Ice on the Run

I was at the school today when, just after 1PM, they came to tell the kids to put on their boots. The river was getting so high with snow and ice, we might have to evacuate.

An hour later the principal came and said they were closing the school early. Some kids were supposed to stay till 4.30, but two hours before that everyone was out.

The seven year olds said they were "all tingly" and had "butterflies in my tummy" - quite understandably. But then the teachers started getting worried, bringing their coats, fetching their car keys - just in case. Maybe not too strange, considering what the river looked like at the moment.

It might be wrong to say so, but I find the whole situation rather... entertaining. As long as no one gets hurt and nothing gets damaged there's absolutely nothing wrong with a little action. Finally something's happening!

And I definitely think it's better for the kids to think of this as "exciting", rather than "scary" - nothing good is going to come of that. As the seven year olds and I agreed - nothing truly bad really happens in Norway; no floods, no hurricanes, no earthquakes.

And nothing at all ever happens here!

(...as if just to prove that last point; as soon as I'd written it the danger was announced to be over, and it's business as usual tomorrow)

Ice

Imagine a super slippery ice rink. Then imagine two inches of water covering the ice. Then dump a crapload of slush on top of that. What do you get? Our roads.

Well, the walkways and sidewalks. Where people walk. Not the main roads. Wouldn't want the cars to get wet.


I'm not sure if I miss the cold or the snow the most...

Snow. Oh boy.

The first snow this autumn came last night.

Maybe it's just as well I never got around to packing up my scarves...

"Solidarity with the snowmen!"

"We're becoming extinct!
Please help us!"




"Global warming is distroying us!
Give us a future!"

Night's here when the snow comes

It's white out. It's almost still in the air, falling down between the street lights. So soft you almost can't see it, so soft you almost can't feel it. It's careful snow, it's got all the time in the world. Tiny, fluffy snowflakes, once caught they will melt before they are seen. The world will be clean tomorrow, for a few hours while the people are sleeping and the cars are quiet. This is peaceful snow. Peaceful snow in a troubled world. Tomorrow they will fight again.

Let's have some snow!

Is this Winter?

It's snowing. Snowflakes touching my window. Landing gently on the ground. The city lighting up the night and snow filled clouds, coming in waves. Resting gently on the leaves still left on the trees. You never want it to stop. Snowflakes land where the wind blows them, and they stay until a rain drop comes. Landing in a snowflake's embrace, joined together for a second. The rain drop remains but the snowflake is lost for ever.


I love snow. I just don't like it when the rain comes and the world is covered with five inches of slush. I could never, in my wildest dreams, have imagined it would snow today. Yesterday there was a storm again, it was kinda bad, no wonder when they name after a nasty god. There was one like it two months ago which left two women dead after a mud slide destroyed several houses. This time one man was killed by another one. Bergen seems a dangerous place this time of year.

When I got out yesterday morning the street was a river and the cars were boats. I had a lecture and when I got back after a 15 minute walk, all my clothes were wet. Down my (waterproof) boots, my pants were so heavy when I got them off I don't understand how I could have walked with them on, even my underwear was soaked. I got out of it all and crawled into bed, reading anthropology for my exam next Monday.

The wind was incredible too. Strange to just stand and watch something like that, even if it's just a little wind. I saw it come towards me from the north, crashing into the wall and trees 20 meters in front of me, then changing directions to the west where I was standing watching it. I just stopped on top of some stairs and saw it come. It was strong enough to twist all the metal in my umbrella, not just turn it inside out but really bend it so hard I can't get it straight no matter what I do. It nearly swept me off my feet, much like I would have been if I had had to cross the street outside my building - the current in the road would have been strong enough to wash me away.

Mother nature sure is having a ball this year, the whole world over. She just gotta stop killing people. We seem to do that just fine on our own.

Wet winds

Does anybody remember if there were snow on the mountains yesterday?
There's snow on the mountains today.

The wind has been howling all night.

There was wet sleet.
Now there's wet snow.
And wet me.

Easter skiing in the valley.

A ten minute drive from our house we find this - a picture perfect place where we go skiing. In summer we drive up here to go for a walk - a long walk - in the mountains, during winter there's snow everywhere.



I ski once a year and this is where I do it.


