Kon-Tiki

If you had asked me, when I was around ten years old, what I most associated with Norway, I may have very well answered Kon-Tiki. If your first reaction to that is something along the lines of "that doesn't sound very Norwegian at all", then you are totally correct. Kon-Tiki is the name of the mythical figure in Polynesian folklore who came from over the ocean to colonize the islands of the south Pacific. What then has this Kon-Tiki to do with Norway? Well, shortly after World War II, a Norwegian biologist by the name of Thor Heyerdahl, who had lived in the South Sea Islands, hypothesized that the Kon-Tiki legend referred to a South American people from Peru, who had fled the Incas on balsa wood rafts and sailed to Polynesia. The major hole in his theory, everyone thought, was that such a voyage on such a raft was impossible. In response to such nay-saying, Thor Heyerdahl did what any good Norwegian would. He built a balsa wood raft himself in the ancient fashion, named it Kon-Tiki and together with four other Norwegians and a Swede, (who I guess they brought for comic relief), he set sail from Peru for the south Pacific.

The little bamboo hut they lived in during the 101 day voyage.

One hundred and one days later, they arrived and landed on one of the islands near Tahiti, proving that indeed, the trip was possible. Heyerdahl later wrote a book about the voyage (called appropriately enough Kon-Tiki), and while I was growing up, I read it over and over. It's definitely still on my list of 10 favorite books, perhaps even top 3. Thus, I was really quite excited when I learned that the raft is still in good condition in a museum in Oslo. This afternoon, I and two of my friends, both named Aaron, navigated the bus routes down to Bygedøy, where they keep all sorts of things associated with Norwegians and the sea. The viking ship museum is there, along with the ship, Fram, from Fridtjof Nansen's expedition to the North Pole, and the Norwegian maritime museum. But our destination was the Kon-Tiki Museum, and it did not disappoint. The raft is not actually all that large; it must have been real cozy, living in such close quarters. They also have a clever set-up, where the raft is suspended between two levels, so you can go downstairs and look at the underside. It was a lot of fun to see this part of my childhood, and while it looks like I will never be a sailor of any sort, if you happen to be walking near a body of water, large or small, and see me staring wistfully off into the distance, feel free to snap me out of it. I'm only day-dreaming about setting sail for seas unknown.

Fisk og Poteter

The bounty of the sea

I suppose it's part of living in Norway, but one thing that the summer school cafeteria has really tried to impress upon us is how often Norwegians eat fish and potatoes. About four times a week we have baked fish with boiled potatoes; it's a bland, if filling meal, and I kind of enjoy it. I think I will miss the amount of fish served here, seeing as we get very little of it in Minnesota. So far, by my count, we have eaten salmon, trout, coal fish (also known as pollack), wolf fish, haddock, cod and plaice. It's been quite an assortment, and it keeps things interesting.

Admit it, that is a beautiful picture of pickled herring on Wasa

However, what I have enjoyed most out of all the fish has been the abundance of pickled herring, or as they say in Norwegian sur sild.  (Funny note, the Dano-Norwegian word for herring, sild, is also slang in both Denmark and Norway for a pretty girl). Aside from the weekend when I was in Copenhagen, I have eaten pickled herring on Wasa crackers every day, and it has been delightful. It makes me excited for Christmas already. If you ever make it to Norway, the pickled herring is something you cannot pass up.

Fram! Fram! Kristmenn, Krossmenn, Kongsmenn!

It was on this day, nine hundred eighty two years ago, that King Olaf II Haraldsson led his army into battle at Stiklestad, and there he met his death, after receiving an axe to the leg, a sword to the neck, and a spear through his middle. When the blood from the dying Norwegian king fell on the hand of Thorir Hund, who held the spear that took Olaf's life, his (Thorir Hund's) wound was healed. Thereupon Thorir Hund gave up being a pagan and took a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. Olaf's body was buried in a sandy bank near Trondheim, then dug up a year later, at which point he was found to have not decayed in the slightest, and so he was declared a saint. For five hundred years after his canonization, all the way until the Reformation, St. Olaf's body lay in a reliquary in the cathedral at Nidaros, but the king of Dano-Norway ordered the papist reliquary (made of silver) melted into coinage and Olaf buried under the church. And there St. Olaf lies today, except for one of his arm bones, which is in a reliquary in St. Olav's Cathedral, the seat of the Roman see of Norway, in Oslo (I have seen it! But since Mass was about to start, I did not take a picture. Perhaps I will go back and get one).

