study abroad – Page 2 – My Oslo Experience

Visitors in Oslo

September 3, 2013 myosloexperience

My contract for my blog for UND only requires me to blog once every two weeks, but that doesn’t seem like enough. A lot can happen in two weeks, especially abroad. My goal is to blog at least once a week, sometimes maybe more. My last blog was exactly a week ago. Maybe Monday’s will be my blog day? 🙂 [when I started typing this, it was Monday…now it’s Tuesday] ;/

Anyway, last week I had class on Tuesday and Thursday. My Wednesday microeconomics class was canceled, so I had the day off. I was still a sick with a cold, that today I’m still getting over. I washed all my bedding and seriously cleaned my room. I swept and mopped the floor and wiped off all my shelves and desk. It felt so good to have a clean room.

Thursday night I went with Sara to the Amatøren, the student run pub here at Sogn. Every Thursday they have quiz night and one of her roommates runs the quizzes. It was fun, though we did not win. Haha the questions were actually really hard and pretty random.

Friday morning my two aunts and two uncles arrived in Oslo. I planned on meeting them at their hotel around 11:30am, but somehow got “lost” with my directions I had wrote down and it took me a lot longer. I also didn’t end up leaving my place until 12:00pm. I did feel bad because they were ready to go do sight seeing and I was late. Oh well, that can you do.

When I arrived, we walked a block to this cute restaurant cafe and had lunch. I had the Norwegian Shrimp Sandwich. I should have taken a picture of it, but I was turned off my the random orange colored caviar sprinkled on top. It was really good, after picking the caviar off. 😉

After lunch, we walked to the Opera. It was my second time being there, so I didn’t take any pictures of myself there. We spent about a half hour there and then walked to Karl Johans gate, the main street of Oslo. There is a lot of shopping, sightseeing, and people watching to do on this street. We walked around for a while, but it of course started to rain. The weather has been absolutely beautiful all week and then when they arrived, it rained for the first time all week. We had ice cream for dessert at Deli de Luca. I kind of love Deli de Luca, they are pretty much on every block in Oslo and have like everything. It reminds me of a cross between a convenience store and Panera Bread.

^^ My ice cream! 🙂

^^ The Opera

Saturday morning, I got up early to make sure I wasn’t late getting to their hotel. I arrived around 10:30am and they were just waking up! I totally knew how they felt thought. The morning after I arrived in Oslo, I slept in until about 1:30pm. It was of course raining pretty heavy again, so umbrellas were a must. We went down to the harbor to catch the water taxi/ferry to go see the Viking Ship Museum. We got off the boat and expected the museum to be right there, but it wasn’t. It was about a 20 minute rainy walk up a hilly residential area.

^^ View as we were leaving on the ferry. Such a rainy and cloudy morning.

^^ Boat on the pier that had fresh shrimp and other fish for sale!

The museum was really cool. It’s so crazy how those viking ships are still preserved from so many years ago. We spent about 45 minutes inside the museum and then walked to the Kon Tiki Museum. I had heard of Kon Tiki before, but had no clue what it was. We then went back onto the ferry and headed to the Akershus Fortress. We walked around inside it, which I thought was so cool. I had never been to any sort of castle before. Inside by this pond area, there was a wedding going on and the bridal party was dressed in their tradition Norwegian costumes. That was really cool to see.

^^ One of the viking ships inside the museum

^^ Viking ship! It’s so crazy how these are still preserved from soooooo long ago

http://www.khm.uio.no/besok-oss/vikingskipshuset/ Website with more information on the Viking ships in the museum. 🙂

^^ One of the Kon Tiki boats at the museum

^^ Outside by the Kon Tiki muesum.

