Vinter Ferie (February 18-26)

February 18th to the 26th was winter vacation! The first day I went to Åre (if you haven't read about that then you should click here and read it!)


On the Tuesday of vacation I went with Mamma, Pappa and Thea to a town called Røros. 


Every year they have a market where people come from all over to sell goods and food. It was officially started in 1854. 
When we first got there we walked up through the streets to a place where this huge crowd was gathered listening to people giving different speeches. Thea and I didn't find that particularly exciting so we moved on.

Mamma, Thea and I
There were tons of people there!

We walked back down the old, crowded streets of the town looking for somewhere we could buy lunch. One of the stands was selling moose burgers, so we each got one.

After we had eaten we walked up to see an old church in the town. It was very pretty.

We wandered around the narrow streets all afternoon, looking at goods, tasting different types of smoked sausage and fighting the ridiculous crowd while trying to keep our tempers down.  Thea and I got very annoyed with all the people there... 
We also found a sheep statue with really weird eyes.

There were so many different vendors and handicrafts. There were hand knit sweaters, hats, gloves and mittens in almost any color imaginable. There were trolls and dolls, hand made cups and taxidermy booths with mounted wild animals.
We got gløgg, a very special warm drink that is very common in the winter time here. We got to keep the nice mugs that it came in.
I bought a little doll dressed in traditional Sami clothes. The Sami people are indigenous to the northern most part of Norway, Sweden and Finland (Lapland).
After thoroughly exploring the outdoor market we stopped quickly at a smaller indoor one. There were more knitted goods and a lot of beautiful jewelry. 
On the car ride home I fell asleep and woke up at this cozy little restaurant and we ate dinner. I was exhausted.


My friend Kristin invited me to go on a hyttetur (cabin trip) on the second weekend of vacation with her and her Parents. (If you have been following my blog you should know who Kristin is... She has showed up quite a few times--especially in "Has it Really Been 21 Days?" and "Rubber Boots are a Girl's Best Friend")
We left Thursday night and drove to their cabin. When we got there it was dark. We strapped on our head lights and back packs, clicked on our cross country skis and headed up to their cabin. 
I'm sure you can imagine how amusing it was for them to watch me try to cross country ski...
With a heavy back pack on...
Up hill...
In the dark...
Eventually I made it. Their cabin was so nice!
We spent the evening playing card, then playing with the cards. 

Kristin is very good at building card houses!

Me on the other hand....

It looked really good for a second there.
We went to bed really late Thursday night and slept in a bit Friday morning.
"A bit"...
We were eating breakfast while Kristin's father was eating lunch...
Friday was an absolutely gorgeous day so we decided we should go to the ski area. 
The plan was that Kristin would go skiing and I would rent a snowboard.
We got to the ski area and they actually had a pretty nice snowboard that I could rent and it was really cheap too! Only like 20 dollars (which amazed me because everything in Norway is SO expensive). So I was about to pay for the board and the guy said they didn't have any boots I could rent...
Wait.... What?
So I wound up having to rent (wait for it..)
Down Hill Skis
Dun dunn dunnnnnn.....
There are absolutely no words to describe how terrified I was.
However, I figured I might as well try. It was a gorgeous day.

That picture was taken at the top of the mountain, before I had tried to ski at all.
The smile didn't last for long.
Thank god Kristin was so patient... The first run was horrible. I couldn't figure out how to control the skis, I couldn't turn, I always fell (once even on Kristin).
I was absolutely terrified. 
A hill that would have taken me about 7 or 8  minutes TOPS on a snowboard took me an hour and fifteen minutes.
That's right:
One hour. Fifteen minutes.
It was scary, it was painful, it was embarrassing but I tried again.

At least the T-lift wasn't so terrifying... My second time I showed a little improvement, but not much...

Just look at that form! I make every skier ever so proud.

By the third run, I kid you not, it took me LESS than 15 minutes to get down the mountain. I took more than an hour off my original time.

