International Food Evening

Only in Norway - going out in wellies, fake fur and a summer dress

Well there certainly was no sign of the sun last Saturday night at the International School's 'Here Comes the Sun' international food evening but there was plenty of scrummy, yummy food from all over the world. But not Ireland for some strange culinary reason - boiled cabbage and bacon anybody? Mmm, no thanks I think I'll go for that delicious Pakistani chickpea curry instead. Can't blame you.

I had a great night and came home with a hand-painted (by D1's teacher) wooden moose I bought at auction. Four glasses of wine - yes, I could still count - and I was feeling 'off' as late as Monday. I know a lot of effort went into organizing the event  and I felt a tad guilty that I hadn't helped out in anyway. Maybe next year, I'll offer up cabbage and bacon, with floury potatoes. Maybe.

Here comes the sun NOT!

Forget the almost zen-like zeal for life of my previous post. It's snowing again and boy am I cranky. I'd opened the windows, embraced the dust brought to light by Spring conditions, and started to wear brighter lighter jackets even though it was still bloody freezing. But now we're back to snow, sludge and the sense that the only thing to do is retreat back inside and eat chocolate and drink wine. After all, it's not as if we'll be baring flesh or form anytime soon in Norway. 

But wait. There's tomorrow night. The International School's international food evening. It has a theme. Wait for it: HERE COMES THE SUN. Here comes the bloody snow again more like. No one seems to know what this theme actually means other than an allusion to delusion. Last year the theme was the 80s. So easy, so nostalgic, so fun. I'm thinking of digging out a summer dress to wear over thermals and tights. We'll probably be digging ourselves out of the car park too. Ah well. You gotta laugh.

In other news, I've just had an email from the kindergarden to say that they have discovered a cockroach. A bloody cockroach, in this weather. I say give it a medal for surviving winter. I'll be looking for one soon. You gotta laugh.

Only half way

I usually ignore my birthday. I’ve forgotten most of them because I treated them as non-events. Although there are a couple of exceptions.

On the day I turned 21, my father’s Cairn terrier leapt up and bit me on the back of the knee as my father gave me a birthday hug. ‘It’s me or the dog,’ I shouted, and promptly flounced out of the house and took a train to Dublin where I was a student. It was clear the dog was staying.

Then there was the day I turned 30. We were living in Singapore, it was Mother’s Day, and my first child was three weeks old. The three of us ate brunch at the Four Seasons (oh the life we used to lead!) and I cried on the walk home because I was such a crap mum. Nothing had prepared me for the bone-numbing, eye-gritting tiredness of motherhood. Yes, there’s probably little about that scenario that would make you feel sorry for me; I just felt very sorry for myself.

However, this year, I feel a certain sense of achievement about reaching 38. I’m happy, I’m healthy and I haven’t given up the novel-writing dream (yet). What’s more I’ve three healthy, happy children, a wonderful husband whom I love dearly, and my parents are still fit and well. (The dog incidentally, died a few years back, so I guess I won that battle in the end.)
I have friends coping with cancer and bereavement, and I think of them every single day. I know that life can change in an instant, that life is fragile. In the past year, I've learned not to take my good fortune for granted.

Who knows what the next year will bring? I’m finally at an age where I’m living day by day, and trying to put worries about the future, worries about what can go wrong, to the back of my mind.
Today, as Elton John and I celebrate our birthdays (not together, obviously), I’m going to embrace the passing of another year (and procrastinate a little longer on Botox and completing my first draft). Really, other than telling the whole world about it, I’m still ignoring my birthday.

Snow more ice hanging around

So true to his word, the landlord sent three men and a lift to save us from death by ice. I couldn't go outside and take photos as baby boy and I were trapped inside by metres of snow on three sides, and falling ice and a lift on the fourth. I got a few shots though which I think illustrates very well my neighbours' snow disposal technique which I mentioned in my previous post.

There's still plenty of ice on the roof, but the overhang is gone (to join the great pile in the drive). We can now go in and out of the house without wearing safety helmets.

