I really hope someone saw this happen

This is further proof that I need someone to follow me video taping my everyday actions.

The last couple of days, we have started to get snow here in Trondheim, the kind that actually is staying on the ground. As much as I love snow and am ready for it to NOT be raining any more, I have also been fearing this day. If you don't remember, I happen to live up the side of a rather large, steep hill (see pictures below for my daily climb). I also have a limited selection of shoes, especially any that are ready to face winter. I blame this partially on living in Missouri for the last two years. I put on my only shoes that have a good chance of keeping my feet dry and headed out the door on the way to church last night. I was slipping and sliding a bit walking on level ground and began to embrace the fact that this trip down the hill could be very eventful.

As I neared the top of the hill, I let out a little gasp of joy when I realized that either someone had shoveled away a path on the hill going down or the melting snow from the trees had conveniently melted the snow there. I figured I was in the clear. I started down the hill with high expectations of a successful journey.

I was about 1/4 of the way down the hill when a large van began the ascent up the hill. I chuckled because of its eminent fate. It began to race up the hill, and when it got up to where I was on the hill, the tires began to slip and it stopped making forward progress. As I was walking past it, it too began to move backwards down the hill. At first I laughed to myself because we were at the same spot on the hill, and this driver was trying to desperately to make it up yet we were making the same progress down the hill. The van then proceeded to move backwards, exactly at the same pace as me, down the entire hill. The entire hill. It was actually quite funny and awkward. The faster I walked, the faster the van slipped.

We got to the bottom of the hill in unison and I paused, waiting for it to back into the street and get turned around. Apparently the van was content with just sitting there so I crossed the street. (I'm now going across the old bridge where the pictures of the building on the water were taken, see below). I started to cross the bridge and the van kept backing up with me, only now it was moving in reverse on level ground. Side note: this bridge can only be crossed by vehicles during certain times of the days otherwise there is a gate that drops down at the other end. This was not one of those times. I was hoping that the driver would realize that even if he successfully backed across the entire bridge, he would just have to sit there. About half way across the bridge the guy realized it and started to drive forward again.

I really hope that in one of the apartment building along this street, someone was sitting in there window saying, "Hey everyone! Come look at this. Wow, that must be awkward for that girl walking alongside the van."

Playing Catch-Up

Once again it has been a while, but here is some of what has been going on over here. We had our second student service on October 20 at Betel. Continuing with our "Quest" theme, we talked about journeys and how it is impossible to live your entire life without affecting others or living a life where no one else has an impact in your life. We then broke into groups and had everyone draw out his or her journey. For those of you who have been witness to my insanely awesome drawing abilities, you know that people were blessed by my pictures that night. :)

The following Friday night after Unbad, the youth service at Betel, we had an all night prayer meeting. It was really cool. We started at about 10:30 and left the following morning around 8:30. We started out with about 17-18 people and by the morning there were still 8 people there so that was really cool. It was an awesome time where we just gathered together in prayer over the city of Trondheim, the students, the church, and other personal prayer requests.

Sorry the pictures are kind of blurry. I didn't want to use my flash and be a distraction. We set up different prayer 'stations' throughout the sanctuary where you could go and specifically pray prayers of adoration, confession, thanksgiving, and supplication (we used 'ask' instead). Seeing as how I hardly know what supplication means though, it didn't translate as well as hoped, therefore destroying the 'ACTS' acronym. It all worked out fine though. We had worship throughout the night and had fruit and tea on a table there as well. In the front we had a place where people could write down prayer requests and then have others pray for them throughout the night. There was a group from the Chi Alpha in Duluth that got together during part of the time that we were praying which was really cool to know that we had people all over praying collectively for the same things. It was such an amazing night and we have another one planned on November 30th so mark your calendars and feel free to join us!

These next pictures are from Lade, an area of Trondheim along the fjord. I went there with Linn Cecilie, who is Kelly's roommate and a huge blessing in my life. We had a blast.

Way to sport the authentic Norwegian sweater Linn! So great.

Haha. We were going around to all of these old historic places and making up our own stories about how history went down. I was currently pretending to be a great commander in the army giving my troops a pep talk during 'the great war'. I think we kind of scared some of the other tourists. We were laughing though.

Yes. We found a swing in the middle of the woods. It was awesome.

This is a place at the end of the trail where you can go and buy waffles and coffee and tea. As many things are in Norway though, it was very expensive so Linn and I opted to purchase soft (the Norwegian equivalent to Kool-aid) and chocolates at a little stand along the path.

This one is for my mom. :)

Ahhh the trip to IKEA!! It is times like these where a car would be nice. You can't see it but Linn has another huge blue bag on her right shoulder. It was freezing cold that night and we had a bit of a hike to get to our bus. Sigh. Oh well. My only purchase of the evening was a comforter for my bed. In the same way you should never shop for food when you are hungry, you should never shop for new comforters while you are freezing cold. I bought one of the warmest ones and am paying for it nightly, I am always so warm. I guess I won't get cold again though. That is always a plus.

Helena, Kelly, Cortney, and me. It was Helena and Cortney's birthdays so Kelly and I had them over and they had foot baths (no, I did not touch their feet for those of you who just gasped) and had facials. The red masks were self-heating. They were crazy. Pretty much right when you put them on your face they started to get really warm. Kind of like those little hand warmers we use when we are deer hunting, except all of my face. It was amazing.




This was at our Halloween party. From left to right:

Magnus is a gangster, Brett is the Holy Ghost, Cortney is a basketball player, Brita is an old Norwegian woman (Oh wow...I just realized she is wearing the same sweater that Linn was wearing from our trip to Lade. The funny part is, it is Kelly's sweater) and Kelly is a Zebra...Cat....Lemur. We couldn't actually decide.