The Oslo Cathedral

Much has happened since that day in 1030 when St. Olaf (or as he's known in Norway now Olav den Hellige) died, including, among other things, the founding of a college in far off Northfield, Minnesota named after him. But his feast day is still celebrated in Norway on the 29th of July. Knowing this, and finally having a free Sunday, I attended the High Mass at the Lutheran Cathedral in Oslo. It was really quite a nice service, and while it was quite similar to Lutheran services in the United States, there were some very interesting differences (aside from the obvious difference that the service was in Norwegian), that I'd like to highlight. First of all, the Prelude and the Postlude are (instead of a time to talk overly loudly with your neighbor) a part of the service. Everyone stands during both of them, and the processional and recessional take place while the organist plays. Next noticeable is that almost the entirety of the Liturgy, aside from the readings was sung. I really liked this aspect; it's an experience with a different kind of weight to it, to sing the Lord's Prayer and the Nicene Creed, instead of reciting, and I think I may prefer it. 

The High Altar

Some things are in different places than our liturgy, for instance the Lord's Prayer comes before the Words of Institution, and there are less hymns. No hymn of the day, and no closing hymn. Perhaps what some people may find most shocking is that the pastor recites many of the prayers, including the Words of Institution, with his/her back to the congregation. Whereas every Lutheran altar (or at least all of the ones I've seen) in the United States is built so that the pastor can stand behind it and face the congregation, in Norway there is no space between the altar and the highly decorated back piece. And so, the pastor, when preparing communion stands facing the altar and away from the rest of the church. Talking about communion, there are no ushers here. When it's time for communion, everyone stands up at once and heads towards the front. It's kind of a mess.

Now, that is an organ.

The cathedral commemorated Olaf's feast day at several points in the service. The sermon was about him and the choir sang the Gregorian chant "Rex Olavus gloriousus", which in English is "Glorified King Olaf". Last but not least, the organist played a postlude based off an old folk tune, the title of which may win a prize for Norwegianness, "Hellig Olav sto ved fjorden med sin hær" (Holy Olaf stood at the fjord with his army).

In English We "Search Again", in Norwegian They "Search Under"

While it may be hard to believe, my time in Norway hasn't been all fun and games and travelling. The largest portion of my time is taken up by my Norwegian class, and with exams this coming week, it will probably take up even more. In addition to my summer school class, I am working on collecting material for a research project to be completed this upcoming year at St. Olaf. My project is a study of the development of the liturgy of the Church of Norway, and so I've been sifting through hymnals and all of the books on the subject I can get my hands on.

I've spent a lot of time in this brick building

Before I left for Norway, I was advised by Professor Todd Nichol to contact Professor Harald Hegstad of Det Teologiske Menighetsfakultet regarding my project. Professor Hegstad agreed to meet me the first week of school and show me around the library at Menighetsfakultet, and from that time I've made the fifteen minute walk three times a week to do my research (A short discourse on Det Teologiske Menighetsfakultet, which translates to The Theological Congregational Faculty. The Congregational Faculty started in protest against the liberalism and rationalism of the theology department at the University of Oslo in 1907, and received the right to confer degrees in 1913).

Almost everything you'd ever need to know about
Norwegian liturgies in one convenient place.

In addition to meeting with me and showing me the library, Professor Hegstad also gave me some suggestions on other people I could contact to talk about my research with. This past week I finally got around to emailing all of them, and as a consequence, I was invited down to Kirkenshus (the main office of the Church of Norway) by Hans Arne Akerø, a member of the National Church Council and the leader of the ongoing liturgical reform in Norway. Herr Akerø was a very pleasant fellow and was kind enough to spend two hours explaining the process behind the new Norwegian altar book (2011) to me (not to brag, but I am proud to say that our entire two hour meeting took place in Norwegian. However, an hour in I must have been looking a little haggard, because he made a comment about how overwhelming other countries can be and served me a cup of coffee, in Royal Copenhagen China no less). Herr Akerø had seemingly an endless store of knowledge concerning the new liturgy (including at one point rapping the Apostles' Creed for me. If you've never heard the Apostles' Creed rapped in Norwegian, you're missing out), but at 3 o'clock he had to go to his grandson's 6th birthday, so I thanked him profusely and headed out. On my way back, I had a hot dog and the gospel explained to me in Norwegian by the native equivalent of a Jehovah's witness, and then finally took a nap. I tell you, liturgical studies is tiring work.

