Christy Anderson Brekken

Nord-Norge Adventure Wednesday, Part 1: Alta

Continuing on our North-Norway tour during the kid’s winter holiday week. We flew from Fauske to Alta, in the far north. We spent a few hours in Alta where we had lunch, met a Portlander working in the tourist office, and visited the Northern Lights Cathedral and museum.

Alta is a cool little town way up in the northernmost region of Norway. There are a few other towns nearby that are farther north, but Alta is also on a fjord and it gets the jet stream, so temperatures are very reasonable, around 20 degrees while we were there. It’s also at the perfect place to see the Northern Lights and has been a base for Northern Lights viewing for decades (or more–the details from the Northern Lights Museum allude me now!)

Use the photo gallery to see some pictures and captions (I don’t know why they don’t load in order, sorry about that, make sure to get them all while I figure out how to fix it). More to come very soon from the rest of our trip!

On Sunday we took the train up to Fauske, well above the Arctic Circle, about a 9 hour ride from Trondheim. Trond was here with Hanna, and Aksel visiting his parents, Elsa and Hans-Ole. They were some of the first people to meet Anders when he was born, so it was a treat to be back to visit.

We’ve shared many meals, got the kids out to a sledding hill, and went downtown today to look around and buy a few supplies for the far north. Tomorrow morning we leave for a visit to the snow hotel in Alta. Pictures of that to come on the weekend!

It was Åpen Dager (Open Days) at the school this week. On Tuesday, Nora’s class didn’t go to school until noon, then they did a half hour presentation for parents at 3:30. After the presentation, everyone stayed to have a snack at the “kafe” with finger foods, coffee, and juice provided by parents. Then we did it all again on Wednesday for Anders’ class!

For Nora’s class, they sang a song, then Nora and Naomi did a presentation on Saturn in English, several other kids did other presentations, then there was a circle dance number by the other 4th grade class. During the kafe, we were invited to bring along our knitting because their class has been doing embroidery, finger knitting, and knitting on needles in the past week. Lots of people were helping kids with their knitting, and although I brought my knitting, I didn’t get a chance to take it out. I did have a little chat with another parent for a bit.

In Anders class, they showed off their rock band class. Each class played, so we got 3 songs. If you look beyond the line of singing girls, you might see Anders’ head back there playing the bass. It was quite a sight! Each group had 2-3 drummers, 2-3 bass players, 2-3 guitars, 3 keyboards, and a whole lot of singers. No backing track needed. They had not practiced their songs much so…it was pretty cool that they could stay together.

After the songs, we saw the artwork that the kids have been doing. They were trying to replicate famous paintings. Anders did “The Sun” by Edvard Munch. He was so frustrated by it while they were doing it, but it turned out great. We also stayed for the kafe. We got to meet some of his friends and their parents. I talked to a mom who is in charge of building the major road and bridge projects around the country. Pretty cool. I also had a long talk with Kristine’s mom, the girl that Anders is getting a ride with from handball to band on Tuesdays. I tried in Norwegian but she just kept going to English, so I went with it. After Anders got home his Tuesday, he was pretty pleased about chatting with Kristine’s mom in the car, and she texted that my boy is nice and polite. Today she said that he sounds good in Norwegian too, and actually tried talking to her. He told her that his main goal for his time here is learning Norwegian, so now I’ll have to remind him of that to make him keep practicing.

I also learned that I was speaking “backward” when I asked Kristine if Anders could have a ride the first time. It’s tough talking with kids, they expect perfection from adults! Kristine was particularly tickled by that because she worked so hard to figure out the verb-noun order in English, which is reverse of Norwegian when asking questions, so I guess that I was all mixed up. She is nervous about speaking English, so I guess it’s good to be a role model for bring brave and giving it a try!

Tomorrow Nora’s class is going into the woods all day for a hike and campfire. All day! Anders’ class is going downtown to a performance of the Trondheim Symphony. Fun week of school for them.

Anders also got the team training suit for his handball team. We even got his name printed on it. He actually got a little tear in his eye when he was saying thank you. Conveniently, it is Beavers colors. He has his own handball too.

I’ve also been doing some knitting while we have been watching chess, curling, women’s hockey, and a scattering of other Olympic events. Nora has a new pair of leg warmers, and Anders has a new pair of slippers. My slippers have a hole in them so I intended to knit them for myself, but they turned out too big and I’m not fond of this style, and he was THRILLED to get them. Today his feet were taking turns with the one that I was finished with while I made the other. Now he has them both on. 

