On old acquaintances

The previous weekend I got to hang out with some old friends. One of them - let's call him Ken* - is Japanese and I met him when we were both attending university in a remote city of Japan, almost seven years ago.

Since we last saw each other our lives have taken very different turns. I returned to Norway to finish first my BA and then MA degree, I've had two other short-term stays abroad (one of them in Japan, but somehow we never managed to meet then, even though he didn't live very far from Tokyo), and I eventually started working at my alma mater here in Oslo, where I currently teach history.

Ken, on the other hand, graduated to become a somewhat classic Japanese business man, working for a big firm in Yokohama. He got married and he's got a son. Then, his company purchased part of a Norwegian shipping company, and as a result of this, they made Ken come work here. "Here" not meaning Oslo at all, but a small town on the western coast of Norway.

Even if it's on the other side of the country from Oslo, Ken is now living a whole lot closer to me than Japan, so we decided that it would be fun to meet up and hang out like the old days.

From our days at the uni in Japan I remember him as a boyish, charming, fun guy. We had a few classes together, and we'd frequently have lunch in the school cafeteria or go out drinking with a bigger group of friends. Meeting him again all these years later he had "grown up" more, but he was still fun and charming, and as easy to talk to as I remembered. For him, coming to Oslo after having lived the small town life for a few weeks was something of a luxury, and I think it's safe to say that it was a very successful weekend for all those involved.

When he was here we obviously wanted to show him not only Oslo by day (the Holmenkollen Ski Jump, the Opera, the Royal Palace and the Vigeland Park), but also Oslo by night. So we went out for dinner and later drinks on Saturday night.

Oslo by  night isn't classy. It can be - there are places where the drinks are too expensive to get ridiculously drunk no matter how rich you are - but for the average Joe we go to places where the drinks are "only" expensive enough to make you have to mortgage your house after a drunken brawl. I'm only kidding a bit. (Foreigners tend to complain about the price level in general, but for alcohol in particular.)

Anyway, we managed to find several places that were okay, and we managed to make ourselves eligible for mortgages (had any of us been house owners). Eventually, after having been to a few other places first, we ended up in a bar I've never visited before. The place was packed, and the noise was almost unbearable. Since it was getting late and we had plans for Sunday morning as well (last chance for sightseeing!), we decided to only stay for one drink and then leave.

As I went to get mine, I passed a group of girls where one of them suddenly went into squeal mode. "OMG, it's you!" she exclaimed.

I knew her face. I knew where I knew her from. We went to high school together. I even knew the two girls she were with, also from high school. We exchanged some pleasantries, and then I quickly made an excuse and went on my way, even though she seemed eager to stay and chat about everything that had happened in our lives since we last met. I was more eager to get back to Ken and my other friends.

I didn't remember this girl's name, and it took me well into the next day (and perhaps a little Facebook research) before it came back to me. We were never close in high school; in fact, I'm not even sure we ever had a proper conversation back then. She was in a different crowd than me, and from the little I knew of her,  I didn't much care for her. After not having seen her for almost ten years, neither of those things had changed.

Still, it hit me. This girl is my own age. We are from the same hometown and now we live in the same city. Looking at her Facebook profile (or the limited version of it, as we are not friends there either), we have approximately 60 or so friends in common. Some of which I count as good friends of mine.

Yet, despite having so much things in common, I have no desire to get to know her, and I don't care what she's made of herself. It makes no difference to me whether we see each other again in the next ten years or not.

Whereas Ken, whom I clearly do not have so much in common with - in fact, I have more or less nothing in common with him apart from the fact that we once attended the same university - I enjoyed seeing again. I hope to see him more times soon. I would like to meet his wife and son (who will move here from Japan soon). I think it's interesting to check out what he's been up to via Facebook, and I enjoy talking to him.

Personal chemistry is important, of course. I have that with the people I count among my close friends, several of them from high school. And I don't necessarily think I would have as fun with all my friends from Japan or elsewhere that I technically don't have very much in common with today, should I get to see them again.

But still, it intrigues me that it is so much easier to stay in touch with some people than others, and that with certain friends you don't have to talk with them very often - maybe once every seventh year - and things are still as they used to be. Fortunately.

Sometimes friendship is like a ski jump without snow. Mostly, it's not.
(I'm in this picture. Or my foot is. The first person to find it gets a prize!**)

*Actually, his name is Kensuke, but I noticed he introduced himself as Ken here in Norway, presumably because Norwegians would have trouble pronouncing his name. It's supposed to be "Ken-ske" rather than "Ken-su-ke" as we would say.

** The prize is to jump from the top of the Holmenkollen Ski Jump without skis or snow.
Still want to be that first person?

