It's true

Dear family and friends. Merry Christmas!!

I can't believe it. It's Christmas Eve in a week. We had our last day of work at Aloha today. Not going back until the 11th January 2011. (11/01/11.... Nice!!) It was a freeeeezingly cold day (+10...), which was perfect for the Inter house sports competition!! (Not...) Anyway, the Christmas spirit is slowly beginning to come to Casa Raustøl.

It has been an extremely busy week with lots of social stuff, and I have enjoyed everything!! The choir (Collegium Musicum) has had a few concerts, and there's more to come. (I love singing!!) There's been drinks and tapas and burritos etc. with different people, and I haven't really had enough sleep. I'm dead tired, and in two hours I'm expecting a few Aloha teachers over for drinks before we go down to Puerto Banús for a Christmas meal with other Aloha people. For some reason (and this may come as a shock to my family!!!) I'm actually enjoying making the apartment a bit Christmassy now!! Playing lots of nice Christmas music provided by Elaine! (Thanks my dear!)

Last night was the (now) annual Senior School Christmas Concert at Aloha (last year was the first one in many years, apparently). Karol (music teacher) had worked really hard with the different musical talents at Aloha, and we had done quite a good job with the school choir as well. The concert was a great success, even though one student fell off stage and we had some technical problems with the microphones. I am so glad I get a chance to help Karol with the Christmas concerts at Aloha. It's sooooooo nice to do something else than just the normal class room teaching!!

Tomorrow afternoon my choir is singing at a Christmas Carol service in San Pedro, followed by a lovely dinner (or a feast, to quote the chef!) with friends. Rumours say there will be more karaoke singing at the dinner party!!

This year Aloha gave us a Christmas present instead of a gift voucher. Here's a picture of the present. I can't remember what they call it, but apparently it has a name. Lots of nice food and drinks.


I'm flying to Norway on Monday. Looking forward to some relaxing days with my family and friends there.

I have to continue tidying up here now. I'm very tired so I'm sure my English is very bad, but I don't care. I just wanted to say Merry Christmas to everyone in Norway and Spain and everywhere else, and to tell you that I'm excited about the holidays!!

I will finish off with a little curious remark I made this morning. This shows how much I am influenced by the English people around here. It was freezing this morning, and suddenly I heard myself saying this to Karol: "The weather is horrendous today, isn't it?" Ha ha! Very English! Very funny! (Must be read with a proper Queen's English accent!!)

Christmas Tree and Lucia

Yes! Verden står ikke til påske! I've got my own Christmas tree, for the very first time in my life. And halleluja how tacky it is. I bought it at the Chinese Bazaar next door this afternoon. (Gosh, I feel like a proper grown-up now. The owner of my very own flashy Christmas tree.)

The flashlights change from blue to green to red, and luckily they can also be switched off. Isn't it fantastic? Or just dead ugly? I don't know. I think it's fun! Take a look at the lovely blue star on the tree. Fiona gave it to me today; it's from the V&A museum in London. It's lovely!

Just to get in the right mood, I also bought some new candles, and a Christmas stocking with Feliz Navidad written all over it. It's Christmas time in my casa. And it's the Lucia Day in the Scandinavian countries today. Look at the picture below, copied from the World Wide Web.

Kids walk in Lucia parades while singing the Lucia song, and they wear electric candles on their heads, eat the famous lusekatter, and generally have fun. Go Christmas traditions!!

Oslo in minus 20, Wednesday morning

On my way to the airport yesterday, after a very nice breakfast with my mum, I actually had to get off the tram and take some pictures of the sea and the fog that was dancing on among the boats. This is at Rådhusbrygga. Between Aker Brygge and Akershus Festning. The bed of fog (?) on the sea is actually just the cold, I think. Or...? It looks very magic!

Can you see the green light coming from the lighthouse on the other side of the sea, at Nesoddtangen in the picture below? It reminds me of the green light (and all its symbolic value) in The Great Gatsby. On Daisy and Tom Buchanan's dock there's a green light. Very interesting for Mr. Gatsby!

Concerts

Two Christmas concerts coming up with my choir the next couple of weeks. And ... lots of deadlines at work as well. So, back to work now. No more procrastination!!

