June 10th- Work and botanical garden

Today started with a meeting with Hanna at 8 followed by working solidly on my presentation until 2:30. I just set up a place to work, put in the headphones, and go go go! I knew I wanted to see the botanical gardens before I left town so I'm glad I finished the presentation in time for me to get back to Ellen's, get my stuff together and go. A tried taking the "short way" ended up getting lost a bit, but eventually made it there no problem. I should learn to just take the way I KNOW to go! haha.

Its beautiful! I felt a little silly walking around by myself so I took a friend along- Pounder. Pounder was a perfect gift given to me before I left. The pictures are my creative way of taking pictures without me being in them. As least I think they are cute. They had so many kinds of plants. They had a tropical greenhouses, rock gardens, scent walk, for those who may not be able to see, but smell. Amazing colors, sizes, variety. So peaceful. I think I would have enjoyed it more had I been walking with someone just to chat with and comment together on the plants. But Pounder and I still had a good time. :)

I made us dinner of pasta and meat sauce. The hamburger is a little different here. In texture or something. Still good, just something is a little different.

Tonight is prepping for the presentation tomorrow, and packing. I fly to Trondheim tomorrow!! This will be a brand new city, experiences, etc. Super excited to see the city, experience the Midnight Sun, and learn about 2 new families! Ohh yeah, new jobs to do too!

My walk today

In Norway, breaks mean go take a long walk in the fresh air. I had two today

My first was to go back to the cell phone place and of course the second I got there everything magically worked. Of course.

Second walk: Decided to try a new part of town. Remember Sim Optima's location? Well I'm surrounded by the "rich" part of town. The exteriors of buildings are just incredible (of course I forgot my camera) and the shops hold the most beautiful, astronomically prized clothing and accessories. Fun to look anyway. Then I got to all the Embassys. I have been to the US embassy on my last trip here. The rest look NOTHING like ours. Ours is a black fortress close to the royal palace. It screams "don't come it, dont even look at us." Well, it also feels super safe once inside.

Walking down a nice neighborhood, I find that China is neighbors to Italy who is neighbors with Korea. Chile's across the street. These mansions are fun and gorgeous with lots of character. I saw some Chinese diplomat talking on the phone in the front yard.

Folk costumes: The lady described the use of folk clothing unlike any other country. Their was a few centuries in which Norway was extremely aware of how they dressed. The embroidery meant something, how to wear the pieces, which pieces of accessories to wear, etc. Today the costumers find a time and place to wear them. Baptizing, confirmations, weddings, but mostly May 17th (their Independence Day). Ellen has a picture of her niece in the room I'm in from her confirmation in the traditional dress. You can come into this shop and pick the fabrics, the ribbon, the thread, etc. The ladies will measure and custom fit the dress. Sometimes people bring in a old pillow or something with a nice embroidery and they are able to use the pattern into the newer dress. Isn't it fascinating!?

Nothing too exciting with work stuff today. But after work Ellen took me to a resturant by the Castle (Fortress) and met her networking group. Nice ladies. Tomorrow is a big work day (I get to play a bit as well) so I had better get ready!

The pictures: The royal palaces ponds have sooo many ducks. Mallards are my dad's favorite. This pics for you dad! The second is a picture of the office I work at this week.

Let me know if there is anything you want to know about my trip, Norway, etc. I'm totally open. I have lots of free time to answer questions!

June 8th- half day work/half play

Off to work this morning and I finished getting my thoughts together and presentation ready. By 9 Hannah and Ellen were listening to my plan for their future presentation.

It went well! They were very impressed and used my "new" eyes to work on their concept further. I'm really happy they liked it, I feel it will be a good model for their customized presentation. Now my job is to prepare the models in the powerpoints, make sure the English sounds correct, and prepare a more marketing type version for the internet. This is all by Friday.

Both Hannah and Ellen had meetings all afternoon and when Ellen heard I had not been to the National Gallery yet, so told me to take the afternoon off and see the art. It was really nice...I walked myself back to the apartment, figured out how to get there and walked there no problem. In the museum there are guards everywhere, sensors if you get too close (really loud!), and ropes so you don't walk to close to the art. Other then that, I love art and it felt amazing to see art you know have been looked at, some for hundreds of years! The most famous painting, Munch's "Scream" was in a Munch room full of his art. The painting is just incredible. There is nothing like seeing a painting in person...you see the watermarks, the damage from over the years, how he originally painted it. The canvas was nailed to a wood background so the paint goes off the edges unto that. The museum kept the wooden frame around one side so we could all see that. The rest of the art was great too, but that one...there is a reason Munch is so famous.