On Streptococcus

To whom it may concern,

Normally I'd start a letter with "Dear...", but in this case there cannot be any reason to be so generous. There is, after all, nothing "dear" about streptococcal pharyngitis, strep throat, and just like that we have arrived at the core of the matter: the absolute repulsiveness of the Streptococcus,  and how they themselves refuse to acknowledge this fact and improve (or better still - just leave already!).

At the moment,  the latter is their biggest flaw in my humble opinion.  That they simply won't leave. Gah.

I get that I'm a great host, and I recognize the compliment disguised in this. The streps think I provide a friendly growth-promoting environment, and they show their gratitude by staying, and thriving. Gee, you guys! You really shouldn't have! No, really...

Because being the host of (uninvited) guests thay overstay their welcome (not that they ever were welcome...) is no walk in the park. Infact, I haven't been able to walk much at all outside, even though the weather has been lovely. All thanks to those nasty coccus (oh, come on, someone had to say it, and since I'm the only one "speaking" here it better be me).

The streppies have been nothing but trouble. In addition to blocking outdoors (and indoors, I might add) recreational activities, they have now stopped me from going to work. You see, holding a lecture (or five, as it was supposed to be) about World War One is slightly difficult when your throat is swollen to the point that speaking at all (or eating. Or drinking. Or for that matter breathing) is difficult.

Add to that the fevers. I nearly never have one (probably partly due to the fact that my body on average holds a temperature around 36 c, a full degree below normal body temperature for human beings), so when I actually get a fever my brain more or less stop functioning. Once I achieve 37 c, normal for most people, I am already burning. Kick it up to 39, which I did this weekend,  and you'd be lucky to get coherent sentences out of me. My boyfriend tried, when picking me up from the pile I'd collapsed in on the floor: "Is there anything I can do for you?" My answer: "Doctor. Medicin. Radish" (or something very close).

Thus, the strepsons and I do not function very well together.  See, this isn't their first visit. Oh, no. They were here just a week and a half ago too. Back then I was convinced I had an ear infection because the swelling was affecting the nerves going up there, but a visit to my doctor revealed the true culprit. She gave me antibiotics, and after a few days I was more or less restored to my old self ("less", because my motivation to do anything but lie on the couch all day watching "Game of Thrones" was still out sick...) 

No wonder, then, that I was annoyed when after I had returned to work (once I got the motivation on board again) my throat started aching again, in an all too familiar way. It was as though the coc-streps (you thought it, not me) had launched a new and fierce plan to disrupt my peace (or rather stress, actually,  since the idea of lecturing about World War One in no way seem peaceful to me).

I can only hope that a new batch of antibiotics will do the trick and send the strepomens packing. And to help, here is my plea to them (thus explaining the "whom" from the introduction of this post): just leave already!!!

On paaaaaaaaaacking

Packingsmackingclackinglackingbackingdacking.

It's boring, it's what it is.

I think I've mentioned it before, but I hate packing. H-A-T-E it. It's one of those things I put off and off and off and off (sidenote: listen to this reggae version of "No Surprises", it's all the catchy and silly and weird at the same time. All of it) and off and off (it's really difficult to type "and off" many times in a row, you know. Sooner or later you start typing "anf odd" and you do it in a reggae rythm, especially if you listen to the reggae version of "No Surprises") and off and off 'till the very last minute and then I'm all "OOOhhh, noooooes, I am totally stressed out because I need to pack all my stuff and I spent all this time not doing it while really I should just have done it in the first place and got it over with. Gaaaaah!!!".

This is especially true when it's actually packing *all* my stuff, for, you know, moving. Moving again. *le sigh*

Packingtrackingklackingsackinghacking.

True to form I am, in addition to putting off packing, having a crisis of sorts, reflecting over all the random crap I somehow manage to accumulate over time. It's a ton. Probably not in actual metric terms, but in actual manner-of-speech-ic terms, it's a ton. Clothes. All the clothes. Books. All the books. Jewelry-and-make-up-and-shoes-and-candle-holders-and-random-stuff-I-can't-even-categorize. All the jewelry-and-make-up-and-shoes-and-candle-holders-and-random-stuff-I-can't-even-categorize. Dust bunnies. All the dust bunnies. I am trying not to pack those. But they are here, trying to sneak into everything.

Besides, I am oddly ambivalent about this move. The place I'm moving out of failed all my hopes, so I shouldn't feel that letting go is any loss. But I do. I do feel that. Despite all its shortcomings, and the fact that I only lived here for a year, this place has held some interesting memories of mine. Important things in my life have happened here, or at the very least while I lived here. Generally, I *always* have leaving a place. I never feel "done". Similarly, I now wonder if I gave up too easily, if things would have been different if I had acted different..?