However, I fell. Well, I fell a lot, but this time I fell really hard and hit my head, really hard...
We went once more. I was doing pretty good, feeling more confident, starting to have fun and maybe being able to see why people enjoy skiing. Until...
Until I fell. Again. Worse than ever. 
Sometimes when you fall in a certain way it immediately sends your body into shock. It happened to me. I couldn't move... I couldn't feel anything for a moment. I opened my eyes and saw my ski lying at an impossible angle: the only way it could be in that direction is if my left leg was horribly mangled and broken in a couple places.
Panic swept over me.
Then the pain came. 
Then all other feelings and I could tell nothing was broken. 
Thank goodness!
Now, being a snowboarder, I am used to my board staying on, so it never even came to my mind that skis detach sometimes.
Yard Sale...
It took me a few minutes to straighten out my crooked limbs, compose myself and click my ski back on (that took the longest). 
Oh, did I mention I was only about 30 yards away from the bottom of the hill? So everyone saw this happen.
The only thing hurting more than my ego was my neck and head (which actually continued to hurt for more than a week). 
After that fall, I had to call it a day. I told Kristin that she should go a few more runs because there was half an hour or so until the lifts closed and I felt bad for making her go so slow (and for only 4 runs) since we started. I went inside the tiny ski lodge and ate an orange.


I'm really not sure if this video will be able to play or not, but I might as well try to upload it. 
My form is horrible, I look awkward and I nearly get run down by two little kids, but considering it was my first time ever trying to ski I think I did alright.

(by the way, this wasn't THE fall... not even close.)


Later that night we watched a few movies and played cards again. We also built more card towers.

5 Stories! 


On Saturday we slept in again. When we were finally up and ready to go we got on our outdoor clothes and went cross country skiing! 
I enjoyed this quite a bit more than the attempt at alpine. It was much less terrifying.
It was a gorgeous day.

Posing for a picture....

Then I fell...

Typical.

To get to the cabin we had to ski there (as I mentioned earlier). 

It is also up hill.

True to form... I fell...

Again, typical...

They had to shovel the snow off the top of their cabin and this created a great opportunity to jump into HUGE snowbanks. We had quite a bit of fun doing that on Saturday.

Kristin

Avery

Kristin

Avery

Rough landing?

Here we go...

Saturday night Kristin succeed in what seemed to be the impossible: a six story house of cards.

Look at that!

Sturdy?

 While Kristin's talent seemed to be building amazing card towers, I discovered I was very good at making a monkey puppet dance.

Super talented....

We watched some more movies and, again, stayed up very late. It was so much fun! Sunday we packed up and washed the cabin a bit then we left for home. 


I had a very good time with Kristin and her family. I am so glad they invited me to their cabin with them! 
Overall it was a great winter break, but I can't believe that time is going by so quickly!

Crashed Ice World Championship: Åre 2012!

Today I went to Åre for the first time!
What's Åre?
It is a ski town in Sweden about 2 hours away from where I live in Hegra.
Today they held the world championship of down hill ice skating.

I didn't even know it existed until about a week or two ago when Pappa decided this would be a good way to spend the first day of vacation. And, indeed it was a great way to spend the day!
We left Hegra a little after 8 and headed to Åre. Before we went into the town, we made a couple of stops at stores first. We went to the liquor store and then the grocery store. I got some chocolate for the AFS weekend that is coming up soon! Yum!
Also we bought Cheez ballz which are the best thing on the face of the planet!

The result of letting Thea, Pappa and I loose in a store...

We drove into the town and went shopping a little more. We looked at some clothes, bought some candy and eventually we made our way up the hill to where the track for the skating was.
We were greeted by a peppy young woman with collagen lips and an iPad. She explained (in Swedish) that we could bet on who was going to win the championship tonight. I understood enough to get the general idea of what we had to do. There were only two Americans on the list, the brothers Andrew and Daniel Bergeson from Duluth.

I decided I would try to bet on Andrew but for some reason I couldn't, so I placed my bet on Daniel! Thea bet on a Canadian and Pappa bet on a Swede.
The competition wasn't until 6 p.m. so we didn't actually get to see any races, but we did see them practicing!

It was really impressive! I know if I tried to do that it would wind up worse than swing dancing (if you have yet to read about my pathetic attempts to dance, you can just click here!)
We saw an American come down the track once! I got so excited and really wanted to go talk to him but then chickened out and decided I was hungry (what does that have to do with anything?).
After watching a few runs Thea and I decided we would go to Max to eat.
We had burgers.
Ahh, I guess I should say Pappa and Thea ate burgers. I ate ketchup with a little bit of burger on the side... They make fun of me so much for my (border-line-disgusting) love of ketchup, but like the Great Ben Franklin once said, "Eat to please thyself..."
After lunch we got new tee-shirts and I bought a hat for myself! Almost everyone there was walking around with either one of two hats on, the cap or the beanie (I got the beanie).
I decided not to put my on yet.
We looked in a few more shops and Pappa got some guy to give me a little black sheep stuffed animal.
We were going to leave when I spied some Burton gear in a shop window and I just had to go check it out Burton  is a Vermont company and also they claim the title of having the world's very first snowboard factory! I dragged Thea along with me (but I asked Pappa to hold my wallet before I went in because I really didn't need to spend any more money...) and I drooled over the colorful jackets, snow pants and boots, the sparkly bindings and bright boards.

