26. - 28. 11. '10: Wonderful weekend at Flåkoia

This weekend I had one of the best weekends so far in Norway: I spent three days together with 9 friends (Hilde, Marte, Sigrid, Torstein, Øyvind, Knut-Eirik, Verena, Lina and Günther) in a NTNUI-cabin called Flåkoia, about a 45 minutes car ride (30km) south of Trondheim. It is situated directly at a lake called Stordamvatnet. The weather was really nice, but the temperature outside was somewhere between -15° and -20°C. Therefore it took quite some time to heat up the cabin.

I took these first two photos from another page on the internet because I forgot to take good pictures of the cabin's interior. It is made for 11 people and has a really nice charm. There's even a small guitar (missing two strings) and heaps of song books there which were of course also used by us. After several hours of heating, the cabin had finally become warmer and we gradually took off layer after layer of clothes.

The lake was completely frozen over and the ice was at least 30cm deep, so it was no problem to walk around on it, which was fun! We made several holes to get fresh water (melting snow takes so much time!) and tried - unfortunately without success - to fish. On Saturday night I went out to the middle of the lake and had a look at the stars - no clouds in the way and no artificial light compromising the view of all those stars - and it was a really humbling experience! I even saw a shooting star and Günther saw two of them! Now and then the ice would make loud cracking noises which were also slightly perceptible through the soles of my shoes and sent small doses of adrenaline shooting through my body, but it was still safe.

On Friday evening we had a big pot of rice-meat-vegetable-stew, cooked on an ages-old primus gas cooker to warm us up fom the inside. We spent our time in the cabin chatting, reading, knitting, playing, singing and generally having fun together. During the nights we took turns maintaining the fire in the cast iron oven. It's an absolutely nice experience being together with some good friends without electricity or running water and I'll definitely not forget this weekend!!

21.11.'10: Journey to Hell and back

Has anybody ever told you to go to Hell? Well, Anna and me have been there, although we took the car to save time. It would have been quite a long walk - approx. 38km to be more precise.
Apart from the unusual name, Hell is just a hamlet like every other one, situated in the near vicinity of Trondheim's airport. But hey, who wants to miss the opportunity to go to Hell when Hell has frozen over? ;-)

We arrived just at the right time to get a more or less dramatical sky and basically just messed about taking pictures at the railway station. Before we left we warmed ourselves up with tea and biscuits in the waiting room of the train station (I like to think of this waiting room as Purgatory). Nope, I definitely don't want to grow up!

19.11.2010: Juleblot

Before I get to the main topic of this post, I want to share some wonderful pictures of Trondheim with you. I took them around 3 o'clock p.m. on Thursday on my way from university to the city centre:

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Yesterday was the day of the Juleblot party, a big christmas party for all medical students at Studenterhytta. In order to get into the right mood, I made about 4l of Glühwein for the vorspiel with some friends at my place, and it tasted delicious (I spiced it with cinnamon, cloves, cardamom, star anise, lemon- and orange peels) - which I was very happy about, as wine is very expensive here.

At 7 o'clock p.m. we were picked up by some organised busses at the medical campus which took us up to the Studenterhytta. We were of course asked to dress up accordingly. After a little opening speech we were served some risengynsgrøt (rice pudding, a traditional christmas meal), in which 3 almonds were hidden - those who found them won a little price. It was a very merry supper and the students sang many a traditional student song!
I included this obligatory beer photo just for you, Mum. ;)

After stuffing our stomachs with rice pudding it was time to party! :)

Everybody had to bring a little present (worth approx. 20 NOK) with him/her and put it into Santa Claus' bag - which was later brought in and the presents were distributed. I got a pack full of candy and licorice which I shared with the people standing nearby.

Everybody danced, drank and sang a lot and we all had loads of fun. I'm happy I didn't miss out on this great celebration!

12. - 15. 11. '10: Weekend in Oslo

As my probably last major trip inside of Norway, I elected to go to Oslo again - to visit Andrea and Sandra, to have a look at the Munch museum and to get a guided tour in the Stortinget (Norwegian parliament). Andrea had offered me accomodation in her flatshare during her visit to Trondheim, and I happily took her up on that.
Not long after I had arrived, we went into the city to the law-pub, where a black-and-white party was hosted. It was rather mediocre but the beer was cheap (for Norwegian standards), so we made a little private contest on who could dance in the must stupid and awkward way. Having taken up on Norwegian habits, we of course also had a "Vorspiel" (pre- ) and "Nachspiel" (after-party) at home.

The next day I went to the Storting for the guided tour, but unfortunately many more tourists had had the same idea and only a maximum of 30 people were admitted. Even though I was 15 minutes early, I was something like number 35 or 36. Well, hopefully I'll return to Oslo again some day and get another chance...
I spent a few hours in the city, went shopping and arrived back "home" in Fantoft studentby with some wool to start knitting a new hat.

On Saturday we met up with some friends of Andrea and went to the Munch museum. Edvard Munch was an amazing artist and his pictures are brilliant! At the beginning of the exhibition there was a big room with loads of information on his life and work. When Munch died, he bequeathed his remaining works to the city of Oslo, a total of 1100 paintings, 4500 drawings, and 18000 prints! This particular exposition was concentrated on Munch's nude paintings (oil on canvas, lithography, intaglio etching, woodcuts and aquarell / water colour). If anybody ever goes to Oslo, be sure to drop by at the museum! In the winter months it's even for free!

On Sunday I cooked a fish-hotpot for the guys and later on Andrea spontaneously knocked up a yummy cake. It was delicious! Thank you very much again for the accomodation and your hospitality, Andrea, I really enjoyed my weekend in Oslo! :)

Back in Trondheim, the Christmas lights are already decorating the trees and make for a really cozy atmosphere together with all the snow. Where's the Glühwein?