We wanted to carve pumpkins really badly but we couldn't find any in Trondheim. No one there had ever carved pumpkins (some couldn't even remember seeing a pumpkin in their life) and none of them had ever dressed up either. We bought Halloween candy though and served caramel apples (they hadn't had those either) and hot apple cider (also a new thing for them). It is funny how there are so many things that you just assume the entire world enjoys but I am daily finding out new things that they've never heard of and many things in their lives that I've never heard of or experienced. It makes life more interesting.

This is me and Fredrik. I was a troll and Fredrik was a pirate. Kelly and I put his costume together and I put on his tattoo :) It says I love MOM in case you can't see the whole thing.

I wish I had an excuse for why I tend to only blog about once a month, but I am just going to have to say it is a sign that I am keeping busy over here. I really am loving it here. I wish that you all were here and able to experience it with me.

Trondheim in the fall

I am just putting up a few pictures of Trondheim this fall. Most of them are taken at an old military fort just up the hill behind my house. Enjoy :)

This is the classic Trondheim postcard picture. I even got the reflection in there.

I was proud of myself.

ahhh this is the hill I 'get' to walk up daily.

quest

The gang when we went to the student koie.

These past few weeks have been a good glimpse into what we will be doing this year. We are working with Betel, a local pentecostal church here, and last year they were also working with a Christian organization on campus called New Generation. For several reasons, we decided this year to start a new group on campus. We debated about several names and ended up deciding on "Quest". I've enclosed a link to our website so feel free to check it out.


Here is a quick look at what some of our plans are for the year:

Cell groups--each of us are involved in a cell group with other leaders as well as leading a cell group ourselves. Kelly and I are currently leading one on the Fruits of the Spirit that meets every week.

Anna Nicoline, Linn Cecilie, Helena and me at our first cell group. Helena made an amazing cake that had molde berries in it. Apparently you can only get them in Norway. They look like gold raspberries.

Student service--On the third Sunday of the month, we meet in the cafe in the basement of the church for a service geared towards and focused on university aged students. We have a time of worship and then most of what we cover is in a discussion format. Of course all of this is done over cookies, coffee, and tea. It is a great way to get to know a lot of the people.

House gatherings--Every other Wednesday night we get together at someone's house and we make dinner as a group and then hang out for the evening. After dinner, we have someone share something that God has laid on their heart that week. It has been so much fun and I am learning more card games.

Siv, me, Kelly, and Helena at the second house gathering at my place.

Prayer meetings--each week we meet at both campuses for a time of prayer with the students on the campuses. We meet on Mondays at Gløshaugen and Fridays at Dragvoll.

Kelly and I walking to the bus after one of the prayer meetings. The leaves are beautiful.

Unbad--Betel has their youth and young adult service on Friday nights. We attend these services to get to know more of the students and it's a great opportunity to be able to pray for many of the people there.

Outreaches--We have plans for several outreaches this year. Because we are a new group and a new name on campus, we are trying right now just to get our name out there. Tuesday and Wednesday of this week we are at Gløshaugen and Dragvoll giving coffee and homemade waffles out to the students. We went through 10 liters of waffle batter in just under an hour today. Food is always a good way into the hearts of college students.

Kelly making the waffles.

Retreats--Two weekends ago we went with four students up to a student koie (cabins that you can rent through the universities) to hang out and get to know them better. It was such an amazing time. It was beautiful! It snowed all day Saturday and Sunday though so that was a bit of a surprise seeing as how it was only the 15th of September. We have a student retreat planned for the first weekend in November which we are really excited about.

Cortney and I getting our water for cooking, cleaning, and drinking. Cortney is really excited about it. Best tasting water ever.

Kelly, Magnus, Helena and me brushing our teeth in the snow.

Magnus enjoying the first s'more of his life.

hehehe

Eating wild blueberries.

You'll be seeing many jumping pictures throughout the year.

SFC Europe--Students for Christ is the organization through the Assemblies of God in Europe that we are working under. In August, we went to a SFC conference in Brussels, Belgium which was amazing. Every third year, the same organization gets together over New Years. This year, we will be meeting in Nuremberg, Germany. We have quite a few students interested in going with us which is so awesome. There has never been a Norwegian at any of the SFC events so that is very exciting.

Prayer Conference--We are going to an SFC prayer conference in Krakow, Poland at the end of January. The team went last year and said it was amazing so I am very excited.

As for some things in my life.....

I am fully settled into my place and this is really starting to feel like home. I didn't get accepted into the Norwegian language class at the university here, but I was able to get into a different program through the community. I am in my third week and it is going ok I guess. I've never been that great at languages so it is a challenge. The fact that I am constantly surrounded by it though helps me learn it faster and gives me more motivation to do so. Kelly and I are currently doing a personal bible study on the book of Acts which has really been cool. My trips to the grocery store have also improved and I am ending up back home with the items I actually wanted. I still end up with a few random things every once in a while. It's hard to strictly base your purchases off of the pictures when dealing with spices and powdery things.

Kelly and Elisabeth had a Uganda night at their place. They cooked us an authentic Ugandan meal, showed us pictures from their time in Uganda, washed our hands for us as we sat down, and made us eat with our hands. It was fun. I think we should permanently get rid of silverware.

Karen Elise, me, and Cortney at Linn's birthday party.

This is a sign for speed bumps. The word for 'speed' in Norwegian is 'fart'. Makes me giggle every time.

I really am having an amazing time and loving Norway. It is such a beautiful place and I wish you all could come here. I can't wait to see what all God has in store for this year!