I sound all melodramatic, now. It's the packingblackingglackingtrackingsacking talking, I swear. In reality, I am glad to leave this place. And I am glad to move into the new place. Even if it means, once again, to compile all my stuff into boxes, again, freaking out over how much stuff I have, again, and thinking that once I get settled in the new place, I won't buy anything, ever again. Again.

("Dr. Feelgood"..? What is this playlist anyway?)

Outside there is a beautiful sunset. The sky is all pink and impressionism-ish. Pollution, no doubt. I've liked the sunsets here. I've liked sitting on the window sills (I've had window sills you can actually sit on! I've always wanted that...), looking at the busy street outside. I enjoy watching my inherited globe, never mind that it's old and the Soviet Union is ripping at the seams, as its soft light blends with the view from the window.

See? Packingyackingrackingjackingbbbackingmackingnacking.

Boring and melancholic. Bad combination. I go in full procrastination mode when faced with such obstacles. Watch 6 episodes of a new drama series because the Norwegian broadcasting company will only leave them up online for another month and a half? Check. Invite boyfriend over to "help" (while in reality none of us had any intention of his visit being very helpful at all)? Check. Try to burn all the candles (so that I won't have to pack them)? Check. Airing out the entire room to avoid smoke detector inferno? Check... Have hard-boiled "what are we doing with our lives?"-discussion with unemployed 22-year old (soon to be former) flatmate ? Oh yes, check.

Paaaaaaackingpaaaaackingpaaackingpaackingpackingpckingpkingpingpngpgp.

Also, now I am procrastinating from writing my packing-procrastination post. It seriously took around 15 minutes between the previous paragraph and this one.

(And I've switched to a new playlist and I don't like this one either. They should make "this playlist will make packing less of a pain in the hind box"-playlists. Wait... Maybe they do? ((Who are "they"?)) Maybe I can google that? ((Yeah, you can google it, but the results that come up are pretty useless. Meh.)) Or maybe I should just look up "anti procratination playlists"? Nah. Later.)

(((Yeah, I know, "putting off procrastination" is an old joke. Sorry.)))

I really need to get a move on.

But the procrastination playlist I found sucked too! I may have to make my own...

Or maybe I just do the actual packing?

Ha. You would think.

Still not doing it.

Still not.

Not.

Maybe..? No. Noooo. Nonononononoo. Noooes. Nope. Nooo. No. No. No.

But...? A--no. No.

..?                                                                         No.


But yeah. I guess, I suppose, it's really not doing itself, I've been trying all day ("Use the force, Cruella!"), but... Yeah? Maybe? Be efficient for half an hour and then take another break?

(The break is a lie!)

((But then so is efficiency.))

Packingschmacking.

On Digressuary

If you have visited Tami lately, you'll already have heard of it (and if you haven't, you should). She decided that the month of February - with its many potential pitfalls for those prone to gloominess - should be banned. Or at least improved. By adding digressions, and the general principles of our (somewhat dormant) religion Digressionism. Hence, Digressuary was created.

Feel free to join in. There's no fee. Very few requirements. We simply want to avoid letting the February gloom take hold of us and instead stand strong through such "hardships" as continued winter (gah), and the sillies holidays Groundhog Day (bah, though I liked the movie...) and Valentine's Day (meh). I know. We're such fragile creatures.

But honestly. I live in Norway. We have lots of winter. In December it's lovely. Early January it's still kind of cute. But come February, I'm really getting over it. Principle-wise, I am in favour of Norway having winter in February, 'cause otherwise we'd be looking at an (even more) severe case of global climate change and all that. But frankly, when I wade through my third straight month of snow/ice/slush, I'm so fed up I'm seriously considering migrating south (which I did, incidentally, last week, but only for a short relaxation injection before stress closes in on me again at work).

And, perhaps worse, is that due to my latitude, winter does not only mean cold and snowy weather - it also means very little light. Light, people. I am light deprived!

This is actually true. My doctor called the other day to tell me my vitamin D test came out with bleak results. Her suggested cure was to take supplements (and, implied, try to get some sun ((but there is (((almost))) NO sun!!!)) and eat more fish, but it just dawned on me - what I lack isn't just the "regular" vitamin D - I lack vitamin Digression! Obviously, I haven't been digressing enough!

So, Tami's idea of a good Digressuary is plenty of "play, be silly and digress". I heartily agree. Somewhere in there a very hungry-for-fun Cruella is still lurking, I'm sure. It's high time I lured her back out.