I hate skiing. I do. I suck at it. I don't want to get out of my bed, put on lots of clothes and walk around in the snow all day, worrying about going downhill cuz I know I'll hit something; a person, a tree or simply trip over my own skis.

Nowhere to go but forwards.

But when we get there it's not half-bad anyway. The sun is shining and it's a beautiful day. It's always like this - I hate skiing until I actually get there. And I'm well aware of it - I told my parents I won't like it until I get the skis on my feet, then I love it. It's always like that. I just hate getting ready, that's all.

One of the places we go hiking in summer.

I hate hiking too. Until I start walking. I love being outside, you just always need to prepare to be outside. You need to prepare for everything, unless you do like Hobbes in the last post. A lot of the time it doesn't take much to be happy. I'm happy when I'm outside. But often it takes two tractors and a bulldozer to get me out there.

A cabin / hut / little house on the 'seter'.

I've tried to explain the Norwegian concept of 'seter' before... Basically they were places where someone in the farmer's family, usually women - a 'budeie' - stayed during summer, or went during the day to milk the cows. Now they're used as places where people build small cabins and go to get away from home for a weekend, or stay longer during summer.

Another 'seter'.

We went past four 'seter's on this trip: Hjortedalssetra (Deer Valley Seter), Storesetra (The Big Seter) Bruasetra (Seter of The Bridge) and Grendasetra (Grenda Seter - a 'grend' is a small area of a town). Where you live in the town - which farm your land used to belong to - decides where your family has or can have its cabin.

A lot of snow - a roof and a chimney.

We went past a cabin with ski tracks on the roof. There's usually a lot of snow this time of year and some places can be hard to get to. You can't get up here with a car or even a tractor - you ski!

Taking a break - bring cocoa.

We sat down and had lunch, afterwards my dad said the children were to go play while my mum and he had coffee - that's how it had always been. So my sis (who is 11) and I grabbed the things we sat on (plastic something or other) which we put in plastic shopping bags, and went up a hill. And another hill. Takes a while when you sink down a foot or two every step you take. You don't walk on snow, you walk in snow. Then we sat down on our plastic covered plastic and tried to see how fast we could get back down. After a few times, the snow had gotten hard and we went fast, even got a jump in there and we went uuuuppp-we-go-and-thud! down again.

Looking back as we're going down.

Our behinds soaking wet and our shoes full of snow (at least mine were) we put the skis back on and started the journey back down. I didn't crash even once! I probably look like a Dane when I start out (they really don't ski), but then Norwegians aren't born with skis on their feet for nothing. I think I managed pretty well.

The first thing I asked my dad when we got back where we started?

"Wanna go again?"

Ice outside

I wanted to play basketball today. But there's so much ice on the ground in the driveway, I decided to go out and see what I could do to get it off. No one seemed to like my idea of putting hot water on there; the temperature drops well below the freezing point in the evening and therefore it wouldn't have been a good idea. I rounded up my siblings and we went into the garage to find whatever would get ice off stone.

The ice was really thick some places and thin others; we got some off but when the sun went down it didn't seem like it had worked at all. Not like we thought we'd get it all off in just an hour or so, I just get these ideas sometimes... My sister and I used brooms to get the snow and ice away so we could see how much was left. We found a footprint, a weird one, my sister went into the hallway and threw shoes outside, I checked to see if they were the ones that had made the weird print. We felt like archeologists for a few minutes - archeologists trying to hit each other with shoes. We never did find the right ones though...

Just three more days till spring is supposed to be here - can you believe it? It's March! The winter is almost over. Spring... flowers, leaves, grass! I can't wait!

It's amazing how tired just being here makes me - I didn't get up until lunch time today, although I spent quite a while in bed between waking up and getting up, just dreaming... It's not even midnight now and I'm exhausted! Maybe it's because I can't sit still when I'm here.

I should be reading, two months till exams, but I just can't concentrate - for some reason my mind is anywhere but here. If you want to be with someone but the distance between you makes it impossible, it's always good to have dreams.

Det snør, det snør tiddelibom

November!

It's November! It's November!

I want snow...

I need snow...

I never need anything (or so I say), but during winter,
I need snow. Can't live in Norway without snow, can you?