Funny work permit story!

So... two posts in one day!! This one is just a funny, typical story!

I haven't technically received my work permit yet, I just had all of the forms and knew I would get it. But, the final step was to bring all of the forms to the immigration department at the police station. So, I had to wait for my uncle/boss/owner of the restaurant to have time to go with me to the police station.

So, yesterday, I woke up and got ready to go to the station. Well, I walk out to meet my uncle, who lives on a boat, and the police station is not boat accessible. And, we doesn't have a car, and there wasn't one we could borrow. So... he decided we would bike there! Then, over the next 30 minutes I was constantly convinced I was going to die. Not only have I not biked for a long time, but combine that with lots of loose gravel, hills, small roads with lots of cars and trucks, etc. and I was seeing my life flash before my eyes. And I didn't want to disappoint Alf Roald, so I was trying my best to both, keep up, and not die. Mission accomplished!

So we bike for 30 minutes, and fortunately, walked our bikes for the hardest parts, and get to the police station. Which.... has moved. There is a sign on the door that said the station moved 2 months ago, and the new location was about 5 miles away, through tunnels and along highways, and over bridges. So, we were totally stranded with only our bikes at the previous location of the police station. At this point I think we are done for the day and have to bike home. Alf Roald calls some relatives but none are available with a car. So, in true Alf style, he looks at all the cars in the parking lot, says it's crazy we can't use any of them, and then looks at the names of the companies still in the building. He finds one company he knows and goes upstairs to look around the office until he recognizes someone...

Success!! Not to my surprise, he knows the owner of the company, who leant us his Mercedes SUV! Apparently he is a developer and is building a new apartment complex near my house, and Alf told him to save him the largest one, he would buy it and move off the boat....

Anyway, so now we're in the car, driving to the new location of the police station. We successfully turned in all my paperwork, my credit card didn't work, we left, went to an atm, and came back to find ourselves 20th in line to get back to the window. (The first time, we were 5th). My uncle breaks in the line and goes up to the window, explains that we were there before and have all our papers. So we go in front of 20 people, spend 10 minutes at the window, and she said she'll call in a few days when my permit has been processed.

We drive back, return the car to the man, and bike back to the house. Alf gets on his boat and rides away!

So, that was quite the adventure!

Bergen!

So, since I haven't started working yet, I have been able to explore Bergen a lot by myself during the days and it is a great city! It's not very big, which, although different, I think will be really nice. It's strange, I feel like I am already recognizing people! There are not many people who live in my neighborhood, it could be called a suburb, but considering its history and layout, it is hardly a suburb. So I am recognizing some people on our bus and as I walk around the neighborhood, which I have been doing incessantly.

Bergen is situated around the harbor and has one main set of docks that make up the center of town, here it's called Bryggen. That is where the fish market is located, one of my favorite spots in the city! A great lunch for me has been to get a fresh, open-faced sandwich from the fish market, either smoked salmon, smoked whale (yup!), sweet shrimp, with cucumber, mayonnaise, and lemon, on delicious fresh bread. It's wonderful! And if I'm really going for it, I follow it up with a soft ice cream dipped in chocolate powder from a store right nearby. This ice cream was one of the things I always remembered about Norway, and it's just as good as I remember!

Anyway, after the fish market, to one side, the city goes directly uphill and is very steep. The city is nestled next to a mountain, Floyen (see my previous post) and then extends into the valley. But its a fantastic landmark, at any point, no matter how lost I am, I can look up at the mountain and see where I am in respect to different locations on the mountain. Very, very helpful! There are 7 mountains and 7 fjords around Bergen (I think it's famous for that) so no matter where you are in the city there are always fantastic views and scenery.

Many of my favorite things about Europe, coffee shops, cafes, bakeries, little neighborhoods bars, parks, abound in downtown Bergen, which makes a day alone in the city wonderful. From my last visit, I remembered a huge outdoor cafe/restaurant that was located outside of an old sardine factory. The factory has now been converted into artist's studios, performance spaces, concert rooms, and even a glass blowing studio. Fortunately I remembered how to get there and had a wonderful little sandwich and a beer and sat almost in the fjord, in a huge outdoor area that was very well populated, and looked at an amazing view of the city (pictures below). Then I went and spent about 30 minutes watching glassblowing and this woman made incredible wine and martini glasses of all shapes and colors. I loved it!

Anyway, below are pictures from my recent trips to Bergen!


Here is a picture down a street in the older part of the city


Another view of the city


The beginning of my transformation... new Euro shoes!


The view from my seat at the outdoor cafe at the sardine factory, and my Hansa beer (the beer of Bergen)


Another beautiful street in the older part of Bergen



This is the outdoor cafe at the old sardine factory



This is a big pond in the middle of the city, you can see the mountain to the right


Here I am! with my favorite dessert, the soft ice cream with chocolate powder... with the fjord in the background.


And here's Floyen, the mountain I use to not get lost, or find my way after I am lost...