When we came out of the store Pappa was talking to some people.. big surprise! He is one of the friendliest people I have ever met.
The lady he was talking to was explaining how the computer thing they were looking at worked. She said she would help me next but then one of the guys there said he could show me on another screen. He gave me a red bracelet and told me to scan it and sign into my Facebook. One of his friends came over and they were talking. Once I was signed in he gave me some instructions and I was able to do the first few steps but then I didn't understand what he said after that... He was speaking Swedish after all... That's right, I understand a limited amount of Swedish too! The languages are relatively similar.
Anyways, I got a little flustered and muttered some words, part in Norwegian, part in English and part incoherently.
They stared blankly at me..
I looked at them.
I'm sure you all know that little feeling in your stomach when it tightens, then you get butterflies, then your face gets hot and you get light headed all in just a few seconds.
Paaaanic!
What the heck did I just say to them? I didn't even understand me....
I shook my head a little: "Oh, I'm so sorry... Do you speak English?"
Their half confused frowns immediately broke into wide, patient grins.
"Ahh, of course we do! Where are you from?"
I gave the whole "Vermont, USA to Norway exchange student for the year" explanation.
So after that he finished explaining to me in English. The computer took a picture of me and posted it on my Facebook.

Then he told me if I wanted to take another pictured I just had to swipe the red bracelet but I didn't have to sign into Facebook again. I figured, why not? so I swiped the bracelet and the guy's friend pretended to jump into the picture, laughed and stepped back out. I laughed too and motioned for him to come back.

A lovely picture!
Once it had been snapped the guy that was helping me was like "There, now that is posted to your Facebook too!"
Wait...
What?
The guy in the picture with me was like "Oh no! I didn't realize that would go to your Facebook! I'm SO sorry!!!"
I cracked up.
"I didn't know it would go to my Facebook either... Don't worry about it."
After I found out that my bracelet sent the pictures directly to Facebook I invited Thea to join me.
Then Pappa.

When we were done with our photo shoot, we decided it was probably time to go home.
On the way home Pappa said we were going to stop at a museum for a little while.
On the way there we came across a car.

Do you see it?
We thought that was absolutely hilarious.
The museum was about an old trade route and an open mine that was a really special type of rock.

We ate waffles while we were there and they were some of the best I have ever tasted.

The ride home was interesting to say the least. Thea and I had eaten quite a bit of sugar and we had both gotten free Red Bull because they are the sponsors of the Crashed Ice World Championship going on today.
Yeah... just use your imagination....

We got home and Pappa and I found a live stream of the competition on the internet. Two Americans were competing and imagine my surprise when neither of them were Bergeson's....
One of the Americans was eliminated in the quarter finals, and the second one, Tigh Isaac, fell and was eliminated in the semi-finals.
The final race was really exciting! The guy favored to win was from Finland and he wound up falling pretty hard and came in third. A Canadian boy took the race.
Congratulations Adam Horst!

I don't quite understand how it works but I believe the World Championship is more like a tournament and this was just the part in Åre. Next the boys are off to Quebec. Where they place in each competition gives them points to add to their final score and I think the one who ends with the most points wins (but I really don't know how it works for sure).

Anyways.....

I think I found a new favorite sport.

Mid Year Stay and Mother's Day

Two weekends ago my AFS region (Region 4!) had our Midyear Orientation camp.
Thursday I packed my bags... I had a ton of stuff.
The list of things AFS always tells us to bring is super long. I needed indoor clothes, outdoor clothes, indoor/outdoor shoes, skis, sled, snacks, towels, sheets, sleeping bag etc...
Friday after school Mila (the Italian AFSer who goes to my school too) and I went to the bus station. The bus was supposed to come at 4. We got there a little before 4.
We waited...
and waited....
and waited.....
It was 4.

It was 4:05.

It was 4:15

4:30.

We were getting really nervous that we missed the bus because we didn't actually know if we were supposed to be taking a public bus or if AFS was sending a bus to pick us up.

