Autumn break

The parents suddenly decided to take off in the morning so it looks like I'll have the house to myself for a few days.

I only wish the weather could have stayed as beautiful as it's been the past week, but it seems real autumn weather is on its way. If the reports are right, we could be getting just under two inches of rain tomorrow.

I have a feeling I'll be spending the next few days cooped up inside...

Summer adventures

After a week at home I've realized how much I've missed spending some time alone. It's strange how some times you don't know what you've missed until it's actually there - and then you dread losing it again. One more week!

Although I've mostly been doing a whole lot of nothing, I did find one fun thing to do. I'm not quite sure where that thing is going, but at the moment I'm just enjoying the journey. However difficult the directions may be..

Now if it would only stop raining..
The sound of rain is nice enough when you're inside, but
inside does get boring when it's the middle of July and it's
supposed to be summer out there...

The sun is back!

It disappears for four months each winter and now it's finally back.

Just to dispel a myth, and answer the inevitable question - no, this does not mean it's dark four months a year in Norway. It simply means where I'm from, we don't get direct sunlight between mid October and February 24th.

The reason for this is Norway's mountains. When the sun is at it's lowest point in the sky (winter solstice - December 21st for the northern hemisphere), due to the tilt of the earth's axis the rays have no chance of making it over the mountains and down into the valley between them.

It looks something like this (no laughing please, I only have a tiny eee and a sucky touchpad with malfunctioning buttons);


This is more or less what the valley looks like, lake in the bottom, our house the red one on the left. The yellow sun is the "summer sun" - it's high in the sky (the northern part of the earth is tilting towards it), the orange "winter sun" is lower in the sky.

Clearly, no direct sunlight does not mean it's pitch black outside, which a lot of people seem to think - although when the sun is at its lowest point we only have light for around five-six hours a day. Basically, we're in the shade for one third of the year - it's dark and it's cold.


Which hopefully explains (in the simplest way possible) why I'm so the glad the sun "is back" - it means a little warmth, a little light, and only a little more time until spring comes!

Do you believe in global warming?

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...

Equinox

Today, September 22nd, the day and the night are just as long all over the globe. From tomorrow on, it'll get darker in the north and lighter in the south. In the north of Europe, Canada and areas along those latitudes, it will get dark half an hour earlier in the evening in just two weeks. And it will stay dark for half an hour longer every morning.

Us Norwegians have a long, dark winter ahead of us. Where I live, in this area of our little town, the sun disappears completely for almost four months. We'll see it on the mountaintops but it won't reach us between November and February. It'll be cold and dark.. very dark.


But... on the bright side (and I could sure use a bright side now), we'll have snow making our world soft and white. We'll see the millions of stars again, and hopefully the aurora borealis; the northern lights, making the sky seem alive. We'll have scarves and mittens, and soon it will be Christmas. We'll have candles again.

Winter can be beautiful.. it just lasts way too long.

Along came global warming...

November 7th 1993
Lumberton, North Carolina

[...] a small A-frame cottage sitting right on the water, surrounded by fir and birch trees. The weather was near perfect. Indian summer, later than it ever ought to come. Global warming marches on.

James Patterson, Along Came a Spider

If global warming was a fact 16 years ago, why has it taken people and politicians so long to react? If it was already something everybody knew had been going on for a while, something casually mentioned in a novel like that, how come nobody seemed to care?

June

The weekend's been hot.

I've been inside writing a paper.

It's warm.

Now there's a hail storm.

I hope the hail will melt.

What's June without weird weather?

Happy, TX?

For some reason Google insists on telling me the weather for Happy, Texas.

It remembers the account I want to sign in with, the podcasts I used to listen to. It knows I am in Norway, and it shows me Norwegian news and web pages.

But weather? Texas.
I change it to Bergen.
Still stuck at Texas.
I wait a couple hours, check again and reload a few times.

Finally Bergen!

Although.. looking at the reports, I really should have stuck with Texas...

