Torn

April 22, 2018

Torn

I think a lot about going home, probably more than I should. I have two months and a few days left before I get on that plane, and I know that that's quite a bit of time, but at the rate things have been going, that's basically tomorrow. Of course I knew going home was inevitable, but when I got an email on Tuesday with more detailed travel plans, I was taken a bit aback. The way I saw it, if it was late enough in the year to get information about going home, I might as well have already packed my bags. A series of movie clips of me seeing everyone again for the first time in a year has been playing in my head on repeat, and I'm not sure how to make it stop. I worked so hard at not having any expectations before coming here, but that was easy enough as I had no idea how this year was going to play out; I had never even been to Norway before. Now I'm going back to the place I lived for more than 16 years, and part of my brain still thinks it knows exactly how life is going to be when I go back. Expectations are building up faster than I can handle, and most of them revolve around things going back to "normal" the second I step off the plane. I'm writing this partially in hopes that it will get all this off my mind, and allow me to enjoy these last two months without tainting them by worrying about going back. Because I'm torn. Half of me can't wait to go back: to see every one, to go back to all my favorite places, to get ready for the last year before college. The other half is dreading it. Leaving Norway means leaving this life that I love more each day. It's become like a glove in a way, and a perfectly fitting one. And it's going to be cold to take it off, especially knowing that the old glove might be too small to put back on. It's too early in the spring to bother everyone reading this with all the specific thoughts going through my head, but late enough for lots of people to be asking me how I feel about going home soon. Now to try and forget about all of this...

This week was a continuation of last week's tentamen period. Monday was preparation day for math, which meant I got to stay home and work. Tuesday was the actual exam, and then I had rehearsal with the group of us going to Copenhagen. Wednesday was Anne's birthday which we celebrated with a family dinner in the morning before school and work. That day was my last midterm/ mock exam, this time in Bokmål, the version of Norwegian written in Oslo (and lots of other places). That was the last tentamen I'll ever have to take and it was quite a nice feeling afterwards (but who knows, maybe I'll come back to Katta for 3rd year and be a russ??). I felt like it took me the whole year up to that last test to figure out the key to the Norwegian exams, but then again I haven't gotten results yet so it's completely possible that I still haven't become a tentamen-master.

Thursday was back to regular school. At this point I'm sort of done with school. The weather is so nice and I would so much rather be outside, enjoying every second instead of sitting in the same classroom for hours on end. Thankfully, there's not much normal school left before exams begin and everything gets a little crazy. Friday was also normal, and very long. My class's longest school day is Friday which is more than a little annoying. Thankfully once it's over it's the weekend. That night Sarah came over and we hung out, ate ice cream, watched a movie, and she started teaching me the important national songs for Norwegian independence day, May 17th. Hopefully I'll get to go full-out Norwegian that day ;)

Saturday I had to go back to school for a seminar with the orchestra. We worked on a bunch of music and ate pizza and discussed a possible trip with the choir and orchestra to come visit me and do some concerts next year(?!?!?!). It's not all that likely that it would actually happen, but I'm keeping my fingers crossed! Afterwards I went out into the city with Beate and Iben where we met some of our other friends and hung out in the sun. I was pretty exhausted from going to bed late the night before and then standing and walking around all day, and took a nice little nap in the hammock when I got home:)

Today was the week's true excitement: a trip to Tusenfryd, the amusement part right outside of Oslo. Now, those of you reading this from the US that know me well know that I am not a fan of amusement parks (in a letter to potential host families I even wrote that I was willing to try anything but rollercoasters), but when a free ticket was offered to me and the rest of my friend group was going, I wasn't about to say no (rule #1 of exchange). When I was woken by my alarm this morning, all I wanted to do was stay in bed and not go, but I'm so glad I forced myself to get up. A group of eight of us met at the bus terminal and took a short bus ride to the park. We started off slow with a carousel, car thing (not bumper cars though, those came later) and swing carousel thing, and then the others went off to the first big rollercoaster, and I think the only one that was open. I really don't like rollercoasters or that dropping feeling, so I watched and took pictures for them:) Then it was bumper cars and my first "real" ride of the day, the log flume (I really have no amusement park vocabulary and have no idea if that's actually what it's called). It was the first time I had ever gone on one of those things, mostly because I had always been too scared of the drop. This one was pretty small though, so I went along and screamed the whole time:)

Next we visited Frida, who works there, and ate some lunch before heading off for more rides. I decided to face my fear of rollercoasters and go one a relatively small one, and much to my surprise, survived. It was also slightly enjoyable!! I'm not saying I'm ready for huge loops and upside down stuff, but it was a pretty big step for me. The next ride we went on was my favorite, and one I've dared to try at other parks. It's the river ride where everyone sits in a circular boat thing facing each other and rushing water carries you down twists and turns and through waterfalls. This one had a few small drops and sharp turns to keep it interesting, and Disneyesque music for entertainment. After that, all the others wanted to go on SuperSplash, basically the log ride on steroids. It was going to be the last ride of the day, and I had already stepped out of my comfort zone several times, so I decided to go with everyone. By the time it was our turn to get on the rollercoaster, my heart was beating approximately 1000 times per minute, but I got on anyways. I held on to the hands of my friends on either side for dear life as the car moved up the steep incline, and closed my eyes and prepared for the worst as the small descent and turns before the real drop started. Then came the drop, which at one point was pretty much vertical. I screamed at the top of my lungs all the way down, but again, survived. Hitting that water at the end was like heaven.

As if we weren't already wet enough, we then stood in the splash zone next to the ride after meeting some other Katta kids, and got completely soaked. There was a drying room thing a few meters away, and we managed to fit about eight people in there to dry ourselves and our clothes as much as possible before getting on the bus home. I have to say, I'm a little surprised we didn't get kicked out for public indecency... All in all, the day was about 100x better than I expected it to be, and you might even be seeing me at another amusement park some day:)

Word of the Post:
en fornøyelsespark = an amusement park

Pictures:))