Thursday morning, 2.24 AM. Last final of the semester in 14 hours (Français).

I’ve survived the worst of it, it seems. (Oh, stop being so dramatic, Greg! It’s only a summer job!) Things are far from originally planned–I still have nowhere to live in Oslo for the upcoming semester; still not sure when I have to come back to Switzerland to check on my residence permit application status…but it’s all sinking in. I’m over the shock.

Determined not to put any part of this summer “to waste,” I had hastily created a Plan B. But this time I am withholding my enthusiasm until it actually happens.

Plan B
Fly to Norway, stay in Siljan hos Kjersti og company for a week
Hyttetur på Himingen med kjære familien min
Fly to Switzerland for Summer Sessions
Eurotrip with Mom (?)
Fall semester 2010 på BI Oslo (provided I get my residence permit approved)

Exciting plans, eh? Jeg har snakka med Acacia om det litt. Sjølv om det skal være en knallbra sommer i Europa er jeg likevel litt deppa av det. Det er bare fordi jeg kanke slutte å tenke på ka det skulle ha vært: arbeid på Nordkapp. Og det er veldig vanskelig å ikke tenke på det, særlig når man setter så stor pris på det.
Jeg var veldig spent for å endelig begynne å tjene litt penger for meg selv. Jeg får ofte dårlig samvittighet når jeg bruker penger–après tout, Mor har jobba skikkelig hardt for at jeg kunne leve livstilen min her i Europa, og det er nånting jeg gjør mæ veldig skyldig i. Så självklart var jeg ufattelig spent å ha fått jobb i sommeren–jeg kunne endelig være litt mer selvstendig, tenkte jeg! Det var trøstende å vite at jeg kunne, etter så mange år, gjør litt å hjelpe Mor, så at hun kunne bruke pengene sine på sæsjølv, ta livet mer med ro.
Den største skuffelsen ække at jeg kommer til å miste muligheten til å tjene penger, det har mer å gjøre med at jeg skal fortsette å være avhengi av Mor. At jeg ikke kan gjøre livet hennes lettere.
Det gjør meg enda flavere når jeg tenker på hvor stolt jeg var å ha fått jobben–at jeg var vellykket og gjorde det de fleste amerikanerne på skolen min kun drømte om. Men jeg bomba! Skulle ønsket at jeg hadde holdt kjeft helt fra begynnelsen da. Skikkelig teit å må forklare til folk hvorfor jeg skal ikke jobbe lenger.

I wasn’t going to write about that, but I felt I had to jot down a bit of what had been going through my head these past few days. Of course, talking to Mom helped–it always does. But I can’t help but marvel at how independent Norwegian adolescents are in comparison to American ones (or, at least the ones that I know). I guess you could say that I was inspired to carry a bit more of my own weight.

It’s sleep time…speaking of which, I never did truly master that waking up early thing. Maybe this summer. Starting the day after tomorrow…

Benvenuto a InterRail Italia!

It’s been a week since my train débâcle, and after some time and distance from it…I can still stand by my original opinion of TrenItalia. Det suger, liksom!
So what happened was this: after an amazing day walking through and getting lost in Venice (which, if I may digress for a bit, is the most beautiful city I have ever visited. I don’t care if people say it’s overtouristy–perhaps it is, but I like it that way; it’s romantic, picturesque, and it’s exceeded my expectations in every way.), I decided to take an earlier train home so I could get back to Lugano by 7PM in order to finish my schoolwork. And here begin my grievances:

They charge me €8 for riding on a different train than I had purchased tickets for. Well, I thought, “Va bene, at least now you know.” However, I didn’t have any Euros on me and asked if I could pay in Swiss Francs. He charged me 30CHF. Only after paying him 20CHF did I realize that he was bullshitting me. (For those who don’t know, €8 is roughly the equivilant of 13CHF.) Trying to stay positive, I had managed to convince myself that paying a little extra was necessary to ensure that I got home early. Little did I know…

My journey courtesy of TrenItalia!

The train that I was on, from Venezia Santa Lucia to Milano Centrale, unexpectedly stopped in Verona. After half an hour of waiting in silence, the conductor announced over the intercom that a man had killed himself sulla ferrovia. (Whether he jumped overboard or hopped in front of the tracks is unbeknownst to me.) So instead of continuing to Milano Centrale, we took a detour–to Bologna.

From Bologna, we slowly chugged our way up towards Milan, with stops in Modena and Piacenza. After six productive hours, we finally reached Milano Centrale. Ironically, I reached Milan even later than I would have if I had taken the train I originally purchased the ticket for. Needless to say, I missed my connection from Milan to Lugano, but was lucky enough not to have missed the last train from Milan to Bellinzona. With almost two hours to kill, I took the time to eat my apple and explore the outside of Milano Centrale and the metro.

In the end, I made it home at around 2AM in the morning. But considering how I did most of my homework on the train, I guess it wasn’t so bad after all.

These next couple of days are very exciting and eventful. Right now I’m still debating whether or not to go to Zürich today. (It’s currently 3:40AM and I would have to get to the train station by 8AM.) Will have a handful of midterms next week, closely followed by the arrival of my Norwegian family on Thursday. Unfortunately, I won’t have the opportunity to be with them for so long because on Monday, I leave for the Czech Republic and Slovakia on Academic Travel.
I’ve also finalized my plans for Thanksgiving! I will be spending the long weekend down in Vailate with Jessica! There are tentative plans to make turkey, which I’m very excited for.
And as for Christmas, hopefully I will be able spend a week over at Marie’s place in either Normandy or Paris before flying home to California.

Wow, I hope all this talk of traveling doesn’t make me sound spoiled rotten. The truth is, I am grateful for every moment of it and am loving life right now. La vita è bella. Ma adesso–devo dormire.

Plans

Back from Bergen, and school has begun. So, I have been doing a lot of thinking and planning lately, like I tend to do whenever I have a lack of things to do. Was at Rudi’s house last night and found out that there’s going to be a Norwegian X Factor audition in Oslo from the 20th to the 22nd of May! If I have no coinciding plans then I’m going to the audition days; it’ll be a great experience to say the least.

I’ve also been discussing a “final road-trip” with Marie la française. We think a couple of us are going down to possibly Kristiansand, in southern Norway. We haven’t decided on a date yet and everything’s still in the drawing-board phase.

Also, I’ve been talking with Mom about what to do after I get back to California. The plan is that I will have July off to “go do my own thing” and hang with friends. And at the beginning of August, we will fly up to Toronto, Canada, to visit a second-cousin. We’ll spend about a week there, and then we’ll head westover (I think it’s westover…) to Ottawa and meet up with Tilly, who will accompany us in Ottawa and hopefully Montréal. And I also really hope that we’ll get to visit Québec City as well.

And after I come back, I will have about half a week off to pack my things before I fly off to Switzerland on July 17th.

Anyway, that’s my travel forecast. However, there’s also still a bunch of immediate stuff that I have to focus on, including that visit to Dolly Dimple’s. “Har du en ledig stilling?” Haha, wish me luck. And this weekend, I will be going to Gol to visit Jessica and get sfasato!

As for today, I think I will go to volleyball practice. Haven’t been there since it started snowing. But now I can bike there again…
And I also need to withdraw money.
And I also need to print a résumé.
Life is good.