Another Italian AFSer (Alessandro) who lives in a town somewhat near Stjørdal came and met us at the bus station. Mila and I were a bit stressed, but when Alessandro got there we felt better because his host mom is very involved with AFS so she could have helped us if we had missed the bus.
Finally the bus arrived and it turns out that AFS had a bus for all of us, so when we put our stuff under the bus and got on everyone was there!! I was so excited to see everyone again.
The bus ride for me was less than 2 hours, but some people had been on the bus for over 10 hours!
When we finally got to the cabin we were staying at, we unloaded the bus and we all tumbled into the cabin, loaded down with our giant bags and our skis.
Tripping and sliding down the hallway we desperately checked the lists on the doors.. Who will I room with this time?!?!
I got to the very last two rooms in the hall.. Did I miss my name.. I looked to the right... Not my room. I looked to the left...
Finally found it!
Avery (USA), Sofia (Mexico), Michela (Italy) and Zeynep (Turkey).
What good room mates!
However, Zeynep and the other Sofia (USA) decided to switch rooms so our room became Avery, Michela and Sofia x2. It was almost a replay of last camp!
For dinner they served us very over cooked spaghetti. It was delicious.
We did a group activity where we had some candles on the table and for every good thing about Norway and our year so far we would light a candle, and for every bad thing we would blow one out. There always had to be one candle lit so if we made it down to just one, people had to say good things, and if all of them were lit then people had to say bad things. It was actually very cozy and a fun activity because we got to hear about how other peoples years were going.
On Saturday we went cross country skiing! It was a lot of fun! We went on a really long trip. I fell once going down a big hill and then one more time when I was working my way up a hill and stopped to rest. I was standing there and my legs just collapsed from under me and I fell in a heap on the trail. I cracked up... I wonder what the girl behind me was thinking...
Saturday night we had a birthday cake for one of the Italian boys, who was turning 18 that day (I feel soo old! I can't believe I will turn 20 this year! What?)
Anyways, it was great to finally see everyone again and have a chance to talk in person. I actually was able to talk with a few more people this time than before because they are shy about speaking English but now we can have a basic conversation in Norwegian!
Here: enjoy some awesome pictures of some awesome people!

Sliding down the hall!

Can't have fun without chocolate!

Kiwi 

Gotta love 'em

Twinsies!

...?

Hahahaha :)

Kyss

Ski trip!

Region 4!

This past weekend was pretty interesting also. Friday night I went to a birthday party for the boy who turned 18 over the AFS weekend. It was so much fun! there were 5 other AFSers there and a ton of his friends from school. I made so many new friends! It was great. We stayed up so late... or I should say we stayed up until it was disgustingly early. Saturday morning I took a train home early to get to school. Yup. You read that correct.
On Saturday I took the train home early to get to school.
Ole Vig (the high school I attend) has been under constructions since I got here. They were building a new gym and finally have finished! Saturday we had an open school so a lot of people from the community came to see the spiffy new gym and lunch room area. The gym is HUGE and extremely impressive (maybe 3 or 4 times the size of the Otter Valley gym). Even though it was really inconvenient to have to go on long detours just to go from class to class, I am very glad that I was here before they were finished with it. If the gym had been done when I first got here, that would just be normal for me... In my mind the school would always have been that way, but since I was here for all the construction I realize how amazing the new part is.
School wasn't that bad since classes were only 45 minutes each instead of the regular hour. We didn't really do much. Also, for the first time in a very long time I ate in the cafeteria (normally my friends and I eat in one of the various class rooms closer to where we have our classes).
Now let me tell you a little story:
When I was new to Norway, new to Ole Vig and couldn't speak the language yet, everything was a little bit overwhelming. I was getting used to my school schedule and I had a lot of free time. I had people I considered my friends, but let's be honest... I spent quite a bit of time by myself in those "early days". I didn't mind much because I could amuse myself by surfing the web on my computer. I would sit in the cafeteria between my classes. There are two banners that I noticed at the beginning of the year and I was really curious what they said. I thought I should ask someone but I only ever remembered when I was alone. My other option was to google-translate it and then a thought came to me... I can wait! When I can read them, I will know that I have a good handle on the language.
Then I forgot about my challenge to myself.
Well, like I said, on Saturday I sat in the cafeteria for the first time in a very long time. I looked up and all of a sudden I understood! I turned around to see the second banner and I understood that one too! I got so excited and told this to the girls I was sitting with.
The banners say that we all have to clean up our own trash and the other one asks if we remembered to clean up after ourselves.
Small victories.
I have also officially changed my facebook info to say that I know how to speak English and Norwegian.
Anyways, Saturday Mamma and Pappa came to see the new gym and when I was done with class I met them at Hos Oss.
Sunday was a very special day for two reasons. First, it was Morsdagen! Mother's Day!
Second, it was the one day of the year that Pappa's horse group all gets together and goes for a sleigh ride! We drove to one of the neighbor's houses at 10 and hooked up two sleighs: One for Pappa and I and one for the neighbor and his wife and Mamma. We set off to meet the larger group at another person's farm at 11. We were about five minutes late and the rest of the group had started off already. We followed their path up a hill and eventually we caught up because they had taken a little break. There were 10 horses total. We went for about an hour and a half. It had snowed on Friday night so there was a fresh blanket of snow covering everything. It was lovely!
I got to drive the sleigh for a little while! When we finally got to a little cabin up in the woods, we ate lunch. They had dug a fire pit in the snow with a bench around it made from snow. We took the furs from the sleighs and sat them on the snow and all snuggled in. We cooked hot dogs over the fire and ate some chocolate. After relaxing for a little while and looking in the nearly 200 year old cabin, we got back in the sleighs and went home. Going home took a considerably a shorter amount of time because the horses were all excited to be headed home. As we went, the group split every time we came to a fork in the road. Eventually it was just us again. When we got back the horses got some grain and we left.