Vårens vakreste

It's raining.

I am sick and tired of this rain!

I want sun! I want summer!

I want to go outside wearing no underwear and not have the kids next door and the neighbours tell the whole town about it!

Punched in the face

It had stopped raining when I was walking over to the Uni about an hour ago. I suddenly realized how quiet it was, stopped and looked up. With that, a blanket of rain came down over us.

The rain only lasted for a few seconds before it turned to hail. The size of golf balls. At least they felt like it - largest things I've ever seen. Although we're used to all kinds of weather over here, I was glad when I got inside a couple minutes later - this hail storm kinda hurt.

Add to that my very sensitive skin and I now look like I've been punched in the face a few times. It's not a goood look.

- is it just me or are we not supposed to have hail storms in May?

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 'n Wild

And wet it was...

Last night the police was calling the situation 'hopeless', water rushing into houses, cars being filled up above the steering wheel and basements being flooded. It was about to get worse.

Roads have been closed all over the city, all over the county. Two main roads down the street from here were closed during the morning. People were told to stay at home. Houses have water reaching 1.5 meters (5 feet) up the walls, people are leaving their cars and using boats to get away.

A mall is in danger of collapsing. The river has dug its way under the building; leading to one of the pillars holding it up sinking half a meter (2 feet) into the ground. One of the shops is almost completely under water.

At 2am a mountain side collapsed and destroyed five apartments. 10 people were buried as rocks, mud and water came rushing into their houses when they were sleeping. Nine people; four children and five adults, were brought to hospital. A four year old girl is critically injured and her condition is unstable. One woman was found dead early this morning.

The city already had rescue workers in the area and 75 people were evacuated. Around 100 took refuge in five houses; it's not possible to get them out yet. The 'Sivil Defence' and the National Guard were called in last night and they have managed to get food in to those who are trapped. They're not in danger any more and the police has got helicopters helping secure the area.

One woman told of hearing shouting, then jumping out of the second floor windows with her family as the rocks and water broke down the front door. Another woman was riding her bike, the water reaching above the seat.

Bergen also broke its September record for rain during 24 hours, as was predicted. We were expected to get around 100mm (4 inches) but this morning we were told the new record was 156.5mm - 6.1 inches. The last record from 30 years ago was passed a few hours - and 40 mm (1.6 inches)- ago.


Apart from a few closed roads and a lot of wet clothes, most of us got away from hurricane Maria without a scratch. Now we just have to boil our water again. They've installed a cleaning system to get rid of the Giardia parasite from a year ago, but the flooding knocked out the system and we're asked to boil our water until they can fix it.

This city is used to rain.
Bergen knows rain.
But this was some rain...

"Extreme rain and flooding"

It's raining. They're saying the gates of the heavens will open 3pm and it'll only get worse during evening until midnight. Heavy rain all night until around lunch time tomorrow when it'll go back to rain showes.

Do you see Bergen?




We're getting the leftovers of tropical hurricanes Maria and Nate. They didn't hit land in America and now they've blown their way across the ocean. They won't be too strong when they hit and they won't be as much hurricanes as extreme-record-breaking-rain-and-wind.

The Norwegian Water Resource and Energy Directorate has issued warnings for four counties, that doesn't happen often. They're saying flooding will be more likely in urban areas.

In the city they've stopped work in the streets. The workers are saying this is just what autumn in Bergen is like, but it was a little hard to keep going; the concrete was too wet and the tiles were floating away, taking on a life of their own.


I was out a while ago, had a lecture at 12:15 but no professor ever showed up. It really is pretty wet out there. I wish we'd have thunder and lightning too, that's so much fun!

Hold on to your hats people, this is gonna be a bumpy ride!

Autumn

I love the smell of autumn. I love walking in the rain when it's windy and the rain drops are tiny. I love watching the leaves fall from the trees, telling us it's time to rest. I love watching the rain drops running down my window. And the patterns they make when they stay. I love sitting on my bed reading, listening to the world, imagining my own.

