A Canadian Exchange Student in Norway: Its the most wonderful time of the year.......

What has happened since my last blog?..........

We are slowly starting to begin our christmas preparations but still not to the extent that you would expect for this time in December. I don't think I know anybody who has a tree up yet (The exception being my school). On December 1st, I started my advent calendar. It is a wool heart with a bunch of notes tied to it (my host mom made it for me). They have sayings like " Det blir dyrere og dyrere å leve, men fremdales er det like populært..." (I am kind of unsure what this one means) on the them. I finished my christmas shopping in the first few days for my christmas gifts to send home, so that they would make it in time for Christmas. My host mom is big on traditions. Two weekends ago, she (and with a little assistance from me) made some candles. They are called the Tre Kongers Lys. It was a long process. We also made these little heart things called julekurver. I have not seen them before back home. We made them buy weaving paper so that it forms almost a little basket. The one thing that the Norwegians have for Christmas but we don't have back home is christmas themed food. They have julebrus (a christmas themed pop that kind of reminds me of gingerbread), cheese, sausage and even yogurt.

I've had 2 hockey games in the past few weeks. One of them was an exhibition game and the other was a league. The exhibition game was against the best U15s in the area. I can't tell you if we won or lost because the score was not up on the scoreboard and both teams scored a hand full of goals. The league game, this past Saturday, was agianst Skedsmo (which is a team located somewhere near Oslo). We lost that game 9-7.

School is continuing along with tests, projects and homework. I actually passed a test that I thought I was going to fail for sure. It was a written test in gym about basketball, warm up techniques, etc.... I have the wrong textbook for that class so I had nothing to study from, plus I forgot my English-Norsk dictionary at home so my teacher had to explain the unknown words to me. But thanks to the past 2 years of high school gym, I got 40 out of 54. We also had to run the "BEEP TEST" (Yes, the beep test is international and it is still a huge pain in my butt!!!). It was basically the same as the one that we run back home but the guy had an Austrailian accent and the beeps were more a "blurp" sound.

This week is the first week that I have wished that I was back at home.......wait, did I just say that? I know what you are thinking, "I thought you were having a wonder time" (quote from Oma) but its not what you think. I have 5 words that will explain it all: SNOW DAYS AND CHRISTMAS HOLIDAY. Tilbury so far has had 2 snow days this week which I think is pretty ridiclous. Looking back at what we usually get for weather in mid-December, its not much, if anything at all. Here, I've experienced -20 weather and snow storms but the Norwegians just won't cancel school for anything (with the exception being funerals of course). The second reason is the last day of school before Christmas for everyone back home is this Friday. I, on the other hand, have to go to school until next Wednesday. The only bonus being that I do not have to go back to school until the Tuesday after New Year's Eve but I'd rather have 3 more days before Christmas of than 1 extra after (plus mondays are my favourite day of the week....its only because school starts at 930am and we are done by 130pm) Though I do have the bonus 6 weeks off of school from January until I go home.

I have finally joined the "Norwegian Sweater Club": I am now the proud owner of 2 norwegian sweaters. One of them is a store bought one that my host mom gave to me when I first moved in (I was not able to wear it for the first few weeks because it was a size too big). The second one is a legit homemade norwegian sweater. Its a hand-me-down but I love it anyways. You can tell the homemade ones from the real ones because they have an extra itch factor.

I also have finally seen the new Harry Potter. After weeks and weeks of having to go through the pain of everyone saying how awesome it is, I finally know what they are talking about. The Norwegian names though for the characters are really messed up: Gygrid (Hagrid), Frank (George), Dumling (Durseleys), etc...(the list goes on, getting weirder and weirder).

For St. Lucia's Day (celebrates Saint Lucy on December the 13th), my host mom and I made lussekatter ( a sweet dough made with saffron). They took forever to make but they were totally worth it. I brought them in for my class the next day and they completely devoured them. (I will defiently be making them on Decemeber 13th next year). Now that I am on the topic of food, I might as well bring up brunost (brown cheese). Having a piece of bread with a slice of brown cheese on it is about as norwegian as you can get. I absolutely hate the stuff. I mean, I am not usually a picky eater when it comes to food. I eat rakefisk and Melba toast willingly but there is something about brown cheese that just turns me off. It takes like a combination of peanut butter and caramel and when you eat it, it gets stuck to the top of your mouth. It should not even be considered a cheese.

And now for the weather update...We have been relatively cold here for the past little bit (-20) but last Saturday it got the warmest it has been here in a while (-8). Snow comes everyother day or so. The Norwegians are ready for any type of weather though. Summer activities have just adapted to be performed with the snow. You would think that outdoor soccer practice would be cancelled after the snow fell, but thanks to astroturf and a tractor, kids are still running around on the fields kicking the soccerballs. Biking and jogging are also still happening. You would also think that Norwegians must have tough vehicles to manover through all that snow but no, everyone is still zooming around in their little volkswagons. My host mom has the only practical vehicle, a 4 wheel drive land rover. The sun rises here at about 9ish and is going down at about 2ish,,

I will send out another blog after Christmas........bye for now!!!