Qvale family reunion

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This is why we have come to Norway, the reunion of descendants of Ulrick Qvale and Anna Holst. We caught an early train from Oslo to Tonsberg with Andy's nephew Taro. I was about to send us on to Asgardstrand when Taro said he thought the reunion was in Tonsberg. He was correct. The address I had was from the very first email about the reunion.

Ulrick and Anna had 8 children and on arrival everyone got a name label with a coloured dot to indicate which of these children you are descended from. Everyone was also allocated a table to sit at To mix things up. It was a great idea. Everyone was very friendly and interested in where we fit in the family and about us coming from Australia.

The Norwegians are big on drinking brewed coffee whereas I drink more tea. The only teabags they had were 3 Earl Grey, 2 green tea, 2 herbal and 2 Lady Grey. Given that there were 85 people at the reunion, they weren't expecting a lot of tea drinking. Luckily, I had some teabags with me (and a thermos) in case we wanted a brew on the train. So I fished out my teabags and made a tea and thought, this tastes a bit funny. Then I realised the pots they were using for water had been used previously for coffee so the tea had a distinct coffee flavour. I then thought okay I'll try a coffee. The full cream milk curdled as I added it to the coffee. Dilemma, I then remembered the thermos and you will be pleased to note that I was then able to make some proper tea to sustain me for the day.

Everyone then made their way to the allocated tables. I realised I might be in trouble when the program came out in Norwegian. The days proceedings were all conducted in Norwegian. They thought it would take too long if it was in English. The man next to me explained what was being discussed. We all then had table discussions on who we were related to and why we where there. My table did this in English for me.

We then broke for lunch and people could sit where they liked so I had an interesting chat with some others. After lunch, I must admit I was having some trouble staying awake for the final presentations.

At the end of the presentations we were all invited to afternoon tea at the Qvale's original house. It has been beautifully restored. After more conversations and a tour of the house we then went with another cousin Erik to his summer house for dinner.

It was an enjoyable and relaxing end to the evening. Taro and I were catching the train back to Oslo and Andy was spending the night with other cousins, his Mum and brother. They dropped us off at the train station for what they thought was the next train. However, for some reason on Saturday that train doesn't run. By the time the next one came along there were a lot of people waiting for the train.

I was very tired by the time I made it back to the apartment at about 12:30. Still lots of people out and about at this time.

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