The beginning of my translation of the Altarbook 1889

København

It's hard to believe, but I've already been here in Norway a month, and with my time winding down, the time came for my last weekend trip. While, to be sure, there is quite a bit of Norway that I haven't seen, especially in the far north, I decided that it would be a shame to not visit Continental Europe during my stay. Thus (with staying in Scandinavia in mind), four of my friends and I booked passage by boat to Denmark. Our destination was the capital, København, or as we write in English, Copenhagen. It's a 16 hour trip to Copenhagen, and so we were sleeping on the boat there and back. I had had the boat described to me as a ferry, so I wasn't expecting much, however when we showed up, I could tell right away that ferry was a little of a misnomer.

As you can well see, it was a full size cruise ship.

It turns out that we were on a "mini-cruise" from Oslo to Denmark and back. It was nice, because they had all sorts of services, like money exchange and restaurants, but a little loud and crazy for my taste. They also had a duty free shop, where all the Scandinavians ran to buy lots and lots of alcohol and cigarettes, but which I utilized to buy delicious Danish butter cookies. After exploring the ship, eating our sandwich dinners, and staring at the ocean, we headed to bed in our little cabin. The next day, we awoke at eight in the morning to the sound of the ship's captain addressing us in Danish (A short aside on Danish: the relationship between Danish and Norwegian is an interesting one; I can read almost all of the signs, and the Danes can for the most part understand me when I speak Norwegian, but the language when spoken is for the most part unintelligible for me. Despite the close similarity of the written scripts, the phonetics of the two languages are very, very different). 

After arriving in Copenhagen, we tracked down bus passes and then headed into the center of the city. Our first stop was Assistens Kirkegaard, a walled cemetery, where the Danish theologian Søren Kierkegaard is buried. During my studies at St. Olaf, I have come to appreciate Herr Kierkegaard's thoughts very much and so I endeavored to visit and pay my respects.

The Kierkegaard family plot

After visiting brother Kierkegaard, we were quite hungry, and luckily for us, we stumbled upon a bakery by the name of Lagekakehuset. There, we fortified ourselves with coffee and delicious pastries, and emerged quite satisfied. I could have sat there and eaten pastries all day, but luckily for my waist-line, my wallet, and my teeth, we had other things to do.

We wandered around the city for a little while and then headed towards Nyhavn for lunch. Nyhavn is a pretty section of Copenhagen with a canal and sailboats and lots of outdoor cafes. We got lucky in that the weather during our visit was wonderful, and so we sat in the sun and enjoyed the scenery.

Unfortunately, because it took so long to sail back to Oslo, we had only a short time in Copenhagen, and so it seemed that almost as soon as we got off the boat we had to get back on. However, short or not, it was a pleasant trip and Copenhagen is definitely on my list of places to visit and explore some more.

The Hardangervidda

Now, while I wouldn't consider myself an expert on lonely places, I feel I know a little more than your average Joe. I've stood at 10,000 feet among the 4,000 year old bristle cone pines, wandered between the Joshua trees of the Mojave Desert, and listened to loons call on the lakes of the Canadian shield, if I must present a few of my credentials. However, that being said, I have never encountered a place that carried with it a profound loneliness like the barren heights of Hardangervidda. It lies between Bergen and Oslo, a large plateau (Vidda is Norwegian for "wide expanse"), at an average height of 3,500 feet. Its height combined with its northern latitude prevents the growth of any trees, and so nothing but barren moorland, pocketed with crystal clear lakes and streams, stretches as far as the eye can see. I may sound like a broken record, but words truly don't capture the feeling the heights evoke, and so, dear reader, I leave you with some pictures.

Bergen Part IV: Where Musicians Live

This is the fourth in a four part series on my trip to Bergen, on Norway's west coast. If you'd like to start over at the beginning, you can find the first post here:
http://kristofergoestonorway.blogspot.no/2012/07/bergen-part-1-go-west-young-man.html

On Saturday, our last day on the west coast, we had two stops to make, visiting the homes of Norway's two most famous musicians, both of whom called Bergen home during their lifetimes.

If you remove the Russian Orthodox turret and the
Arabian porch, it's a classic Norwegian home...