Dill-dall

It's raining cats and dogs here. And a few elephants too. I had forgotten how dark and cold it can be here when it's raining constantly. So yes, that's how the weather is right now. (Just wanted to let you know, in case you thought I spend my days sunbathing on the beach. No no no.) And this shows how much I'm influenced by living among English people; I'm talking about the weather. (Ha ha ha)

Tonight I've watched an interesting film; "The Hours". I remember watching the film with my friend Marit, back in 2002, when we were studying English at the University of Oslo. I was thinking of Marit now, and realised that I haven't written anything about her visit on my blog. Now it's just three months since she was here, so I'm not that late.

Marit and I had five fantastic days together in Tarifa, Casares, at a friend's BBQ (with our own, private swimming pool ... what a luxury!!), at the local market here in Nueva Andalucía, in Puerto Banús with all the rich people, and at the local Indian restaurant. And, most importantly, we had lots of time to catch up and talk about everything. Thanks for lovely days, Marit!

It's already a month since my friend Kari and I went to Barcelona. I have previously posted some pictures, and there will be more. Barcelona: what a great city! The cosmopolitan and urban feeling. Oh joy!! We did the obligatory tourist things; La Rambla, the old town, Parque Güell (disappointing), the port, the Picasso Museum etc, and lots of other things. We also went to a few other interesting places and saw lots of great art. I was fascinated by the exhibition at MACBA. The mysterious, fairy tale-like cathedral La Sagrada Familia was also incredibly fascinating! We lined up for hours just to get in there, and it was definitely worth it!! (The Pope visited a few days after we were there.) We also enjoyed lots of nice food and drinks, and I even went on one of those typical tourist buses on a round trip with our new friend Gordon. (Btw, Gordon was American, and he had no idea of who Gordon Brown was... ha ha! Is that normal?)

The last part of the half term (høstferie) was spent with my mum, sister and niece here in Nueva Andalucía. It is standard procedure to have dinner at the Pasta Café the first night my family visits. This is something my niece Oda introduced, and we've done it ever since. (In my opinion the food there is boring, and it's a really touristy place, but hey, if it makes your niece happy, then why not?) We also went to the local market to get new flamenco shoes for my niece, and the other ladies got some shopping done as well. The Raustøl/Kroken ladies also experienced their first ever Halloween party. (Yes, it's true, I've never been to a Halloween party before. Or was it actually a Halloween party you had, lille-Natasha, at Sogn studentby many years ago? I remember Marisol bringing the blonde wig and the whip....) Anyway, Oda finally got to meet her special friend Lucas again (my neighbour) and we all dressed up in strange outfits. On the dia de todos los santos, allehelgensdag, the day for all the saints that haven't got their own day (in Spain all saints have their own day, but there are more saints than days, so the less important (?) saints get a day on the 1st November, or something like that?!), we went to Fuengirola to visit friends from Brumunddal, Reidun og Leif Gunnar Sørlien, who work in the Swedish church there. When we got there, they served us waffels on their fantastic veranda. We also went to Mijas Pueblo with Reidun. And guess who got a taxi ride on the donkeys? Oda and her auntie! :) It was great to have some quality time her with the ladies of the family, and we even got to spend some time by the pool. Yeah!

I have to tell you that the ten sing choir from Brumunddal came to Calahonda and gave a concert in the Norwegian church a few weeks back. I went to their concert, and it was really fun.

Talking about music, this month I have really enjoyed singing. We're practising for the big Christmas concert now, and in a life with lots of work related stress (reports, parents' evenings, schemes of work, marking, teaching TOK etc.) it is lovely to switch off all that, and meet other people who also enjoy singing, and just sing for two hours every week!

Another thing I'm enjoying more and more now is speaking Spanish. I took the Level 1 Spanish exams last week, in Málaga, and even though it was quite easy, I know I've got some stupid errors. Celebrated with some friends in the evening (thank you, Mariela, for cooking lovely Italian food to the exam people!) and spoke a bit of Spanish there. Went out with two of the Spanish girls I met in Oslo in the summer, and three of their friends last Saturday. They are lovely people, but blimey it's hard to speak Spanish all the time. All the time.

