE WEARS THEM! 😛 All they wear are skinny jeans…at least I brought one pair of those 😉
THINGS I WISH I WOULD HAVE BROUGHT:
1. Slippers! For wearing around my room and my floor. I have flip flops for the shower, but in my room my feet get cold.
2. Rainboots! Again like I mentioned with the sandals above, research the climate/weather of where you’re study abroad at to see what’s the best footwear. It rains here a lot and when it snows it’s the wet kind of snow, so Uggs would not be a good choice.
3. Fall jacket! I didn’t pack a decent “fall” type jacket, all I brought was my Columbia fleece that I talked about above and my winter coat. So I ended up having to buy one while I was in Sweden.
4. Skinny jeans! I’ve again mentioned this above, I should have packed only skinny jeans! 😉
5. A duffel bag! I wish I had brought a bag that was bigger than my backpack, but smaller then my suitcases to bring for longer trips.
I hope some of these things were helpful to those who are going to be studying abroad. A lot of the things somewhat correlated with each other, so I’m sorry if it was a bit repetitive. I don’t have anything else to update you with, except to look for a more entertaining blog next week. I’m going to Copenhagen, Denmark on Thursday with a few of my friends so look out for that blog sometime late next weekend! 🙂
I’ve Arrived!
I arrived at the Minneapolis airport around 10:30am thinking security would take a while and they suggest that for international flights you arrive 3 hours early. My aunt, mom, and brother dropped me off. I said goodbye to them though I had a few tears when my mom started crying. Having lived at home for all previous 19 years of my life this experience was something completely new to her and everyone. I checked both of my unfortunately heavy luggage bags. One was 49lbs, just a pound under the limit. Thank goodness, but at the end of the day I wished I hadn’t had them that heavy. -more on that later-. I went through security without a hitch and there was no line at all! So much for arriving 3 hours early. I went and to exchange $200USD to get Norwegian Kroner. That’s about $1200 Kroner. And it does not go far at all. My flight from Minneapolis to Detroit was no problem though I was in the middle seat, which always sucks. The older lady behind my was from Grand Forks and we talked for a bit. She noticed my “Sioux” sweatshirt I had on and asked if I was a Sioux fan. I told her well yes and I’m from Grand Forks. She wasn’t on her way to Norway, but she said she was there last summer visiting some relatives and it was absolutely beautiful. I arrived in Detroit with about 40 mins to spare before boarding to Paris. The first ever international flight was to Paris and it was so long. I had an isle seat, much better than the middle, but it was still uncomfortable for that long of time. I read a whole Sarah Dessen book, watched part of a movie, listened to music and attempted to sleep. I probably slept for 2 hours and that was not solid sleep by any means. I arrived in Paris at 7:00am (which was 1:00am MN/ND time) So it basically was a new day starting when I should have been going to bed. I had an hour or so in the Paris airport and I bought a lemonade, French candy and French magazine which I still haven’t read yet…but I will. My flight from Paris to Oslo, I was exhausted. I attempted to sleep the whole 2 hour flight. I got to Oslo Gardermoen airport at noon local time. I found my luggage right away. I hopped on the train to the Oslo Central Station. My bags were so heavy that this Norwegian guy had to help me lift my luggage onto this train… I arrived at the Central train station and met the people from BI.
——– This post is already long but, I will finish it later ——–
*I need to work on summarizing everything better* (:
