Good times were had by all

 Friday, the day before the Christmas party, I went to Cathrine's for cheese and wine night. 

And crackers and ham and grapes night.

 Ida was there, lookin' all right, with baubles in her ears.

 I drink wine rarely, so when I do, I pick the nicest looking bottle. Never ended up with anything too bad.

 

Cathrine and I trying desperately to look relaxed.

This might sound odd (it does to me), but I feel like I've become more resilient when it comes to alcohol. After not drinking for eight weeks straight... Unlikely. It might just be that I had tons of cheese on tons of crackers. I like to call it the high carb high fat diet, unlikely to make you healthy, but much less hungover.

Christmas party

Renate's beautiful shoes

Yesterday was my work Christmas party - the Norwegian Mail (sorting + delivery part of it anyway), Tromsø, have their Christmas party at somewhere called Ølhallen (Hall of Beer). Classy? No. On weekdays, Ølhallen is open from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m... That should tell you all about it. It was nice though, we had lots of Norwegian Christmas food, free drinks (not always a clever idea with Norwegians), and I got to know some of my co-workers better. 

The best thing was my shoes though. I'd invited my landlady over to my flat earlier that day, to have a look and see how I've furnished it. Seeing my party dress all laid out, she offered to lend me a pair of shoes that would go with it. We have the same shoe size. Amazing. I have to give them back today...

Feeling slightly reduced after two nights in a row of drinking lots of wine. Copious amounts of tea seems to be the remedy.

Exam done!

Me, failing at thumbs-up, but winning at everything else

That's right, I got an A. As a combined grade for my essay and my oral exam. For the first time in years, studying hard really paid off. Well done me, pat on shoulder, go on with my life, back to work as a post-lady tomorrow morning.

Winter and dark times

Sunday, around midday, outside my bedroom window

On Monday, suddenly every other house in Tromsø had their fairy lights up for Christmas. It confused me all through my work day, because we're still in November, but it's not mid-November or any special occasion to put them all up now.

Then I realised, Monday was the official start of Polar Night, in Tromsø. What we have is more like polar twilight, but it doesn't sound near as hardcore. The Norwegian name for this time of year is mørketid, meaning dark time, which just sounds more awesome translated into English. We've entered The Dark Time... Which will last until January 21st, which is known as The Sun Day (soldagen).

It's getting darker and darker every day now. We have something like dawn at eleven o'clock, and something like sunset at one o'clock, but the sun never climbs above the horizon. I'm happy that the residents of Tromsø start their fairy/Christmas lights early - it's more to light up the Dark Time (loving this translation) than to celebrate Christmas. And, remember, the reason Christmas has been placed in  December, is because it's in the middle of Dark Time.

Christmas Wishlist

Mostly because this is the easiest way to reach my family all at once.

1. Something from the Red Cross Shop, Gimedhjertet (give with your heart)
2. Something from any other similar shop, give me some trees in Kenya or a goat in Kathmandu, go on.
3. Giftcards from H&M, Løiten Lys, G-Sport, XXL.

4. Moomin mugs! I dropped mine as I was packing my stuff to move to Ryavegen in July... Poor Snufkins.

And then... Nothing else. Or, English people: I'm fond of Christmas cards. Hint, hint.

Random photo of a cake

Just to tempt you, there we go

My mum makes a very good chocolate cake. And she makes an amazing chocolate frosting cream type thing to put on top. When I was younger, she'd save some frosting for me so I could eat just that... I think that's what I'll want for my birthday in March. (Did you read that, mum?)

Anyway. Hobbes and Locke and Rousseau are having fun in my head at the moment, maybe I'll dream about them tonight.

Active Choice-day

 Xiomara from Colombian Red Cross and Torill from HivNorge

 Sofie, always turning away

Lucy & Dixie, insisting on looking silly when I focus

Yesterday was the long-awaited Active Choice-day (in English!) at the Red Cross house. We wanted to attract international students, and although the advertising for the day could have been better and we could have had more people, the day itself went really well (well planned, Dixie!).