Happy Mother's Day!

150 year old sleigh

I got to control it all by my self! :)

Norway is beautiful!

Mamma with all the furs

The fire pit a.k.a. where we cooked lunch

Old cabin

We had sodd for dinner, which is a very Norwegian meal. It is a type of soup with meatballs in it. It was Mamma, Pappa, Kristian, Christine, Kristoffer, Louise and I. Thea would have come but she was working (she came later in the evening). After dinner we went up to visit Bestemor. When we got there onkel Egil was there. Thea came soon afterwards. We ate cake. Also I want to thank everyone that gave tulips online to my Mamma for mother's day to help show her how much I love her! We got well over 150 tulips!
Anyways, it was a very nice evening together.

Mamma, me, bestemor and Christine

Mamma's cake

This past week has flown by! I can't believe it is Friday already!
And you know what that means?
WINTER VACATION!
I am free from school for a full week!

Happy Mother's Day!
I love my Mamma.

Just a little picture to entertain everybody between bigger posts.. This is absolutely true!

Little Update

I went nearly a full two weeks without seeing my sister. She was the last one I saw in the airport when i flew to Oslo, but I didn't see her until the Friday (January 27) after I got back. After school that day I went to her house. I told her I would be there at 3:30, but then I found out I didn't have to go to my history class that day so I texted her and said I would be there at 2:30. When I got to my last class of the day, my teacher excused me so I sent Thea another text and walked to her house at 1:30. We went to some stores to get a few things then drove to Maren's house to get my bag out of Johan's car.

For dinner we went to Kristian's house. We played with his kids while he made dinner. 

We had tacos!!! 

After dinner I we went back to Thea's house and I got ready to go to the last school party. Thea braided my hair very nicely (I wish I had taken a picture! I'll just make her do it again sometime) The braid wrapped almost all the way around my head and then the end that was loose was tucked back under so you couldn't see it. I got quite a few compliments on it.
I went to Kristin's house (after having quite of bit of difficulty finding it) and together we walked to Julie's house and her dad drove us to Skatval, where the party was. It was kind of a lame party (it was mostly younger kids and there were a couple of fights) but I still had a lot of fun because I was with Kristin and Julie.

Also since my work week I tried ice hockey. It was so much fun and I didn't fall once, but I wasn't particularly helpful to the team I was on. I would see the puck was headed down to one side of the rink so I would set out to get there, but by the time I reached the correct end, the puck had gone back and forth about 3 or 4 more times.
Eventually I just gave up on playing and went off to the side and skated around a bit with one of the other people there.

And finally I have been cross country skiing. There is a freshly made track in the field right in front of my house so Tuesday after school I went out for a little while. It was a lot of fun but a lot of work. I hadn't skied for many years.
I fell twice.
One of those times I was standing still.
Look at me go... I think I'm on my way to being a pro skier!
Maybe not...

I just finished a biology test, and thanks to Mrs. Fretta and AP Bio last year, I don't think I failed it! I understood all of the questions (which were in Norwegian) but I had to write in English because I don't know enough yet to explain different concepts.

After school today I am going to my midyear-stay with AFS. We will be together until Sunday. I am so excited to see everybody again!
When I come back Sunday evening, I will go to Thea's house and we are going to watch the super bowl! I can't wait!
It should be an exciting weekend.