We took the bus up to Bymarka today with half of Trondheim to cross country ski. It was a nice day and we had some new snow this week, but windy. Bymarka is the home of some of this year’s Olympic cross country skiers, including Johannes Hosflot Klaebo, a favorite to win several medals this year. We saw so many people, young and old, babies pulled in pulks (sleds), or in a kind of bike trailer on skis. There were also plenty of international students trying out the national sport as well, so we weren’t the only novices on the slopes.

Bymarka is a forest nestled among the hills around Trondheim, so there was very little flat out there. We did plenty of downhill, Anders does great and Nora got the hang of it. I was not ashamed of taking off my skis for a steep downhill. Ted and I both felt like our skis were not quite right for us, although I readily admit that I’m afraid of speed if I am not confident in my ability to stop. It’s not just the skis for me. And with downhills come uphills! Getting up a hill on skis is no small feat. We got quite a full-body workout. At the end Nora and I took off our skis and just hiked uphill in our boots too.

Trondheim’s ski culture is amazing, and the network of trails is incredible. There are also “hyttas” (cabins) and skistue (ski “rooms”) that serve snacks, have places to rest inside and bathrooms. You can take a bus up to one hub and ski to another hytta or stue that are served by another bus or tram service, so you can make a whole day out of it and don’t have to turn around and go back to your starting place. We talked with a family that was doing that today, but the trip was too long and uncertain for us for a first time out.

We got home in the early afternoon and took it easy. Now we are exhausted and happy for bedtime.

Now more pictures in the gallery (click one to start), some of them are by Anders.

We went out for a tour today with our borrowed skis. We went on the trails that are part of my walk to work, quite flat and open spaces. With new snow this week, it was perfect.

We had to walk for about 15 minutes from our house to the top of the downhill ski hill, then through a neighborhood to get to the trails. Carrying the skis is a bit of a drag, but it’s great that you can walk in cross country boots, so we didn’t have to carry boots too.

Our pictures make it seem like we are alone, but there were lots of people out, especially as the morning turned into afternoon–families, older folks, college students, tiny kids, and plenty of people out for a good workout.

Ted also packed us a nice snack of sandwiches, tea and hot chocolate. For a first timing outing with the kids, it was good to go down a few paths, then stop for a snack, then take a few more paths before taking the walk back home.

Everyone was a good sport, Nora fell down lots of times, I fell down a few times (I need to practice going downhill and slowing down), Ted dove off the track as he was on a fast downhill because a little kid was on the track coming his way and wasn’t moving. He is such a hero.

Anders is rock solid!  He brought along his camera and got some of these great pictures.

We were only out for a few hours, but it was a great way to get a start, especially for Nora. She is always reluctant to try something new, especially something outdoors. But once she gets outside, she is happy. And as long as she can talk constantly about Harry Potter or whatever happens to come to mind at the moment. Then she is all good. Tomorrow I hope that we can go out for another tour.

We are also enjoying some authentic Norwegian TV viewing. First, chess with Magnus Carlsen, current World Chess Champion and a grandmaster at the age of 13, on both Friday and Saturday nights. Chess on TV! This was a Fisher random match, where the board starts out in a random configuration. They had heart rate monitors on the players to display their pulse. Magnus had a heart rate around 80 almost the whole time, he’s one cool customer. The American he was playing was up in the 120s most of the time. They have constant commentators, scoring showing advantage for one or the other, and they display messages from viewers. Last night, everyone was either knitting or eating tacos (or both), according to the messages that they were sending in. Tonight, Anders sent in an email and it was posted on the program! It says “We are Americans in Norway, you can win Magnus! All my family hopes you can do it!” He was so excited that it was displayed that he couldn’t get a picture of the whole screen in time!

We are also enjoying the Olympics. We have to keep up with the country’s great sports, like women’s cross country this morning, where a Norwegian skier won silver, and biathlon this afternoon. The top-rated male cross country skier is from Trondheim, so that’s exciting. And the Norwegian mixed doubles curling team is killing it! We’ve watched a lot of their matches last night and today. More than once I have heard the words “that’s astounding!” uttered near me. It’s pretty impressive.

Nora has been at her friend’s house across the hall all afternoon and evening. Their big project: Making a pie! They went to the store on their own to buy ingredients and everything. Pretty cute, and we get half of a pie!

