Grimstad Tour :)

If you're wondering how many times I can procrastinate by watching Love Actually before writing this blog post, the answer is 7.

I'm not going to bore you with what I did every single day because I literally do nothing. Last Wednesday our geography class went to Grimstad for a walking tour. This was a rather poor decision by our teacher because it was only about 35 degrees outside. We walked around the city with a guide but, unfortunately, the tour was in Norwegian so I learned nothing. After that, we went to a maritime museum and checked out some old Norwegian sailing stuff. Nothing really too interesting. BUT! My amazing friend Hege (who now reads my blog) offered to give me a tour of the city!

So on Sunday (the coldest day of the week (it didn't even reach 32 degrees)) I met Hege for my personal tour of the city! We went to this art installment thing which is a frame that frames and overlooks the city. From there we walked through the city, Hege was pointing out random stuff and I was taking pictures as we went, and made our way up to the middle school. We had to walk through a super, super creepy tunnel to get there. There was a swimming competition going on there so we checked that out for a little. While we were there our friend Aina joined us! Aina, Hege, and I walked to a church in the city and looked over the town. We decided to take a cute picture of us. This was a mistake because I have a mini-tripod and it sucks. After a few failed attempts at taking pictures, we made our way to Cafe Ibsen.

Henrik Ibsen actually lived in Grimstad when he was working as an apprentice pharmacist. The cafe was AMAZING! We all ordered hot chocolate. They also had white hot chocolate so I'm going to try that next time. We sat there talking for over an hour. Hege, Aina, and our other friend Siren are all planning on coming out to visit me in Pittsburgh in the spring! I'm so excited! But back to Sunday. After we finally got a picture of the three of us, Aina had to leave for dinner with her boyfriend. Hege invited me to go watch her brother perform in a gymnastic performance. It was the 150th anniversary of the gymnasium and their Christmas event. It was very loud but lots of fun. I'm not just saying this because Hege is definitely reading this post, but she is so awesome and fun to hang out with. All my friends here are. They remind me so much of my friends back home which just makes me realize how much I'm going to miss them when I go back home to Pittsburgh.

That was the end of my long and cold day of walking around the city. It wasn't as much informational as it was fun. The rest of the week has been Thanksgiving prep and freaking out about Thanksgiving prep. On the actual day of Thanksgiving, I'm cooking dinner for my family. Then, on Sunday, I'm having like 15 friends over and cooking for them! I know I've said this before but please, please everyone wish me luck.

Once again my camera refuses to cooperate with my laptop. Please forgive me for the quality lost while transferring images from my camera to my phone and then emailing them to my laptop.

White houses in Grimstad

More white houses

Tiny street in the center of the city

View of the city and church

Another view of the church

View from one of the docks

One of the few blue sky days we've had

Sculpture of a man. I forget who he is or what he's famous for, though.

My attempt at jumping. 

Hege and I

Hege's jump. Much better than mine. She actually looks like she has legs.

Hege acting like she's going swimming in this freezing water

One of our failed attempts at a group picture

A group picture that actually worked!

Aina and Hege at Cafe Ibsen

Hege and I at Cafe Ibsen with our hot chocolates

Aina, Hege, and I at Cafe Ibsen :)

Reasons to Study Abroad

Wow, I'm going to start off by saying that I'm sorry for writing two posts in under 24-hours. I'm trying to make up for the fact that I haven't written in awhile. Alright now onto the actual post!

I think studying abroad has been one of the most rewarding and challenging experiences of my life. I want to give some reasons why American students should study abroad and some more for specifically why you should study abroad in Norway! Hope you enjoy!

Reasons American high school students should study abroad:

1. You meet so many incredible people and make so many great friends!
• Seriously how cool is it that you can have people wishing you happy birthday in different languages and people liking your Instagram pictures from halfway across the world? Plus if you ever go back to your exchange country you'll always have a place to stay! Some of the people I've met here in Norway have been the kindest, most accepting, funny, wonderful people on the planet. 
2. You learn so so so so much!
• From learning a different language to another countries culture, the random facts you collect are endless. Like did you know that Norwegians wear their wedding rings on the right hand? I thought everyone here was single for almost a month. While I don't really learn anything while I'm at school I still learn a lot outside of the classroom. Even if I'm just talking to people in between classes or playing games with my host family. 
3. It looks incredible on your college applications!
• Kinda petty I know but I've already been accepted to 3 colleges (University of Pittsburgh, Chatham University, and Washington & Jefferson) and I honestly believe that the reason I got into Pitt main, got a scholarship from Chatham, and a personal note at the bottom of my W&J letter was because of my exchange. It shows colleges "what integrity [they] see in you [and] what a tremendous experience you create" that was a direct quote from my W&J letter. Colleges are always worrying about how their students will handle life at college and exchange students prove that, while in high school, they could live in a foreign country where they know no one. I was a pretty good student in high school and I believe that my exchange really pushed my application over the edge. 
4. The views!!!
• It doesn't matter where you study abroad, but no matter where you go you will definitely see one view that will take your breath away. There are so many amazing places to see even if you live in a small town in Switzerland you are bound to travel to other places and who knows maybe a nearby mountain will be your new favorite hiking spot with an amazing view at the top.
5. Everyone loves hearing about it!
• Okay, so this one only lasts for about a week after you return. BUT it is an amazing conversation piece when meeting new people. Just don't sound too cocky about spending a life changing year abroad while everyone was just sitting on their couch at home. 

Reasons why you should study abroad in Norway!

