This week has found me being the epitome of restlessness. The extreme scheduling of this place is starting to get to me, I don't really enjoy always knowing exactly what I'll be doing every day. Besides that, sometimes it's nice to have a sense of anonymity. It's nice that everyone cares and that everyone knows you, but sometimes you'd rather escape it and be able to walk down a city street and not have anyone say hello to you. Does that sound strange? I also get the feeling that there's a bit of a pendulum effect going on on campus...at the very beginning, everyone's very homesick. Then people get overwhelmed by the excitement and novelty of everything and this whole place becomes much more happy. Then gradually, as reality and routine set in, people start to become a bit homesick again, myself included. I guess it's only natural, and if this is the worst it'll ever be, then I shouldn't complain too much, right?

This next week is going to go by really slowly, so looks like more restlessness for me. This coming Saturday I'll be in Forde with some of my favorite girls for a much-needed day of capitalist perfection. Then that night is the cabin party (hopefully), and that coming week I should be in Bergen for my PBL. Everyone at school gets the week off do go to some educational project, so I'll be in Bergen with a couple people staying at Bergen University, doing some research by day and some semi-urban type things by night. I need it, before I drive myself crazy.

Okay, I actually don't have much to say, I'm just procrastinating a paper like usual. Peace and love.

Sufjan Stevens. Listen to him and love him. Because he is close to one of the most talented people making music today. Beautiful.

Also, I've learned how to knit. Last night I sat up for far too long with Raine learning to knit things, and now it consumes my life. I sit and think about how much I want to get back to my knitting. Is that sad? Haha I'm making the world's widest scarf, but I will still wear it with pride when I finish it in a year. It takes forever. Oh well.

Too much studying, and it was officially still nighttime when I woke up today at 7:30...I didn't see any sort of light until after first block. A bit scary.

Doing quite an interesting presentation on Tuesday for English comparing some Linton Kwesi Johnson to some classic British Romanticism. If you've never read "She Walks in Beauty" by Lord Byron or "When I Have Fears That I May Cease to Be" by John Keats, then you're missing out on some of the best writing in the world, in my opinion.

"...Then on the shore of the wide world I stand alone and think,
Till love and fame to nothingness do sink." -John Keats

"How passion spent we droop like sapless vines
in the winter of our minds."-Linton Kwesi Johnson

How does one get to be like that? I am simply envious.

I think that instead of enriching my writing skills, this blog is only contributing to my mental detrioration because I seem to write in it mostly to avoid writing other, much more boring things like history essays. Procrastination at it's finest. But everyone must be allowed their vices, right?

So, been awhile since I updated. The first year show went great, or at least it seemed to. My Arabic, Maldivian, and Hip Hop dancing was either all scary or really brilliant, I'm not sure. I'd forgotten until now how much I love being a part of productions like that. Not the same as doing Guys and Dolls at Harmony, but still, same idea and same excitement. I think I want to put something on here at the school to give everyone a chance to get into performing even if they're not a part of the Performing Arts service. It'd be a lot of work and I'd have to be well prepared to have choreography and music and everything, but I think it'd be much more than worth it. Although right now I can't really justify adding more things to do and organize in my life, I've got quite enough. We'll see.

Now I'm learning a bit of Arabic calligraphy on the side as well. It's really great, I think I have a knack for it. It's quite strange though, because with practice I'll be able to write all the Arabic letters and translate English words into Arabic writing, but I won't have any idea how to say them and they won't mean anything to anyone Arabic unless they spoke English. See, the catch is that I'm not learning how to write the Arabic language, just the alphabet. So really all I'll be able to do is write English in a really pretty way, but I still think it's cool.

It's strange to think about how quickly this is all going by already. I'll be home so soon that it's doubly scary and exciting at the same time. It's scary because I've become so used to being comfortable here, so used to the new social norms and rules that are completely different from those back home. I mean, this might be one of the most liberal places on Earth, and I feel more at home in this culture than I ever did back in my good old Southern high school. But it's also exciting, because I feel like (and I would hope) that after this experience, I have a lot to contribute back home and that I'll have a completely different way of looking at everything. It's also exciting that I'll be eating real pizza and Mexican food soon too, but all that didn't really fit into the theme of my deepness, haha.