Our first stop took us on a short ferry ride to the island home of the violinist Ola Bull. While he is almost forgotten outside of Norway these days, at the height of his popularity, Ola Bull may have been the most famous violinist in the world. He was immensely talented and accumulated fabulous wealth on account of it, which he promptly spent on things like a private island and founding a colony in America (a fact which I alone in our tour group knew, thanks to the honorable Todd Nichol). He was also an expert showman, early in his career paying women to faint at his concerts, whereupon he would venture down into the audience to revive them. Later on in his career, the women would do the fainting without being paid, at some points even lining up outside his hotel to purchase his bath water.

A portrait of the artist as a young man

His career as a violin virtuoso aside, he is notable in Norwegian (and art history) as the discoverer of not only Henrik Ibsen, but Edvard Grieg. In fact, Ola Bull was responsible for Grieg's parents sending him to Leipzig to study.

Don't tell anyone, but seeing this jellyfish may have been
my favorite part of the tour.

Speaking of Edvard Grieg, his house, known as Troldhaugen, was our second stop. Here again we toured the artist's house and learned many things about him. For instance, he was a small man, 5' 2" tall, married his cousin, and had a rubber frog he would carry around and rub before every concert. His eccentricities aside, Edvard Grieg may be the most world famous Norwegian, known especially for the incidental music to Henrik Ibsen's play, Peer Gynt. Even if people don't know Grieg's name, they are sure to recognize the theme from his piece "In the Hall of the Mountain King", which describes a scene where the main character, Peer Gynt, is chased around by the troll children of the Mountain King, whose daughter Peer Gynt has tried to abscond with. We didn't spend much time at Grieg's house (like the man himself, it was quite small), and so afterwards we headed back to our hotel to say our goodbyes to Bergen and prepare for the long bus ride back to Oslo.

Edvard Grieg and I. The statue is life-sized, so you can see,
he was no Nordic giant.

Bergen Part III: Av Kirker og Kristoferer (Of Churches and Kristofers)

This is the third in a four part series on my trip to Bergen, on Norway's west coast. If you'd like to start over at the beginning, you can find the first post here:
http://kristofergoestonorway.blogspot.no/2012/07/bergen-part-1-go-west-young-man.html

The Altar, Pulpit and Organ in Nykirke (The New Church)

Saturday, after a short walking tour of the city, we had from 11 in the morning until 7 in the evening free, and so I decided to indulge myself a little and visit the churches in the old section of Bergen, down by the water. There are five large, Lutheran churches in the parish of Bergen, within fifteen minutes walking of each other. One of them, Mariakirke (Mary's Church), is closed for renovation until 2015, so that gave me four churches to visit that afternoon. My first stop was Nykirke (the New Church), on the south side of the harbor, two blocks from the water. After I had gone inside and looked around for a little bit, I asked the lady who was showing another couple around the church whether I could take pictures. She said yes, and asked where I was from, and when I said I go to school in Minnesota, she got excited and introduced me to her husband. Her husband was a retired pastor, who grew up in Long Beach, graduated from PLU and Luther Seminary, St. Paul, and served several parishes in southwest Wisconsin (it's a small world isn't it?). I had a pleasant chat with him (although he did make fun of me a little for being from "cream of the crop" St. Olaf), and also with the pastor when he showed up.

Johanneskirke (St. John's Church) towering over the Bergen skyline.

My next stop was Johanneskirke (St. John's Church), a little to the south, referred to in the city as the big, red church. Johanneskirke is the tallest building in Bergen and was probably the most impressive of all the church's I visited, richly decorated and featuring quite a bit of woodwork (the other churches are mainly stone). In addition to the rich beauty, Johanneskirke stands at the top of a steep hill and so getting to the church requires a climb up stairs like a penitent going up to St. Peter's in Rome (or at least that's how I felt going up. Never having been to Rome, I can't say whether it's really actually the same).

The Altar i Johanneskirken

Halfway done with my pilgrimage, I headed northwest towards Korskirke (the Church of the Cross). Korskirke was unusual among the four churches I saw in a couple different ways. First off, it was the only church with any people buried outside of it, a fact made even more unusual by its location in the middle of downtown. Graves aside, Korskirke was the only of the four churches that was more impressive on the outside than the inside. Its richly carved stone exterior is a stark contrast to its drab, pale interior. 

