AUTUMN EQUINOX, BLUEBERRIES & A FRIEND FROM HOME! Ashley, a former CU-Boulder student of mine, is studying in Sweden for the year and visited me in Oslo this weekend. It was nice to see a familiar face and talk in detail about the phat Illegal Pete's burrito and other Boulder nuances that are missed...
On Thursday p.m. my Norwegian classmate invited us to partake in the annual Aker River Light Festival. The walk is a celebration of the autumn equinox and we were among 25,000 Norwegians walking along the river being entertained by choirs, musicians, trolls, light sculptures and glowing ghosts. It was pretty cool...since we are losing sunlight quicker than Floyd Landis lost the yellow jersey.

On Saturday Ash & I went on a big hike-15km and stopped at the cutest little Norwegian cabin, Skjennungstua. This antiquated cabin was adorable and cozy. It is one of those little cabins where you just want to cuddle up in a fuzzy blanket with some hot tea and a good book. All of the cabins in the woods are known for their "homebaked goods" and this particular cabin baked delicious blueberry muffins and bread. We were inspired by the blueberry muffins and on our hike down the mountain, we stopped and picked wild blueberries and baked our own amazing muffins when we got home.
Photos: (1) Pre-Aker River light festival, tasting some aass beer (Ash, Preet, Ali & Me). (2) The light festival crowd and some crazy lights. (3-4) Ashley at Skjennungstua cabin and another shot of the cabin and the delicious baked goods. (5) Picking wild blueberries.

LOSING DAYLIGHT BY THE MINUTE! Fall is in the air and the leaves are beginning to fall. We are losing on average 4-5 minutes of daylight everyday. Today the sun rises at 7:03 a.m. and it goes down at 7:15 p.m. In 2 weeks, October 7 the sunrise is at 7:37 a.m. and the sunset at 6:33 p.m. On Halloween (which Norwegians DO NOT celebrate), October 31, the sunset will be at 4:25 p.m. Click HERE to see the nifty sunrise/set clock.
Photo: The Royal Palace in Oslo at sunset.

Happy Birthday Preet!
Tonight was too much fun...a whole lot of Indian food & homemade desserts ( Malodova apple cake, Pakistan coconut cake, American chocolate cake & Norwegian brownies).

There was a whole lotta aass (beer), cake fights, "action photos", feeding each other Norwegian brownies, homemade Naan bread, enough camera flashes to make it feel like a nightclub and there were even a few bollywood dance moves.

The longer I am HERE, the more I LOVE OSLO! Today, I finally had some free time. This past week has been pretty intense with classes, seminars and reading. Our semester schedule is much different than what I got used to in the States (10 LONG years ago), there is no consistency. We have 4 units this semester and we just finished up unit 2 in one week. Unit 2 covered literature, lectures and discussion on the "processes" of Higher Education which included: teaching & learning, curriculum, discipline classification and accreditation. Did you know that Europe just started accreditating Universities in the last 5 years? The U.S. has been doing it for over 50 years. The U.S. tends to be the model in many areas within Higher Education. But watch out, the EU is not too far behind, the European Commission on Higher Education came together in 2000 and developed initiatives with the intention of becoming the world leader in Higher Education by 2010. Not too sure that is going to happen, but some pretty cool and innovative initiatives (like this scholarship-Erasmus Mundus.) grew out of it.

Needless to say, I was more than ready for Friday (today)! So, this morning I had a class and then went to the Doctors office to get a prescription refill (that will be a whole different entry in my blog.) Then, I headed down to the pier, aker brygge which is just beautiful on a sunny fall afternoon. I sat on a bench down by the old (early 1900's) sail boats and ate a chicken tandoori sandwich while the seagulls befriended me and waited patiently for some bread. After some shopping at the aker brygge mall, I walked over to the Akershus Fortress, across the pier. I found a bench in the sun and unzipped the backpack and pulled out (yes!) my literature for Unit 3. Woo...I'm trying to stay ahead of the reading! And to be quite honest, I am thoroughly enjoying the material (some of my classmates think I'm crazy). It is SO interesting to me! I guess that means I chose the right program.

YOGA IN NORWEGIAN! I can officially say that I have taken a yoga class in a foreign language and still managed to reach the inner peace and tranquility that results from yogifying yourself. However, downward dog becomes extremely difficult when you are continuously looking up at the teacher to watch for the next pose.