I read somewhere that someone said Coldplay can make you feel really lonely, but in a fufilling way, but I never really understood the appeal until now. It is lonely, and it is fufilling. I'm not sure if I can explain it much better than that, all I know is that I listen to it a lot and it makes everything seem okay, it makes it seem okay to be homesick, it makes it seem okay to be a bit overwhelmed sometimes. But again, don't the wrong impression, because I'm not really upset more often here than I was back home, it's just different.

Alright, I think I'm going to go print off some piano sheet music and start working on some songs. It's frustrating because I know that since I'm self-taught, I can never really be too good or get too far with it, but at the same time it's still rewarding to know I can figure things out myself. Sorry this was a bit more of an idealistic post than a practical one, but I'll update on all of my actual going-ons soon. Peace and love.

It seems as though I thought I had a lot to say, but now I can't remember it all. So it looks like this is going to be just another random posting again.

Raining like crazy and the sadistic Norwegian government still hasn't made it easy for me to pick up my raincoat. I think they would rather that I get constantly soaked enough that I'm convinced to leave their country, I hear they can be a bit wary of immigrants (I'm an immigrant! How strange.). And I still have a bit of a cold, but I get the impression that that is going to be a constant feature of my life here, just like the rain.

House drop-in last night was great. We had chicken mole! That's Mexican food! Ahhh it was so nice. And right after this posting I'm about to go eat my last bowl of either Cinnamon Toast Crunch or Easy Mac, I haven't decided yet. They say that smell is the closest sense tied to memory, and I believe it. Taste is closely associated with smell, so it makes sense to me that just the taste of food from home is enough to make me think I'm going to look up and be sitting at the dinner table with my family.

Sunday was one of the best Norwegian days I've had so far. I ran about 6 km total, into Flekke and back. It was about 75 degrees and incredibly sunny, and it felt so good just to get out and be active. There's a law in Norway that states that it is perfectly legal to walk around on any property (they are socialist so private property laws are a bit more relaxed than I'm used to). But because of that, I could walk around on a lot of land off the main road. I walked down a small hill to a brook that was the greenest place I've ever seen in my life. I don't think I understood the full meaning of "brook" until that moment, because the water really did sing and laugh over mossy rocks and tree roots. It was gorgeous. I took off my running shoes and just put my legs in the water, then had a nice drink of the water. If I learned anything from this experience, it was that one should drink as much natural water as possible. I think that water ranks among the top 5 best things I've ever tasted. And then, to top off my perfect day, I went down to a huge flat rock that juts out into the fjord and laid out in my swimsuit and read Philosophy. I think everyone could use more days like that.

Added a fifth language today! Now I'll officially be taking the 5 following languages in some form here on campus: English, Spanish, French, Norwegian, and Mandarin Chinese. Cool, right? Alright, maybe another post tomorrow or Thursday after the first year show! Hooray! Peace and love.

Hey all! Thankful to say that I'm much less stressed out now than I was at the last posting. It's actually been quite a wonderful weekend here. Friday night I had my first shift at my campus responsibility, Snikkarbua. It's a cafe on campus run by students for the other students. I had baking shift, so I made 4 cakes and two pizzas, all from scratch! Impressive, I think. It turned out really well and it was so nice just to forget the rest of campus for a bit and have fun by myself. I just turned up some R.E.M.'s greatest hits, opened all the windows and doors out to the fjord, and baked like crazy. As my Dad pointed out, that may have all just been a perfect experience, and really fitting for my life here. Anyways, tons of fun and hope I get to bake every Friday!