The front door of Korskirke

After bidding Korskirke adieu, I headed up the hill towards my final stop, Den bergenske domkirken (the Bergen Cathedral). Now, Kristofer was and is a relatively common name in Norway (however, now it's generally spelled Kristoffer), and so it seems a rather safe guess that many other Kristofers had set foot in the Bergen Cathedral before I did that grey afternoon. While I'm sure that many of those other Kristofers were swell fellows, only one of them was the reason my visit to the cathedral was especially meaningful for me.

The doors to the sanctuary

As many of you know, I am a quarter Norwegian. Half of my Norwegian lineage, the Sethres, comes from Eidsvoll, north of Oslo (where the constitution was signed), but the other half, the Tvedts, is pure Bergen stock, and the last of them to leave Norway was the Kristofer our story is concerned with. Kristofer Olai Nilsen Tvedt, the son of shopkeeper Nils Kristofersen Tvedt, was born in Bergen the 8th of June, 1884, and (more importantly for this narrative) was baptized in the Bergen Cathedral a month later, on the 6th of July. And after a round about journey, 128 years later, his namesake (me!) walked back through those same doors. I though it was pretty nifty, and it's probably been the highlight of my time here in Norway so far.

The high altar in the cathedral, the back piece carved of stone.

Bergen Part II: A Little Bit About a Little City

This is the second in a four part series on my trip to Bergen, on Norway's west coast. If you'd like to start over at the beginning, you can find the first post here:  http://kristofergoestonorway.blogspot.no/2012/07/bergen-part-1-go-west-young-man.html

Late Friday afternoon, after our fjord tour, we finally arrived in Bergen, a city of around 200,000 on the south-west coast of Norway. After checking into our hotel, we had nothing to do until dinner, and so armed with a map, a short history of Bergen, and a hotel guidebook I set out to get to know the city.

My first stop was Bryggen (which means 'the wharf'), right on the old harbor. Bryggen, with its historic wooden houses, was the original seat of the Hanseatic League. Bergen has always been an important port for the Norwegian fish trade; all the dried cod which came down from the northern fishing grounds passed through Bergen on its way to Europe. As a result, the Hanseatic League, a guild of German traders, established itself in the 14th century. They came to control the fishing industry and exerted a considerable influence on the culture of Norway's west coast. Bryggen remained an independent, German speaking area of Bergen until the 16th century, when the Norwegian king forced them to integrate, but the League remained in place until the 18th century, and their mark can be seen all over the city. For example, Hansa Beer, based in Bergen, takes its name from the Hanseatic League, and retains its unique heritage by brewing Norwegian beer made from German ingredients.

Note the Hansa logo, one half the Eagle of the
Free city of Luebeck, other half
the red and white shield of the Hanseatic League.

After leaving the wharf front, I wandered up the cobble stone streets. Bergen is a city built in the foothills of seven mountains, and so the streets are narrow, twisted, and steep.

After exploring for a little bit (and marking down the locations of all the churches), I was getting hungry. I had heard that Bergen was famous for a type of cinnamon roll known as the skillingsboller, and my guide book informed me that a bakery called Baker Brun had been making them since 1893. However, try as I might, I could not track down this Baker Brun, and so I had to go without a roll that first day. (Fear not though, on Saturday I finally tracked the place down and tried a skillingsboller. It was quite good, but I will warn Americans who try a skillingsboller that if you're expecting  it to be as sweet as our American cinnamon roll, you may be a little disappointed).

A skillingsboller, with Norwegian flags in the
background to boot.

Having not found a skillingsboller that afternoon and with dinner approaching, I headed back towards our hotel, passing last through the famous Bergen fisketorget. The fisketorget is an open air fish market down by the waterside, with all sorts of delightful offerings, all of which cost a pretty penny. (I still can't quite figure out why the sea food in Norway is so expensive, but rest assured, it is fresh and it is good). 

As much as I wanted to buy a plate of shellfish, a dinner that I had already paid for awaited, and so I passed on the opportunity. My evening meal consumed, I took a short walk, listened to a steel guitarist play Bob Dylan, and then headed up to bed to go to sleep in a city where another young Kristofer, destined to be a pastor, went to sleep 120 years earlier. If I wasn't so tired, it might have been a thought to keep me awake; luckily though, after adapting to my cot, which slanted heavily to the right, I slept like a log.

Bergen Part I: Go West Young Man!

