Norway

Last week, I went to Norway! I was expecting to go sight seeing, hiking, and shopping, however, Norway revealed itself to be covered (an understatement) in snow. So, I couldn't see anything nor hike anywhere and did not go shopping because it is out the butt expensive there. So what did I do? Snowboarding and sledding!!!! WHOOOHOOO!!! Mission accomplished.

From the beginning....

I left Dublin on Wednesday and planned to return the following Monday. UCD has a lot of cool festivals that take priority over classes, so I took advantage of my canceled classes and booked a 50 euro round trip to Norway.
Apparently there are like 5 Oslos and I flew into the one farthest away from where I was staying. The Gustavsens, long time family-friends, kindly offered their home for me to sleep, eat delicious Norwegian food, and watch LA Ink. Mrs. Gustavsen even purchased my train tickets to and from the airport. What a wonderful family.
From the airport, I took a four hour train ride to a city called, Lillehammer, which was 45 minutes away from my final destination. Lillehammer is in the middle of nowhere. BUT! It was the host of the 1994 winter Olympics, which was a sign that I had to go snowboarding. So I did. It was grand. I did not get injured. Boo yeah.

The last day in Norway, I visited the Andviks and they fed me a wonderful dinner. We talked about the last time they came to visit us in the States and looked at videos and pictures of their family. Erlend also showed me some videos of him doing back flips on his snowboard. That guy is going to be some extreme master in parkour or snowboarding or any other extreme sport. The Andviks were a really amazing family and I was really blessed to visit with them.

Memorable things that happened:

1) Pulled off a huge indy at the terrain park
2) Chopped wood with Mr. Gustavsen
3) Ate a lot of awesome food
4) Ate the awesome food with A LOT of people (including the Gustavsens) who were not speaking English. It was like I was excused to zone out from interacting with people and focus on eating as much as possible. Pretty dandy for me.
5) Went sledding with Tina and Linn down a mountain and had their mom haul us back up with her car.
6) Went to Church
7) Went to Linn's school
8) Met Tyler, a guy who is a halfy, like myself, and is staying in Norway to learn the language because his dad didn't want to teach him. Maybe it's a sign.......

























That's all, folks.