Monday, July 24, 2006

Getting Acquainted


Hey All!

So I've been here a little over 3 days, and I'm finally getting organized. It feels good after dealing with all the chaos getting here. Up untill 10am on Tuesday, I thought I was scheduled to depart on Tuesday afternoon. As soon as I finally got my 2 big suitcases to closed, my mom informed me that it was actually on Wednesday. That extra 24 hours of packing saved me. I took a flight to Stockholm, Sweden, had a 5 hour layover, and then flew to Trondheim. One of my smaller bags never made it. This blog was delayed, because the power cord for my laptop was in that lost bag. It finally made to my apartment on Saturday afternoon. I haven't quite gotten adjusted to the time difference, so I keep waking up at 2pm if I don't set an alarm. The sun's out almost all day which is kind of nice. Sunset is around 11pm, and sunrise is at about 4am. Even at 2am it looks like dusk. The streetlights are on, but they definitely aren't needed. During my first full day here, I made a trip to Ikea to get some stuff for my room. On the way back, the bus changed route number part way around the loop (apparently that's normal here), so I ended up walking about a mile with an area rug on my shoulder. I've decided I need a bike. It's a little too far to walk to the center of town, and the bus is really expensive (~$3.50 one way).

I spent most of the second day exploring the down town area, where I got to practice my Norwegian a bunch. I talked to a toothless train conductor from Tromso¸ and his friend who's a Danish construction worker. They were definitely odd people to run into, but fun to talk to. It's cool being able to communicate with people from bothSwedenn and Denmark. The languages are unique (especially written), but close enough to understand at the same time. A lot of the TV here isSwedishh, so I better get used to it. Today was really slow because nothing's open (not even the grocery store). The other students are just starting to get here, so things should pick up soon! Hope all is well!