Hello from Norway! This past weekend my first year roommate, Anna, and I met up in Norway for the weekend! She is studying abroad right now in Ireland and we met half way! We were very lucky to have met up with one of Reid's roommates, Ida, when he studied at Oslo last June. I arrived in Oslo on Friday afternoon before Anna and Ida met me right away and took me to meet her fellow band-mates. There was a ball tonight for the medical students and a parade leading them to their party- the Medicine Orchestra Band led them there!.... Ida said they needed someone to carry their Bands banner... guess who it was? ME! I took part in my first ever Band Parade in Norway! It was so awesome! It is like a joke band of 30 or so people where they dress up in Black blazer coats with a bunch of medallions and pins from where they have played and traveled as a band, then they were goofy hats and play fun songs! They are all medical students, not music majors, so it is all fun and games when they play! I carried the banner behind the horse and carriage leading the parade with the Band following me! It was such an honor!  After the parade was over Ida was so kind and let me hang out with her friends at the band hang-out spot called THE GRAVE. We ate kebabs for dinner and had a good time. Then we picked Anna up at the train station around 10:15 or so and went back to Ida's apartment to eat some dinner! It was the same apartment that Reid stayed in last June for 3 weeks! It was so cool! We cooked hot dogs and enjoyed eachothers company. It is a 5 bedroom apartment with a kitchen. Very small, but that's all they need. The surrounding area of the apartment is very nice too- I could see how Reid fell in love with Oslo for sure!  Then Anna and I took a taxi back to our hostel (which wasn't so nice) and rested up for the night.

The next day Ida sang in a wedding so we weren't going to meet with her until the afternoon- how nice of her to open her weekend up for us! Anna and I ate at a cute little cafe on the main street and strolled over to the Akerhus Fortress. We also went up to the Ski Jump that was used in some Olympics and got a great view of Oslo. We bought balloon hats from a guy on the streets making them and both got Viking Hats- so we walked around all day with those on... people sure laughed at us! A few dogs barked and some babies cried! After the ski jump we saw changing of the guards at the royal palace and then ate some lunch! It was so cold this day that anna and I had to change because we weren't prepared! We met Ida in the afternoon and went to Vigeland Statue Park- A huge open park full of interesting statues, I learned that the area of the park is perfect symmetry! It was very pretty. We went to have a drink at Reid and Ida's favorite bar- Evergreen. It has a nice cozy atmosphere with cheap beer! Then Ida showed us kind of the "bad" parts of town, where the heroine addicts and prostitution takes place. It is becoming more and more of a problem in Oslo these days. For dinner we treated Ida out and ate at a very good restaurant with Mexican Food, Ida had lived above the place before so she knew the workers there. We were exhausted after dinner and cold so Ida was so nice and walked us back to our hostel!

On Sunday we decided it'd be fun to have a pic-nic breakfast on one of the nearby Islands off of Oslo. Ida picked us up again (we took trams everywhere though, no cars) and we got some breakfast to go and then went to the ferry! The island we went to was just a 20 min. boat ride. It was so nice! We enjoyed our breakfast and explored the island a bit. In the afternoon Ida took Anna and I to another different area where many of the Immigrants go to. I also saw another pub that Reid liked to hang out at- it was so neat seeing the city Reid lived in for just 3 weeks and the people he met and places he hung out at! Anna left in the afternoon on Sunday so after we dropped her off Ida and I went back to her place and made a typical Norwegian dish.

She cooked me trout fish with potatoes and carrots and a very good sour cream sauce. We even made Chocolate Mousse for dessert!  More of Ida's friends came  over to hang out with us that night while we watched some T.V. and listened to music.

I was so fortunate that Ida let me stay at her place my last night in Oslo instead of staying at the hostel, how nice of her! My train left early Monday morning so we had a sleep over (I used Reid's sheets that he left for Ida!) and woke up bright and early. Ida was such a great hostess- she made me breakfast and even packed me a lunch! Her hospitality the whole weekend was awesome and not expected what so ever! I love her! My weekend in Oslo was so much fun, thanks to Ida. Anna and I had such a great time. I think if we hadn't met with her we wouldn't have seen all that we did. She was able to show us the town from her perspective and tell us all the dirty secrets! haha. I hope to go back to Oslo later in May for their National Holiday- it is such a fun city!