After spending an hour or so at the fortress, we went back to the hotel and relaxed for a while after sooo much walking. We ate dinner at this restaurant down the block from the hotel called ‘Gamle Raadhus Restaurant.’ It’s inside the original town hall building of Oslo. I shared a meal of scallops (my favorite) and arctic char & seafood risotto. I’m normally not a ‘fillet’ fish person (not sure how to describe that) hahah, I like crustacean type fish. 😉 But I did really like arctic char, so maybe I will start to like that kind of fish. For dessert, I had probably the best crème brûlée I’ve ever had. Oh my god, it was so good! 🙂

Sunday morning around 7:00am we left the hotel. I ended up staying at their hotel Saturday night because I didn’t want to go back to my place after dinner when it was dark and it takes like 40 minutes to get back there. I walked, while they took a taxi to the Oslo S Central Train station. I said goodbye to them and they went to find their train to go to Bergen for a couple days and then I went to the subway to go back to my residence.

The hotel had given my aunts and uncles 4 tickets to Taste of Oslo, but they never got around to using them. So I took them and went with my friends Sara and Simon, and his friend Niko. I had no idea what the Taste of Oslo would be, but hoped for free food. It turned out to be kind of lame, but we got a few free little samples and a free drink!

This week I have class of course and then Friday I am flying to Stockholm for the weekend with my aunt and uncle. 😀 I’m excited to finally start traveling while I’m here.

Time Flies When You’re Having Fun

August 26, 2013August 26, 2013 myosloexperience

This past Friday marked my two weeks of being here in Oslo and it was the last night of “Fadderullan.” The time had really flown by and it seems like just yesterday I got here. The quote, “Time flies when you’re having fun” is so true. I really love it here!

Friday afternoon, I went to the Oslo Opera with a couple other exchange students and then we walked around the city center a lot. The weather here this past week has been absolutely beautiful. I’ve been told that this weather is usually warm for this time of the year. I’ve definitely been trying to take advantage of the gorgeous weather.

Outside somewhat on top of the Opera ^^

The view from on top of the Opera looking toward the city! ^^

I arrived back to Sogn at around 3:30pm and did a little grocery shopping at the Rema 1000 right near my residence before going up to my room. I then relaxed and tried to cool down because I was so hot from the afternoon outside and I knew that later on we’d be going to the last “fadderullan” party. The party theme for that night was called “Suit Up” so it was a somewhat formal event. We planned on going to the pre-party for sure, but didn’t really plan on going to the actually party because the pre-parties had always been a lot more fun anyways. Plus we didn’t want to have to pay 200kr just to get in. We still decided to dress up anyway and I was glad I did, because all our new Norwegian friends looked so good! Hahaha

I don’t think I can say it enough or describe how cool it is to have the opportunity to get to know Norwegians. Before I arrived, everyone who had either been to Norway or had a connection to Norway told me that Norwegians are so hard to get to know. I can see where they are coming from in certain ways, but as a foreigner to get to know the people of Norway you have to really put yourself into a position that allows you to get to know them. I am so grateful to have had such a wonderful and welcoming buddy group. After the first day of our buddy group, before we met the Norwegians, our leaders told us to come back and meet them at 11:00am the next day to go to the park with them. The first day we had like 25 people in this group, the following day only three of us came back and I am so glad I made that choice to come back. Those other 22 people definitely lost out on the opportunity to get to know the people of Oslo and their fellow Norwegian students. It wasn’t only our buddy group where the exchange students didn’t come back the next day, a lot of them didn’t decide to go back. I feel like that was such a lost opportunity for them. During the 10 days of “fadderullan” I got to somewhat know a lot of the Norwegians in my buddy group, some more than others. I really do hope that I will be able to continue to get to know them because I have really enjoyed the last week with them all. (:

While getting to know our buddy group, I probably can say that I may have missed out on getting to know my fellow exchange students. My whole view on this, is that all my classes will be with them and I can get to know them in class with discussions or group projects. The opportunity to get to know them is still there, while getting to know the Norwegians is there, but at a farther distance.

I really hope this post doesn’t come across rude in anyway, I am just glad of the decisions I have made so far while I am here and that everyone has their own views and opinions on why they are here and what they want to do. (:

Anyways back to Friday night, the party was very fun and probably one of my favorite nights of “fadderullan” even though I didn’t go to the actually party. My friend Sara, didn’t want to go to the actually party, but everyone else wanted us to go. I really didn’t care if we went or not, so I went back home with Sara when the others went to the actually party. Like I said before, the pre-parties are always more fun! (: & I wasn’t going to leave her, because all the other nights when I wasn’t able to get in because of being 19, she didn’t leave me. Anyways, I was starting to get a cold and it was probably a good thing so I could go to bed at a somewhat of an earlier time than the nights before.