Today was the annual X-mas Bazaar at Aloha. It's a shame that the weather was crap, but hey, there were lots of people there, and I think it was successful. The school choir sang Christmas Carols, and two lovely songs: "We are the world" and "Don't Stop Believing" (from Glee), and everyone seemed happy! It was nice to taste some Scandinavian food from the Scandinavian stall, and my friends really enjoyed the rye bread with shrimps, the saucages etc. (Unfortuntately I couldn't name all the dishes there...)

Last night I was reminded of how lucky I am to be involved in the Cambridge exams here in Andalucía; We had a farewell party for our excellent team leader. It's really rewarding to be working with the Cambridge exams here, and I've met many nice people through the Cambridge University system.

This last month has also been marked by problems with the Internet and the electricity. It's annoying when you come home in the evening to find your apartment all black, and the food in the freezer gone off. And it's quite fascinating that your apartment can go black about 20 times in one evening. Yai! :)

So, that was a few words, eller litt dill-dall, about my life. Because of the Internet problems (the line, or the dongle, is extreeeeeemely slow) it was impossible to upload pictures. So, dear friends, use your imagination and your creativity, cause this blog entry is nothing but words. Words. And more words.

God Adventstid!

Spanish Exams

Yes! Yesterday I had my first exams in Spanish. They are organised by the Instituto de Cervantes in Málaga and can be taken all over the world. I took the exams on the lowest level (A1), and, I know, hand on heart, that I passed all of them (reading comprehension, writing, listening, speaking), although I've discovered some stupid errors now. De todos modos, it feels good to have done it, and it required a lot of effort. I'm proud of having done the first level, and I think it is important to make an effort with the language they speak in the country you're living in. And in May 2011 I will take the A2 or B1 exams. Yeah!

Active vs. inactive

The inactivity on the blog does not mean that nothing exciting or worth telling you is happening in my life. It just means that I have more important things to take care of right now. Can you believe it?

This is Norway

To my friends who don't know much about Norway. Click on this link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ebqdwQzmSHM and I promise you will learn a lot! :)

Lørdagslykke

I love this Saturday! After a great holiday in Barcelona with my friend Kari and fantastic days here in Nueva Andalucía with my mum, sister and niece, I am now really enjoying some time on my own. Have had a loooong breakfast with coffee, bread and Brie (yes, I'm growing up, I'm finally beginning to like Brie cheese) and read through the entire version of last week's Sunday edition of New York Times. Now it's time to go out in my garden to enjoy the sun (yes, it's still hot here when the sun is up!) and do my Spanish homework and prepare next week's lesson in Theory of Knowledge. I have also discovered mint plants in my garden. Wow! Going to Fuengirola tonight to watch the musical "Anything Goes". Life is good! Wishing everyone a great Saturday.

Barcelona - the Giants

It's half term (for Norwegians, this is like the good old høstferie) and I've spent the last five days in Barcelona with my friend Kari. None of us had been there before, and we're both very much in love with the city now! On the first night, we were just walking around in the Bario Gotic, trying to absorb the atmosphere, when we suddenly bumped into a great party of Giants outside the Iglesia Santa del Mar.


It was kind of crazy, and we didn't really understand what was going on, but it turns out that Barcelona and all its surrounding cities have their local giants, and now all these giants were gathering in Barcelona for a very long parade in the streets of this lovely city!

You may ask yourself: How do they manage to move these giants? Well, each giant was carried by a really strong man (or woman?) and there was some kind of system that actually enabled them to make the giants twirl around in the streets. Very fascinating! (And a bit scary when they got too close....)



I have sooo many pictures and soooo many things I want to share with you, so I'm doing the blog entries from Barcelona poco a poco.

Overdose

It is staring at me. The little packet. Red design. Brown-red content. Asking me to open it. Enjoy it. I know I would have done it in the past. Enjoyed the content. Felt a piece of my country. But it's been in the fridge for three weeks now. Not opened. Untouched. What has happened? Did you lose your value after I found out I could buy you in Spain? Not so interested anymore now, Stine? I don't know. One thing I know, though, is that it seems as if I've had an overdose of the fantastic brown cheese (aka Gudbrandsdalsost).