Starting out with some icebreakers, we continued with a presentation about Active Choice (=sexual health) in Colombia, and learned some of the games they do with students there. There were some games going on while Dixie and I had to taxi down to the pizza place, because their delivery service didn't start until way after lunch time. After lunch we had a condom-course, and the best part of the day: a talk by Torill from HivNorge, about HIV/AIDS in Norway (surprise, I know, considering who she works for). The only thing is that she was kind of preaching to the converted, since we were mostly Red Cross Youth people there. She said, and I agree, that there should be more talks about HIV/AIDS in schools, young people need to know more about it, that it exists in Norway, and how it can, and how it can't, transmit.

Looking forward to December 1st now.

I wish I could just memorize this song for Thursday and get an A

... But I doubt it.

Look!

 I got a package in my mailbox the other day, just getting it, without opening it, made me so happy.

 I did open it, though. Look at this adorable letter from the adorable Jemma.

And pretty things for me! And something else for someone else, which will remain a secret, until Dec. 24th, at least.

I didn't start reading my philosophy on Wednesday, like I promised. Instead, I went to see the film Drive, with Ryan Gosling (yes) and Carey Mulligan (yes) and a strange mix of soothing, peaceful images and violence (...yees...?). Recommended. 

I've started reading philosophy again now though, and dear me. It's so much. My head is so confused with all the information I've been cramming into it today, about Kant & Aristotle & Descartes & Hume and about fourteen others. I wish this philosophy class would get marked on our participation at seminars instead of an oral exam, but there you go. By Thursday I need to be up to date on the difference between the mechanistic and teleological view of nature (just translated that myself, so it's probably called something else in English).

Of course it's all gone by this afternoon

I've never been so happy to see rain in my entire life. Much better for post delivery.

Snow, properly now

Sunday was a rainy, soggy, windy day. My dad drove me home in the evening (after watching both parts of Pride & Prejudice + two episodes of Downton Abbey with my mum), saw my bike on the porch, and said: "Do you still need your bike? Or do you want me to take it home?" Of course I replied that I might still use it, seeing that the roads were still bare and winter still seemed far away.

Woke up eight hours later to a completely snowfilled landscape.

Not fun for postal workers, looks nice though.

Viktoria's Birthday, or A Selection of Gorgeous Girls

 Ida looking fantastic as always

 Me, just having realised it's harder to hide your unwashed hair when it's this short (look at my sad face)

 Birthday girl herself, look at her happy face!

 Charlotte (who I realised I've know longer than any of the other girls around the table)

Christine, Christine! I can't say her name in English without singing Phantom of the Opera-tunes

I promise, this is the last birthday celebration in a while. I do have photos of a very tasty chocolate cake from my mum's birthday celebrations, which also coincided with Norwegian father's day this past Sunday. Soon I'll be telling you all about my dreary life again. Or maybe write something clever philosophical. Next week is my oral exam in philosophy, so before then I should have read some 200 pages on the subjects we've covered... I'll start tomorrow. Promise.

And then it was Saturday

 I got up at 8:45, went to town and met up with this birthday beauty again

 Brought some old clothes to Rådstua

 And sold clothes at the "Fiin-loppis" (Vintage Flea Market)

I was fairly unprepared, in addition to not actually wanting to sell my nicest second hand dresses, so I didn't sell much. Ida made a bit though, I managed to get rid of a hideous bag, and I scored a new top by swapping one of the ones I was selling with one of Ida's. So it wasn't a total waste... I also had a good time, managed to be at a vintage flea market without buying anything, and got some quality time with Ida. Happy days.

It's Friday, Friday, etc

 Ida's birthday party (her actual birthday was Saturday), I'm the early nerdy type, as usual. I get more cupcakes.

 Cathrine & Christine - from my media high school

 We were having a media party in the corner, while the journalists (who work with Ida) were in the kitchen

Ida & me

Seeing that this was my first big party since Sober October (and actually, since mid-September), I think I did rather well. I had a grand time, drank a bit, was in a very good mood, and got up early o'clock the next day (more about that in my next post) without too much dizziness. And again: Happy birthday, Ida, you gorgeous creature.

Everybody and their mums' birthdays

 Viktoria and me, posing awkwardly

 Christine enjoying her carrot cupcake while wearing her crown

Ghost plate & blackcurrant cordial

Tuesday: Invited Christine to what she thought was just a normal girl's night, when in fact we were celebrating her birthday. She brought carrots as snacks, then Karoline showed up with a massive carrot cake, and Viktoria came with carrot cupcakes. All the vitamins for us!