Some pictures from the party on Thursday night and Friday night:

The attempt to get the whole “Fadderullan Entøk” group picture after a night of drinking… = a tough task 🙂 Looking so classy!

My favorite Canadian, Sara

William , one of my more favorite Norwegians, but they all are my favorite!

His pants matched my dress, so of course we had to take a picture!

Thursday night at the superhero themed party…not many dressed up!

Sara, Leivi and I

He told me he had read my blog, so I said we needed a picture for my next one. So here’s the picture, Wilson! 🙂

Saturday, I kind of took it easy and didn’t do much, I’ve been sick with a sore throat and somewhat of a cough. I went and bought two of the books for my classes, I still need 2 more, but the store doesn’t have the on in yet. The prices for the two I bought were not that bad at all. I paid around $130usd for the two books. Back home I paid almost $200usd for just one. I didn’t do anything Saturday night except attempt to study and read my text books, but I ended up falling asleep reading them instead. Hahah

Sunday morning, I slept in and made a good breakfast of scrambled eggs and toast. It was delicious and the first time I’ve had true breakfast food since I’ve been here. I met Sara at 1:00pm to head to the museum. We both had registered for this free tour to BI students of the Munch exhibit at the National Gallery in Oslo. The tour was good, for the most part that I paid attention too. About halfway through I almost passed out. It was extremely hot in there and we were in a smaller room with a lot of people and then all of a sudden my vision started blurring and my hearing was going out. I had no idea what was going on and I could barely walk. All I could say was “I need to sit down.” I managed to find a bench and then I was super hot so I took out this brochure for the exhibit from my purse and sat there and fanned myself trying to cool off because my forehead was dripping sweat. I really don’t know why that happened, but I think it was the combination of it being super hot outside and in the museum, too many people in the small room, being sick, and not drinking enough water the last couple of days. I did get to see ‘The Scream’ which was exciting since that’s one of the most known/well recognized paintings in the world and I remember elementary art class learning about that painting. 🙂 I was completely fine after I cooled off, but I still have a sore throat and am a little congested. The rest of the day, I just stayed in my room and studied.

Today is Monday and I haven’t done too much. I don’t have any classes on Mondays, which I love. I have been doing some studying and I did laundry today. Tonight, I’m going over to Sara’s to have dinner. She’s making Thai food, my favorite, so I am excited about that! 🙂

Sorry this post is kind of long, but sometimes I just get into the swing of writing and can’t really stop. (:

Fadderullan!

August 19, 2013 myosloexperience

(pictures at the end :D)

“Buddy group” is the translation of fadderullan which is where my time, this past 5 days, has been consumed by. The first day of the group was just international students and the buddy leaders. They gave us a little tour of the school and showed us around a little bit. The next day we were told to meet at the school at 11:00am because we would be going to a park. I met Sara, my now friend, in our buddy group that day. We found out that we both live at Sogn so we took the train back together. We planned to meet the next day to meet with our group.

Wednesday morning Sara and I took the train to BI to meet our group. We got there a little early and didn’t see any of our buddy leaders so we went back in to see if they were in side. On our way in we met Simon, who’s from Germany. He completes the “3 amigos” of the international students in our buddy group because no one else showed up, which in the end I’m kind of glad because I really like getting to know actual Norwegian students. We found our group and today the first year Norwegian students joined us. I met so many people that day, I had a hard time remember all their names!

After introducing ourselves to each other we got on a bus to go to a park in Oslo. On the bus we sat with the Norwegians and talked. Somehow we got on to the top of driver’s licenses and they couldn’t believe you can be 15 and have your driver’s license. I learned that it’s really expensive to get your license in Norway. One of the guys I was talking to on the bus, who I can’t remember his name, spent a year in the United States and studied in California.