This is the first in a four part series on my trip to Bergen, on Norway's west coast.

On Wednesday, July 11th, after taking a nap and packing, I walked through the rain and got on a double-decker bus to journey along with 70 other summer school students to the city of Bergen. We left at 2 in the afternoon, and started west, away from Oslo. Six long hours later, the bus stopped and we tumbled out into the rain. Our first destination was the Borgund Stave Church, and if you remember my thoughts on the stave church at Heddal, you might understand that I was trying not to get my hopes up too high.

I must say, that I was pleasantly surprised. Our guide was knowledgeable and cheerful, even standing out in the rain to greet us, but more importantly, they had done a much better job preserving the essence of the church. It was quite dark inside (the church only has one window), and the smell of the fresh pine tar that they had recently spread on the outside filled the whole space. The guide did a good job of keeping things quiet, and it was really quite an experience to stand inside and look up at the dark, high ceilings as the first Christians in Norway did a thousand years ago. Also, a useful bit of information from the builders of the church that I pass along to anyone who can use it: The Norwegians refused to build doors on the north side of churches, because they knew that everything evil (mostly winter) comes from the north, and if a door was built on that side, evil would just come waltzing right on in.

A picture I took during my pre-bed walk in Lærdal

After visiting Borgund, we drove another half an hour and arrived in the small town of Lærdal, nestled at the foot the mountains. We dined at a seafood restaurant catering almost exclusively to Japanese tourists (seriously. The menus were in English and Japanese), and then after walking around and watching a mother duck put her ducklings to bed, I followed suit. I slept well, except for when my roommate, returning to the hotel room at an early hour of the morning, opened our window and disturbed the pair of sea gulls and their two chicks nesting outside our window. The seagulls calmed down after a while, and when I woke up to start my day, I packed my lunch and we continued our march to the sea. At about 10 in the morning, we drove through the tunnel to Flaam, which is carved 24 kilometers (about 15 miles) through a mountain. Despite its impressive length, it is as you might expect, rather boring, being primarily a dark tunnel. On the other side, we reached Flaam and boarded a ferry to see one of the famous fjords of Norway.

While it's not an albatross, I'm guessing it's still not good luck.

Though it was raining as we departed, I found a seat under an awning and settled in as we traveled down Sognefjord, the largest fjord in Norway, stretching from the sea 205 kilometers (127 miles) inland. It was beautiful, but fjords share the characteristic of other landscapes possessing beauty in grandeur, in that their really too darn big to capture adequately in a picture. I gave it a shot, but it's really something you need to see for yourself. I really can't even do them justice with words, so having told you that after touring the fjord, we got on the bus and headed down to Bergen, I will give you the best picture I got and leave it at that.

Telemark Part 4: We Will Go Through the Mines

This is the fourth in a four part series on my trip to Telemark this past weekend. These posts will be a little on the long side, since so much has happened, but in an effort to hold everyone's attention, I've split the trip up into four smaller posts. If you would like to start at the beginning, you can find the first post here:
http://kristofergoestonorway.blogspot.no/2012/07/telemark-part-1-boats-and-things.html

Thank goodness for that helmet. I must have hit my head
 on the ceiling at least 5 times down in the mine.

As the last stop on our Telemark trip, we visited Blaafærverket (literally 'the Blue Color Works'), a cobalt mine. Cobalt is a mineral that, when refined, has a brilliant blue color and has been used for many years to make blue glass and to provide the blue in fine china. This was one of three cobalt mines in Norway, but now has been closed and is used primarily as a museum.

In case you were wondering, it is quite dark inside a cobalt mine. In addition, it is quite cold. Due partially to my imprecise math skills, but mostly to my ignorance of the Celsius temperature scale, I didn't realize just how cold five degrees Celsius is and wore shorts on the tour (if you're wondering, five degrees Celsius is just a touch above 40 degrees Fahrenheit). Luckily they provided us with nice warm ponchos and the tour was only an hour long. The tunnels are cut straight into solid rock, and we wandered around them while our guide explained all about how terrible it is to work down in a cobalt mine, with dangers ranging from poisonous gases to cave-ins to dynamite, etc. The mine is also exceptionally wet; the walls are dripping with condensation, and I must confess that down there in the dark, wet tunnels, I was more concerned with accidentally running into Gollum, than any other danger. 