Watch your head

All week I’ve been worrying about the ice on the roof. More specifically, I’ve been worrying about it sliding off and dropping on someone’s head, killing them instantly. It looks quite pretty – like an ice blanket draped over the eaves – but as with many things, looks here are deceptive; it has the potential to be lethal.

As I’ve typed away at my computer, I’ve noticed Knut and the other elderly neighbour, looking across at our house disapprovingly. They’re out every day shovelling the snow from their gardens onto their driveways, smashing it with their feet and leaving it to sit in the sun and melt away. Life’s too short. At least mine is, even if I live to be 100. Anyway, I think it'll be fun to have ice in the driveway in June. Something to blog about.

The thing with the roof is that it might actually make someone's life very short indeed, but we haven't known what to do about it. We’ve tried poking the ice down but it’s rock hard. My structural engineer husband has been unconcerned compared to me. Still I worried. And repeated over and over, like a parrot, 'watch out for the roof, don’t loiter, come straight in or go straight out the door, without stopping'.

Yesterday I arrived back from the school run to find these wooden posts set up under the porch. I gathered that Knut had called the landlord who had sent someone to erect this support, in case the ice fell on the porch and killed it. And you thought I was being paranoid about him watching us. 

Of course I was mad. I mean wouldn’t a phone call have been nice? A little courtesy. I was around all morning - why not call in and say you're going to call the landlord? It’s not that I’m oblivious to the danger hanging over us, I just haven’t known what to do about it, and to be honest I didn't really think it was the landlord's problem. Of course, I hadn't considered the potential damage to his porch, only our heads. 

Around 6 pm, the landlord showed up, and of course I wasn’t mad at all. I’d already got that out of my system ranting about rudeness on the phone to my husband (the kind of conversation that ends with him saying, ‘Are you finished?’). 

The landlord complimented my Norwegian while doing a good impression of someone lip-reading which was somewhat unnerving. He took photos. And he said that he was sending a man with a crane around today to remove the roof hazard.

There’s no sign of the crane yet, but as it’s -3 now, I’m happy that nothing else will budge that baby for a few hours.  Still if you’re in the area, watch your head, don’t loiter, come straight in or go straight out the door, without stopping.

p.s. while trying to put these darn photos into Blogger, I saw the landlord drive up to the house then turn and drive away again. Mmm.

 

Royalty awaits II

Well D2 didn't actually get to MEET the King but he was sitting in the front row as she and her pals presented their paintings to the conference speakers in front of an audience of hundreds. She looked very serious up there but explained this afterwards with,' the lights and heat on the stage were just as much as I could bear.' And that was for five minutes. So, I think she may not be destined for a life in entertainment after all. On to Plan B.

We did see the King leave the theatre and get into his stretch limo from which he gave us a royal wave. I wonder when D2, some day, walks down the aisle to marry his grandson, will he remember the little girl with the grim face and slightly stained red dress. Oh that's Plan B by the way.

Tonight I'm off to the Irish Embassy for a reception in honour of St Patrick's Day. There will be no more hob-nobbing for the rest of the week though. The sun is shining, the ice is melting, and - shh don't tell anyone - I think Spring might finally be on its way.

                              HAPPY ST PATRICK'S DAY

Royalty awaits

Tonight my six-year-old, is one of six kids from the International School in Oslo, going to meet the King. They will be presenting paintings they were asked to produce on Friday – I guess you could say they were commissioned – to a group of people, one of whom is the King of Norway. Another is the Minister for the Environment & International Development. It’s in connection with a conference on the environment, taking place in Oslo today.

So she goes off to school with her hair braided, ready to unleash her curls on royalty later in the day, while I polish her black patent shoes (‘Are you sure they match, mummy?’ Of course, they do!) and try to get the stain, which looks suspiciously like glue, out of her red velour party dress.  The chipped green nail polish from Saturday has already been removed from her fingers.