Out of all the international students I’ve met or people in Oslo in general, the Norwegians speak THE BEST English our of everyone (besides native English speakers). It’s really easy to carry on a conversation with the Norwegians because they don’t need to pause and search for the right words like some others do. The French, for example, a lot of them that I’ve met are not good at English and have a hard time. The Norwegian’s are really good at English. One of the main reasons they said it’s because all their TV they watch is American or English with just Norwegian subtitles, so they don’t dub over voices like other countries do and they take English really early on.

On our way to the park, after getting of the bus, we had to stop at this little grocery store to buy some ‘beverages’ to drink at the park. In Norway it’s not really legal to drink in the park or public, but in Oslo the police don’t really follow that law too well. We also got hot dogs and these really cool disposable grills that they have at like every grocery store. The Norwegian’s eat hot dogs with lefse and potato salad. It’s actually really good! At the park we cooked hot dogs, drank, and played games. We spent all afternoon at the park getting to know the Norwegians. At about 6:00pm or so we left the park and took the tram and the train to get to Morten’s apartment. He’s one of the buddy leaders, which just means he’s an upperclassman at BI who’s been in the same position as us all and volunteered to help us get to know one another. For the exchange students it’s a really good opportunity to get to know Norwegian people, which can be tough. I’m really glad we’ve been sticking with our buddy group for the past 5 days, because it’s not everyday you get the opportunity to get to know Norwegians.

We were at the pre-party until probably about 10:00pm and then we went to the concert. The artist was Erik & Kriss, they’re a well known Norwegian rap group. When we got to the club, I had to go wait into a different line because I was not 20. There were sooooo many people around and everyone was pushing and shoving to get in. I didn’t recognize anyone in line, so I just hoped I would see people I knew when I got in side. Once inside, found Helene, one of the buddy leaders, and she told me to follow her to find the rest of the group. I ended up losing Helene after we both ran to the bathroom. I didn’t see anyone I knew, so I went to the floor where the concert was to try to find someone I recognized at least. I didn’t want to have to spend the whole night a lone. lol I then found 2 people that had been in my buddy group that I remembered, but hadn’t really talked to. We then spent the next 20 minutes trying to find the rest of our group. Somehow, I got split up from those 2, and ended up with a few international students I had met my first night here in Oslo. The night ended up okay, but I never ended up finding my buddy group of Norwegians, which I later found out, was because they stayed in the basement area which was 20+ only. I really love my buddy group and all the Norwegians in it. Everyone is so nice and really genuinely interested in you. It actually really sucks being 19 in Oslo, because there is really only one club you can go in, if you are under 20.

The next day, Thursday, was basically the same preparty in the park listening to music, playing games, etc. The only that was different was Sara and I didn’t have tickets to the concert for that night. We were okay with that because we both hadn’t ever heard of the artists, so why waste money in Oslo when everything else is already sooooo expensive.

Friday ended up being really crappy weather and we had a “Study Smarter” workshop at the school in the afternoon. Friday night we met up with our buddies once again and tonight’s activity was a “pub crawl”. My friend Sara said it was not like a normal pub crawl she had ever been on before, so this was not a typical one. We were split up into teams, thankfully Sara and I were put on the same team, but the rest of our team wasn’t good. We were stuck with like the 3 Norwegians who we hadn’t really talked to before and the one was super quiet and never talked or just talked in Norwegian. Basically the first task was to find the buddy leader somewhere in the park. This would have actually been a pretty fun night if it hadn’t been raining. After about 20 minutes of no luck, we went back to the starting place and told them we couldn’t find them. It turned out that they had thought everyone had came through so they just went onto the next place and didn’t wait for us. So we ended up on the wrong foot. At each stop there were different challenges to do in order to get more points. The first stop was to take a picture with at least 2 random strangers. Also along the way, we started out with really small items and our goal was to trade for items worth more value. My team definitely lacked in that department, I think due to the rain, we were just focused on getting to the next spot. Friday night was an okay night, but would have been a lot better if it hadn’t rained or we had had a better team. 😉