Yesterday, 130 people from campus left to go partake in something called Pa Flukt ("Po Flooked"). It's a refugee simulation where you hike around and pretend to be "on the run" from the government and such. They even have fake paperwork and immigration offices and everything. So there were only about 70 people left on campus, but it seemed like much less. It was so nice, I'm happy I stayed here. This weekend I only had 2 other roommates because of Pa Flukt, which really is a lot more privacy and quiet than I'm used to. And everything was so empty, we could use the auditorium to watch episodes of South Park on a big screen! Haha sad that that's exciting for me, right?

I'm so sick of Norwegian bureaucracy I could scream. I wonder if the U.S. is like this too and I just don't know because I'm a citizen? It's just frustrating because the government is so inefficient and so suspicious of non-citizens. I have a raincoat in Flekke that they wouldn't let me pick up because all I had to prove I was Valerie was a picture ID. Are you kidding?! What's much better than a picture ID?! Agh. I can only imagine what a fiasco coming home in November could turn out to be. Hopefully don't have to go through Norwegian customs though, maybe only in the U.S. I'm so excited though. And I hope I get a bit of time in Bergen, maybe just to go to a restaurant or something. Might be in Oslo for a weekend coming up, seems like I have a lot of random days off and one of them might be a Friday. So that'd be lots of fun, there's 1 million people in Oslo!! That's like, a real city! And if I can get into a city, I could always get my nose pierced....haha don't have a heart attack, Mom and Dad, I'm only kidding. Maybe. :)

School's going well. I was sick on Thursday so I missed all classes and didn't get to try out Spanish, but we'll see how it goes tomorrow. Never thought I'd say this, but wish English was a bit more classic literature. Some Shakespeare, some Dickens, Hemingway...I think some John O'Hara or some F. Scott Fitzgerald would be interesting here as well. Or Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, I'm sure that's a side of the U.S. most people don't think about, and a side that I happen to really love. Kind of fits with our Carribbean theme as well. Speaking of, my desktop picture is a picture of a square in Savannah with an American flag hanging from a house, and it looks like heaven to me. Savannah may just be one of my favorite places on Earth.

Getting good marks in History...see that, Mr. B and Ms. Carr? You guys didn't fail me! Haha really, my teacher says I'm so well-prepared for History that I owe you both a thank you, which is quite true. There's even a DBQ on the IB exam! Haha, and to think I had thought I had escaped the dreaded DBQ.

I've just realized all my posts somehow turn into novels. But I guess the point of writing this isn't so that everyone reads every inch of it. Okay, sending my love from a campus of pretend refugees and fish pudding for breakfast!

Sorry for the sombering post last time, but it was a bit of a somber day after all. Anyways. Been too busy lately, I'll be happy when next Thursday is over. The first year students are putting on a cultural show of song and dance for the other students, staff, and locals. We only got two weeks to prepare for a two hour long show. Quite a task. I'm in three dances as of now and I'm also dealing with costumes for all parts of the show. So every day, I'm in meetings and rehearsals. For example, tomorrow I have Tai Chi from 6-7, French class from 7-8, Hip Hop Dance from 8-9, and Arabic Dance from 9-10. Not to mention they still haven't posted the time for Maldivian dance practice tomorrow. Wheew. I think it's all expecting a bit much. Hope it's worth it.

Tomorrow I start my 7th subject. The IB diploma only requires you to take 6 subjects, which is what most students do. However, I have a lot of free time because of when my 6 classes meet, so I thought it might be good to add a little bit extra to my education. I'll be taking Intro to Spanish and it should be easy considering I've had 3 years of Spanish instruction in the past. But still, it'll be good to be practicing and it will look good when I'm applying for University. I'm excited, class should be good.

