Tonight we hosted the home fellowship group we’ve been attending through Agape Church. They call them “Connectgrupp” and they meet every other week in different homes. It’s not anything like our home fellowship group we left behind in Mt. Vernon, but it’s something. Since they speak Norwegian, and they speak it fast, and they all have dialects, I rarely understand anything they are talking about. But tonight, since it was in our home, they let me do most of the talking. I spoke in English, used easy words and spoke slowly so they all understood me. I told some of my good “God thing” stories and they seemed to be encouraged as a result. That was nice. I also made some good food, and everyone was raving about that as well (it doesn’t take much to trump Norsk food.) It’s so nice our little house can sit ten around the dining room table. Our house in Mt. Vernon can’t even do that comfortably, so it was a treat. We spent a lot of time in prayer, which was good, as God understands us all no matter what language we speak.
Kaleb had a lot of homework to do today as he “conveniently” left his books at school yesterday so he couldn’t do his homework last night. I think he got the idea on Monday when his teacher left their books at home and didn’t return them… so then he couldn’t do his homework Monday night. He thought that worked so well for him that he’d have another night like that and just leave his books behind. So today I told him he had to come right home from school and he could not go to the afterschool program because he had so much homework to do. He shed a few tears, but complied and sat this afternoon and did homework with Kory for several hours. It takes a long time to look up all the words we don’t know in the dictionary, so his homework is just downright painful. It’s not at all hard, once we understand what’s going on, but getting to that point isn’t easy.
For the last hour of my class today The Good Teacher Inga took us to an art gallery in town. She said it’s important we not just learn the language, but that we learn about the culture of Norway as well. There are a LOT of art galleries in town, and in fact, in all of Norway. Every Norwegian house I’ve been inside has at least a dozen original pieces of art hanging on the walls. Norwegians are crazy about art. And if a person goes to art school here and attains a “degree” in art, then the government has a program whereby they subsidize the artist’s salary so they can make a livable wage. There are no starving artists in Norway. Norway so values artist’s contribution to their society that they put their money where their mouth is and make sure that those who really want to be artists, can be. If the artist makes enough money on their own then the government subsidies get reduced or stop altogether, depending on the income of the artist. I think it’s a most interesting concept and probably Norway is the only country that can pull that off the way they do. (America has a similar program with its farmers, but they don’t pull the plug on the cash flow if the farmer makes a lot of money.) The art we looked at today was VERY nice and I wish I could afford to buy a painting but the one I liked the most was over two grand. Even unknown artists will charge a minimum of $300 for a painting, on up to thousands of dollars, and people will pay it. I saw some lithograph prints at the art studio we were at today done by one of Norway’s most famous artists, Ørnulf Opdahl, (who happens to live on the Island of Giske very near here, and whose son happens to be the attorney that Kory works for with the Sinking Houses.) Each print done by Opdahl sold for nearly $2,000 DOLLARS (over 10,000 kroner) as that guy is very famous and is known as “a friend of the Queen” because she likes his art work very much and has become his personal friend. His original works of art are out of this world expensive but he has no trouble selling them. Such is the affluence of Norwegians. Kory is so worried I might actually spend some of his hard earned money on original works of art, that he’s using all his spare time drawing the landscapes around here hoping to squelch the fire burning within me to have some local art. (Typical tightfisted Ålesunder mindset, but it just might work.)
Kaleb had a lot of homework to do today as he “conveniently” left his books at school yesterday so he couldn’t do his homework last night. I think he got the idea on Monday when his teacher left their books at home and didn’t return them… so then he couldn’t do his homework Monday night. He thought that worked so well for him that he’d have another night like that and just leave his books behind. So today I told him he had to come right home from school and he could not go to the afterschool program because he had so much homework to do. He shed a few tears, but complied and sat this afternoon and did homework with Kory for several hours. It takes a long time to look up all the words we don’t know in the dictionary, so his homework is just downright painful. It’s not at all hard, once we understand what’s going on, but getting to that point isn’t easy.
For the last hour of my class today The Good Teacher Inga took us to an art gallery in town. She said it’s important we not just learn the language, but that we learn about the culture of Norway as well. There are a LOT of art galleries in town, and in fact, in all of Norway. Every Norwegian house I’ve been inside has at least a dozen original pieces of art hanging on the walls. Norwegians are crazy about art. And if a person goes to art school here and attains a “degree” in art, then the government has a program whereby they subsidize the artist’s salary so they can make a livable wage. There are no starving artists in Norway. Norway so values artist’s contribution to their society that they put their money where their mouth is and make sure that those who really want to be artists, can be. If the artist makes enough money on their own then the government subsidies get reduced or stop altogether, depending on the income of the artist. I think it’s a most interesting concept and probably Norway is the only country that can pull that off the way they do. (America has a similar program with its farmers, but they don’t pull the plug on the cash flow if the farmer makes a lot of money.) The art we looked at today was VERY nice and I wish I could afford to buy a painting but the one I liked the most was over two grand. Even unknown artists will charge a minimum of $300 for a painting, on up to thousands of dollars, and people will pay it. I saw some lithograph prints at the art studio we were at today done by one of Norway’s most famous artists, Ørnulf Opdahl, (who happens to live on the Island of Giske very near here, and whose son happens to be the attorney that Kory works for with the Sinking Houses.) Each print done by Opdahl sold for nearly $2,000 DOLLARS (over 10,000 kroner) as that guy is very famous and is known as “a friend of the Queen” because she likes his art work very much and has become his personal friend. His original works of art are out of this world expensive but he has no trouble selling them. Such is the affluence of Norwegians. Kory is so worried I might actually spend some of his hard earned money on original works of art, that he’s using all his spare time drawing the landscapes around here hoping to squelch the fire burning within me to have some local art. (Typical tightfisted Ålesunder mindset, but it just might work.)
