pics

my roomate kristin and i in italy

man cannot live on bread alone

time flies. the first week of school is finished and i am exhausted. in every way. we had teaching about "the father heart of God." i wish i could have been in the classroom more, but was instead running around, trying to figure out what in the heck i'm doing in the kitchen. our kitchen is run by people who have never run a kitchen before, so cooking for 70 people can be interesting. and the girl who is running the kitchen just realized she was leaving for holiday... today, which means i'm in charge. God help us all.

maybe a little funny news from the kitchen might liven this blog a bit. so, one of my tasks is to go grocery shopping. the problem is that we live in a small town, which means there aren't big grocery stores, which means we have to travel to 4 different places and hope they have what we need. more often than not, we're running back and forth to grocery stores throughout the day. today i was pushing a cart of 50 loaves of bread up (notice i said "up") the cobblestone street (carts on cobblestone streets make a lot of noise!) to our base with my friend and co-worker, janne, and as we're unlocking the gate, i'm trying to keep the cart from rolling down the hill into oncoming traffic. as the cart began to roll, i sacrificed myself and ended up smashing my body in between the brick building and cart. i was stuck, but i was laughing so hard we couldn't get me out. we just stood there, a cart full of bread, me with my head stuck, oncoming traffic staring at us, laughing until we cried. but the bread was saved and we can all eat knowing that i almost lost my head for the sake of my students.

i'm better now

so, maybe you might think i sounded a little stressed or tired in the last blog... you were right. but, i´m better now. thanks for your concern.
wow. it´s getting cold here in skien. one day last week i actually saw my breath as i walked to work. i didn´t bring my winter coat with me because i was going to but a more suitable one this year and i´ve been shopping and i found the perfect one. it costs $250 (don´t worry mom. i didn´t buy it). welcome to norway.
a little news about life here. this week was election week for a new party leader in norway. for those of you who don´t know, norway has a king, so this election was a bit like electing a prime minister. a big deal, in other words. but the man we were praying would be voted in lost and things are about to change. the man elected is hoping to take away all financial support from private schools and allow abortions later in pregancy. and until now, people were given a yearly allowance (pretty sizeable) for each child they had, but the new leader also wants to throw that out. to put in the words of a friend, "norway has no moral foundation left." honestly, it sounds like a lot like america and that´s scary on many different levels.
norway was just voted the best country in which to live. sweet. i never thought God would send me to a place that was voted the best place to live. i also think it´s a bit ironic that we were voted the best place in which to live and now things are about to change.

ranting and raving

what is annoying me now (know that this will probably change in the next 30 minutes):

* italian women
* the pesky "sniff" that is followed by the lack of energy due to the cold i've had the past week
* stupid boys (not all boys, just the stupid ones)
* not being able to find the best fitting word (see what i mean?)
* being cold all the time, knowing it's much warmer in other places
* not being able to communicate what i feel or think
* not being able to get past the "thinking" stage to the "doing" stage
--------------------------------
okay, enough of that. let´s talk about language learning.

i think language is like a bridge. for me, english is on the nice cosy side of the bridge and norwegian on the ominous, unknown side of the bridge. where am i (lyndee)? is what you might be asking yourself. well, i am on the bridge. actually, i´ve fallen off the bridge and am dangling on a threadbare rope. what do i mean by all this? i mean that i´m in the place where i am slowly understanding a bit more norwegian, but as i´m understanding norwegian, i am losing my english, thus making me a bit more mute than normal. i think i need to begin lifting weights or something to hoist myself back up to the bridge and march on across. this dangling place isn´t so comfortable.

more of life here

this is the view of the state church as we're walking to work, along Snipetorp road.












jay and ingvar.








this was taken in our basement (hans, soren, sindre, evan - all staff this year) at a going away party for a friend, ingvar, who is going to ethiopia.






this is the view of our base (school) where all the magic happens.