Oslo: not enough fjords

It's been a very eventful week here in Scandinavia. It began with two exams, one of which I didn't realize I had until the day before because I didn't bother to look at my schedule. But don't worry, I aim only to pass, and that I am sure (or pretty sure) I did. After my two days of actual work, things went back to normal and I decided to go on a little trip to another one of my many homelands.

The destination was Oslo, Norway. I went with Karoline, a funny German girl who I did my dental implant paper with for biomedical materials. We left on Tuesday night for the 8 hour bus ride to Oslo. The plan was the sleep on the bus. I brought my pillow and my sleeping pills, but alas, I could not sleep. We arrived around 5:30 am and couldn't check into the hostel until 1 pm. A fun morning ensued. We sat in a Burger King for a few hours until stuff started opening. (More Burger Kings in Oslo than McDonalds, a first in any of the European cities I've visited) We went to the National Gallery and saw The Scream (Edvard Munch = Norwegian) and ate at Peppe's Pizza, the best American pizza chain in Norway I'm told. And I have no doubt that is true...Norway is a very small country after all. After a morning of walking around half asleep, we finally were able to check into the hostel and proceeded to take a nap. Afterwards, we visited the newly opened opera house. Its quite a unique building. We walked up the roof (see picture to understand how this is possible) and took lots of pictures. We continued the sightseeing the rest of the evening, probably had dinner at some point, and went out for a drink to my favorite Scandinavian chain of Irish pubs, The Dubliner. I had one beer for 75 Norwegian kroner (11 dollars) and decided I would never drink in Norway again, especially if I wanted enough money to get home.

The Norwegian Opera & Ballet

Day two in Norway was rainy and cold, what the Germans call "dog weather" I was told, but we were still out there, seeing what else Oslo had to offer. We visited the viking ship museum in the morning. The museum had 3 viking ships, later used as burial ships, for sailing around in the afterlife I suppose, from around the year 900. They were in very good condition considering the age. You must now be thinking that I have a weird obsession with old ship museums, but its not my fault, its what the Swedes and Norwegians like to display in their countries. So after that museum we went to the Gustav Vigeland sculpture garden consisting of over 200 statues by the same guy of humans at different stages of life displaying a variety of emotions. My favorite one was of a man kicking a baby. I guess its ok to kick babies in Norway. Perhaps its my Norwegian blood that makes me not so crazy about babies. Its only those darn kittens that reduce me to a girly mess. That night we took a trip up into the hills to visit a restaurant I had read about in my guide book, Frognerseteren. Getting there was a bit sketchy though. We took the tunnelbana (subway) to the last stop on the line, this too was called Frognerseteren. The stop was outside with nothing and nobody around except the forest. We eventually found a sign leading down a hill that said 'restaurant' and figured this was what we wanted. The path was dark. I kept tripping on rocks, keeping an eye out for rapists and murderers hiding in the woods. Very scary. But I suppose my fears are misplaced in somewhere like Norway. The food was good and the view was nice. So on your next trip to Oslo, I highly recommend it. Well this is getting a bit long so I'll speed things up here. The third day in Oslo was spent walking and shopping and trying to spend the rest of my money. We took the bus home on Saturday, another 8 hours of fun, and arrived in time for the big end of exams party at the student union.

A baby being kicked at the Vigeland sculpture park

I fear that my posts from now on may be less interesting, as I think I might cut back on the ridiculous amount of travelling. Although I have excellent news. 1 dollar now equals 7.9 kroner (up from 5.8 in August) Yay global economic crisis! So until next time guys, Happy Halloween!

Part II: Janet and Marty explore their Scandanavian roots

When I last left you, I had a full box of Reeses Puffs and I had just returned from London with my parents in tow. Well I ran out of milk, so I still have plenty of cereal. Skim milk in Sweden is called minimjolk- I was very confused the first time I went to the grocery store. Oh but you want to hear less about food and more about what I've been up to this past week? Well alright, if you insist...

So I finally got around to seeing Stockholm this week. We went to all the big tourist attractions. Skansen, the open air museum, has been open since the late 19th century. It features old buildings from all over Sweden. There are people dressed up in traditional costumes who hang out in the houses or shops or churches and tell you about what life would be like in that time and place. There is also a zoo, with animals found in Sweden. Moose, seals, and bears, oh my! Oh and there were just peacocks wandering around the paths. The bears and foxes were put in the same habitat for some reason. I was very nervous for the poor foxes. There was a bit of an issue regarding some kind of dead animal. The foxes had it, but the bear wanted it, so when the foxes noticed that the bear was approaching them, one of them took the food behind a bush along the fence and the other fox stood between the bear and the fox with the food. Gutsy. But no one died. Darn.

After a long afternoon at Skansen, we walked over to the Vasa museum. The Vasa is a warship that sunk in the Stockholm harbor on its maiden voyage back in 1628. 333 years later, the wreckage was found. It had been preserved under clay or silt or whatever was at the bottom of the harbor. The ship was salvaged and treated with some sort of polymer (yay materials) to replace the water in the wood and put on display. I hadn't been that excited about seeing the ship. My thoughts were, oh great, a ship, but it actually was very impressive. The place kinda smelled weird though.