Saturday, was nice weather and I had my appointment with the foreign police at 2:00pm and there was also a scavenger hunt with our buddy group at the same time as well. I left for my appointment at around 1:00pm thinking I would have plenty of time to find the police station…turned out it was not and I ended up being about 45 minutes late to it and Norwegians are NEVER late. It all worked out and the lady was super nice to me and didn’t give me a hard time about being late at all. I was told to take the train to the city center and get off and just ask someone where it was. I did that, and they then told me to go to Grønland, an area of Oslo that I’ve been told don’t go alone or at night. It’s a lot of immigrants and to just be careful there. So I get off the train and ask people where the police station is. They told me to go just down the street and it’s on the left. I walked and found the building, but it looked closed. I went up to the door and it was locked, so I buzzed the button and some guy answered in Norwegian. I told him what I was doing and he said this isn’t the correct police station and attempted to give me directions. I could go on and on about how I was lost and then eventually found the correct police building, but it could get quit boring and I really just need to summarize this and say that I made it there eventually and I will be receiving my residence card in the mail within the next 10-14 days. 🙂

After my appointment, I met back up at the school with Sara and Simon and I went with them back to the scavenger hunt even though it was basically over. I honestly love spending time with my buddy group and they are so much fun to be with. We went to Marcus’s apartment first. He’s another buddy leader and we’ve come to the conclusion that there really are more buddy leaders than “students” and they really enjoy being buddy leaders. Marcus’s apartment was really nice as well. All of the apartments we’ve been to have been extremely nice! I will leave that at that and say I had a ton of fun on Saturday night with all of them. 😀

Sunday was extremely crappy weather and I was really tired from the night before. Sara and I ended up going out for late lunch,/early dinner, my first time at a sit down restaurant in Oslo, at a Thai food place called Rice Bowl. It was delicious and I had a pad thai of course. 😉 After eating I came back to my room and just relaxed. I also did laundry for the first time here. I surprisingly had no problems, thanks to Sara for showing me how!

Monday, today, we had a Fadderullan activity as well, but I am going to end this post here since I took quite a few pictures today so that will be it’s own post. 🙂

^^ Most of our buddy group on the first night!

^^^Erik & Kriss concert, the first day of Fadderullan

Our group chanting to the other school groups of Fadderullan in Norwegian. This was one of the days at the park.

Sara with Jim and Jespar. Funny story, Jim was planning on going to UND this fall, but something happened with his visa so he has to wait until next year.

One of the buddies randomly found these tables that had a note that said “Free take them” so he just brought them over to where we were sitting in the grass.

William and I ! 😀 I couldn’t have a post without a picture of myself in it. Hahahaha so I stole this one from my German friend Simon. 😉 & I had no idea that we both had the same facial expression when he was taking the picture, Kind of funny.

Busy Busy Busy!

August 14, 2013 myosloexperience

I’ve been trying to find myself time to get another blog post written the last couple days, but I’ve been extremely busy! It has been a lot of getting to know everyone! I’m still amazed as to how different countries are represented with all of the BI exchange students or other students study at other universities in Oslo. I have many stories I could write about but the one I’ll tell you now is about attempting to make it to Grønland, an area of Oslo known for it’s cheaper produce and being their melting pot of cultures. I was walking to the metro stop with 3 others and it was raining, not too bad, but I didn’t have an umbrella. Half way to the train stop it started hailing… I haven’t seen hail in a long time and I had never been stuck walking in a hail storm. I had flip flops on and I was soaked by the time we stopped at this shop because one of the girls I was with had to buy her metro pass. We waited for about 20 minutes and just decided to skip Grønland and just head to BI to get our student ID cards. On our way to the train stop, we hadn’t gotten their yet since we had stopped, we walked past a Burger King and they were handing out free disposable plastic rain ponchos with a big Burger King logo on the back. I think since BK has those, it’s safe to assume that it rains a lot her in Oslo. We finally got to the train station and rode the train to BI. I’m a little worried about how my student id photo will turn out, as I took it right after getting soaking wet from the storm… It’ll be an unfortunate photo because I’ve heard that every time you log into the student website your picture shows up!

I’ll leave you with a few pictures I’ve taken the last couple days here!