One final note on the mine. Aside from a large children's camp that they run, the biggest industry that the mine now supports is cheese. Evidently the cool, dark tunnels are perfect for the storing and aging of expensive Norwegian cheeses. Who'd a thunk it?

Well, that's all from Telemark for me. I'm off to Bergen today, and so in a little while, I'll have a little bit to report on Vestlandet and the Tvedt's ancestral home.

Telemark Part 3: Heddal Stave Church

This is the third in a four part series on my trip to Telemark this past weekend. These posts will be a little on the long side, since so much has happened, but in an effort to hold everyone's attention, I've split the trip up into four smaller posts. If you would like to start at the beginning, you can find the first post here:
http://kristofergoestonorway.blogspot.no/2012/07/telemark-part-1-boats-and-things.html

On Sunday morning, I climbed out of my skinny little bed at Uppigård Natadal and headed down to breakfast, where I nourished myself on hearty home baked bread, soft-boiled eggs, and pickled herring. I had never had a soft-boiled egg before, and I must say I'm a pretty big fan. Anyways, that's beside the point. After breakfasting, we piled onto the bus once again and headed down into another valley to see the Heddal Stave Church.

A little background on stave churches, in general. Stave churches are so-called because they are supported by staves, four large beams placed at the corners of the sanctuary. They are constructed entirely of wood, and were built about 800 years ago, about a hundred years after Christianity first came to Norway. Because of the time period in which they were built, the churches are a fascinating blend of old Viking animal carvings,  Roman Catholic motifs, and (later) Lutheran additions. The inside of the stave churches are very dark. There are no windows, just a small skylight. 

The Altar

As for the Heddal Stave church, it was a mixed bag. First the good: The church is beautiful, and well-preserved enough that it can still be used for weddings and baptisms. Unfortunately, that's about it for the good.

The door of the church, carved with dragons to protect against evil.

Even though it is beautiful, or perhaps because it is beautiful, at this point in time, the church has become little more than a tourist attraction. It's locked most of the time, and can't be entered without a 65 kroner ticket, and the few times it is opened, it's filled with the flash of tourists cameras as they run around taking pictures. After the tourists have gotten their shots, a grumpy Norwegian college student points out several features of the church he's been paid to memorize and then everyone is ushered out. Perhaps it is a telling picture of the religious state of Norway today that the atmosphere of the church has been destroyed; at any rate, they treat what could be an awe-inspiring church space as little more than a curio, no more sacred than the art gallery downtown. I, for one, was quite disappointed to say the least.

Having stood on my soapbox and harangued the multitudes, in an effort to cheer you, my reader, up (and myself), I'll leave you with a prime example of the finest art in Telemark, rosemaling. This picture is of the ceiling of a house dating back to the 1600s, and not only the ceiling, but all four walls were covered with the delicate paintings. I'm not sure how I'd like to live in a room decorated like that all the time, but it was really quite nice to lie on the floor for five minutes or so and stare at the handiwork of some long-ago artist.

Telemark Part 2: A Shortcut for Hazelnuts

This is the second in a four part series on my trip to Telemark this past weekend. These posts will be a little on the long side, since so much has happened, but in an effort to hold everyone's attention, I've split the trip up into four smaller posts. If you would like to start at the beginning, you can find the first post here:
http://kristofergoestonorway.blogspot.no/2012/07/telemark-part-1-boats-and-things.html

After our afternoon at the Vrangfoss Locks, our bus headed away from the Telemark Canal and into Norwegian dale country. Our destination was Uppigård Natadal. Uppigård, meaning "upper farm", refers to the location of the farm on the hillside 1,200 feet above the valley floor, and Natadal, which means Hazelnut Valley, refers to the valley the farm is located in. When we arrived at the farm, the persistent drizzle had not let up, and so we stood around in the rain looking at the farm buildings.

A traditional sod-roofed farm house, with a Norwegian farmer coming out of it.

Uppigård Natadal is still a working farm, with a few sheep and chickens, but the owners have turned it into an historic bed and breakfast. Most of the farm buildings were built in the 1700s and some even date back to the 1400s, before the Great Plague. The interiors, of course, have been renovated and installed with all sorts of modern conveniences, like running water and electricity. The couple who own the farm still live on the premises, but the nuts and bolts of the bed and breakfast are managed by a hired lady.

My first room.