The world sure is a surreal place to be. Two examples:

Earlier, me and Erik from Aland Islands and Ted from Sweden and Tove from Sweden went and laid down on the dock at the boathouse and put our heads upside down over the edge so that the sky and land were inverted. It was insane. The land was so dark and the fjord was so light, in addition to the fact that the fjord looks like a mirror. It was almost impossible to tell that we were upside down. So that makes one wonder, is everything in the world like that? Are we all theoretically upside down and we just don't know it? Ah, Summer, my Philosophy teacher, would be proud. :)

About 15 minutes ago, I come back in my room and turn my computer on. MSN is my homepage on Internet Explorer and it's just about my only link to current events and news. Anyways, MSNBC had a breaking news headline about a shooting at a college in Montreal. I thought it was either UQAM, McGill, or Concordia, but knowing the area, I was quite curious. I pull up the story and begin reading and suddenly the name appears: Dawson College. That's where I took my classes when I did the exchange program to Montreal. And just hours ago, a gunman opened fire in the cafeteria, the same cafeteria I ate in every day, and killed anywhere from 4-16 people. Out of all the places in the world, out of all the universities, and out of the number of places I've been, it just happened to be the innocent, small, college that I have fond memories of. It makes me feel very strangely, but I'm not sure exactly what the emotion is. Shock? Surprise? Disbelief? But more than all those as well. Hm.

Alright, time to attempt some Norwegian homework and then more Arabic dancing...hooray. Mkay, peace and love.

And so today, I dealt with a tragedy that has no importance in my new home. Quite strange to be in a place where I've felt the most cared for in my whole life, yet everyone is indifferent about today. I can't blame them though, I just never really thought about it. How Ameri-centric is that? That I just assumed that because Americans were in mourning today that the whole world was. I think it even affected me more because I was isolated from it. I went and sat down by the fjord and wrote in my Philosophy sketchbook and just mulled over what has become of my country and its people as a result of this day 5 years ago. Interesting. And even though I was the most homesick I've ever been today, it still wasn't impossible to deal with. It's necessary to feel certain things sometimes, so in a way it was relieving just to sit and think about home and let myself feel everything I wanted to. But it's late, and tomorrow's a new day. Peace and love, most importantly today of all days.

Civilization!

Hi everyone! So today I'm in an especially good mood because I was in a TOWN today! I got up at the crack of dawn to go into Forde (pronounced Firda), a town of about 15,000 people an hour away from campus. The bus ride there was absolutely incredible, I simply must go back and see some of the waterfalls we passed again. I've honestly never seen anything like white streams of water flowing down entire mountains into a fjord.

Forde was a much needed break from all the isolation and nature of the college. Every once in awhile, it's nice to just exercise some good old American capitalism and buy stuff. Haha. I almost cried because there are actual malls in Forde. They even have an H&M! I mean, Atlanta can't manage to get an H&M, but a town in the middle of nowhere, Norway has one. It was great, I wanted to buy everything.I walked around every inch of Forde, just to see what was there. I even managed to order a lunch of a calzone and a Coke. The calzone was heaven (hot food! pizza-like! familiar!), and the Coke was interesting. It's different than American Coke! Not in a bad way, just less sugar but thicker Coke syrup. Strange, right? I even figured out all on my own how to tell the people in the stores that I don't speak Norwegian. I was quite proud: Eg snakke ikkje norsk! Haha.

Even though most people spoke English, it was still a bit frustrating not to know Norwegian. I felt completely separated from everything that was going on around me. For some reason, I felt like everyone could tell that I didn't belong, you know? Like, I was walking around and doing the same things, but I was more of an observer from the outside looking in. It was such a strange, lonely feeling. Surreal, to say the least.

Sorry, no pictures of Forde as it wasn't really the most attractive place. To me, it sure looked like the most beautiful place in the world today, what with all the shops and restaurants, but in reality it's pretty ugly. Oh well. Obviously not all bad, because now I'm sitting here in some new clothes getting ready to read National Geographic! That's right, I managed to find a copy of the newest National Geographic in English! Quite a nice reminder of what I'm working towards here. Also, maybe it will help keep me a bit more in the loop about current events, which is nice. It's easy to get caught up in what I call the "bubble effect" here. It's like nothing can touch this campus or the people here. Anyways, time for some R&R before the cabin party tonight! Peace and love.

