More than a week into my time in Norway

Hello beloved family and friends!(or, Salam! Namaste!) Life continues to be lovely in Norway. Today I got to meet Jan Egeland-many of you might not know who he is, but he is basically a superstar in the peace-keeping/humanitarian world, so I was really really excited to meet him. The other peace scholars and I were nervous and prepared some questions to ask him. We were only given one hour with him, but what a great hour it was! He's pretty much an expert on everything that I'm interested in, so it was such an incredible opportunity to be able to directly ask him a question. I'll post a pic of the group with Mr. Egeland once it becomes available. This week the peace scholars class also got to visit the Nobel Institute, where the head librarian sat down with us to tell us the fascinating history of the Nobel Peace Prize. She was a pretty cool lady-she has met every peace prize winner since the early 1970s! We got to see the room where they decide who gets the prize (it's all very secretive-they don't even release the names of the other candidates until 50 years later). Overall a great experience!

The view out my window at 11:00pm...this is as dark as it gets. 

My other class, Scandinavian Government and Politics, continues to be interesting (though not as much as the Peace Prize Seminar). It's a little difficult adjusting to the learning style of some of my classmates, who tend to be outspoken and long-winded. We watched a short cartoon at the beginning of class this morning which I really liked. You can watch it here, if you like. We watched it because we are learning about Norway in the Scandinavian context, and this cartoon illustrates how mixed the ancestries of Scandinavians are.

This is the inside of Oslo City Hall, where we had our opening ceremony and reception which I mentioned in my last post. Those are the portraits of Norwegian royalty on the wall.

Yesterday for class we went on a "critical walk" around the Gronlund neighborhood in Oslo, an area known for being diverse and lower in socio-economic terms. We observed the area, noting what kinds of restaurants they had, who was walking around on the streets, what kind of housing was there, etc. Below are some pictures from that excursion.

This is a really cool sculpture in Gronland-the hand looks like it ripped apart the sidewalk.

Crazy looking mannequins in one of the shop windows in Gronland.

Street view in Gronland.

In my free time, I've been up to the lake to run a few more times, which has been lovely. I also went down to the harbor and walked around with some friends I treated myself to an ice cream ($6! yikes!), but it was delicious so I felt justified. :) The ISS is also really really good about putting together stuff for us to do, so I've gone to a Norwegian movie and a lecture on Norwegian art and music that they put on for us. I'm looking forward to going on a weekend rafting and hiking trip either next week or in three weeks-should be exciting, if a bit cold! I'm also trying to figure out where to go for my upcoming four day weekend-I might just pick the cheapest flight and go where ever that takes me! Suggestions are appreciated.

Cool eternal flame of peace sculpture along the water's edge in Oslo.

 I'm still enjoying the international environment-it's so true that a big part of learning at the ISS is learning from each other. For example, I was just reading about the conflict in Sri Lanka involving the Tamil people. I don't know a lot about that, so I just asked the nearest person from Sri Lanka to explain it to me!

Tonight there is a party for all the students, and this weekend should involve going to the beach and celebrating the 4th of July, weather permitting. I hope you all have a fun weekend, and I would love to hear from everyone! Miss you!

Love,
Maria

P.S. Here is the picture of the peace scholars with Jan Egeland.