This was my first time in the grocery store. This one is called Rema 1000 and is located just a block down from me. There are 3 grocery stores within easy walking distance from my residence.

I haven’t done too much sight seeing of Oslo yet, but this is the view from the area where the giant ski slope in Oslo is.

This is what was called like ‘apple pie cake’ I am not sure of the actual Norwegian name for it, but it was delicious!

Last here is a picture of the inside of my school. It’s really amazing!

Ed Belfour – The World Can Be So Small

August 11, 2013August 11, 2013 myosloexperience

Yesterday was my first day waking up in Oslo. Like I mentioned in my previous post I slept in and wasn’t kind of relaxed in my room during the afternoon. Later on I took the T-Bane to BI(Norwegian Business School) to get my photo taken for my ID card. My school is just down one train stop from where I get off for my dorm. Including all the walking and the train ride, it takes about 15 mins to get from my dorm to my school. When I arrived, there were a bunch of students registering. These were all of the Norwegian students who are enrolled full time, not the exchange students. I went to find the student center to take my picture, but they were closed when I got there. I then took the train back and came back to my room.

Later on that night the group of exchange students for the fall got together on the rooftop of BSN, the other, more convenient (it’s literally across the street from BI), but more expensive residence place for the BI students. This is the view from that rooftop.

I talked with many students from all over the world. To name all the countries people were from would take way too long, but to name some, there were people from France, Switzerland, Denmark, Poland, Sweden, Mexico, Holland, Netherlands, and Germany. I was talking to a guy from Sweden and we got on the topic of hockey, of course! (: We had been talking about American Accents and the Texas accent. He then mentioned that his favorite goalie to watch growing up played for the Dallas Stars before he came over and played for a Swedish professional team towards the end of his career. He said he had played goalie as a kid and just idolized him when he played for the Chicago Blackhawks. I told him I followed hockey quite a bit so he was like you might know him. It just so happened to be Ed Belfour! 😀 That moment I realized that depending on who you’re talking to, the world can be so small. I told him, “You’re not going to believe this, but Ed Belfour played college hockey for a year at my school back home and won a national championship with them.” He could not believe that I knew who he was or let alone I go to the same school he did. What a crazy world.

We left the rooftop to go to Hard Rock Cafe because they were having some student welcoming party. It’s right downtown the city center of Oslo. So the group of us hopped on the T-Bane and walked to it. It was super busy so we went to try and find a different club to go to. We get to this one club and they say the age limit is 20… So I had a short panic moment and thought oh God, I’m going to be the only one who can’t go in and will have to take the train back to my room alone at like 12:30am. Luckily there were 5 other people who were 19 and 4 of them live at the same residence, so we went back together. Three of them were French and one guy from Poland. Whenever the French would talk to each other, I could somewhat pick out every like few words when they talked. When we were walking back one of them said to the other, ” Elle est de Dakota du Nord ” It was funny because I immediately said ” I understood that!!” 🙂

I’ve also had 2 people think I was from Norway. One guy on the bus I took to Ikea started talking to me in Norwegian and then these two girls, who both looked Scandinavian, asked me if I knew where this club was. I said I didn’t know and that I wasn’t from here, they looked at me shocked and said where are you from? I said the United States. They we’re wondering what the heck I was doing in Oslo and said I looked soooo Scandinavian. I took that as a compliment! 🙂

So far I’m the only one I’ve met who is from the United States, and most people I’ve talked to has said the same. I’m hoping to change their view on Americans by not being what they say the “stupid American.” I think I have a start to that because I acutaly know the difference between Sweden and Switzerland. 😛

It’s so interesting meeting people from all over the world and especially when you have 2 people that both speak the same language and I just sit there having no clue what they are saying at all. I don’t know if they’re actually talking about me or what. I just assume they’re not… hahaha lol

I’ve Arrived! Pt. 2

August 11, 2013August 11, 2013 myosloexperience

——– continued from pervious post ——-

I then took the train and then walked about 2 blocks to Blindern, which is like the main campus of University of Oslo, to pick up my key. Keep in mind I had both my bags with me weighing almost 50lbs each and it was super hot out. Oslo is definitely not flat like North Dakota! I was literally dragging my bags up the sidewalk up a hill at turtle pace because they were so heavy and I was exhausted from the travel. I got my key and went back down this hill to the train to go to Sogn, which is the area my dorm is. There was a couple people I met at Blindern getting our key who are at Sogn as well, so we all struggled with our luggage together.

