First days i Norway

I have made it to the beautiful Norway. I live in Toten which is a small district about an hour and a half north from Oslo. Toten consists of about 17,000 people with many small cities within the area. Many families here live on farms or they maintain  big gardens where they produce a majority of their food. The first few days I stayed with my counselor Tor and his wife Eli. They live in Skreia, about a ten minute drive from my school.  They live in a yellow house  with a nice garden. The two of them were very welcoming and kind to me in my first days. They helped me to file all my paperwork for my visa and set up a bank account  in Lena.  They showed me the closest big city, Gjøvik, a twenty-five minute drive with about 30,000 people. On Sunday the 14^th of August I switched over to staying with my first host family Egil and Hjørdis Berglund. 






                                                 Tor and Eli's house in Skreia

                                              Egil and Hjørdis's farm in Kolbu

And their house

I have learned a lot more about  the shootings and bombing recently in Oslo. It has been three weeks since the shootings happened on the island Utøya. Jens Stoltenberg, Norway’s prime minister, has received high praise for the actions he has taken since the tragedy. His popularity has risen a significant amount. He did a wonderful job on mourning the deaths of the incident. All throughout Oslo there are flowers and flags emphasizing the horrible event, and it has brought the Norwegian people much closer together. Now however after some time has set families and witnesses to the event have brought up critical questions on why the police were so slow on making it to the island and why the police took the harbour route instead of the most direct one, currently the police aren’t too well liked by the Norwegian public. It is a very interesting time, for me as an American Exchange student, to observe and be living in the country. 

**Norwegian fun fact

The older generation of Norwegians, those around sixty years of age, find relaxation when they leave the house. For example, they like to bring a canteen of hot tea or coffee to the forest and just sit and relax in the nature, whereas here in America people seem to find relaxation at home and leaving the house can sometimes cause more stress.