So I'm sitting here listening to it rain the hardest it has since I've been here and I'm wondering, can you really doubt everything? I mean, if I walk outside and feel raindrops, how can I doubt the knowledge that I am wet? But on the other hand, how can I not doubt that knowledge? Why is believing that rain gets me wet any different from believing that God exists? I think a combination of having Philosophy last period today and spending some time looking at the fjord has made me feel quite introspective and inqusitive. Ah, Descartes. I have to admit that although all this questioning is a bit tiring, I have begun to love philosophy. It's the only class that's completely new to me in format and in material, which is great. I guess you could argue that Norwegian is new, but they might as well call that class "Idiot Communication" instead of Nordic Communication because I literally leave there feeling stupider than when I went in. But I guess that is part of the joy of Scandanavia, the fact that they have their own little language cult that is not quite easy to join. Oh well.

I have to say that I've begun to feel badly about my horrible ability to keep up with my blog. My English teacher (hey Pete!) keeps a much more detailed and overall better blog than me, so if you ever want to check out anything actually good, visit his page. By the way, any help with posting photos would be greatly appreciated, I'm apparently not a computer wiz (surprising, right?).

Hard to believe that my second week of classes and third week of living here is almost over. And to think that I was so scared about both of those things: living here and classes. It seems so ridiculous now. For one thing, living here is so much easier than adjusting to living with a Vietnamese family in Montreal. It's even easier than every time I've moved around back in the States. For another thing, classes here are not impossible or unreasonable. If I've been surprised by anything, it's been by how well prepared I've been for all my subjects. I thought the American education system was such crap, what with all the propaganda Bill and Melinda Gates and Oprah are spreading around, but after being here I feel really fortunate to have already received the education I have. If I'm not ahead in a class, I'm at least right where I'm supposed to be. I'm not even overloaded with work, and the work I do have I don't mind doing. I have to say the part about not minding the work is new and a much appreciated change from good old North Gwinnett High School. But like I said, turns out NGHS might not be such a bad place after all. Amazing.

Well, time to go do a bit more history homework. Maybe another post tomorrow, but until then, go check out my photo blog. http://www.flickr.com/photos/vbondura. There are some pretty good pictures up so far, and way more to come. Okay, peace and love.

It's already been two weeks?

Hi all! Wheew, I honestly can't believe that two weeks have already passed! Part of me feels like I've always been here because I'm so comfortable, but the other part feels like the time is going by so quickly. It's strange. The weather's been pretty nice actually. It rains almost every morning but clears up and reaches about 70 degrees almost every afternoon. I even saw the Northern Lights the other night! Talk about amazing. The Haugland Center on campus is great, it has this huge hot pool that's like a massive jacuzzi, as well as saunas. I can already tell those are going to be really nice on some cold Norwegian mornings.

I've just finished my first week of classes, and it's all gone really well. I'm happy with all my classes, or at least happy with all my teachers, except for Norwegian. I haven't really learned much from that class, but being in Norway and surrounded by native speakers kind of forces you to gain an understanding of the language. My history teacher is a bit monotone, but the course material is really interesting. It's very focused on the U.S.S.R. and Stalin, which is cool because it's a subject I don't know very much about. Philosophy is also fascinating, albeit difficult because I'm the only native English speaker in my class. Try discussing empirical vs. a priori knowledge with non-English speakers! Oh well, still really great.

I'm also getting involved in some things around campus now. I'm going to work at the campus cafe that opens on Friday nights called Snikkerbua, which will be tons of fun. I'm also joining the college magazine as well as a debate group that puts on a presentation on controversial current events every Friday evening. It's just amazing to be able to debate global affairs with people who are actually living them. Like last week, we had Lebanese girl and an Israeli girl debate Hezbollah and the current conflict in the Middle East. Perhaps a bit heated, but also really interesting.

Alright well, this is getting a bit long so I should finish it up. I can already tell that I'm going to miss this place and this experience when it's all over. I caught myself talking to someone and referring to my room as "home" earlier this week, which is doubly nice and scary. And to think, I've only been here for two weeks!