She’s not in the least bit fazed by the fact that the King is finally getting to meet her. Of course, I’ve hung out with him before when the Irish president was here, but today I’m just acting as lady-in-waiting/dresser/chauffeur/agent. I’ve a feeling I might as well get used to it. 

Oslo St Patrick's Day Parade

 

St Patrick's Day Memories

There’s been a little discussion among some of my Facebook friends about what they’ll wear to next Saturday’s Oslo St Patrick’s Day Parade: wellies or skiis in any shade of green being the current options. I haven’t been to a St Patrick’s parade since I was a teenager; we’ve been away for a the past few, missing the Oslo gig.

The parade days of my childhood were always wet and cold; so cold that I was forced to wear a thermal vest underneath my Girl Guide uniform while marching. Lord, I didn't know what cold was. 

I don’t know what I’ll wear this coming Saturday. It doesn’t matter because no matter what I wear, I’ll always know that once I wore worse. Oh, so.. much... worse.

My Dad has always been an active citizen involved in various organisations in Kilkenny, some of which have entered floats in the local parade. One year, as you can see, I was tortured and forced to wear the above ‘thing’ and stand on a float, waving to all and sundry. I guess I was about 12 or 13. They probably told me to smile too but I somehow doubt I managed that. My youngest brother was too young to care, the other one must have got away scot-free and marched with the Boy Scouts. As you can see I was lovin’ it. No wonder I haven't been to a St Patrick’s Day in twenty years. 

For anyone interested, here are the details of this year's Oslo St Patrick's Day Parade:

The St Patrick's Day Parade will take place on Saturday 14 March, starting at 1200 from Youngstorget and finishing with ceremonies, speeches and activities at Universitetsplassen, Karl Johansgate. All welcome! 

Coffee Mornings

The first time I was invited to a coffee morning, I was insulted. Newly arrived in Houston, married only two weeks, 27-years-old. What would I be wanting with a coffee morning?

A coffee morning? I mean how retro, how sexist, and what a waste of time. I associated the term with housewives; housewives with not enough housework to do, and with a penchant for gossip but with little of interest to talk about. That wasn’t me. Coffee mornings were a throwback to my mother’s generation and further, weren't they? I was a career woman, without a work permit at the time, but a career woman, nonetheless, above such idleness. I only gathered with people when there was a specific agenda or alcohol, or preferably both, on offer. Yada, yada, yada crap. I didn’t say any of this aloud, you understand, but politely accepted the invitation and produced such a diatribe to bend the ear of my husband.

I also used to think that any woman who didn’t work clearly wasn’t ambitious and that absence of ambition was worthy of derision. I once said that I wasn’t going to send my children to the international school too.

So this morning I went to a coffee morning for parents of Grade 1 students at the international school and was grateful that I didn’t have to rush to an offce after school drop-off. There was one dad there; a brave Swede. I can’t imagine many Irish men turning up at such an event (but could in fact see my Danish husband yapping away with the ladies if I ever earned enough to keep us in the style to which I have become accustomed. Yeah like that’s ever going to happen). I had a nice time. I have embraced the merits of such a gathering.

Maybe I’ve grown up and divested myself of my ‘I’m-never-going-to-be-expat wife’ (expletive removed) chip on my shoulder. I clearly remember the evening I made that declaration by the way, only a few months after I started dating my husband. (You’d think he’d have had the sense to run).

Or, have I just become an expat wife. Mmm. What do you think?

That toilet charge thing - again

OMG! I actually thought he was joking but according to the morning's Irish Times, Michael O'Leary is serious about the proposal to charge passengers to use on-board toilets. He proposes that customers use their credit cards to swipe access to the toilets.

'.. if the airline was prevented from charging passengers on the way in to the toilet, it would impose the charge when they were on the way out. It would also impose soiling charges where appropriate,' the Irish times quotes O' Leary. 

Soiling charges! Oh pleeease! Does that mean a toilet inspection would be included in the price of a pee or poo, or would the customer have to pay for that too?! 

