No, They Don't Speak Swedish in Norway!

Hello everyone!

My name is Isabelle Telford. I am a sophomore in high school in the United States, but I am preparing for a year abroad in Norway. This is something that I have been waiting to do for a while now, and I've decided the best way to keep everyone back home updated while having something I can look back at after my return would be a blog. I plan on posting once a week once I get to Norway, but I realize that that might be difficult if I am busy, so there will probably times when I post once every two weeks. This first post is going to be more about why I want to go abroad in high school so badly and answering some questions that I get repeatedly!

A few years ago, my mom made a comment about studying abroad in high school. I knew that lots of college students studied abroad, but I didn't realize that this was something a high school kid could do! My mom's comment was definitely not meant to inspire a new dream; I doubt she even knew I heard her, but I held on to that idea for a while. I began research on programs and found a few that looked reliable. I read stories of high school exchange students and watched videos. I was hooked. By this point, I was already in the throngs of planning a summer trip to France to stay with my aunt and her family, so a year abroad took a bit of a back burner. I spent that summer in France learning more French, making new friends, learning new skills, and having surreal experiences, but the aspect that surprised me the most was the fact that I was living a somewhat normal life as a French teenager. I love to travel and explore new places, but above all, I am a homebody. To be exploring a new, might I add gorgeous, place while just living life was the happy medium I had been chasing. It was paradise.

Lake in Annecy

Pretty sure this was at one point a jail, also in Annecy

Views of the Alps on the way to Chamonix

Lyon from above

The lake in the neighboring village from a mountain- I swam here all the time

But that tremendous summer came to an end like all great things do, and I returned to the States for the reality check of high school. It was then that the idea of high school exchanges resurfaced in my mind and I began to get excited about the idea having some chance of happening. In looking through the countries different programs offered, I found that my options weren't constrained to what I would consider the "popular" destinations: places that spoke languages that would give you an advantage in international work such as France, Spain, Germany, China, Japan, and some South American countries. No, these companies offered programs in dozens of countries, including Norway. I didn't know much about Norway besides having heard about how gorgeous it was, but I was captured by the scenery I saw in pictures and decided that this was the place I was going to live. 

The next few months were spent trying to convince my parents that this was something I could do and that sending me overseas for a year to live with strangers in a country where I do not speak the language was not a terrible idea. While I was never completely rejected, I was not given the go-ahead either. But I got a job and did more research and found information that would help strengthen my argument and, lo and behold, it worked. A whirlwind of a fall ended with me pressing the "send" button on an application to spend a year in Norway with a program called Youth for Understanding.

I'm not sure which day was better: the day I found out I got into the program or the day I found out who my host family would be. Both days were incredible and filled with me pinching myself repeatedly to see if this was actually happening. Turns out it was, and now I'm in the process of applying for a visa and getting the financial part of this trip figured out. Telling my friends I was going abroad was the next step, and it was a combination of exciting and sad. I could see the struggle of how to respond to my news on their faces, but many of them had questions that I got over and over that brought laughter and smiles. Here are some of the most frequently-asked questions I've gotten:

1. What language do they speak in Norway? Norwegian.
2. Do you speak it? Ummmmmmm, it's a work in progress.
3. How long will you be there? About 11 months.
4. Where in Norway will you be? Right outside of Oslo.
5. Can we still talk to you? Of course, just not as conveniently and often as we do now.
6. Aren't you scared? Yes. Very much so. But I'm also extremely excited and it outweighs the fear.
7. Are you going to have a pet polar bear? You know, I don't think so. 😜

I hope these questions and the answers to them cleared up some of the questions that I'm sure keep you up at night! I also want to quickly touch on the title of this blog before ending this post that is turning out to be much longer than expected. I've titled it More Than Just a Trip because to me, that's exactly what it is. I am coming back after my year, but I'm not going just to sightsee and try the food. I'm going to Norway to live in Norway, and that's not something you can do on a vacation. Doing it in high school is allowing me to experience family and school life in Norway at the same time, and give me a true sense of Norwegian culture and community. I hope to return with a global perspective on current issues, a second family and set of friends, and a new-found sense of self. I expect this year will change me in many ways, but I don't want to get too ahead of myself.

I am going to end this by saying that I am not quite sure when I will next post. I hope to get at least one more out before I leave in August about the preparation progress, orientations, and pre-departure feelings, but I'm not sure exactly when that will be. So for now,

Ha det bra!