School Report: The kids are happy to go to school every day, although they seem to get by without working too hard at Norwegian. They have friends who are more than happy to speak to them in English, and translate for them. Everyone brings their own lunch from home and eats at their desks with the kids that are assigned to sit near them. Anders forgot his lunch today and said no one noticed, so he came home hungry–I was wondering what they do if a kid forgot but he didn’t want to find out. I challenged Anders to practice some questions in Norwegian to get the kids talking about something in Norwegian, so he knows the subject of the conversation at least. He tried it out a bit this week. He thinks he is understanding about half of what is said to him. Who knows with Nora, she will cruise along as much as possible, but she does get extra Norwegian homework that she does with Ted, who is also learning. But that’s reading and writing. I still trust that something is sinking in for her.

Anders had to read the newspaper all week for a quiz that they are having on Friday, which is good news for me because I get a newspaper! I can read about 1 article per day with breakfast because it takes so long, so this week of newspapers will last me a month. He was intrigued by the guy’s mustache in the photo. Trondheim has a mustache club, so maybe he is a member. But he was really talking about the rise in credit card debt, likely due to social media creating a “luxury trap” where you feel like you need fancy new things to show off. Good lessons.

The kids’ classes each have an “open day” after school next week where parents come to see the work that they have been doing in class. Nora’s class started knitting this week, yay!, so parents are welcome to bring along our knitting and it for a snack while we knit and help the kids! This is my kind of parent school event! I look forward to seeing if lots of other parents come to knit too, but it looks like there will be lots of snacks–hot dogs, pastries, coffee, soda. I don’t know what Anders’ class is doing yet, but they have been studying electricity. Maybe Ted will have his own circuit-building-kafe.

Sports Report: Anders is trying out handball and enjoys it so far (he is in the black shirt and green shorts). He can play on Tuesdays and Fridays. I met the coach this week, who was very enthusiastic about Anders’ participation. He has a good and accurate throwing arm, which is good for handball. The coach said that he could play games if we sign him up more formally. So far he just shows up to practice. On Tuesdays he has band too, so he can go to the first part of handball, but then it’s a 25 minute walk back past our house to band. Turns out that there’s a girl in his class that also plays both handball and is in the band. I arranged for him to catch a ride with her because he couldn’t possibly ask…she’s a girl. I talked to this fearsome 12-year-old braces-wielding being and her dad at practice this week and they were happy to give him a ride so that he could get the most out of both activities. Then I found out that he has been sitting next to her at school for 2 weeks! Must be rough. I think he is going to have to finally break the ice and talk to her.

Nora also joined a soccer team with the girls in her class. She goes every Monday after school and every other Friday. She was invited by the girl in her class who likes speaking English and sits with her, and her dad coaches the team. She was very reluctant because she just doesn’t see herself as an “athlete.” On the first day I had to run her gym shoes over to the school, because they practice inside. Actually, they are doing all kinds of games in the winter, not just soccer. She was in the locker room in tears with 4 other girls around her, encouraging her. We got her to head to practice with everyone, then I left to get groceries. When I came back to get her, she was thrilled. She made 7 goals and won the game for her team! It was great! I told her that I’m much more proud of her courage to try and stretch her view of herself than I am of some goals.

Skiing in Norway is indeed a universal activity, especially with the Olympics coming up. Groomed paths, grocery shoppers in their boots while their skis are waiting outside, basic commuting, buses full of people with their skis going up to Byåsen and other ski areas on the weekend. Kids are “born with skis on.” We see some tiny kids in the store with their ski boots.

Each Monday, someone at at work asks me (in Norwegian) “have you been skiing this weekend?” And I answer no, we don’t have skis, we are not skiers at home, I didn’t think it was worth it to buy them for just a few months, we have to teach the kids, etc. This is now one of my most comfortable subjects to talk about in Norwegian.

Leisure Report: Both of the kids hang out with friends. Boys in Anders’ class go to “tweenies” at a little neighborhood center nearby on Mondays. They take turns playing video games and sledding or playing outside. He also has friends that invite him to sled or skate on the weekends or after school sometimes, but they don’t play Magic The Gathering so he is missing that and it doesn’t seem like they are making deep ties yet. He can skype with Atticus to play Magic, and plays with Ted.

Nora and her classmate across the hall are exchanging artsy letters through the mailboxes in our building. Too cute. She writes notes and checks the mail multiple times per night sometimes. They also do homework together. Her friend just returned from Canada, so she speaks great English. But bad news: her family bought a new place so they will be moving in a few months. I told Nora that they can keep being pen pals!

The library is a wonderful thing, so there is no shortage of books to read, in English. Nora has been missing Connie’s hot chocolate, so I taught her how to make it in a pan this week, because that seems to be part of the magic secret. But it will never be quite right without Connie’s touch.

Nora is also missing more toys a little bit, but it turns out that removing all toys does trigger a child’s natural creativity. Here we have a macaroni box, tape, and some plastic twine transformed into a hair styling activity. She has also created a camping trip for her 3 stuffed animals out of things around the house. She has been writing her Harry Potter fan fiction. Creativity does not rely on stuff.

