For any of you who have not heard, I did arrive safe and sound to my student village, Krinsja, yesterday morning. I made my flight from Newark to Oslo with about 10 minutes to spare. Luckily I met a young man traveling from Erie back to the Dominican Republic where he was from who graciously carried one of my bags as we speed-walked through Newark to my gate. I was able to secure my luggage and find the train station fairly simply, though not without directions from a few helpful travelers. Everyone that I have met so far has been very pleasant and willing to help. I sat next to a woman on my flight to Oslo going to Stockholm and she came over to me while we were waiting for our luggage to make sure I had everything I needed and to wish me luck. The train system in Oslo seems to be effective and was easy to figure out (I say that now of course). My stop is about 5 past the university where I will be studying, so it is fairly close. A couple of the girls I met went with me to get our student cards and travel cards yesterday. The library is huge!!! I am very excited for that. That's about the only building we saw, but I am looking forward to exploring.
I haven't met many Norwegians yet, mostly just international students. I had dinner last night with two Italians, two Greeks, one French, one Canadian, and a German. Today I met up with a few people from my program who brought along a woman from Pakistan and a man from Holland. It's so amazing that in only my second day I have met more people from different countries than I have in my entire lifetime. Two of the women I've met have also been to India, though both had different experiences than I, so it is interesting to talk to them.
The housing I am living in is different. It seems as though I have to go through many doors to get to my room. My "apartment" is a hallway with a kitchen off of it and about four other doors that go to rooms. When you go through the room doors you are met with two other doors (each individual room) and a teeny bathroom to the right. The rooms are a nice size, containing a bed, desk, shelves and an end table. I'm not thrilled with the bathroom though. I live in building 26. I'm not sure how many buildings there are in the village I live in, but it seems like quite a lot (20-30?). There is a grocery store right near the train stop called "Kiwi." It has basically everything I need (except contact solution for some reason). We also have a post office here (no I do not know my address yet.) and laundry (which I have not investigated). One thing that I do not like about it here is that the paths are all extremely icy. It looks as though some gravel has been scattered on the ground to make it less slippery, but I have to walk cautiously wherever I go. The streets in the city center do not seems to be like that.
Another interesting thing I noticed is that all the cars stop for pedestrians, even if they are simply standing by the side of the road. My friend and I were standing at a crosswalk yesterday discussing which way to go and the car just stopped and waited for us. In America the mentality is usually if the walker isn't going straight into your path at the exact second you're good to go.
The weather has been clear. Today was a little gloomy and cloudy, but yesterday was nice. It doesn't seem that cold during the day, though at night you can tell the temperature drops considerably. It started getting dark today around 3:30. I was expecting the darkness to be worse, but it's not, just something to get used to. As I was getting up today (9:30ish) the sun was rising.
Today we took a trip to IKEA. In the center of the city they have a free bus run to and from IKEA. I had never been in one before. It's a huuuuge store. Mostly furniture, but I got some towels and cookware also.
I had originally had some trouble with my internet, but now it looks like we're good to go. I will try to get some pictures of where I am staying up in the next few days.
Until next time...