I joined the rec center at the University, called Domus Athletica (see picture). It was 600kroner=96US for the fall semester and there are many FREE drop-in classes to choose from; cycling, aerobics, yoga, stretch, ball, etc. I actually looked into teaching a cycling class but it was too late in the semester.

Last week, Preet and I tried out our squash skills for the first time and it was quite entertaining (see picture). We hit the lighting fixture in the ceiling more than the wall. Domus is a nice facility and the cardio room is awesome! The equipment is top of the line...treadmills, circuit, free weights. But, if you go during the prime times (4-8 p.m.) you will probably be stuck waiting (time to check out all of the audacious hair-do's). I am also planning to join the ski & snowboard club even though I will only be here until December. From what I understand, they have weekly training nights which might be kinda fun plus I need to meet myself a Norwegian ski guide. Namaste

5 Hr. WALK IN THE WOODS x 2...You all know how much I love the great outdoors, the sun and the mountains! So, this weekend was probably one of the best weekends I have spent in Oslo. I discovered that right outside of the city limits there are an ungodly amount of forest trails. The topping on the cake: it was an unseasonably warm weekend for September (70 degrees).

The International Student Office here at the Uni. organizes excursions, movie series and trips for International students. I signed up for the "Walk in the Woods" on Saturday and discovered that the beautiful lake in my backyard (Sognsvann) is just the beginning of an amazing myriad of trails, lakes and cabins. I chose the "adventurous & hard" route and tour guide. It was a beautiful hike and we stopped along the route for some blueberry picking and some mushroom education (see pics). The trail was well marked, muddy and rocky...hence the "adventurous" description of this particular route. This trail also serves as a nordic trail in the winter.

A few of my Chinese classmates joined the hike and I met 2 really nice Germans who are here for a 3 month research project in Chemistry. There are many students who come here for a short period to conduct research. Anyhow, the hike ended about 5.5 kilo's from the bottom of the lake. There is a "serviced hut" at the top where you can purchase snack items and chocolate (chocolate is a BIG snack item here and it's really GOOD!) The trails are like major highways as many Norwegian families bike or walk to picnic at one of the many "serviced huts" on the weekend, especially on nice sunny days. The Norwegians LOVE the outdoors and the SUN...I think it's because there isn't much SUN in the winter. Something to look forward to...

On Sunday, a few of my classmates and I journeyed to the northern end of Oslo and discovered yet another load of trails. This area is the local ski hill-Tryvann and the views are incredible. It sits a little higher than the ski jump and you can see the entire Oslo fjord. After a few hours of hiking, we found the "serviced hut" and indulged in cinnamon rolls and the typical Norwegian b-fast-waffles with cream & jam. YUMMY!!!

10 More FUN FACTS!

1.) For all of my girls back home...check this out!!! The maternity leave here is 1 year off, 80% of your salary PAID! Can you believe that? And there is a bonus to that spankin' deal...it is mandatory that all daddy's (mack-daddy's) take off one month. Now I understand why there are so many baby-bearing women here in Oslo...I was starting to think there was something in the water.

2.) Forget the trash...it's called "rubbish"!

3.) New slang word..."bugga". That is a bugga! It comes from the British vernacular and it's quite a great word. Try it, "oh that is a bugga!" But be careful...bugger n. adj. v. Another superb multi-purpose Brit word. Buggery is sodomy but the word has far more uses than this. Calling someone a bugger is an inoffensive insult (in a similar way to "git") and telling someone to bugger off is a friendlier alternative to the f-word. It can also be used as a stand-alone expletive in a similar way to "bollocks" - "Oh, bugger!"

4.) The bread here in Oslo is to die for. It is full of grains and there is absolutely no white bread, except hot dog buns. Which brings me to my next fun fact...

5.) Norwegians LOVE their hotdogs. But, they are not American style weiners (not weimers), they are long and wrapped with bacon. Even as long as they are, they still insist to eat them on the short, white buns.

6.) Wine and alcohol are extremely expensive here in Norway. The liquor business is run by the government, hence they can jack up the price. A bottle of tequila costs 400NOK=64US and that's for a regular size bottle of Jose Cuervo. The typical wine price is 100NOK=16US and that's for a Jacob's Creek...sorry Aussies, but that's nothing too special.