And my favorite lunch! The open faced sandwich from the fish market.

The end of Easter holiday!

During Easter in Norway, everyone takes a vacation and all the stores close for 10 days. It started last Saturday and yesterday (Tuesday) was the first day stores opened again and everyone returned to work. Some stores opened briefly on Saturday so people could the necessities, but other than that, there is nothing open and no one works for ten days. What a concept, actually allowing people to have vacation and spend time with their families! It's wonderful. Everyone in Bergen goes to the mountains for the whole time and skis, snowboards, and cross country skis all week. Fortunately my cousin was still in town but other than that it was practically empty here. It has been nice and left me time to get settled and do some things around our house and get to know the restaurant and help there. So, Sunday, I went for my first hike with my cousin/roommate Stian. It was fantastic! It was not very long, took about 2 and a half hours total, but was nice and steep and had a wonderful view at the top. There are pictures below from the hike. After the hike we stopped at a gas station for milk and bread and came home. We watched a Norwegian movie about a detective, it was pretty disturbing, but apparently one of a series of about ten all with this same detective. Watching Norwegian with English subtitles or vice versa is really helping me learn the language!

Monday was the last day of the vacation and Stian (my cousin) was busy all day finishing my room, which until now was not painted and did not have a floor... But, Monday he finished everything but the baseboard so now I have a wonderful room! It is great, with a nice huge
window that I leave open during the day for the sunlight and fresh air, it's great! I went for another hike on Monday by myself and got very happily lost. I ended up at the location of our family's old farm and first house in the area, pictures below. The house isn't there anymore but some of the stones from the foundation remain, so on the left is a picture of where the house used to be. It was a beautiful hike and I discovered miles and miles of hiking trails that are about five minutes walking from my house, very exciting development! After my hike I was supposed to paint this tank at the restaurant with my uncle because we are going to store live cod there to display, and eventually cook and serve. So we had this project, which turned into quite the day! We went with his new girlfriend and another one of my cousin's, Gitte, who is also my uncle's daughter and the artist whose paintings are all over the restaurant, in our house, and I am now so lucky to have a huge painting of hers in my room! Anyway, she and her husband joined us as well. So my uncle set me up to paint and it was really hard, a shallow cement tank that I had to paint the sides and bottom, my knees were killing me! Fortunately, I switched with my uncle for a bit and got to relax in beautiful weather and chat and have some great wine. Then I finished the bottom and we all started to cook dinner. We made really great beef tenderloin with a fennel, brown butter, white wine sauce, potatoes, and tomatoes with balsamic. It was so good, and we ate it at a table right next to the fjord, it was fantastic!

My uncle really lives for the moment, so at one point he opened a $170 bottle of Chablis from Burgundy because "it wasn't selling well, so we may as well drink it!" It was a wonderful dinner, and everyone was laughing the whole time. Most of it was in Norwegian, so I would have to wait for someone to translate before I could laugh along. My cousin's husband was telling the funniest story (I only knew that because everyone else was laughing) and he was acting like a crab with his arms pulled up near his head and bent and talking so fast. It seemed like the funniest thing they had ever heard and I was laughing just because he looked so silly. But, when they finally translated, it was so much funnier! On May 17th, Independence Day, everyone wears traditional Norwegian clothing. So, he was impersonating a kid whose parent was trying to get one more year out of their outfit without buying a new one, and it doesn't fit, so they are stuck in these clothes that are way too small and they can't move... it was hilarious! He said they couldn't eat ice cream or anything because they were like a bomb that would explode if they had anything to eat or drink. Very, very funny. Anyway, it was a great night and I came home and went to sleep.

Tuesday (yesterday) everything was finally open so I took the bus into town! I was so excited to fnally get some things done and be in downtown Bergen! I bought a much-needed English-Norwegian dictionary and then started on another hike, this time up Floyen, the mountain right next to downtown Bergen. There is an automatic tram up to the top, which I have done before, but as I am training for the 4 or 7 mountain hike, I wanted to challenge myself and hike up the mountain. It was really a challenge for which I was neither mentally nor physically prepared. First of all, I was wearing my cute, first-time-in-Bergen, outfit, which is not ideal for long, mountain hikes, but I wanted to make a good first impression. Second, I didn't realize how sore I was from the hikes the two previous days. So there I was, the ill-dressed American, dripping sweat on her favorite purse, struggling with every step, while these Norwegians literally ran past me, I am convinced they have some mountain goat in their lineage... Needless to say, I was ecstatic when I made it to the top, and relatively delirious. I bought a water and some postcards, took some pictures, sat for a bit, and walked back down, which was much easier!

Once back in Bergen I sat at the outside patio of a restaurant, had some wine, read, and then ate mussels and a roll of huge shrimp and scallop with a wonderful chili dipping sauce. I deserved it! I walked around a bit more, figured out how to take the bus back home, and got home exhausted and pretty much went straight to sleep. It was a wonderful day and I am really excited to spend more time downtown! However.... the seven mountain hike is looking less feasible everyday. Maybe I will do just the four, I think the family is counting on me at this point.

