Oslo, Norway
We had to catch a very early train from Cinque Terre to Milan Airport. Milan was really pretty from what we saw of it (which wasn't very much at all). It was another close call at the airport, as we were lined up in a queue for the wrong flight, and it wasn't until we heard our names over the loudspeaker that we realized our mistake. After a 2 and a half hour flight into Oslo, we hopped on a bus to the city center. We had no idea how long the bus ride would be, and were surprised when the driver announced that we'd be arriving in the city in just over 2 hours. I really didn't mind, though, as the scenery was really beautiful during the ride. It was nice to get a feel for the Norwegian villages and countryside before heading the city. 
Once in town, we found our hostel really easily and settled in, meeting some people in our room and spending the night relaxing and getting to know some other travelers, with a quick wander around the nearby area. My immediate impression of Oslo was that it wasn't anything particularly special (it sort of just reminded me of Cleveland but with more water), but I did notice how well people spoke English there. Sometimes it's hard to even pick up on an accent. Also, it was quickly apparent how incredibly expensive Oslo is... we refused to buy into the ridiculous restaurant/fast food prices, so instead decided to live off of the cheapest items we could find in the supermarket: peanuts, bananas, yogurt, and rice cakes. 
We started off the next day at the Opera House, mainly because we were told you can climb on the roof and get a good view of the city. After hanging out up there a bit, we moved on to the main site in Oslo: the Akershus Fortress. This is a medieval castle turned prison turned historical site. We followed along with the pamphlet's self-guided tour, discovering the purpose of all the various buildings within the fortress; some were used as royal residences, some had military purposes, and a few were used to house prisoners.
The Nobel Peace museum was also a worth-while expereince in Oslo. Norway gives out the Nobel Peace Prize every year, and has a museum to showcase the winner and commemorate all past winners. The European Union received the award in 2012 for promoting peace and democracy among countries. I had never really known much about the EU, so this was definitely an educational experience. Currently 27 countries are in the EU and Croatia is soon to be the 28th. In order to join the EU, the country must abide by certain regulations, such as implementing democracy, tolerance toward immigrants, the use of euro, etc. Funnily enough, Norway is the only Scandinavian country that is NOT in the Union.
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| The Royal Palace |
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| Nobel Prize museum |
After stopping past the Royal Palace (the king was in!) we headed to Vigeland Park, famous for its strange and somewhat crude nude sculptures lining the pathways Jess and I practiced our signature imitating-sculpture behavior. I had heard that Scandinavians were really fit, but this became quite apparent in the park with the huge amount of joggers all around.
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| interesting... |
On our way back to the hostel at the end of the day, we heard a band playing and noticed a large gathering of people in the main square. Apparently it was the birthday of some supermarket and they were throwing themselves a bit of a party, handing out so much free food and drinks. We were pretty pleased about this due to how expensive it was to eat in Oslo. Although it may not have been the healthiest of meals, it was free, and that's what mattered the most at the time.
That night, we went to the Hard Rock Cafe for the Battle of the Bands finale, joined by an Italian girl (Maria) that we met in the hostel. We knew the drinks would be expensive, but we had no idea that magnitude of the situation. Maria bought a jack-and-coke for 112 krone, which is just under $20 (as you can tell, Scandinavian money is strange... we had trouble sorting out the exchange rates and figuring out how much everything actually cost). So, we opted to stay sober and enjoy the music. I especially liked the winning band, "Groove Zero". For my fellow OU students reading, they reminded me of First Street Heat.
I have a Norwegian friend, Silje, who is also on exchange in Lancaster. She lives nearby Oslo and happened to be in the area, so we met up with her on the morning before our flight out. She took us to the Viking Ship Museum, which I was really glad to see. It was a pretty small exhibition, but it had some really impressive vessels and insights into what was found in excavations. It's amazing what experts can discover about humans from the remains that they found; one woman found buried in a ship apparently "had osteoarthritis, and suffered from lupus, bedridden from ages 8 to 10". Before leaving the country, Silje insisted that we try the famous Norwegian brown cheese (brunost), which has a caramel flavor to it. It was quite nice, but I have no idea what it would complement well. |
| Silje with the brown cheese |
Copenhagen, Denmark
The hostel here, "Sleep Inn Heaven", was definitely my favorite in Scandinavia. It's hard to explain why.... it just had a really fun vibe. The bar area upstairs had old-fashioned wooden tables where people brought in their dinner or just relaxed with drinks. This area overlooked a lower ground, filled with comfy couches, pools tables, and board games. Maybe it was the great music that they played that did it for me.
We got in late the first night, so we were just able to get a taste of the city, but I could already tell how much I'd like it. It was definitely more "cute" than Oslo, and some areas sort of reminded me of Italy's piazzas. If one thing stuck out right away in Copenhagen, it was the amount of biking. Bikers have their own lane on the main streets, and at somem points there were more people biking on the roads than there were driving. What I first noticed was that the parked bikes appeared to be free-standing (not chained to anything), but I later found out that the bikes come with keys that keep the wheels from turning when locked. But that doesn't necessarily prevent someone from taking the bike...  |
| city hall |
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| 2 red houses in back survived |
Our first full day commenced with a 2-hour walking tour of the city. Our guide was a local who was simply in love with his city and wanted to share some interesting stories with visitors. Two major fires occurred in Copenhagen in the past: one of them burned the western half (47% of the city) and then the other one, years later, burned the remaining eastern half (53%). Only TWO houses in the entire city weren't harmed by either of the fires, which we got a glimpse of.