The rains have come

The lights are off and the windows open. It's so loud you'd have to raise your voice to be heard. They said on the radio we'll be getting 100mm (2 1/2 inches) of rain the next few days. In my Middle East class today we saw a video from Yemen (The hanging gardens of Arabia) where they said they're lucky when they get that much in a year. I wish I could give them some of ours. They need it and we've got plenty.

The gutter that runs along the roof goes down a drain right outside my window. From time to time, when there's too much water at the same time, it makes loud gurgling noises that sound like something is breaking really loudly.

Rain in Bergen doesn't just mean rain. When it rains here, it's always windy. I learnt that the hard way. You get soaking wet no matter how you hold your umbrella. If you manage to hold onto it. But it also means more noise, rain hitting the roof and wind blowing by. My window is so wet I can't see the world clearly.

Rain or no rain.
Do we ever see the world clearly?


Edit: of course that was supposed to be 4 inches, I don't know where my mind was at... I must have though 1 inch is 2.5 cm but still... Anyway, thanks to anonymous (aka teddy bear) for correcting me.

Weather vs. Clothing

Earlier today I was putting on a t-shirt I found in the back of my closet. I hadn't worn it for a year because I didn't bring it with me when I moved to Bergen to go to Uni. I put it on and it smelled familiar. I realized I hadn't washed it since I was in France a bit over a year ago, I hadn't worn it and so I hadn't washed it. It smelled like my room in Saint-Rémy. It smelled of the washing machine liquid thing I used to wash my clothes in. It smelled like my bed. Like my room when I was drying my clothes. Like home away from home in a way.

I spent nine months in France as an au pair. I lived in a small town called Saint-Rémy-lès-Chevreuse, just outside of Paris, from October 2003 till the end of June 2004. I stayed with a British family, watched two kids, a boy and a girl who were 3 and 4, spoke English, learnt French and spent every weekend walking the streets of Paris.

To return to the subject; I was wearing the t-shirt. The reason I was wearing this t-shirt was that my parents, sister and I was going up to a seter and up through this mountain pass (btw, that picture is from the seter we went yesterday). It's not exactly a pass, I think, but it's the best English word or expression I found. It's not a mountain but it's high up there.

It was cloudy and grey as we started, some raindrops hit as we started walking. Before we reached the seter, Otterdalssetra, it was pouring down. We still had over an hour of walking before we got to the pass, Otterdalsskaret. This was the first time ever on a trip, and there has been a few, when our parents seriously suggested turning around. But we ain't quitters so we kept going.

It kept raining as we made our way up the hills, the wind was picking up and the fog coming in from the lake. It was thick as porridge but we were able to stay out of it until we reached the top. We didn't spend more than two minutes up there before we started on the way back. Making your way down a steep, slippery mountain side with the rain pouring and the wind howling, now that's something you should try. Once. And only once.

It did stop raining when we were down the worst part. We started warming up as we kept walking but we were still completely soaked. It's been raining a lot this summer; we were jumping across small rivers that used to be two feet wide but now some were 6, others more like 10. Wouldn't wanna fall in there... It was... an interesting trip. But from now on I'm not going out walking the mountains when it looks like the sky's about to fall down.

Then again, as the old, Norwegian proverb goes:

There's no such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing.

Oh bite me...

Wonderous Winds

Today the wind came inside. The door to the veranda next to the elevator on my floor blew open when I walked past it. Just like that. The wind kept moving it back and forth, opening it, almost closing it before opening it wide again. And it's a heavy door.

Walking down the stairs, I felt the wind three floors down. On the first floor there were papers scattered everywhere. They don't put advertisements in our post so someone puts them next to our post boxes and we can pick them up if we want to. They were all over the place.

Outside, I nearly blew away like a leaf left from autumn, clinging to a branch all winter only to be whisked away by the snow-filled winds of spring.

*whoosh*

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.