If you have made it this far in this blog post, you get the best news of all!!! My six-month work permit has gone through and I am official!! As soon as I sign the paper work and get the stamp at the police station, I can start working! I met the general manager yesterday and he is excited for me to start working. I may be training before the end of the week! Yay! So that means I will be here for at least the next six months!

More to come... here are a lot of pictures!

A spot along my first hike where I sat and read for a bit. Ulriken (mountain) in the background.














View from the top of my second hike to the left.
Below, me, with the North Sea in the background. On this hike, the North Sea was to one side, and the city of Bergen and inland, was on the other side.

















Downtown Bergen, in the city center, looking out at the fjord.


I made it to the top of Floyen!


View of the city from about halfway up the mountain.


My wonderful dinner group! From the left, Gitte, the artist and my third cousin, her husband who tells the hilarious stories, Eilidh, Alf Roald's girlfriend, and Alf Roald, my uncle (my dad's cousin really) and owner of the restaurant, and my boss!


Our table set for dinner right next to the fjord!

I think next I will do a post about my house and where I live, with some pictures!

Jai Bor Har!

That means I live here!

Jai ar ikke por ferie har. (I am not on vacation here)

And that means... I also work here (Jai osso jobber har!) I'm learning.

So, my first project, with my incredible second cousin/boss was unbelievable! We are building a new dock/float for the island. We took a huge pipe and had to use the crane on the island, plus rope, plus a boat, plus a chainsaw, to cut it in half, get both halves on land, and then clean and power wash it. I must say, I missed the hardest part where he scuba dove to collect it from the bottom of the fjord where he was storing it, drilled holes, connected it to his boat, towed it to the other side of the island, made a chain the exact size of the pipe, and pulled the pipe through the chain to remove 2 feet or debris (seaweed, mussels, etc.) that had collected over the last two years since he bought it.

Anyway, our job was hard and interesting enough for me to realize how incredible the man is who I will be working under for the next however long.


So here I am operating the crane to move one half of the whole pipe around to empty the water, get it on land, and clean it. Quite the task.

Today (my first full day here) was amazing! I was woken up by Alf (my uncle/owner of the restaurant) around 9 to go have breakfast at his house. Well, he lives on a boat so breakfast was on the boat; he transformed the steering room into a kitchen and made a big Norwegian breakfast (toast, egg, bacon, cod caviar, pepperoni cheese in a tube, and beets) for us. Then we went straight to work and took the boat to the island and started this project. Then we had a little welcome party with the family from 12-2, Norwegian cardamom waffles with jelly and sour cream, and then we went straight back to work, which is when I took this picture. We finished our project, had some beer and sat at the restaurant, talked about everything, and then took the boat to Bergen.

Once in town, we walked to his favorite spots, ending at a sushi restaurant, where we didn't need a menu, he just told the chef there were two of us, and this came out....

My kind of place! It was incredible! We ran into some friends of my uncle's and then took the boat back to the house and here I am! An incredible first day!

Oh, the flight went great, everything was very easy. The room I am supposed to stay in currently doesn't have a floor or paint, but that is supposed to be fixed by Monday. My cousin/roommate is so nice and fun so that should work out wonderfully! Everyone has been so nice and I am learning a bit of Norwegian. My next update will be about the restaurant... stay tuned!

Countdown: 7 days!

Hada! (Norwegian for hello)

So with exactly one week before I board my one-way flight to Bergen, I decided to start my blog!

This time next week I will be filled with anxiety and sitting in a terminal in Dulles waiting for my plane to board. I am flying to Bergen, Norway, where I will be living for an unknown amount of time to pursue my culinary/restaurant interests. My second cousin, Alf Roald, owns a restaurant on an island in a fjord near Bergen, named Cornelius. Here is the website for the restaurant, http://www.cornelius-restauraunt.no

I will be working there, doing whatever they need me to do, serving, cooking, scuba diving, toilet cleaning, helicopter piloting, etc. I am very flexible.

So for the next week I am trying to live it up in DC, see as many people and places as possible while still maintaining my sanity and packing.

I hope to update the blog weekly with stories and pictures from this adventure! The tentative plan is something like this...

April 20- October 20: 6 month work permit to work at Cornelius
- November: travel around Norway
December- February/March: lease a car and drive from Norway to Spain, stopping in
various European countries and cities.
Ideally that will have me in Sevilla sometime in March, to spend 2 months with Cris, my
fantastic host mother from my study abroad, ending with Semana Santa and Feria
de Abril!
I would be home from all of this around May, 2010!

That plan is incredibly subject to change and actually does change almost everyday. I clearly have some thinking, research, and planning to do.

Whatever happens, I am very excited and encourage anyone to visit at any point! Have a country you've always wanted to visit? Done, I'll meet you there! I will work anything into my schedule, literally.

More to come! I mean, I haven't even left the country yet....