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Published: July 20th 2007
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My room mates last night turned out to be a guy from Belgium...who's girlfriend was sleeping in the girls dorm!?!? They must be REALLY christian over there! I never could figure their reasoning for that. Then there was a mysterious adidas duffel bag sitting beside the one bed and a mysterious pair of shoes down there as well. I found out later that there were two IRISH guys who were staying there. I remarked how it seemed that they were packing light, to which I was told that they only came to Oslo for ONE NIGHT to go out drinking! I know the Irish are supposedly heavy drinkers, but to actually justify spending ONE night in Oslo just to go out boozing...it struck me as very odd. All that aside, I knew what to expect when they came home later in the evening. Obviously they staggered in around 4am...and continued to whisper quite LOUDLY to each other for the next 15-20 minutes. Finally they succumbed to their drunken haze...just after I heard one of them say, "That was fun...maybe we should stay another night?" The answer back wasn't audible to me...and I fear heading back to my room after I'm
done writing this. I did, however, do a great job of banging doors, dropping shit and scrapping table bottoms on the ground JUST for them in the morning.
After a handful of museums over a two week span...they become somewhat tedious. They are still filled with exciting things and still hold your attention, however the jump isn't in your step. That is until you see a LARGE German or Spanish tour group (it's ALWAYS German or Spanish...what the hell!) starts making their way towards the place you want to get too. So it becomes a race. In this case I raced a German group onto the deck of the "Fram", which was the first ship to go the farthest north and south during the late and early 19th and 20th century. Being closed inside a 120 year old ship...is a tad bit spooky. That's all I'll comment on that! Then from there it was over to the Kon-tiki museum which houses the original crafts that they sailed across the pacific with in 1947 and the atlantic in the 60's. Both were his proof that cultures could have met thousands of years before everyone thought. After seeing the vessels...what a
dumbass! Adventure for sure, however floating with the current and tradewinds on a balsa wood raft. Hmmm, not so smart. It was, however, an interesting museum aside from that simple thought. From there it was a short (meaning fairly LONG walk) to the viking ship museum, where they have the remains of 1200 year old viking ships. Two seemed to be in pretty good shap, given their age, and the other was quite rotted. Again, for obvious reasons this place is quite tourist heavy. They thankfully have lookout towers above and to the side of the ships for you to view them and take photos of. For some reason, nobody caught on and I had a great spot for all of the ships. For something like this, you actually DO take your time to study it. Only a short walk (this one WAS short!) away was the Norsk Folkmuseet.
The Norsk folkmuseet (Heritage Museum) is basically like Fort Edmonton park. It's a massive open air museum. Some buildings are open, others not so much. You have a multiple amount of paths you can take on your journey and in some cases a quick glance back TO your map is
usually in order since I found myself lost twice. The major difference between the two, besides this being in NORWAY, is the 'actors' who inhabit the grounds in their original costumes. Certain areas don't depict a time period, rather it depicts the area of the country it represents. For example, in the saskatchewan exhibit you'd have finely dressed, intelligent people. In the BC exhibit there would be hippies and truck drivers wearing turbans (More Vancouver for the last one I guess), in the Alberta exhibit you'd have...well not really sure how you show the fact that their AWFUL DRIVERS!!! and finally in the Newfoundland exhibit you'd have an empty town with signs that read, "Gone to Fort Mac, be back when the oil runs out!". WOW, took a LONG while to get that little jab in. The big difference between the two really is what I hated the most about Fort Edmonton park.
Don't get me wrong, Fort Edmonton Park is a pretty good place. It's their approach with the 'actors'. In Edmonton, we get flunky University B.F.A. students who OVERACT and worst of all I kinda like when the actors don't really interact with you, rather they just
go on with life like you aren't there at all. Kinda make you feel like your invisible and you've visited from the future. THIS is what they did here. There is something to be said about that massive, aging transexual who was making soup at the Fort Edmonton Park that DID make it worth the trouble. NO transexuals here, at least I think not. Hmmm, gotta do some heavy thinking now. The great thing was if you walked into a yard and there were LITERAL children playing. Now, they were speaking full on Norwegian so they may have been talking about current issues, but I couldn't tell so it was alright by me. One girl even had to walk BY me and didn't even react like I was there....they just played in and around you. The only time the MOM of the group would talk to a guest is if they approached her, however she quickly answered the question and went back into her role. Was perfect for me. (Plus the kids looked cute in their traditional outfits!) Down the Satesdal street I smelt a familiar odour. I came into a cook house (which was HOT AS HELL) and watched
for awhile as they made Lefse. For 20 Kroner, you could have a piece...you'd better believe I did. Lefse made IN a traditional cook house with the original tools. Tasted unreal...went back for seconds too!
Today I basically finished seeing everthing I wanted to see in Oslo...which means that tomorrow is a day to RELAX and just take a deep breath and not worry about having to plan and rush to see things. Don't get me wrong, I don't really 'rush', however I do make a point in seeing at least three things or more in a day. 3 to 5 is usually a basic number of things you'll fit in WHILST abroad I've learned. That is unless your trying to see London in 4 days...then your time is a bit more tight. A visit back to Vigeland Park might be in the plans since I could see myself relaxing there tomorrow. Hopefully the weather stays as it is. A little overcast in the mornings and beautiful and sunny in the afternoons. The one regret I have about sunshine and warmth in tourist heavy places is the body odour that lingers in certain areas that you come into. Usually
you can track down the guy (or girl!!) who left it and by that time NEW people have walked into the vacinity and attribute the smell to you! Ugh...again...German and Spanish tourists! haha.
Ha Det!
Don
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Jess
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I'm no hippy, and definitely don't wear a turban and drive a truck!!!
I wasn't aware that Saskatchewanians were so fashionable. Must be the fact that some of the men wear green t-shirts with red vests... That outdoor museum looks pretty cool-- and finally nice weather?? PS. Riders lost 21-20 last night