Is this not a cultural place?

So it turns out that there are two Scandinavian concerts in Fuengirola/Mijas this week! I'm impressed. If you're in the mood for a combination of classical music and jazz, check out Drammen Symfoniorkester, and Royal Garden Jazz Band with Karin Krog and Laila Dalseth tomorrow night at Teatro de las Lagunas. On Friday, at the same theater, you can enjoy choir music presented by Copenhagen Girls' Choir. Who said this is not a cultural place?

"This is not a cultural place"

Wrong! This is definitely a cultural place! It just depends on what kind of culture you are interested in! (Before I moved to Costa del Sol, somebody who lives here said "this is not a cultural place, are you into sports?"... ) So it's safe to say that my expectations were quite low...

From April to October, each village arranges its own feria. For the most eager feria people, it's actually possible to go to ferias every weekend in this period. You may remember reading about me going to the San Pedro feria and the Mijas feria. In the weekend, my friend and I went to the feria in Fuengirola.
It was really fun, and quite different to the other ferias I've been to. According to a web page, "Fuengirola's Feria and Fiesta del Rosario is held from the 6th to the 12th of October and features displays by horses as well as bullfights, flamenco dancing and other popular Spanish cultural activities." There were horses everywhere, and as you can see on the pictures, the people wore their traditional Spanish costumes.


There were horses, the traditional feria tivoli, and of course lovely mojitos and some fantastic salsa bands and salsa Djs. We danced and had lots of fun!!

I definitely have to get a flamenco dress for next year's ferias!! :) There is just one feria left now: San Pedro, next week.

Music and hot chocolate

It's raining on Costa del Sol today. Heavy, heavy rain! (Well, right now the sun is actually shining. Weird...)

On a rainy day, what can be better than drinking hot chocolate with good friends, watching Grey's Anatomy (yes, I'm finally on Season 7 now!) and listening to music? (*Have also been to see a doctor friend in Marbella to pick up a prescription for my neighbour. THANK YOU, Doctor K.*) I love lazy Saturdays! And to be honest, it's sometimes nice to have bad weather down here. Other plans for this weekend include going to the feria in Fuengirola with my friend, and an intensive course in Spanish.

Right now I'm tidying up the apartment while listening to Lily Allen. Her CD "It's Not Me, It's You" totally takes me back to Oslo in 2008/2009 and life in that tiny tiny apartment at Etterstad. Do you also have memories attached to certain songs? Please feel free to share your connections in the comments section if you feel like doing it.

Talent

I have had the great pleasure of being audition "judge" together with the Music teacher and the Drama teacher at Aloha! In every lunch break the last two weeks we have listened to approximately 30 students auditioning for different roles in the musical "Oliver".

Here's my favourite song from Oliver right now; "I shalls scream". Click on this link from You Tube to hear the song. (It starts at appr. 01:50)

Tomorrow is the last audition, and we're beginning to get an idea of who we want to cast for the Aloha school production of "Oliver" in February 2011. I'm so glad I will be part of this production! The students have been excellent and we're impressed by their talent!

Clouds/Nubes/Skyer

I managed to catch the wonderful symphony of light created by the clouds, the sunset, the blue sky, and La Concha, before it suddenly got pitch dark here now. The pictures show the view from my little garden.

The view towards Istán

I like the way the blue sky mixes with the grey and pink clouds in the sunset

Ohooo... scary clouds surrounding La Concha

And here is my friend (and neighbour) Bianca's photo which must have been taken a tiny bit earlier. Still, it looks fantastic I think!

This was all from Stine, the photographer of Nature, tonight. Now back to work. Oh, it's great to be a teacher on Sunday nights...

To all my teacher friends in Norway: Ha en strålende høstferie!! Om tre uker er det min tur:)

Something special

I read "Eat, Pray, Love" (by Liz Gilbert) almost two years ago, and I really liked the book! It became a hit among my friends, and we discussed it and loved it. Some friends had already been to India, and others wanted to go. I had the same relationship to the book as is described in this image:

(Picture taken from a blog I follow)

We were surprised when we heard Julia Roberts was going to play Liz Gilbert, and pleased to hear that Javier Bardém was cast as Felipe. I watched the film tonight, and enjoyed it! Well, sometimes it was like when you watch the Harry Potter films, you wait for certain things to happen, because you remember reading about these things. (For instance Richard from Texas who wanted an open heart, and got it ... in the literal sense...) But all in all, an entertaining experience.