When I picked up my key, the guy had asked if I wanted to be on a high floor or lower floor or if I had any preferences and I couldn’t think of any at the moment. So he gave me my keys and said it was on the 7th floor but like it’s not really 7 complete flights of stairs. I didn’t think anything of it until I got to my building…There are no ELEVATORS!! So here I again struggle with my bags. I was literally dripping in sweat when I was done carry my bags one at a time. I then realized why he asked if I had a preference and said the 7th wasn’t as bad as it sounds. 😉

When I got to my room, non of the other “roommates or flatmates” were there so I just started unpacking my stuff a bit. (I still have all my clothes in my suitcases, I just haven’t felt like finding places for them. lol eventually it will happen) The buildings are set up so that there are 5 rooms on each floor and we share the like hallway, kitchen and bathroom. So far I only have one roommate who’s from Germany named Finn. The others have not arrived.

After a while, my roommate and his friend from Germany, I can’t remember his name, went to Ikea, the cheapest places to buy like the basic things for the rooms. There’s a free bus that runs from the Oslo Central Station to Ikea so we road the T-Bane, what they call the subway/train, to the Central Station and got on the bus, which was packed with students. I got a pillow, a blanket, a mirror, a lamp, and a couple other random things. I was so tired by the end of it that I literally was bobbing my head on the bus pack about to fall asleep. This was like going on hour 36 with out sleep. So I got back to my room and unpacked my stuff and then realized I hadn’t ate so I walked to the grocery store at Sogn. It’s just down the block not far. I bought a frozen pizza to eat. I went to turn on the stove and realized I like had no idea how to use a European stove. I somehow figured it out, not sure if it was the correct way, but it ended up cooking. I had a couple pieces, then Skyped with my aunt, mom, and brother and then went to bed. I slept in the next day until almost 1:00pm in the afternoon.

I will end this post here, even though I have much more to write about. (:

48 Hours – Introduction

August 6, 2013August 6, 2013 myosloexperience

I’ve never written a blog before so please bear with me with the first few blog posts. (:

I leave in a little less than 48 hours and today is my last day in Grand Forks until December. Tomorrow we’re driving to Minneapolis to stay at my aunt and uncle’s house and my flight leaves Thursday afternoon from Minneapolis. I can’t believe it’s almost time to hop aboard the plane and start this adventure. I am honestly not really nervous at all… I’ve almost been finding it weird that I have no nerves as I am about to leave the town I’ve called home for these past 19 years and live in a country I’ve never been to before, where I know no one. I have come to the conclusion that it really means I am ready to do this.

I’ve spent the past week or so organizing and getting things ready to pack. Finally last night after about 4 or 5 times of repacking and organizing my suitcases I got almost all of my stuff together. I hate packing all together – whether it’s just for overnight or a week long vacation I hate it. So packing for 5 months was a challenge. I am someone who almost always over packs and I need to have a lot of choices when it comes to what clothes I am going to wear. Before I started packing I looked at lists online of what other people suggests bringing for studying abroad. I can tell you a lot of them said like only a few pairs of jeans, a pair of dress pants, and like shirts to last about a week. I can tell you that for sure there is no way I could live with that few of clothes. (; I really just suggest pack what you are comfortable with and what you think you will be able to manage carry/wheel throughout the airport and when you arrive if you have to take public transit to get to your dorm or host family’s house. I’m checking two suitcases and carrying on a backpack.

The only packing I have left to do is organize what I am going to take with me on the plane in my carrying on. So far I have my laptop, headphones, ipod, camera, 2 books, a set of clothes, and all my paperwork.

If you want to learn a little bit more about me take a look at my about me page titled ‘behind My Oslo Experience’. (link is on the top menu bar)

I can’t wait to take you on my journey and share stories, pictures and videos with you throughout my entire study abroad.

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