Palmesondag

Kaleb wasn’t feeling too hot this morning so he stayed home from church and slept.  He had a stomach ache, sore throat and headache all day, so he was pretty much bedridden and had to cancel a sleepover with Andre, who also didn’t feel so well today.

Philadelphia Church had no service today.  It’s fairly common for churches to close their doors during Easter break and in July because so many people are gone on vacation. I think it’s crazy, but at least Agape Church was open, so we went there, and were blessed. 

I noticed Pastor Mark used his I-pad for his sermon notes – how hip.  It created a little glow on his face because the church is otherwise, very dark.  Agape appeals to the younger crowd so they even do their announcements using “Agape TV” where they obviously use someone’s gifting in the area of media production to make a stimulating visual presentation each week.  It reminds me of my friend that loves to entertain but hates to cook. She serves Costco Lasagne on the most decked out table I’ve ever seen, so it makes the food taste even better.  It’s all about presentation.

We saw a few more people after church that we hadn’t seen since we arrived and we had a chance to visit with them in the café afterwards, so that was nice.  The church was packed out, but I think it had more to do with the baby dedication they did, than the fact it is Palm Sunday.  Many people were dressed in their traditional bunads (National Norwegian costumes), as is customary for baby baptisms.  Agape is a Pentecostal church so they don’t baptize babies, they just dedicate them, than let the kid decide when they are older if they want to be baptized or not.  The parents still throw the traditional baptism party afterwards, which requires everyone to be in formal attire, so it was exciting to see all the family members dressed up.  I just love those bunads!

It rained the entire day, but I came right home from church and started making dinner, so it didn’t matter to me.  We invited Kory’s cousin, Rune and his “samboer” (living together person), Sol, over as a thank-you to Sol for helping us get our license plates back.  We also invited an old childhood friend of Kory’s, Helge, and his wife over too, as another thank-you since last year when we were here he gave us a nearly new set of tires for our van (he owns a body shop).  We didn’t know until tonight that Helge and Rune spent a year together in a Kabutz in Israel when they were young, so that was a fun to learn.  Small world.  (see photo)

I had way too much stress making the dinner though, but in the end, it was all OK.  I made rice with a shrimp/apple/sugar pea topping (sautéed in wine, mustard and crème), and that same warm salad I made the other night with the butter lettuce.  That was all OK, but we stayed too long at the café after church and the dinner took longer than I had to make it all.  I also made pecan squares for dessert and unfortunately, I thought we had enough honey for that recipe, but Kory’s been dipping into the honey pot just a little too much lately and we were down to near nothing.  I panicked, as that was the only dessert option and stores are closed on Sundays around here.  Kory went to Tante Kari, but she didn’t have any honey.  He got some from Tante Aslaug, but her’s was old and solid so I put in the microwave to liquefy it again and it bubbled all over inside the oven so there went the ½ cup I needed. 

Then I remembered that just two weeks ago, thankfully, a “Sunday market” opened up not far from here.  There’s been quite the discussion by store owners as to why stores can’t be open on Sundays, when a few select gas stations are with little mini-marts in them.  Well, the store owners won out and just last week the first “Sunday” store opened down the street.  By law, it can’t be more than 850 square feet, so the items for sale are limited, but Kory ran down there and they had honey!  It saved the day for me.  He said the entrance was on the side of the normal market entrance and the area that was open was blocked off from the rest of the store because of the size limitation for Sunday sales.  The place was PACKED as everyone was buying a thing or two they also probably needed for Sunday dinner.  I hated to resort to shopping on a Sunday because I do like the day-of-rest thing, but I was in a pickle, and the Pecan Squares wouldn’t have worked without it.  The dessert was divine and everyone had a good time, so Hallelujah, for that. 

Everyone brings flowers when they come for dinner so our house is looking like someone died.  Tulips, roses, orchids (see photos).  It’s festive and sure brings color to the otherwise very gray days we’ve been having.  I’ve now got two more couples crossed off my “payback” list with only 13 more to go.  Good thing we’re here for a while.

