Karoline (great great grandmother) 1857
and Jørgen (great great grandfather) 1853
Anyhow, my newfound relatives are fantastic. After feeding me, they lent me a Norwegian phone, went out and bought me a sim card so that I can function like a normal person in this new place. Also, they offered to take me out to Løten in September, where the old family farm remains. It's a small small place, not even quite a town, where my great grandmother's niece and husband still reside. To make that even more cool, apparently the most famous Aquavit distillery is in Løten as well. No wonder my ancestors settled down there....
photo of the relatives!
Other than visiting the relatives, I've just been running around doing a lot of cool stuff, and for the most part forgetting to take photos of it. I remember sometimes though, here's a link to the site I've begun uploading photos too. http://www.flickr.com/photos/41623197@N05/sets/72157621963850593/ I will try to keep up the comments on the pictures to contextualize it all for you. Other than meeting the relatives, there has really only been three other major moments in my life here that I simply can't gloss over.
Recently, I had my very first Kebab Experience, and I have yet to fully digest my thoughts about it (or the kebab itself). For those unfamiliar with the "kebab," it is a spicy meat (beef?) that is diced up and served in a kind of flat bread with veggies and a mild or spicy sauce. The first few bites were pretty much delicioso.. it is definitely top of the line hangover food. Still, the next few bites had me wondering, "Is it healthy for one person to down this much spicy meat in one sitting?" Every bite after that was an offensive attack against the spicy sauce that began to vaporize the inside of my nose! Unfortunately I lost the war against the kebab in the home stretch (I would have made it without my sore throat, but in general-- too much meat for one girl to handle... unless that girl is Hillary Hansen-- and I'm not entirely convinced she's fully female). Nonetheless, I look back on the experience as a positive one.
The next exciting experience was gathering my Swedes (yes, I have collected a Swede or two along the way) and taking them off to IKEA, which more or less is the Swedish embassy in Norway. Now that I have reclined on the comfy bus seats of the Ikea shuttle service and strolled their luxurious aisles for myself, I understand the majesty surrounding the Norwegian IKEA. The store is gigantic and you can actually see it clearly from the plane as you fly over Oslo towards the airport.
The shuttle takes you for a cute 15 min. drive through Oslo before you arrive at IKEA itself. It was kind of fun to see more of the city, especially the little sailboats that are docked in some inlets next to the highway. The Swedes and I were shaken out of our daydreams when the massive IKEA structure jumped onto the highway in front of us and slapped away the scenic view! As mentioned before, it is a very large building and the Swedes and I, half delirious from Kebabs and a tipsy sleeping schedule, felt we had to commemorate our maiden voyage to the IKEA we heard so much about by eating köttbullar, or as us Americans call them, Swedish meatballs. Although I had just downed a kebab a short hour before, I was still excited to try such an infamous cultural dish.... at IKEA. Appropriately, my dad always called IKEA "the place with the Swedish meatballs" throughout my teen years. Needless to say, it wouldn't have been a real trip without them. Unfortunately, the Swedes were less than impressed by the bastardized version of their beloved köttbullar, but luckily for me I was able to redirect that frustration into offering them the opportunity to make them properly... for me to eat. They knew I was being a tricky american, but they are so desperate to save face of their "great?" nation that they agreed. Accordingly, this next Thursday is Swedish meatball night in my flat.... CAN'T WAIT!
So I covered the relatives, the IKEA trip, what else is left? Oh yes, the swine flu. Unfortunately, beginning with meeting the relatives and throughout my IKEA trip, I became increasingly aware of a sore throat, cough, and escalating flu symptoms. I did my best to ignore it because I just refused to get sick while abroad, but unfortunately the late nights and refusal to deal with it only worsened my state, it would seem. In fact, early this morning I awoke from a raging fever (which gave me some crazy ass dreams) and the sorest throat of my life, and felt compelled to deal with my sickness in the most adult way possible; I started sobbing and calling out for my mommy, and skyped the family to share my medical woes with them. They did their best to comfort me, even a pants-less Hillary showed up as part of the support group.
After a proper commiseration, I went off to the health clinic to get checked out and make sure I didn't have strepp throat or something. In the back of my mind, I tried to convince myself that this was a good thing, because now I got to experience the joys of free health care that I've heard about for so long. In actuality, despite having outside international health insurance and being a registered student, some bureaucratic bullshit prevailed (just like health care in the US), and I had to pay 170 NOK to be seen by a doctor, and another 80 NOK for the blood/saliva test. I was pretty confused throughout the entire process, because they kept sending new people in to me who always tried to speak to me in Norwegian, despite my constant reminders that I only spoke English. After seeing how swollen my glands were/red and constricted my throat was/how much I was coughing, they immediately made me put a facemask on and wait for a nurse (who was more or less wearing a hazmat suit) to come take my temperature and blood/saliva samples. Unfortunately, I forgot that I only appear relatively intelligent when I don't speak in this country, so upon seeing that my temperature was 39 degrees Celsius, I remarked "so that's more or less normal, right?". "NO NO NO NO NO!" the nurse bellowed at me. Damn it America, why can't we use normal measurement units so that I can understand the weather/thermometers in Europe. Upon coming home and calculating it, I realized that my actual temperature was a 102.2 degrees Fahrenheit. Fair enough, nurse.
Anyways, they ran my samples and found that while I have some kind of flu, the strain did not match up to any of the commonly found strains of influenza. Accordingly, this led them to believe that more likely than not, I have the H1N1 virus. Unfortunately, they can only give you pills to help your symptoms if you catch it in the first 48 hours... which I did not. Thus, there was no reason to send my results in for further testing to see if it is swine or not, since they basically can't do anything for me either way. Nonetheless, they chalked it up to swine, wrote me a note demanding that I not go to any classes/show my germy self in public for at least 4 more days, and sent me home with a slew up facemasks so that I would not infect the rest of the public. Also, they recorded me into the system as a case of the swine flu, which seems pretty inaccurate to me since they didn't really confirm what it was. They have been so paranoid about swine flu here; I think they were excited to have someone who vindicated the insane precautions they have been taking to prevent the spread. I, on the other hand, certainly jinxed myself by making fun of such precautions throughout orientation week. Oops.
So, here I sit- isolated in my room on a Friday night as all my friends are at a vorspiel (pre-party) a few doors down before they head out to the student bar. My friend, Femmy from Holland showed up earlier and had made me soup, which was amazing because soup here is dry instead of pre-made in cans, and I couldn't understand the Norwegian labels enough to make it for myself. My Swedish brother/roommate (whose last name is also Hansson... stupid spelling of it though) is making me tea before he goes out, but after that I will be completely alone. Being sick in a foreign country officially sucks. On the bright side, it has given me plenty of time to update my blog. Whether or not I'm even writing in complete sentences is beyond me at this point though, as I can feel my fever creeping back up, and I'm starting to have mild hallucinations. Hello, pretty stars on my ceiling, thanks for keeping me company.
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