Settling In

Arrival! After shaking off a few rough days of shock and homesickness I was able to get out and start realizing why I came to Norway in the first place. This place is beautiful! Surprised Norwegians are constantly questioning me and my American friends on our choice of studying in Norway. My answer is usually, "I don't know, have you looked around lately?" Well, thats not what I really say, but you get it. The people are super different than from what I raised on. They are suspiciously shy in their public demeanor. No body looks up when walking around, they keep their eyes on the ground in front of them. My Dad always said, “Never look down, make eye contact with people”. Well, not always, but he told me that when I was young and we were walking around in the ghetto. A buddy and I make it a point to be the friendliest mid-westerners from the states embellishing every “Hallo” as the awkward Norwegians try to slink past. He, Tyler, even started running and fist pumping next to an old man driving a van. The guy replied with a couple enthused honks. In this smaller town filled with shy people, you also get local guys who drive around their ten-years-too-old junker cars blasting American top 40’s or goofiest Euro-techno doing doughnuts and fish tailing for hours. Literally. At any given time there will be at least three of these guys out on the road so, given the minuteness of the town, it’s impossible not to notice. Apparently in the spring, they do the same thing, except with their massive John Deere tractors. Jason Aldean doesn’t have shit on these back country Norwegians.

 

·      There is only one word to describe the weather thus far: perma-dump. It snowed continuously for the first three days and nights I was here. The snow fell in fine, powdery, light flakes and settled on everything perfectly creating a perfect picturesque winter-scape. The reason the snow able to nimbly settle upon on the most exacting surfaces such as telephone wires, fences and the like is the absolute absence of wind. I haven’t felt a gust yet. The temperature, surprisingly, has not been much colder than Milwaukee’s. On Monday January 10, I saw the sun for the first time since arriving. The skies were clear of clouds, fog, and snow and you could finally realize the raw beauty that surrounded you. Stupefying mountain scenery surrounds Bo. These mountains tower over the beginning rows of the Rockies but do not quite match the Rockies’ highest peaks. They end with shear drops that I can only guess were formed by the same glaciers that sculpted the valleys of mountains in which all of Norway’s fjords lay. I hope to be making a ski trip to mountains this weekend with a couple of buddies to get a better a look at everything Norway has to offer.