Wednesday: Invited myself to Ingrid to finish her chocolate cake from the weekend. Sadly, they had managed to finish the cake without me...so Ingrid had just baked another one. NOM.

Thursday: ...No cake.

Friday: Ida's birthday party, lost count of the number of cupcakes I consumed.

Saturday: Went out for Chinese with my family, then home for chocolate cake to celebrate my mum's birthday again.

Sunday morning: Father's day (in Norway) = homemade buns and chocolate cake and normal cake.

November 7th to 14th shall be known as Cake Week henceforth.

Babies everywhere!

Unimpressed baby is unimpressed

Well, at least children. On Monday, I went to see Hanne, our previous youth coordinator in the Red Cross Youth (North) - who's left us twice now to have babies. I was there to take photos that might hopefully be used for Christmas cards, etc, of her two children. There are so many photos on my harddrive right now, just waiting for me having a few hours off the Red Cross and all the birthday celebrations this week, to see if there's anything usable. The little one, Elias, was very unimpressed by the lady coming to photograph him. He wasn't in a bad mood or anything, just completely disinterested, and not wanting to smile. His older brother Sindre preferred running around, hiding from the strange lady, to sitting down and being photographed. I think we managed to become friends in the end. We'll see.

Gratulerer med dagen, Ingrid

 December 2005

 December 2005, can you believe how adult she looks at 16?

 August 2005 - before we started different schools, after three years of seeing each other every single day

17.mai (Norway Day!) 2006. Yes, that is snow on the ground. And ice cream in my hand.

Happy birthday Ingrid! One of my oldest friends. The other one is Cecille, the girl in the middle of the August 2005 photo. We have so much history. We learnt the Elvish alphabet (the Sindarin version, I think) together when we were 14, and wrote each other letters in Norwegian, but with Elvish letters, from 2006 to the present day. There's my biggest geeky secret out. We walked around my parents' new house before it was finished, and dreamt of having boyfriends we could hold hands with instead of each other (on the 17.mai-photo it's happened/is about to happen for both). Recent years we've bonded over Neil Gaiman (or me pushing his books on her), Studio Ghibli films, having lived in England, cake/chocolate and endless conversations about books (girl works in a book shop! So jealous).

Tomorrow I'm going to visit Ingrid, to celebrate her birthday and eat more cake. It's birthday week in Tromsø, apparently! Anyway. Love you, Ingrid. I hope we eat cake and write Elvish for years to come (at least 80 more!)

Weekend in Sandy Bay

 Pimm's & Lemonade & All The Fruit I Could Find

 Mamma with her first bag of seigmenn (jelly men covered in sugar. NOM) since... forever.

 Ciderrrr

 My beautiful rose bush, taken home to my parents' house for winter.

 A buttercup we found on our Sunday walk - November 6th, north of the Arctic Circle.

Stuff you find when you're tidying away old school books.

Sandy Bay is the literal translation of Sandvika, where my parents live. I spent most of my weekend there, only broken by four or five hours on Saturday, when I went to excercise at my new gym (Sats! I love having a gym again), home to Ryavegen for a) a shower and b) wrapping birthday presents for five wonderful people, four of whom have birthdays between November 7th and 14th.

That Pimm's up there? It marks the breaking of my alcohol fast! No alcohol between September 18th and November 3rd. It was good. Even better was all the fruit, to be honest. I am now determined to put fruit in all my future drinks, whatever they be.

Apparently we were having English drinks weekend, because we also had a few bottles of Weston's and Severn cider. When it comes to drink preferences, my mum is (and to some extent, I am) very English. Tea, tea, cider, more tea, Pimm's, and another cuppa.

I've had so much food and drink I am about to burst. And I had the oddest dreams last night... I blame the gluttony! First world problem if there ever was one.

Surprise, maybe

Q: Guess what I did yesterday?

A: spent a whole lot of money at the hairdresser, first getting this cut, then buying proper salon shampoo. Because it works a lot better for my hair.

Gratulerer med dagen, mamma (hjerte, hjerte)

My mum and me in Germany (Margetshöchheim/Würzburg), May 2011

Hurra! It's my mum's birthday today. I'm going home to my parents soon to drink tea and be astonished at the amount of food in their fridge. And eat a lot of the food. And surprise them. And give my mum something small and nice for her birthday. Glad i mammaen min.