Would parents be allowed to take young children to the toilet, or would that incur a double charge? Even Harrods lets pregnant women use their toilets for free; would Ryanair do the same (with a doctor's certificate, of course (heavy sarcasm)).

Do you think he'll start distributing free coffee and delaying flights once passengers have boarded to increase his toilet-usage revenue? Will toilet paper be included in the tariff? 

So many questions, mostly tongue-in-cheek because you know, I STILL think this must be a joke. Only, I'm not really laughing. 

Either that, or O' Leary has genuinely, once and for all, lost the plot. 

Then again, a few years back, people probably thought the same about the prospect of being charged for taking luggage on holidays.

This is what seventy looks like here

This is my neighbour Knut. The seventy-plus-year-old I mentioned in my most recent Weekly Telegraph article. On a daily basis, as I sit in front of my computer staring out the window, I get tired just looking at his constant physical activity. Here he is shovelling snow up onto his trailer before driving it off somewhere - only five minutes away - to dump it. He’s been doing this all week and he's hardly made a noticeable difference yet. Still, he keeps going. For most of the day.

I, on the other hand, was rather pleased with myself for clearing snow from the three steps at the front door on Monday. Not the full width of the steps, you understand, just enough to allow one person use them without slipping. And god was I pissed the next day to find a new centimetre of white powder covering my handy work. Goodness knows how Knut felt. It didn’t stop him loading his trailer though. He has also cleared much of the snow off his roof. We’re presuming that as the house is only five years old it has been made strong enough to support the metre deep snow lying on top of it. 

This is why, in another couple of months, Knut will have a pristine lawn resplendent with flowers in front of his house. He'll probably continue to be active until he's 100 too. We, on the other hand, will still be looking at the remnants of the darn snow hill wondering if it will last until July as it lies in the shade. I can only imagine what Knut thinks of us and our lazy, young (relatively), foreign ways of sloth. He'll be looking at our eyesore too, poor man. I wonder if he'll be tempted to offer us a loan of his trailer.

Today's Headlines

 

It's an emotive debate in the western world - working mothers. So imagine Norwegian parents glancing innocently at the newsstand this morning on their way to work or on the way home from school drop-off (whichever camp they're in) and faced with two sides of the great debate.

On the top left, we have Dagbladet with the headline 'Warning Young Women Not To Take Long Maternity Leave: Mamma Loses' .  Aftenposten, on the other hand, on the bottom right - diametrically opposite in fact - says: 'Warning Against Early Start in Kindergarden'.

This morning, at least, it seemed that Norwegian women couldn't win - at the newssagents at least.

Need to spend a pound?

According to the Telegraph, Ryanair boss, Micheal O' Leary is thinking of charging passengers to use the on-board loos. He might be joking; then again, he might not be. 

You can imagine it, can't you? You go to buy your ticket online and you're given the option:

                 PRIORITY ON-BOARD PEE - £1. 

(If you do not avail of this option, you will be faced with a £5 charge in the event that you cannot keep your legs crossed until we land.)

Oh yes, I can see it now. Two lines in the aisle. One line for people waving their priority peeing vouchers, the other weighing up the option of flushing £5 down the loo or peeing in their pants, while vowing next time to pay up-front just in case.

We fly SAS to Dublin anyway, as they give us a 100 kg luggage (i.e. shoe) allowance with our tickets so it works out cheaper, even without paying to pee. With my tiny bladder, it would be a no-brainer.

200th dose of drivel

So this is just a gratuitous post to mark the fact that it's my 200th. Nothing else happening; just waiting for spring to arrive, and ignoring the frozen water stuff - can't even bring myself to say the word anymore - that's lying everywhere and, get this, still falling out of the sky, on and off. Five weeks and we'll be on our way to Ireland where, rumour has it, daffodils and other floral things grow. Whoohoo! Colour. Fragrance. Variety. And that's just the easter eggs.