1. Norwegians
• The Norwegians are a particular type of people. They are shy when you first meet them for sure. When they open up they really open up. I have heard countless stories that I really, really wished I hadn't heard. They also become super inclusive. Every time there's an event someone always invites me which is really nice because I've gotten to go to so many parties and hang out with so many people. 
2. The Norwegian language
• As long as you learn some of it beforehand! At least how to pronounce the Ø Å Æ sounds as well as the Norwegian R sound. I'm going to make a separate post about the language and how hard it is for me (I know boo-hoo, Olivia. My life is so hard, etc). Simple phrases are easy to pick up though and basic words and fruit are easy. A lot of words are also really similar in English, too. I REALLY RECCOMEND LEARNING AS MUCH OF THE LANGUAGE AS YOU CAN BEFORE YOU GO! Even if it's not required it can never hurt. 
3. The history
• Norway is so old. Grimstad is older than the United States. Isn't it crazy? Simple things like that stun me. There is even an Ibsen museum in Grimstad because Henrik Ibsen actually worked as an apprentice to a pharmacist. There is so much history in Norway and Norwegians are so, so proud of their history you can't go anywhere without learning something.
4. The views!!!
• I know I mentioned this above how there are amazing views everywhere but Norway has the best views. In the morning on my walk to the bus stop, I can see across the harbor in Fevik to the iconic white houses that this part of Norway is known for. On the bus ride home, I drive past two fjords, a beach, and two harbors all in under 20 minutes. Today it was foggy, rainy, and we only had eight and a half hours of sun, but all I was thinking was how lucky I am to be here.
5. It's different
• With Aspect, right now, there are two American's in Norway. There's one other exchange student in my school from Brazil. What I'm trying to say is that no one goes to Norway. And they should. Most American students don't even think of Norway. Some people come here because of their Norwegian heritage, but my family is mostly Eastern European, Irish, and German so no Norwegian but Norway is a great place for everyone. Norway is the 17th safest country in the world, pretty high considering that America is 94. Norway is also considered the highest developed country in the world based on the HDI scale. It is so amazing here I highly recommend spending your exchange in Norway, you will not regret it.

It was around this time last year that I was finalizing all my documents to study abroad. I really recommend study abroad (especially with Aspect). I hope that you all decide to study abroad and have a great time while you're there!

Halloween

Sorry, I haven't written in awhile! I haven't been particularly swamped here either, I am just a huge procrastinator, haha. Before I begin with my post, for those of you that haven't already, on the right side of my page there is a box that says "Follow Me For Updates!", if you put your email in there then you will automatically get updates every time I make a blog post! You can also write comments at the bottom of the posts, I would love to hear what you think or any post ideas you have for me.

Last weekend was Halloween here in Norway. I was surprised at how many parties and how many people dressed up. In the past, I have always viewed it as an American holiday and even then I never do anything back home for it.

The night before Halloween I invited some of the girls in my class over to carve pumpkins! Two of them have never carved pumpkins before because it only got popular in Norway within the past view years. I think southern Norway underestimated how many people were going to carve pumpkins because by 4:00 pm there no pumpkins within a one-hour radius of where I live. My host parents and some siblings went to Kristiansand to pick up someone at the bus station there and they couldn't find a single pumpkin. Two of the girls in my class managed to find the last pumpkins in our city and I had one we bought earlier in the week. The other two girls actually used honey melons. We had a lot of fun and the melons turned out really cool as well! I realized how lucky I am to be in a class with these girls because, while they were shy at first (and so was I), they have really accepted me into their group and I'm going to miss them terribly when I go home.

On Saturday, I went to a Halloween party that a guy in my class was having. The invite he sent me was in Norwegian so I attempted to translate the directions but it was on a private road so it didn't show up on Google Maps, it took Ida and me about 40 minutes to get there. I was there for about half an hour until one of my friends showed up and invited me to another one of our friends house where they were just watching some TV relaxing. Oh! I went as Rosie the Riveter. Mostly because I had all the items in my closet. A lot of people went as scary things with white or red contacts and scars on their faces.

Sunday was spent relaxing because the past two nights I had been up really late. Monday we were back at school. Same old, same old, I just sit there and do absolutely nothing. On Tuesday, I only had math class because my English teacher was sick. I also went to the police station and officially applied for my visa! Wednesday we had Norwegian all day but my teacher didn't have anything planned for me because all the other kids were taking a test all day. I just went home. It was a bit upsetting because I was at school for less than an hour and I would have much rather been sleeping. Thursday was normal and Linn Victoria and I went to the grocery store at night. This was the largest grocery store I've seen here in Norway, but it still had about as many products as Giant Eagle. The store also sold random, miscellaneous things like skis. That brings us to today. My Norwegian teacher again told me that since they were doing New Norwegian I could just go out in the hall in work. Since I don't have a language I don't have anything to do until 12, oh well it's some nice down time.

Well, that's been my week! I am officially supposed to come home January 16th. I can't believe that's only 70 days away! I'm still working on planning out my Thanksgiving for my friends so I will let you all know how that goes. Keep your fingers crossed for me, okay? The most I've ever done for Thanksgiving is cut celery, but I'm pretty fantastic at that.

Grimstad

Grimstad. Isn't it pretty?

Carving pumpkins and melons

Me and my friends (Hege, Matilde, Siren, and Aina)

Finished products

The hill I have to walk up everyday from the bus stop.

The "huge" store. It looks pretty big but everything is really spaced out and there isn't a lot of products offered.