Sometimes it was a bit challenging when they spoke Italian and it was translated to Spanish, but I got most of it. It is also interesting that they sometimes have a 5 minutes long break. Ha ha! And after the break, the film started in Spanish (dubbed version), before they switched to English. There are always exciting things happening in Puerto Banús!! That's for sure.

Golf

Ulempen med å jobbe på en skole som ligger rett ved siden av en gedigen golfbane er at det en sjelden gang kommer golfballer SUSENDE inn i klasserommet... (!) Eller hvis du tar med klassen ut og sitter på gresset i ring og bedriver høytlesning av Dracula (herlig!), så kan det komme golfballer dalende ned fra golfhøyden. Dette fenomenet er nytt av året. Nå har det skjedd to ganger på en uke. Er det fordi golfspillerne er mer ustabile, eller ... ?!

La Luna Mora

Went to a fantastic festival last night, Festival de la Luna Mora, in a village called Guaro, somewhere up in the mountains. The whole village was full of candle lights, and after dark, it was absolutely fantastic!

The village and some of its inhabitants before dark. Look at all the candlelights!

There were lots of stalls there as well, where you could buy jewellery, candles, clothes, "nips", and lots of nice food. Look at the cakes, saucages, and sweets they sold!!

These are massive cakes!!

Spanish saucages etc. (not my cup of tea)

Sweets! Yummy! Definitely my cup of tea!! :)

I tried to take some pictures in the dark as well, just go give you an idea of how it looked. It was absolutely amazing. But my camera isn't realy good enough to capture the atmosphere, so I've kept the nice memories in my head!

This is the same spot as the second picture!

So we were really we went up there, it ended up as a spur-of-the-moment trip, but it was fantastic!

Cheese --- part 2.

Last night I visited Euro Market in Fuengirola for the very first time. The Cheesy Cheese Hunt was on, and we found what we were looking for kind of straight away: the very famous Norwegian brown cheese, aka Gudbrandsdalsost.

Thank you (and sorry) to friends and family who have visited me and who have had to bring several kilos of brown cheese in their suitcases. No need for that anymore. And to my friends down here in Spain who I've managed to get addicted on the brown cheese: It's there! At Euro Market. Only 8 Euros 20 for half a kilo. Run, run, run!!

The cinema

Going to the cinema in Puerto Banús can be fun!! (And a challenge.) There are two options; either you watch the dubbed version of the film, or the original version. The latter is of course most easy at the time being, although my Spanish is getting better every day! (Positive thinking!) However, I would claim that you certainly need to know some Spanish even if you chose the original version!! The story below is true, and it is not the first time it has happened. 


The very cute Jaden Smith (picture: www.filmogkino.no)

I watched "The Karate Kid" at the local cinema yesterday, and we chose the original version. Once the film started, it turned out that they had put on the dubbed version where Will Smith's son and the other actors actually speak Spanish! (Or ... some Spanish actors dub them.) Crisis! Trauma! The audience, which of course consisted mostly of ex-pats and non-Spanish people, started shouting and talking, and panicking, "oh, did we go to the wrong film?!?"" and "I don't speak Spanish..."-- but after five minutes there was silence again, because they put on the original version. However, they couldn't be bothered to start the film from the beginning again. Oh no... Luckily both me and my friends understand some Spanish, so we weren't completely lost. (And for those of you who have seen the film: How much would we actually lose if we didn't understand  the first five minutes?)

Then, when the actors in the film spoke Chinese, subtitles appeared on the screen. Which language do you think these subtitles were in??

Things you learn in life

Breaking news from Nueva Andalucía! 

It turns out that there is a very well functioning air-condition system in my car!! (Pity it wasn't discovered a year ago... )

Cheese -- Ost -- Queso

I'm soon off to a lunch with colleagues. And for some reason, the Norwegian Gudbrandsdalsost (or "brown cheese" as we tend to call it), is extremely popular amongst people down here. How come? Take a look at the Norwegian-style sandwiches I will bring to the lunch!

