A working life
Exchange year
Posts written during my Erasmus stay in Toulouse, France 2008-2009
SUMMER 2010: WALES
Jul 20th
The past few days, I’ve been with Tom in Moss, a small village near Wrexham in Wales. We’ve planned the upcoming South Africa trip, played with ther puppy dog Rosie and played some golf. It’s been great.
We also paid Chester a visit, one of the oldest Roman cities in Great Britain. We got to see some sights and I bought myself some proper golfing clothes (trousers and polos) so that I will be allowed entrance in South Africa. Tomorrow we leave for London and the day after tomorrow, the trip to South Africa will finally begin!
Below you see a couple of shots taken with my phone (and the very cool Hipstamatic app).
The clouds making shadows between Oslo and Manchester.
Rosie playing in the bushes.
BBQ with Tom’s friends. Here: Matt, temporarily playing BBQ chef – Matrix style.
Transfer to a new platform
Sep 23rd
iPublish has recently been transfering their system from their self-developed iPublish platform to the better and more reliable WordPress platform.
I’ve made sure my place in cyberspace is taken by creating my account. Additionally I’ll try to merge my old Abroad blog into this, fresh new blog.
It seems that iPublish need a bit of time to do the transfer, but I’m confident that they’ll succeed eventually.
Until then, bear with us and I’ll see you all on the flip side!
THE FIRST WEEK
Sep 2nd
The first week in Trondheim has been a hectic one, but great. First of all I have an announcement:
I’m in love with volleyball!
I had three practices last week (NTNUI tryouts) and will have three this week. Since Friday’s practice I’ve been eagerly waiting to get going on the next one! This week’s practices is my last chance to show NTNUI that I’m good enough to play for them (I really hope I am)!
ISU (International Stutent’s Union) in Trondheim have a program where Norwegian and international students can sign up to be buddies. The point of this Buddy programme is for the exchange students to have a Norwegian student who can help them and introduce them to Norway and its culture, take them to parties and for both to have in general!
I signed up a couple of weeks ago and the first exchange student I was appointed isn’t arriving until the second semester (January) so I found (literally) myself another one at volley practice – Narcís from Spain.
Last Saturday it was a big ISU Buddy party at Rick’s in Trondheim where we all had a great time and yesterday Narcís and I had a coffee at Dromedar coffee bar in Nordre. So far Narcís seems like a really cool guy and I expect to have a lot of fun with him in the coming semester/year!
Before volley practice tonight, I’ve invited Narcís over for a good Norwegian meal: “Kjøttkaker i brun saus med poteter og kokte gulrøtter” (Meatballs in brown sauce with potatoes and carrots). Any suggestions for other Norwegian meals I can offer?
The picture in this post might seem a bit random, but it has a story. It’s a shot I took during an Easter trip a couple of years ago, a trip that brings back lots of memories – a very good trip where the weather was perfect all the way! You can see it published on my Flickr account :)
Back in Trondheim
Aug 25th
It’s over a year since I left Trondheim, my university city in Norway.
The year has been great (as this blog proves) and I’ve met loads of new, kind, cool and awesome people abroad and I’ve been able to travel a lot, both in France and in Europe. It has been a great experience!
That said, it’s also nice to be back too.
It’s cool to meet old friends again, to get back to “my” apartment (I rent it) and to be back with my apartment mates Ellen and Andreas.
I’ve spent the past two months mainly in Oslo, where I’ve lived at Kringsjå student housing. I haven’t felt properly at home, a bit too institutionalized. Even though I’ve just got back to Trondheim and my life is still in a set of boxes in the attic, I still feel at home, relaxed and excited about the semester and school year to come.
Here’s my initial plan for this fall:
- Get into NTNUI volleyball team, probably team 2 or 3 (tryouts this Wednesday, wish me luck!)
- Start working out (jogging and iron pumping, you know ..)
- Be a “parrain” for a foreign student (I’ve already signed up, but don’t know what’s happening).
- Save money for traveling (must travel more!)
TECHNOLOGY!
Jul 23rd
Just got back from a “salary beer” session with people from work. It was good fun, but the beer in Norway is too expensive (246NOK for 3 pints, you do the math).
I’ve spent a lot of money, probably way too much money, but most of it is not on beer.
I’ve spent money somewhere else, but for what? What will I get?
I will get loads of technology placed into a tiny tiny box. I’ve ordered myself a new cell phone, and I’ve gone the full mile while doing so.
It’s Samsung’s new Omnia HD (or I8910 if you prefer) that is coming my way. I’m super excited, the spec. list is endless, but most important is the built-in camera, something I’ve missed for a long time (I’ve only had a SLR camera, something you don’t bring everywhere).
I suspect the phone to be in my posetion early sometime next week!
I’m also excited about returning to Skien once again, it was awesome last weekend, but not enough time. I’ve planned to visit a few friends, and I’m really looking forward to seeing them again! Additionally I hope to squeeze in a few beach volley sessions with Marte and the others! Good times coming up!
I’ve also noticed the “Anbefal” link below every post. For those of you not quite there in Norwegian, “Anbefal” means “Recommend”, that is, click the damn thing if you like the post (or if you like me).