The Vasa Warship

After 3 days in Stockholm, we left for Copenhagen, Denmark. We stayed at a bed and breakfast. The lady who owned it seemed very nice, but she kept talking to me in Danish, even though I never responded in this language. Fortunately, I could understand a little of what she said because Danish is pretty similar to Swedish. Not that I can speak Swedish all that well. We saw all the important sights. Went of a canal tour and saw the harbor, visited Tivoli, the amusement park in the middle of the city all decked out in Halloween decorations, and ate Danishes (sorry, no more food). My favorite part of the trip was probably the visit to the Carlsberg brewery. I think Carlsberg isn't as popular in the US, but you've heard of it right? Its my beer of choice here, as it was during my summer in London. I didn't learn anything on the tour that I didn't already know, as I've already been on many brewery tours. I just like free beer (well I still had to pay for the tour), and I tried some interesting Carlsberg varieties that I hadn't heard of before. I would have stolen some glasses too if it wasn't for my parents storing their stolen glasses in my bag. Good influences, those two.

My parents flight left several hours before mine, so on Sunday afternoon I went to the Louisiana modern art museum 30 km outside the city. It was a good museum, but god was it crowded. I've never seen so many people at an art museum. And so many children. It was a bit annoying. The museum itself was a bit of a maze. Lots of stuff was outside as well. I found a narrow path/work of art called journey of self discovery or something like that, so I followed it, and I wound up at some other building with other artwork. It was all a very confusing adventure. I returned to Stockholm that night, and over the last few days I've been recovering from all the sightseeing and walking. I don't see how I managed those 2.5 weeks spent backpacking through Europe. Maybe I've grown lazy in my old age. And now finals are approaching (quarter system, how silly) so I might actually have to do some work this week! lame.

Art museums in Denmark

Check out pictures here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/30355022@N06/sets/72157608020735470/
and sorry for switching between flickr and facebook all the time. People are going to have to put a little more effort into their stalking if they want to see pictures of my parents.

And all I can think of is that Weezer song

October already guys! And the days are just flying by now that my parents are here and I'm sightseeing 24/7 (maybe not quite that much, but more than usual) I now have my Reese Puffs cereal, and I can be happy again..for a week or so that is. Here in Sweden, cereal is eaten with plain yogurt instead of milk. And all the cereals are healthy and boring. No corn pops, or apple jacks, or lucky charms. I have no reason to get out of bed in the morning! No, I'm not that obsessed, I just miss good old fashioned sugary unhealthy American food. But don't worry, I get my daily dose of sugar and unhealthiness by covering everything I eat with nutella.

So my parents are visiting me this week. We went to London this past weekend, spent some time in Stockholm, and tomorrow we're leaving for Copenhagen. I'll write about London here before I forget everything. I met my parents there on Saturday and we found our way over to the hotel. I had forgotten how crowded the underground gets there. I'm so used to Stockholm where crowded means I might not get a seat on the train. In London, we barely had space to stand. So many people. That night we wandered around Leicester Square, Convent Garden, and Piccadilly Circus. If you haven't been to London, these names mean nothing to you, but it makes me feel cool to write about places you don't know about. Sunday it rained all day. Luckily I had those rainboots I bought in Helsinki, so I was alright. My mother, on the other hand, has difficulties with shoes. For example, on the day I moved out of my apartment in Ames, she wore these difficult-to-walk-in fancy sandals. I had told her to bring appropriate shoes for the trip- including something in case it rains. However, she failed to do this, therefore her feet were wet, which we heard all about that day. (If you're reading this Mom, sorry. I think you're swell!) We took one of those double decker tour buses around and saw all the sights- Big Ben, Buckingham Palace, Tower Bridge (what you guys probably think is London Bridge) Then we took a river cruise down the Thames back to Parliament.

That night we went to see Stomp, which I very much enjoyed. Next time one of you sees me drumming on a table or attempting to tap dance, you should join in, but make sure it sounds cool. So the 3 of us enjoyed Stomp so much (well I enjoyed it, I think my parents nodded off a few times) that we went and bought tickets for another show the next night. This one was Buddy, the Buddy Holly story. I really wouldn't call it a musical so much as a concert featuring a guy with Buddy Holly glasses. It was entertaining, but not so much story was involved. Hate to spoil the ending for you all, but Buddy dies in a plane crash at the end. His last show before the crash was in Clear Lake, Iowa! So in the last scene of the show, Buddy and his band played to the audience, as if we were the audience in Clear Lake. So the concert announcer person came out and talked to the audience while they were changing the set. He said stuff like "I hear there is a group from Cedar Rapids here tonight" or "Who here came up from Fort Dodge?" and I thought to myself, I'm probably the only person in this audience that knows where these places are. He didn't mention anything about Ames though. Ames was probably cool enough to have their own show. I mean, if Clear Lake had one, we definitely would.

I planned most of the trip, but I did let my parents choose what museum we would visit. Afterall, there are a lot of great museums. I went to a lot of them the summer I was in London, as they were all free. So they chose the Museum of London, which focuses on the history of the city. However it was under construction, so I have no idea what happened to the city of London past the Great Fire of 1666. The rest of my time in London was spent hunting down delicious wine gums, shopping in Camden Lock Market, visiting St Paul's Cathedral, and trying to remain pleasant for my parents sake. On Tuesday morning we left for Stockholm and oh boy, what fun we've had here, but you'll have to wait for part 2 of The Bergerud (- Chrissy)'s European Vacation.

Quick shout out: Hi Chrissy! Hope you're having fun looking after the dog.