Back to work

Life is good!

It is eaxactly two weeks since I came back home to Spain after a nice summer in Norway. I really enjoyed coming back to Spain again; catching up with friends, enjoying the weather, taking a very intensive course in Spanish (I'm supposed to be an expert on the past tenses now....) and basically just being back where I live my life now.

I want to tell you a bit about life at Aloha College. Monday was the first day back at work, and I really enjoyed not being the new one anymore. Now I know my way around, I know which books I'm supposed to use, I know where the staff room is, where the coffee machine is, I know what Key Stage 3 and all other British National Curriculum terms mean, - basically I am not panicking as much as I did just a year ago when everything was new to me. I am more confident in my job now.

The first day I also got a nice surprise: I was told I have to teach an IB subject called Theory of Knowledge (TOK). This subject is a kind of philosophical subject where the aim is to encourage the students to think outside the box. Develop them into critical thinkers. It is divided into two main areas: ways of knowing and areas of knowing. I am sharing the course with another teacher. I will be teaching the following ways of knowing: language and emotion, and these areas of knowing: the Arts, Ethics and History. It is going to be a cool subject to teach, I think, and I'm looking forward to the challenge! I can draw on a lot of the things I read for my Master studies, and also from teaching Religion og Etikk and IB History at Berg.

So ... the first week at work has been a good week! It was made even better by the fact that my friend Marit visited from Oslo! We had lots of fun. (I will tell you about that in another blog entry.)

I have just been half asleep up by the pool for two hours now (I love Spain!), and will soon head for Fuengirola to enjoy some food and drinks with my best friend in Spain.

Wishing everybody a lovely weekend!!

Tjøme

Once upon time, or more precisely two weeks ago, eight girls had packed their bags and were on their way to a place called Tjøme. One of the girls, Marisol, had access to a beautiful summer house at Tjøme. Her in-laws had kindly let the girls use their summer house this weekend. This is the Jahre family's summer house that the girls stayed in!

The girls had met at the University of Oslo while studying English. Some of them had known eachother since before 2002!! The only exception was Kelly from the USA, but she was already adopted as the girls' friend, so no worries about that! :)

The girls chilled out in the garden, and the atmosphere was great. They chatted about life (after all, some of them hadn't met since Christmas!), discussed their holidays, men, books, films, music, and other things that they found interesting!

The wine was served from the kitchen window, and in the evenings they dined outside in the garden.

They also went for long walks in the beautiful landscape out there; Tjøme, Hvasser, Verdens Ende ... all those beautiful places!!

After three days, the girls went back to Oslo/Holmestrand filled with happiness and joy, and great memories!

(Photos: Silje Mittet and Stine Pernille Raustøl)

Family time

News update from Spain.

I'm back in Spain. It's very hot here, and I've already become sunburnt. (The sun is actually quite strong here, compared to Norway... Strange?) It's really good to be here and enjoy the weather, the smell of the flowers etc, the people, my apartment, the swimming pool, the cheap wine, and yeah -- basically just being back in the country where I live right now. And in my apartment!  


I'm looking through lots of pictures from my five and a half weeks in Norway now, and I decided to post some memories on my blog today. I have chosen my family. One thing we did was celebrating lots of birthdays, and the pink Hello Kitty party hats I brought very extremely popular! :) Other pictures from my stay in Norway will be presented in another blog entry.

Mamma, pappa, Oda and me at my sister's veranda

Pappa and Sivert

Oda enjoying one of the many birthday dinners in August

My brother-in-law and me at his birthday party (lovely hats, huh?)

The sisters playing UNO with mamma and Oda

Oda and Hedda dancing "the Spain Dance" --- with goggles on!

Sivert doing his version of the very famous and extremely popular "Spain Dance"

Oda proudly showing off the birthday cake we made for my sister's birthday party

Lunch at Dattera til Hagen with my mum, auntie Margit and auntie Marit.

After lunch my mum, my aunties and I watched Jo Strømgren Kompani's dance performance "A Tribute to the Art of Football" at the new and extremely fancy Oslo Opera House. Beautiful, isn't it?