7.) Norway is the most trustful country! Everyday I take public transportation to get to school, downtown, etc. and I have never been checked to see if I had paid the fare. Of course I have paid, but it blows my mind that there is no system of ensuring you have paid before jumping on the subway, bus, boat or lightrail. It gives me faith that the core of mankind is truthful and honest.

8.) Oh, how I could sink my teeth into an egg and cheese with tomato on Italiano (Moe's bagel)!

9.) The frozen pizzas here are pretty damn good. Almost Nick n Willy quality...ha, ha! My classmates and I had a frozen pizza party...we are truly college students.

10.) I found a FREE TV in the stairwell, that actually works really well. (See TV in the picture above.) We have free cable here so all I had to do was purchase a cable and I was good to go. Now, I can watch the Animal Planet 24/7. SWEET!

Photos: My room (top), Another troll (middle), Watch your head for ski-jumpers (middle), Ali (Brazilian) eating a PBJ for the first time EVER (bottom)

10 PAGE PAPER?! Folks, I have officially finished my first assignment, a 10 page paper. (Now that it's done, I will actually return your e-mails and not cut the on-line chat short.)I never knew that I would get so rusty at writing a bloody research paper. The last 10 years I mastered the art of writing memos, year end reports, M.O.U.'s and even leadership curriculum, but not research papers. Ugh! So, I found out real quick...like within a few minutes of sitting down to type my paper...that I needed to re-learn how to format references, how to site references properly (where does the comma go?) and how to formulate a well thought-out argument.

The topic was...What is the biggest challenge facing U.S. higher education? At first, I wanted to take it all on; funding, access, quality of teaching and the massification of Higher Ed. but I quickly came to my senses. I chose to argue that the quality of teaching/education is the biggest challenge. After numerous hours of research, writing, proofing, re-writes and toggling between dictionary.com and my paper...I'm done!!! A few hours before pressing the "send" button, I discovered an article about Harvard and how they are launching a huge new study to explore the possibilities of making "teaching" (not just research) a part of the tenure performance plan. Brilliant!!!

Our Masters Programme has a learning platform that is much like yahoo where you submit your assigment, check e-mail, chat, etc., it's called classfronter. (They are high-tech here in Norway!) So, I pushed the "send" button today at 1:34 p.m. and felt a load lift off my shoulder. Then I went home and took a 2 hour nap.

Ahhh...now it's the weekend and I will sleep in, go for a long hike tomorrow with some other international students, go shopping in the "cheaper" part of Oslo with some of my classmates and do my laundry (this could take me all day, as I have been putting this off.)

Photos: More photos from my extended weekend trip to the Fish Market in Bergen, Norway...perhaps, I should have been at home writing my paper?! P.S. that crab rocked my face off!

AN ODE to the CROCODILE HUNTER...Oh crikey! RIP!

I'VE FALLEN IN LOVE with ...Bergen, Norway! This western city in Norway is one of the most beautiful places I have traveled to. A few of my classmates and I decided to take a long weekend trip to Bergen, where the fjords are endless and the fish market is quite educational. A 6 hour train ride through some of the most beautiful countryside takes you to Myrdal, where we switched over to the Flam railway. This one hour train takes you down the valley of the fjords with stops at a waterfall complete with a cheesey tourist trap-a singing Norwegian in blue dress. We then hopped on a 5 hour boat "Fjordtroll" where we chilled out and took in the spectactular norwegian fjords. These fjords are just enormous and the little fishing villages are so quaint, colorful and the landscaping is soooo green (it rains a great deal)!

We arrived in Bergen just as the sun was setting and what a sight to be seen! In Bergen, I had the terrible misfortune (ha, ha) of being the only woman in a hostel full of men...many Aussies! In fact, I was the "token" woman in our hostel bunk room (thank goodness I brought my ear plugs, as I understand there was quite a symphony.) We made friends with our "bunk-mates"and hit the town, toured the city, ate a LOT of seafood at the fish market, rode the funicular to the city overlook, hiked around and somehow (after a few bottles of wine) got to talking about relationships. What a bunch of genuine, 30-something, single dudes with big hearts and a whole lotta baggage. All I gotta say is...women are ruthless!

We stayed in Bergen for 2 nights and then headed back home to Oslo. On the train back to Oslo, we sat by a U.S. Olympic swim coach, all I gotta say is this dude gives Americans a BAD name. He oozed that "full of himself" attitude that I have come to discover is the American stereotype.