After we stood around for a bit, the manager ushered us inside and started handing out room keys. (A short comment which will become relevant shortly: The manager did not speak any English, and so because I have advanced to the point where I can hold a conversation in Norwegian (!), and despite her rather strong Telemark accent, I was one of the few people in our group who could communicate with her). They had passed a sign up sheet for rooms on the bus and though I was last to sign up, I had gotten a double room all to myself. I was feeling pretty lucky, but I guess the Norwegian Lutheran in me should have known that good luck like that doesn't last very long.

Just after I had put my stuff down and stepped outside for a breath of fresh air, the manager hailed me in Norwegian from the balcony and asked if I would be nice enough to switch rooms with one of the girls from our group. There wasn't really any reason for me to say no, so I agreed, whereupon the manager informed me that the girl needed to switch because she was claustrophobic. This puzzled me for all of the two minutes until I found the room that the girl had vacated. I'm lucky that I'm a thin guy, because the room was about three feet wide. It wasn't really bad, and I can understand why it made the girl claustrophobic. I didn't spend very much time in there other than at night, and it didn't affect my sleeping at all, so I guess I have nothing to complain about.
Well, that's not quite true. Unfortunately, despite its person sized bed, the room must have been designed as guest lodgings for elves, gnomes, and/or trolls, because the door was all of four feet high. I probably hit my head on it at least five times during my stay. So, aside from a slight headache and the manager referring to me as Gutten med det lille roomet, "the boy with the little room", my minute lodgings were quite fine.

We had arrived about four in the afternoon, and dinner was not to be served until eight, and so the owner of the farm gave us a guided tour, and then settled us down to relate some Norwegian farmer wisdom. I wrote down some of the choice bits of advice and will pass them along here.
1. To keep ghostly hordes, spooks, and other creatures in league with the devil from entering your house, eating your flat bread and drinking your beer, draw crosses on the lintels with tar.
2. Never forget to move the nisse. The nisse, as you may or may not know, is a little fellow who looks a bit like a skinny garden gnome and lives in the barn. If he's happy he protects the animals, but if he's not, he lets them out and causes all sorts of havoc. And an easy way to make him unhappy is to build a new barn and forget to invite him in. Porridge is generally the best form of invitation.
3. Always hang a cross over the crib of an unbaptized baby. Otherwise a mountain troll will sneak into the house and steal your baby, leaving one of its mountain troll children in its place.
4. On Christmas eve, the ghosts of dead farmers who didn't receive a Christian burial will come back to try and claim their beds. To prevent this, go outside at 5 pm on Christmas Eve and shoot a gun off three times (once each for the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost).

That forest looks like a prime spot to find a troll, a spook, or a ghostly horde .

After receiving farm wisdom, I walked around outside a bit, taught some people from Vietnam and Poland how to play Go-Fish, and did a little reading. Having seen the farm, I must say that farming in Norway could only have been hard. The farm is surrounded by a dense pine forest, and the ground available to plant on slopes downhill at an angle of almost 50 degrees. The Norwegians must have rejoiced when they came to Minnesota and found flat land to plant on. And if the flatness of Minnesota made them happy, just think of their reaction when they got to North Dakota.

Anyways, farming aside, the last main event at Uppigård Natadal was dinner, prepared in authentic Telemark fashion by the Danish chef. We were served an appetizer salad garnished with smoked sei, a relative of the cod (which I think we call a pollack in the United States), along with fresh baked flat bread and Telemark butter, which is butter made with sour cream instead of sweet cream. It's really quite good.

The main course was roast lamb with carrots and potatoes grown on the farm, and dessert was a caramel flan garnished with hazelnuts from the valley.

Den fineste norske akevitt!

To make sure the meal was authentically Norwegian, our hosts offered us aquavit (akevitt in Norwegian) to be drunk as snaps with our appetizer of smoked fish. Aquavit  is the official Norwegian liquor, and is made from potatoes, seasoned with caraway seeds, and aged in oak barrels. It is also extraordinarily strong, and the caraway seeds give it almost a spicy flavor. I think it's an acquired taste, and I'm not sure I can recommend it, but the Norwegians sure are proud of it, and it's supposed to help digest fatty meals like Christmas dinner. 

Dinner took two hours, and then sleepy from all the food, I headed outside for a last breath of mountain air and a look down into the valley which by that point was obscured totally by fog. Then, I crouched down into my little room, curled up (well, stretched straight out, the walls were too close together to curl up), and slept soundly until the morning.