After the museum it was nice to just walk slowly through that area of town, looking in stores, just wandering. Got back to the apartment and talked on Skype. Then went and got myself a pizza (weird peperoni!) Now time for a glass of wine with Ellen and get work stuff ready for tomorrow! Great day!

Here are a few pictures of Ellen's apartment. My bed which is shorter then I am! and her super cute dining room.

June 6-7: Relaxing and first day of Internship!

Yesterday I got a day of sitting! Sitting was so nice after walking so much all week. Laura and Eva (German roommates) checked out and I sat in the tv room and was on the computer almost all day. Got some reading done, skyping, etc. Really nice to just relax for a bit.

Ellen came around 5:00 and took me back to her apartment. She is a nice, hardworking 60(?) year old woman. I have my own room and we share the bathroom. The living areas are really quaint! Super cute. Ellen then took me out to dinner and grocery shopping. I got to do a load of laundry! (This will be a whole post later I think). We chatted and when she heard I had ancestors my family was looking for she got out a program on her computer. We found my great grandma Clara! And my mom's cousin Tim. otherwise no such luck. I gave her a bottle of wine from Morgan, MN and she was really happy. Then I got ready for bed.

6:45 is early when you haven't had to do that for a long time! Walked to work and the location of Sim Optima is a great story itself. Just behind the Royal Palace, directly across the street from the Prime Minister's house and the King's guest house lies on the second floor- Sim Optima. Along with like 7 other small companies. Its really cute, they all seem to be the same company- their own floor work culture. We unloaded the floors dishwasher, and made coffee before the others got there. Hannah shares the office with Ellen and she is really nice as well. She works for a company called Soulutions (yes I spelt Solutions the way she likes it spelt).

My job (in oslo): Create an engaging, interactive presentation for a new management training concept in a collaborative venture between Sim Optima and Soulutions. After learning about Sim Optima and all their practices I had a meeting with Hannah and Ellen about my project and they explained their concept to me. I got it right away. I think they were both surprised. It made total since to me! Anyway now I'm creating a Power Point presentation to be given to 40-50 year old, highly educated managers of various companies.

(everyone was interested in the American in the building....I got introduced to everyone!)

After work Ellen got a call that 2 dear friends of hers was having supper and asked if I wanted to go! Duh. Her friends are really nice and one was Norway's National Alpine Ski Champion for 3 years in the 70s! haha she is still so embarrassed that she gets recognized sometimes.

After I finish this post I have to get my presentation ready for work tomorrow!

The picture is from a few days ago, but I wanted to highlight the always entertaining street performers!

June 5th- Mom goes home, hanging with the roomies

Yesterday was another big day in Oslo.

Ate breakfast at the hostel and got Mom packed up. We took the T-bane (subway) to the Central Station and found our way to the flytoget Express airport train. Gave Mom and few hugs and watched the train leave. Thanks for coming with me mom!! I love you!

Now I was on my own for a bit. I bought a snack and walked around before getting back on the t-bane to meet my German roommates for our afternoon plans.

We went back up the mountain to go to the ski museum. This is the future site of the 2011 World Skiing Championship. There is construction everywhere trying to get ready for the event. The museum is the oldest ski museum in the world. The ski lovers in my life would have just gone crazy here. So I took lots of pictures for them. They had skis dated 600 AD. That is nuts! The best part was they had a ski simulator. I got to pretend I was a skier in the Torino 2006 Olympics. First was the Ski Jump. Amazing. it is so quick. When you watch on tv, it seems they are in the air much longer. You felt your feet leave the ground off the jump and then they hit the floor again when he landed. Crazy cool. Next was the downhill. I thought I was going to be sick by the end. They are going so fast! I could barely see, your feet really feel like when you are skiing: pressure on one foot, then the other. You flew when they flew, you landed when they landed. I had to close my eyes for awhile because the movement with the visual was too much. I seriously was nauseous for like 45 mins after that.

Because of all the construction, we got lost trying to find the bus stop. Lots more hills and walking. We then heard of a music festival that was going on in a city park so we went and sat with half of Norway! Soooo many people there! We mostly went because Eva loves the tv show, Euro song contest. The Norwegian in the contest was singing there. He sang Everything by Michael Buble. Ok, it was horrible compared to Michael. Eva didnt agree with me. haha.

They REALLY wanted to eat at Burger King for dinner. At that point I was too tired to care where we ate. So one hamburger, fries, pop was 43 Kr. That is 3X or more what I spend in the states.

