November

While a silent and dark war between autumn and winter is going on outside, I’m baking sjokoladekake and finally dropping some blog-lines. I must admit that it’s quite easy to be lazy when the evening starts at four o’clock, after the sun’s unconvincing short journey along the horizon line ;)



Two weeks ago, I went to Røros, far into the country, close to the Swedish border. Røros is a former mining town (copper mining), on the UNESCO world heritage list, with small black wooden houses, a huge wooden church and a mining museum. It’s a very cold place in winter, my car got a strong taste of ice and snow on the way there, we had the chance to walk in white frozen surroundings and envy the owners of a spark (some kind of bike-sledge). We got to see traditional Norwegian bunads (cloths) in the church and the miniature miners working in the Røros museum’s undergrounds.

Last weekend it was time for another koia trip, that turned out to be more extreme than expected. It started snowing on Thursday and by Saturday even Trondheim’s streets were all white and icy. But our great motivated international troop (the seven nation army) was ready to get onto the Tydal bus at 9 a.m. and head towards the Holmsåkoia. On our way there, it kept on snowing happily and I kept on congratulating myself for having left Wü home. All in all, we had a very cosy weekend in a four stars koia, after a two and a half hour long struggle with knee-high snow (we didn’t have skis :( ), during which some received the graceful title of path-makers. The four star koia was worth its fame: We had the best crepes ever on Saturday (the cooks spend three hours ín the kitchen), got to enjoy the French cuisine under an Italian cover (Sunday was pasta day), some had the chance to taste the Finnish sauna and we all enjoyed quality piano music all trough the weekend. We all bravely survived our way back (the path was already covered with fresh snow on Sunday), but we were very disappointed to arrive in a melting Trondheim in the evening… Hopefully new snow is on the way, I'm a faithfull supporter of team winter and my skates are very anxious to get out there :)

Snø

Today I finally got to see fairytale-snowflakes, in Frau Holle size. One minute I was looking out the window, disappointed of the everlasting rain, the next one a white universe took over. The shy, almost transparent snowflakes kept getting bigger and bigger until everything turned white and the playful feathers took over the sky, the trees, the ground, the grass, the people, our world. And we – we were gazing out of the window, staring at the hard-working Frau Holle, hoping that she would have infinite pillows to shake…

Høst - My first post

It's autumn again, or almost winter in these Norwegian surroundings (had the first snow 3 days ago, quite amazing :) ) and if the sun dares to shine for some hours, it's the most beatiful høst ever - the grass stays green here all through the 3 "warm" seasons, creating an amazing blue-yellow/red-green contrast. Have some pics.
Had a barbeque (!) on friday at work, the brave Norwegians stayed outside and grilled the pølse (saucisson/wurst/carnatz) , we (Takaya, Iwe an me - Japan, Holland, Romania/Germany) - confortably inside, waiting for the food, enjoying a glass of beer/wine (Best wine ever, I won it at our lottery, nice, red, from Chile - must add that 1 "cheap" bottle of wine - which u can only get in special shops - costs around 10 Euros) ... In the evening we went 2 watch a theatre play, Norwegian students as actors (very professional !), really enjoyed it and had the impression I understood almost everything, only to find out that I had missed the key point... Na ja, almost got it... Talking about the Norwegian language, it's incredible how bad I am at learning it. Literally not able to understand people talking. It's much easier when I read, a lot of german words, just a bit different, always ok to get the meaning from the context. But speaking is a whooole different story... Hmm... Hoped that I would be able 2 talk fluently in 2 months (before coming here), now my goal is before Christmas. I am still confident that it'll be perfect (sau asha :)) by the time I'll have to leave.
Had a very very relaxed weekend (still managed 2 clean the house), with mexican food, great omelette breakfasts and hopefully climbing tonight; only quick steps outside, trying to stay away from the unfriendly weather (det bloser, det regner alltid!) Used to remember the "indian summer" in october, with warm, lazy days in the sun, here it's more like the october version of november rain. Interestingly not as depressing :)
Added some pictures from our climbing trip and our fjelltur (a greeeat tour) , the landscape really amazing, and we even saw a jerv (not xactly a polar bear, but similar :) small little beast, jumps around the mountains, only 260 left in Norway, quite dangerous if man alone, looks like a small bear or like a bursuc (?) never saw a bursuc before...) !!!
What elsee... The pic on the right (me, Trondheim and the bike) - the 2 other main characters are Trondheim's big cathedral (might be quite famous, some kings are burried here, the biggest in Norway, unfortunately still didn't get the chance 2 see it from inside 1. because I'm lazy and 2. because they ask money for it on regular days so I have to wait 4 a concert/a mess) and my great bike, the best ever, 100% Hollandrad, no gears, only Torpedo break, greeeat to use :)
Erik's sister is visiting next week, will be happy to finally see her perform live (she's gonna play in a cafe here in Trondheim) and also quite curious to hear about life in Oxford. In 2 weeks Virgil is coming, bringing my brand new jacket ;) , some calitatea 1. bunica jams (syltetøy) and hopefully some wine :) Also, some volleyball games are on the schedule and climbing in between (think I'm even getting better now :) ) And work, of course, my project is going quite well and who-knows maybe I'll even achieve my goals :)
Promise 2 keep u up to date and post a word from time 2 time!