We received a fun grammar lesson on the tour, which showed us just how weird the Danish language is. "D"s are not really pronounced when they come in doubles, but instead create a sort of open-mouthed, tongue-out sound. For example, the word "pludder", which means "mud", is pronounced "pluehhhr". The tour guide was really cheerful and friendly, a good representation of his people. At the end of the tour, he told us that if we are to remember the Danish people by something, he would want it to be (I'm paraphrasing here) "that we love our queen and she is very good for each other, we look after each other, and everything is always hoogily all of the time." This word, "hoogily", can loosely be translated into what Americans would say as "it's all good". Scandinavian people are known to have really positive attitudes, and I definitely felt this being in Copenhagen.
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| Jess at Mary's house |
After the tour, we walked to see the famous "little mermaid" statue. The artist modeled the body of the mermaid off of his wife, but not the head. Throughout the years, the head mysteriously disappeared, apparently stolen by some local hooligans as a joke. I reckon that it was his wife, though, angry at her husband for not representing her in her entirety.
That night, we planned to do an organized pub crawl set up through the hostel, but we didn't read the brochure thoroughly enough, as we found out just before we were meant to set off that the pub crawl only occurred on Fridays and Saturdays. Wondering what th eheck else we could do on a Sunday night, we recruited the guy who worked at the hostel for some suggestions. We ended up going to a free jazz club open-jam. It was definitely a good decision; the place was packed and the drinks were expensive, but the music was spectacular. It made me really want to start playing saxophone again. 
Trying to live as the Danish do, we decided to rent bikes for the day. Cristiana, a self-proclaimed autonomous small commune, was the first stop for the day. Negotiations have been going on for ages about what regulations should be put in place for this area, but up until 2004 their free cannabis trade was completely tolerated.This place was definitely in its own little bubble with a vibe similar to that in Amsterdam. We walked through the open markets filled with pipes, hemp, and hand-crafted jewelry. There were signs everywhere telling us that neither photography nor running were allowed in the area. Why no running? Apparently it's been a rule since the start of the commune, as it incites panic among the cannabis dealers and others partaking in unlawful activities.
It was an absolutely beautiful day, so we continued tooling along on our bikes, spending most of the time in a large park on the water. The bikes stayed with us until after dinner (t a delicious vegetarian buffet) when we finally headed back to the hostel.Stockholm, Sweden
We did two walking tours of Stockholm; one "old city" tour the evening that we arrived, and another "new city" tour the next morning. Both were really well done, but I especially liked the old city tour which was filled with stories of the city's royalty and battles. Something that stuck with me from the new city tour was the fact that Swedish people can buy fire insurance. This is simply a metal plaque that is put on your door, and if there is a large fire in the area, the firemen will attend to your house before those without plaques. Sounds like blackmail to me, but I guess insurance in general can be seen that way...
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| The Royal Palace |
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| narrowest street in the city |
Our hostel here was really nice. It had plenty of lounge areas and a
huge shared kitchen with fridges for each room, and one fridge dedicated
to leftover food from past visitors. We barely had a need to buy
anything; there were plenty of supplies in the kitchen. They even had a
free sauna, which we took advantage of after walking around in the cold
all night.
This is the bakery that supplies all of the bread to the Royal Palace. Apparently, the Swedish king hundreds of years ago came here for a bite and loved the food so much that he demanded the company start supplying him bread every day. The tradition stuck around, as all the bread in the Royal Palace still comes from here.
One of our tour guides recommended going into the bakery to try their famous hot chocolate, and that's precisely what we did. It was probably the best hot chocolate I've ever had, served with "cream" (what we'd call whipped cream).
At
this point, I still hadn't seen the changing of the guards at any point
in my travels, so Jess and I made it a point to see them in Stockholm.
I didn't realize what a process it was! It took a total of about 20
minutes, complete with a marching band and perhaps 50 guards. The
really weren't messing around... check out the knife at the end of the
gun. I kept my distance.
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| Nordic Museum |
We
took a metro to another island of Stockholm, Djurgarden, where we
wandered around the extensive meadows and forests. There was an
open-air museum and an amusement park in the area, but we skipped
these. We stumbled upon what appeared to be a community garden, which
was a lovely area for us to relax and take a break. We grabbed some
cheap snacks for lunch ("Crunchos" were disgusting) and then headed to
the Nordic Museum, which focused on the cultural history of Sweden in
the early modern age.
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| much of the museum focused on clothing |
The
night, Jess took a Swedish meatball making class (my vegetarian self
couldn't be persuaded). She said she had a good time and met some
Italians studying in Norway and some fellow Australians.
Going
back to Lancaster was bitter-sweet after this trip. On one hand, I was
having such an amazing time on my travels and wanted to keep seeing new
places. But on the other hand, I was sleep-deprived in a bad way after
countless nights of snorers keeping me up, so I was definitely ready to
have my own bed back. To get from Stockholm back to uni, Jess and I
had to take nearly every type of transportation possible: a bus, a
plane, a train, and finally, a cab.