Back to the hostel and we played card games. We taught each other our card games. Interesting. I think I will describe then in another post.

Before bed we got on the topic of 9/11. interesting to discuss with Europeans.

June 4th- More Oslo sites

Anyone getting sick of me yet?

Today we used the great Oslo Pass. Mom and I think we haven't paid for anything except food during our time in Oslo! In Oslo = get the 72 hr Oslo pass!

The four of us (Laura and Eva) went to the harbor this morning to use a free cruise we get on the Oslo pass. It is an genuine old wooden sailing rig boat. It started at city hall, went to their Opera House (see picture), and around some of the close fjords, to the museum island and back. Our roommates got off for the museums but mom and I stayed on for the whole thing.

Then we went to the highest point in Oslo (using metro and bus lines). It was devaju from 2.5 years ago--if Lisa, Kelly, or Jackie are reading this---it was the shop we rented our sleds at!! (Those of you who are uninformed: when the hill is closed due to ice, don't try to go sledding anyway) So Mom and I did the 10 min hike down to Frognerseteren. Guess what my International Public Relations class buddies: in the summer the view is even better! Mom and I grabbed lunch there and ate outside with the entire view of Norway to look at. We both had fish of some kind.

Once down again we went to the Royal Palace. The guide book says tours in June- late June people. So no tour but we could walk the grounds. Beautiful fountains and huge trees, plus guards watching you all the time! hehe. We then got really lost.

By the time we got back to City Hall our feet, ankles, hips, etc all just killed. We think we have walked at least 4 miles a day since getting to Norway. City Hall was interesting, weird art on the walls I must say. Then we just sat at the harbor and watched street performers and people digging in the garbage for bottles and cans. I mean multiple people!

The Oslo Peace Prize Center is across the street from where we are sitting so we decide to go. Its free with the pass! I had been there before so I could show Mom to the better places inside.

We decided to eat at TGI Fridays. I know, its American, but we are tired and hurt so don't pick on us too bad. We got a 20% discount there with the pass! To be fair the "American food" didn't really taste or look American. We shared a couple of appetizers and made the trek back to the hostel.

Skype is a beautiful thing everyone. You should all have it if you are away from loved ones.

June 2nd- Norway in a Nutshell

Norway in a Nutshell is a way to get around the country while seeing the most important sites Norway has to offer. You use 3 methods of transportation: train, bus, and boat, ....followed by 2 more trains.

At the Bergen train station we met another mother-daughter travel team from Minnesota! Really nice- Cathy and Karrie. The train to Voss was short and really let us see the little villages/towns along the coasts/islands of Bergen. The ocean was beautiful and it was great to drink coffee and wake up a bit.

At Voss we got on a bus- probably close to the craziest transportation ride I have ever received. Drive crazy fast up this hill only to see at the top the most gorgeous view ever. Right away, however, we started going down hairpin turns seriously. From the picture you can see the valley below. Yep, we kept taking sharp left and right turns over and over to get to the bottom. All along there are beautiful things to look at all to get to the famous World Heritage Site of the Sognefjord.

We got on our boat, the Skagastol Folro, in the town Gudvangen. We dumped our luggage and found seats with our new friends. Can you even really put into words the sites? It felt so peaceful....when you werent looking at the 1,000 cameras everywhere, or the Asians throwing bread for the loud seagulls, or a little kids singing as loud as possible. But seriously, for the most part it was amazing. I can't imagine how they even built the houses at the top of the mountain with the steepest drop offs! It was a two hour boat ride. I hope you like the picture! The best part was other then the few villages, the nature is completely untouched by humans. So nice to see that once in a while. There are a zillion waterfalls. I have way too many pictures of waterfalls.

We got off the boat in Flam and ate a great soup lunch with the travel buddies. The train to Mydral was really cute and wooden. The biggest waterfall ever is called the Kjosfossen. They had this old Norwegian folk fairy woman doing her dance- funniest thing ever!

At Mydral we had like a 2 hour wait so we just saw and chatted with Cathy and Karrie. Then the train to Oslo was like 4-5 hours. That is really long.....we sat with a really old couple from Norway. Learned a few things and overall just sat back and enjoyed the ride.

Once we got to Oslo, the scariest most un-fun part of travel exists. When you have no idea where you are or how to get there. I knew the Hostel we were staying at but from the location we didnt have a lot of help to find it. But thank the Lord above we met nice people and found eventually the hostel. We are sharing the room with two 21 year old's from Germany. We are getting along fine.