Quick shot

Of me as I was yesterday, drinking "Heisse Zitrone" (Hot Lemon drink) and eating an entire Milka bar, both which were brought home from Germany by my mum. Thank you mamma.

Sober October is ober?

First sober party, Oct 1st: Ellen, Gabriela, Siwi, Lourdes, my teetotal self being awkward 

(photo totally stolen from Gabriela Grud)

So. If I stay sober until Saturday, it'll be seven - 7 - weeks since I had my last drink. I wanted to say seven weeks since I had a drop of alcohol, but that would be lying. It's been Sober October, not Teetotal October (nothing to do with catchy names. At all). I've tasted other people's drinks. I had one sip of the wine my brother brought back from Germany (my family was finishing it, I "had to"). But that's it. Nothing that would bring me even close to the "can I drive?"-limit.

Have I learned anything? I have had the opportunity to think through my drinking habits (more Northern European binge than Southern European savour), and watch while the people around me change as they drink. Sometimes, they become incredibly stupid. Sometimes, annoying, obnoxious, tiresome, or annoyed and tired themselves. And sometimes they have a fantastically good time, dance without restrictions, make new friends and find everything amusing (especially repeated jokes that make sober people bang their heads against a table).

I've been out four out of five weekends in October.

It's been good to have a break from my usual habits. It's been important to realise that I do and say exactly the same stupid things when I'm sober - I'm a person that can act stupidly from time to time, and I can't blame the alcohol. It's been good to let my body rest and have Sundays where I'm a fully functioning person. I'm going to start drinking again this weekend though. Maybe slightly less than before. Probably sometimes more than I should. But hopefully with a better perspective.

In November, I'm not buying

A subscription for this newspaper.

Last week I got a call from Aftenposten, wanting to hear how I enjoyed my three week free subscription to their newspaper. I replied I liked it very much.

A-man: ... You probably realised we had an ulterior motive behind giving you this free subscription?

Me: Yes...

A-man: Good. Well, we want to offer you Aftenposten from now until Christmas for only (some price I can't remember). It's a fantastic offer! Etc.

Me: Ah. Well...

A-man: Or, do you find you haven't got the time to read the entire newspaper every day?

Me: In fact... yes.

A-man: Well, we have this offer, where you can get it for seven weeks, and only get it on Thursday, Friday and Saturday, for only 299 (34 pounds).

Me: (showing a great amount of willpower) No. Sorry, I'm not interested.

I decided to save money for food instead. I also knew I had "In November, I'm not buying" coming up - and I've already given 200 NOK to the TV-aksjon (almost like Red Nose Day. This year the money went to clearing anti-personell mines, so so important) which will come out of my next phone bill.

So what should I do with my no-newspaper-subscribing money? I went for Save The Children this time.

87.5% of my money goes to Save the Children's work with children, 12.5% to administration. I think they could do better, but it's still pretty good. Whenever you want to donate money through some organisation, I recommend looking for something like this at the bottom of their webpage. If you can't find any information about how they spend their money, they're probably not spending it that well.

So, yeah. That's left me feeling smug for another month. Keep in mind that I'm still buying stuff I need, and stuff I want. I've just decided to get better at helping others as well.

This month I will be getting an expensive haircut, I will buy new salon price shampoo and conditioner, I'm going for the Body Shop body butter, and, since Sober October is now officially over, I'll probably spend some money on drinking/going out, etc. I can still afford to donate 30-40 pounds to charities though.

Tomatoes and the Red Cross

I just needed to share these. Top photo: The Red Cross Tromsø has just gotten one of these fancy screens that they can update with what's happening, what rooms are booked out for which activities, etc. This says: What's on in Tromsø Red Cross: Friday: Morning Coffee. Saturday: Coffee break.

Bottom photo: I've found a way to make tomatoes taste nice! As my sister says: They always look so yummy in the shop, all shiny and red and plump. Then you taste one and you go "bleeeurgh".

If you heat a little oil, and maybe some garlic (because garlic makes everything perfect), and then throw the tomatoes in at full heat for one or two minutes, then toss them onto your food and eat them quickly, they're perfect. Warm and juicy and not soggy or squishy in a bad way.

That's me being weird for the day. That was also one of last weeks more healthy meals.