Observation 1: It saddens Anders to know that baseball is only represented by the Yankees (with a dash of Red Sox) in Europe. He noticed that there were only Yankees fans around town (with an occasional Red Sox fan), now we know why.

Observation 2: Ted and I went to the Fretex today (Salvation Army), the thrift store. They have little kiosks everywhere–schools, grocery stores–for donating used items. The downtown store is small but I have had good luck getting a traditional outfit for Anders before, and they often have sweaters that are in good shape.

And they have so many comic books! Comics are huge here, the latest Donald Duck is always on the newstands. Ted thought the kids might like the norsk version of Calvin and Hobbes, known as Tommy og Tigern here. The kids have read all of them at home, so they should be able to apply that knowledge to understanding the Norwegian.

When I took them to the counter, the sales lady asked how many (in Norwegian). I didn’t know because Ted picked them out, so she counted and told me that they were 7 kroner each, or 10 for 40 kroner. If I got a few more it would be cheaper (in Norwegian). I picked out a few more and replied “my husband didn’t think about that when he picked them out,” not to diss Ted but because it’s what I could think to say in Norwegian. She was quick to reply, “ikke sant! damer er alltid mer økonomisk!” (isn’t that true! women are always more economical!). It was satisfying to have a regular back and forth with someone easily. My Norwegian is getting better!

Observation 3: We bought this butter among many when we first arrived, it says it has a “unique Norwegian taste.” Indeed, this is the tastiest butter I have ever experienced. I have to stop myself from eating it like a dip with crackers, and make myself thin out the layer that I put on said cracker. I have a container at work for lunches. Norwegian lunch is typically crisp bread (like Wasa) or regular bread with cheese, canned fish, liverpaste, caviar from a tube…yeah. If I bring a salad, I will eat crisp bread with butter on the side. And crisp bread with butter has been the only snack around when I’m hungry, because there isn’t anywhere to go nearby to buy anything when the national culture is to pack your own food. So I butter my crackers and just think to myself that people who walk across a frozen tundra need their calories to make it back home. I’m putting in 8,000 to 9,000 steps a day (3.5 miles) when I go to work, and up to 12,000 steps (5 miles) if I do extra trips to the store or to kid activities. Those aren’t always easy steps in the ice and snow. I earn my butter.

Observation 4: Our apartment is bordered on one side by courtyards with playgrounds, and a walk/bike multi-use path that runs north-south on the other. Just north of us is the kids’ school and a middle school, and it continues on across the street through another neighborhood. Going south, there are more types of apartments/townhouses along the path, it goes past a barnehage (daycare), past a shopping center with a grocery store, yarn store, health offices, and eventually we get to the sports facility where Anders plays handball, about a 20 minute walk. People are always out on the path. They have these gate arms, lit up at night, to keep cars from coming on. The path is exactly the right width for 1 car at a time, and occasionally you see people open the gate to take their car up to their apartment door for some reason, but not often and they don’t park there. People park in communal parking lots nearby and there are parking garages. It’s so sane.

Today Ted and I took a trip downtown, which is becoming our Wednesday errands-and-lunch-date ritual. Good news! We didn’t have to go to the bank today! I got an email saying that we are approved for an account, but now we have to wait for customer agreements to arrive in the mail, then we sign and mail them back, then we will get cards and some kind of secure code generator for logging in online. So…eventually we will have all of those numbers. But so far we haven’t had a bill for the rent, and Ted hasn’t been paid, and those two things pretty much cancel each other out, so we are all even for now.

Today was a gorgeous snowy day to be out on our Wednesday date. We decided that this is the perfect way to enjoy the new food culture in Trondheim. Without kids.

This time, we went to Bror (“brother”). Burgers (beef, chicken or veggie), sweet potato fries, BBQ, on-site brews. It has a Block 15 vibe (Corvallis place), but you order at the bar and pick up your own food at the kitchen window, taking the Corvallis self-serve culture to the next level. It was fun but the food was meh. Ted’s beer was great though, and it’s nice that they serve a small size option for lunch. But we don’t need to go back for a meal, not worth the price.

Observation 5: Waiting for the bus on the way home, we saw 3 groups of daycare kids, all decked out in their reflective vests. They have 4 adults, 2 men and 2 women, for about 12-15 kids (they were moving too much, I didn’t count). They got on the bus with us, along with what looked like a middle school class of kids too–it was crowded! You often see daycares taking kids out for a walk near their facility, on a walking path and especially into the woods, so it was interesting to see them downtown. These were kindergarten age kids, so it must be an educational opportunity to learn how to get around out in the world safely. There definitely is an attitude that you should let kids have opportunities and take reasonable risks to mature and learn. The adults were so patient with them, lots of smiles and gentle corrections to stay with the group and stop chasing pigeons.