On cloudiness

Today, this picture haunts me:

It's from artist Berndnaut Smilde's clever use of a fog machine and just the right amount of humidity, temperature (and light) to create a real (as opposed to photoshopped) indoors cloud.

Also, I feel cloudy.

No, there is no actual indoor cloud hanging over me, though occasionally it seems that way. I'm not trying to overestimate my own problems here, and I realize that the image of a personal cloud is a worn one. But bear with me. Think of it as a real cloud - in reality, clouds come in many shapes and densities, and mine, at the moment, isn't a dark thundery cloud. It is also not a light, summery whips of coolness in an otherwise perfect blue sky. It's somewhere in between. The cloud thickens some days, and other days I can see the rays of sun behind it. Sometimes a cloud comes in handy - it lends shade when the light is too bright. Other days you wish you could escape it.

My current cloud has a pink shear to it - I see good things for me, both in my present and future. Though my cloud also has some darker areas, as if it's about to rain (or more likely, since it's Norway and January, snow).

I can't do anything about the weather. I can't stop my cloud from erupting into rain, snow or even full storm. But I can try to prepare myself for whatever may come. Wear a coat. Bring an umbrella. Try not to take it personally if the sky falls in my head.

And in the meantime I am fortunate enough to be one of those people who enjoy watching cloud formations.

On things that are great and things that could be greater

Things that are great:
-Vacation time very soon (Hasta la vista, Noruega!)
-Cupcakes
-Giraffes (duh)

Things that could be greater:
-The speakers on my work computer. They could work.
-The situation in Syria.
-My ability to cross off tasks from my to-do-list (or rather, my ability to DO the things I want to cross off from that list)
-The banana at my desk, turning browner each day
-My scratchy, scratchy glasses (I think I need new ones)
-Cupcakes (I mean - imagine if they were EVEN greater!)

On people

People are such interesting creatures.

I find myself studying them, like a nature photographer might study insects or a pride of lions. I'm Sir David Attenborough, only the habitat of study is found among lattes and fake rustique furniture, rather than palm trees and exotic plants.

A meeting. Four women. In their forties, or seemingly in their forties. Maybe one is a little older. Maybe one is younger. But they are all of the glorious "too old to be naive, young enough to be fresh of mind" age. They know life, these women. They have ambitions, careers, they spend their weekends as happily with their small children as with friends over a glass of wine. Some of them are divorced. One has a young lover. They know where they are going, and more importantly - they know where they've been.

The women are joined by a man. He is midgeted by them. He is a photographer, and his task is to document the meeting. An interview. Classy pictures in soft light, disguising fine lines around the eyes, but not hiding the stauesque shades that add character to the faces. The man takes a bite of his sandwich. Takes a few more pictures. Knows that his role is unimportant now, here, but once the interview is published, the pictures will be glorious. He knows. He is man enough to realize is position.


A young bust boy. Not the brightest. Slightly inappropriate in that he steals candid looks at the female guests. He performs simple tasks such as refilling the coffee beans, stacking glasses, clearing tables. Maybe he has it the right way, though - why should life be complicated? Free coffee, simple tasks and unlimited access to the view of breastfeeding mothers. He's having the time of his life.


A couple. Recently married, a baby on the way. They hold hands and talk to the bump. Notice a small family nearby, exchange smiles with the tired-looking mother. The children, a toddler and a boy close to school-age, are more noisy than the young couple imagine their own child will be. "I was a quiet kid even if my parents gave me a free upbringing," she thinks, certain that her genes will ensure quiet café visits also after the baby is born. "I will be a firmer parent and thus avoid such nonsense," he thinks, certain that his wife will agree with this approach. "Our child will be different," they agree through meaningful glances as the toddler drops a cup to the floor.


A young mother. Two children, the second one planned. The father is working, and she once thought it romantic to stay at home while the kids were young. It is not romantic. It is meaningful, tiresome, exhausting. She misses her job, her colleagues, her career. She loves her children, but they drive her to the brink sometimes. Like now, when she in a desperate urge to leave the house - even for just a few hours - had taken them to the local café. She knows this  is never a good idea. The kids only ever want cakes or pastries when they are there, and she can't be too firm in public, as she hates making a scene. Then again, she hates the idea of people thinking that she has a habit of feeding her kids confectionery goods. Sugared up and wearing too much clothes the boy turns into a nightmare and the sweet baby girl is not sweet enough to dull her mother's irritation when a cup disintegrates against the concrete floor. For a brief moment she considers standing up and leaving. But then, of course, she doesn't.


A woman, observing the lot. Trying to blend in, trying to conceal her fascination with them. She smiles - not at people, but, seemingly - of them. They don't notice her much, though. Everyone is busy with their own. When she leaves, no one even looks up.