Treasure Hunting

Paula and I had a change of plans again today as we intended to take the Hurtigruten ferry boat out to Geiranger (the biggest tourist attraction in these parts), but we woke up to low-lying gray clouds and drizzle. Since the whole point of the trip was to see the mountains plunging drastically into the sea, the perspective is lost if the tops of the mountains aren’t visible, so we canned that plan and will try again tomorrow. Today we took it easy – not something I like to do when we have company that isn’t here for very long, but we had limited options with the rain coming and going all day. (She got to see the REAL Norway after all.)

Paula likes to shop second hand stores as much as I do so I skipped school anyway and Kory acted as our chauffeur. I was able to go to two thrift stores that are never open on the weekends so I’ve never been to them. They were full of treasures for all three of us. Kory even found a cool hand carved lampshade he liked and bought just to sit and stare at the incredible work done on it. I found a few souvenir plates I’ve been collecting of different cities we’ve visited in Norway and Paula found all kinds of things that will provide good memories of her first trip to Norway (I know she’ll be back). We went to several home decorating stores first to see if there were any items of interest there, but it was all too sterile with not much personality, and we really liked the old stuff better. While we were out we bought an awning for our condo. When we were there yesterday it was so warm it was nearly suffocating. Tante Ruth doesn’t like having the windows or doors open to cool the place down, so we thought an awning might be a good idea. Kory told me today that Tante Ruth has stopped eating. She has lost her appetite and won’t even eat a piece of bread. I did think she looked terribly thin yesterday but her spirits were up so I just dismissed it, but now I’m worried. I’m thinking we need to visit more frequently because we only have two months left and who knows how much longer she’ll be around. I felt sad all day today just thinking about her and what a loner she is. She really doesn’t like people coming by (except us) and it made me sad she’s all alone most of the day, but Kory said that’s what she likes. It’s hard to understand.

I guess I shouldn’t have skipped school today because Lord only knows how much more practice I need speaking the language. I was telling Tante Kari yesterday that we bought some things for the baby about to be born to the couple in our Bible Study group. I thought I said I bought some sheets and a bed cover, but it turns out I said I bought an onion and a table cloth. I wondered why Tante Kari looked so puzzled as I was talking. It’s probably a good idea I always travel with a translator. I still have a terrible time understanding the locals when they talk, but for the most part I’m able to give proper facial expressions and benign comments so they at least think I understand what they are saying. I have no idea how many times I’ve embarrassed myself by not answering a question that someone may have been asking that I didn’t understand. My pal Vestina had a job interview this week and the interviewer asked her several questions. She didn’t understand a single one. She asked him to NOT speak with a dialect and to repeat the questions. She still didn’t understand. She then asked him to speak slowly, and he did, but she still didn’t understand a single thing he was saying. He finally said that maybe she should wait for three more months until she’s done with school before she tries to get a job. And she’s one of the best students in the class! So at least I’m in good company.

This afternoon we took Kaleb and Tobias with us as Paula and I went hunting for more treasures at the beach a few miles down the street. Paula likes to find sea glass and there was plenty to choose from at Emblem Stranda, so she had a good time looking (see photo). The wind turned cold today so being inside was the most sensible thing, however.

Kory made dinner tonight so Paula got her first taste of whale meat too – and liked it! That girl is an adventure -in-eating kind of gal and has me beat hands down when it comes to proving we have Norwegian blood in our veins. Paula and I spent the evening with the dead bloodline, as I typed up her family tree so she had something to take home with her, and she continued her search on the internet for more leads on dead branches. Family research is what started her time here in Norway, and it’s a good way to wrap it up. She leaves tomorrow night. I’m so sad about that, but I’ll try to stay focused on the bright side and be happy at least she came to see our life here in Norway and how good we have it. Kory hasn’t got her shouting Hallelujah yet, but there’s always hope for tomorrow.