Observation 6: Anders experienced a more relaxed attitude about where kids can go last week at school too. He forgot his gym clothes at home, so his teacher just let him leave school to run home to get them! Ted and I were both at work, and we live so close that it just takes a few minutes, and he has keys, but they would never let him do that in Corvallis even though we live just as close! He said it was weird walking out of the school because some playground staff was out with some other kids and they didn’t say anything to him, he could just walk off of the school grounds. We were fine with it, just so different.

  Ted at work: On Wednesday I tagged along with Ted to work so that we could go downtown to give yet more documents to the bank.

His building is the same as it was 12 years ago, with the greenhouse-style atrium and offices with windows that open out to the center of the building.

There was also a choir singing in the lobby!

We had a downtown date, starting with the bank. Fingers crossed that this is the last trip to deliver documents. They take a copy, mail it to the main office in Oslo, and eventually we will get a letter with account agreements to sign and mail back, and then they will finally send us cards and such in the mail. I’m starting to wonder if every bank account comes with a 10,000 kroner starter fund or something, because not just anyone can get a bank account. The security codes that come with a bank account are also used as sign-in IDs for other services, such as the app that the kids’ school uses, so it feels like something we should see through, along with the little details about Ted getting paid and paying our rent.

We took a familiar walk from campus through Bakklandet, a cute neighborhood full of cool shops and old buildings. There is also the bike lift, the only one in the world, where you can take your bike up this steep hill instead of walking it! It’s not operational in the winter, but when we tried it before it was almost impossible to use, at least for us newbies.

Going from Bakklandet to downtown you cross the Gamle Bybro, the Old Town Bridge, where a kiss brings good luck. We never miss that opportunity. Looking back toward Bakklandet, you see the Kristiansren Festning (Fortress) overlooking the city.

We had a mini-date downtown with a little shopping and lunch at Habitat, one of the hip restaurants in town. It was delicious–great pizzas and salads loaded with toppings. Ted had a beer brewed in-house and I had a kombucha. They have great games to play while you hang out, so we played a little Code Names (in Norwegian, that was a vocabulary builder) and Ticket to Ride, Scandinavia version. We figured that it cost us about 25% more than a similar meal would cost in Corvallis, but the food was much better than other places here and with the games and ability to stay, relax, and play a game, it was totally worth it. The 25% premium is coincidentally the amount of the sales tax, so we were also paying the Norwegian state for the privilege of being here.

Click on the pictures in the gallery!

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/26/reader-center/arctic-winter-night.html

My friend Jenna shared this article with us, thinking of our long northern nights. It doesn’t feel so extreme here in Trondheim, especially when the days are getting longer. But stopping to reflect on it is valuable, while we still have it.

What I notice is the feeling that the sunrise and sunset takes forever. The sky gets the dusky sunset feeling around 3:00 then the actual sunset is around 4, but the twilight lasts until about 5. Same in the morning–it starts getting light around 8, sunrise at 9, but it’s not really light until almost 10.

My walk to work takes me to the top of the local ski hill where I can look over the whole city. Going there and coming back, in the morning and in the afternoon, the city is bathed in light so clearly from the south. It’s very striking that the sun is always in the south when you see it because it’s just sliding up along the horizon, popping up low in the south, then dipping down before it really gets into the west. That explains the long sunrise and sunset light.

Yesterday afternoon felt like a full strong sunlight for one of the first times because the sky was clear and blue, but I have had a few of those days on my walk home from work too. The shadows are very strong because the sun is still so low in the south, coming sideways instead of from above. We were walking home from the grocery store going due south with nothing to block the sun. Nora wanted to take a side street, but Ted said that we should keep on this road to get our vitamin D for as long as possible. It does feel good to have your skin in the sun, even if it is just your face and hands.

Next month we are going up to Alta to see the Northern lights, it’s about as far north as it gets (zoom out the map to see the whole country and where Alta is). We wanted to wait until February so that we would have a few hours of sunlight way up there to see the landscape. We are going to the “ice hotel” (although we won’t stay in it, unfortunately, no family rooms for 4 apparently), but we will go dog sledding, reindeer sledding, Sami culture, and Northern Lights hunt, along with northern meals and sauna/jacuzzi to get cozy! https://sorrisniva.no/