I haven't disappeared...

I just feel like it! So here is the short story before I go back and attempt to recap my adventures so far at the ISS: Internet is a bit of a challenge to say the least, so currently I am sitting outside, once again not on full battery (smart, I know) because it is near the library that I get the next inernet connection. I wish I could blog from my room, but so far I have had wonderful luck with that. Same goes for SIM cards. So I feel that I am in my own special little island, right in the middle of a very cosmopolitan, modern, and connected city.

Okay, so now that I have explained my situation, you will now understand why if all of a sudden I stop in the middle of a blog post, it is because the battery on my laptop died and I posted just in time.

I should start just by saying again that I have so far experienced absolutely wonderful hospitality here in Oslo. I am so grateful for the amazing experiences I have had so far just in the few days I have been here, and that I feel I have really been welcomed better than I could have hoped for.

That said....
So I had probably the most ungraceful beginning to my start at the ISS---namely, that I got out of my seat on the tram before the Blindern stop only to fall flat onto my luggage, and not even realize that I had fallen onto my luggage until it happened with a comically loud bang, and everyone on the tram was staring at me with those looks of awkward apprehension. Sigh.
Then I pulled all of my belongings up a hill of gravel, only to be directed to the wrong dormitory and go up two flights of stairs (which aren't that many except if you have a large suitcase....and then have to drag everything over more gravel to the other side and go up another three flights, afte ryou have already been pulling your bag all around campus because you were so clever you didn't see how close the tram stop was to the dorm...).

Because I was one of the first to arrive, also, it seemed a little bit strange and surreal, and more like a moving-out day at college than moving in. But guess what? the first person I met here at the ISS was someone from Washington state---it's very odd to open a door and stumble into someone wearing a UW sweatshirt, when all at once you think it's normal and then realize that, wait, you're in Norway and UW sweatshirts are a little uncommon. As it turns out, my roommate is also a Husky. Go figure. Actually, there are overall more Americans here than I would have guessed, but maybe not so surprisingly a very good many are from Washington, Minnesota, and Wisconsin. They are all very nice. just like in college, I haven't met anyone I don't like yet (to put it in fairly understatement terms), so that's great! Then I spent a long time having fun (AKA troubles) with a free SIM card I got. Actually just connectivity in general. I met this really sweet woman from Tanzania who needed to find out how to get in touch with her family back home, so we ended up running all around trying to find out more about phone cards from some UiO offices while also going with my roommate to figure out about locations for exchanging cash, and so we spent a long time with SIM cards and phone cards and trying to figure out how to call from the dorms and other things. A strange start, but I really liked being able to meet people.


I have already had so many incredible opportunities here on the campus. Classes will start tomorrow, and I'm looking forward to seeing how I do in my Norwegian course.

Anyway, here is a very brief list of some of the things I have done since Friday:

-Meeting people from all around the world, of course, including making many friends with a fairly good sized group of students from the Beijing foreign institute who are all majors in....Norwegian. Go figure. Anway, I have been speaking a lot of Norwegian here, because we are all very enthusiastic to practice speaking Norwegian, which is also really fun. We've hung out a lot. So far this had included a really awesome trip to Sognsvann yesterday with them and their teacher, being almost exclusively at the "only speaking Norwegian" table for meals (which has many other really interesting people), and taking a tour of the city of Oslo in Norwegian instead of in English. It's been a series of great opportunities, one after the other, and I have really enjoyed speaking with all the people who are studying Norwegian and finding out their reasons. Here at the ISS you get some really cool answers....
-Actually, the first part of the previous point really summarizes everything else. Whenever you go to a school like this, it's obviously the people who make the school. Yesterday I had a wonderful, long conversation with two Americans and a nice woman from Turkey, who is one of the most cultured people I've ever met. It's led to some very cool discussions already.
-Good Norwegian food, like fiskekaker. They're kind of like Holden Village, actually, in that they do a lot of fun stuff with making other dishes out of leftovers. And of course the Norwegian breakfasts.
-What else is fun to point out for now...? Ah. The rooms themselves. Some have complained about them, but I don't find it's anything worth complaining about. Yes, they're quite small, but frankly, they're clean and comfortable and you can open the window, so I like it just fine. Besides, the weather has been so wonderful here that it just means you can be outside enjoying life more.

I hope to go back into the city soon. My excuse is to buy shampoo or go running, and I'll see if I do that later.

Anyway, this blog post doesn't do it justice, but I kind of already wish that this school went on longer than six weeks. Sigh. Well we'll see when classes start tomorrow..haha.

Perhaps if I can get my act together, my next blog can have a sample of pictures I have taken.

Anyway, hope all is well with you who are/is reading this (how many are reading this, anyway..?)!
Talk to you sometime when I have Internet!