Drammen

On Saturday (27th August) I caught a train to Drammen, a small city with 63000 people.  It is a short train ride, about 30 minutes away from Oslo.  There's an art museum in Drammen which was where I went to.  The ground floor was about the history and building architecture of the city over different time periods and the upper floor was mostly paintings.  They had some rather esoteric things too like scandinavian designer furniture (Herman Miller chairs), designer bowls and a strange racing car made from a skull of some kind of animal on the second floor.  It was a very very small museum and you can easily finish it in under an hour.  Entrance fee was 40 nok for an adult.

"Still going strong" is what's written on the plastic placard on the bottom left

Paintings on the upper floor, some of them are from a famous Drammen artist by the name of Hans Heyerdahl and the rest I'm not so sure :)

View of the ground floor

Ground floor

Apparently Drammen had many many fires over the past centuries.  Everything on the ground floor was in Norwegian so I needed my Norwegian friend to help me translate a lot of it.

There's a door on the second floor that needs some serious lubrication.  The hinges make an annoying eeeeeeee sound that goes on for at least 10-20 seconds after you open it and when it starts to close.

Crazy looking bench chair located near the art museum

The city is separated by a river.  I took a walk all around the city after visiting the museum.  Drammen has 3 bridges, which I find a bit overkill but maybe that's the fashion nowadays (just like in Brisbane).  They have a cool looking bridge though, called the Ypsilon bridge that was builit in 2007.

Ypsilon bridge

Taken from the other side of the river

Aass Brewery‎, the oldest surviving brewery in Norway

Walked to the city of town and took a photo from the church.  Not much of a view buuuut here is the photo.

Weather's not the best on Saturday, there was quite a lot of fog, you can see it in the mountains.  It was raining all day.

Bragernes Church, there's also 4 other churches in the city

Bragernes Church

Had dinner at a Chinese restaurant after that.  I had seafood hot pot, it wasn't too bad.  There were prawns, scallops, cuttlefish, and some green veggies.  It was tasty and spicy.  Also ordered har gow ('shrimp bonnets').  Finished off with dark chocolate ice cream from 7 Eleven after that.

I took a look at the real estate prices here and they are much much cheaper than Oslo.  Frankly I don't understand why people don't move here, it's not that inconvenient to work in Oslo.  For the same price of an apartment in the city in Oslo you could get one a lot bigger (3 rooms vs 1 room, 70 square meters vs 35 or smaller).  Rent is also cheaper.  But according to a Norwegian work collegue there's a saying that people in Drammen are a bit 'special' and that he would never want to live in Drammen.

Anyway to each his own. :)

Walked all around town after dinner and took a picture of 'the thing'.  That's the name that my Norwegian friend calls it, it's a large artsy ball sculpture with water sprays built around it.

'Ting' :P

Caught the train close to 10pm back to Oslo.  Drammen's a nice small city.  Rather quiet but it's nice for its size I think.  I wouldn't even call it a city but that is just me.  I think Oslo is really small but many Norwegians think it's big. :)

Loud Hair

Last Wednesday (17th August) I went to get my hair done at Loud Hair, a hairdresser (frisør) at Grünerløkka.  It's been almost 9 months since I last got a haircut, so it's about time.  My hippy hair was annoying the heck out of me.  A sane male here goes for "cheap haircuts" which cost 100 nok (about 18 Australian dollars) and served by a migrant.  I thought screw that I'm going for an expensive haircut, and so I did.  I got my hair streaked partially blue as well, and why not?  My hair is long and I might as well take advantage of it.  My hair dresser was Martine, a Norwegian who has been living in Oslo her entire life.  She would be in her early to mid 20s from my guesstimate.  My hair went from black to blonde to blue all in the space of 3 hours.  It had to be bleached first before the blue can be applied.  The blue has faded a bit, but when it all goes away I'll just get it done again no worries.

Bluuuue Haaaiiirr!

Total cost of my haircut was 1355 nok (about 240 Australian dollars).  This breaksdown to 'korrigering kort' which cost 230 nok, 'herreklipp' was 600 nok and 'skimmer' was 525 nok.  I was expecting to pay about 2000 nok (or 350 Australian dollars) so it was lower than what I budgeted for.  My hair's going to remain as is until I visit Singapore at the end of the year.  Maybe I'll get my hair done once before then but we'll see.

Being a superhero... again

Last Friday (12th August) I found a wallet on the bus.  Amazing how these things always seem to happen to me!  I didn't give it to the bus driver and I didn't pass it to the police because of my previous experience losing my wallet.  So what I did instead was that I kept the wallet with the intention of returning it to the owner myself.  Losing a wallet really sucks ass and turds.

Lost your wallet?  Never fear Supes is here!

Turns out returning the wallet was a bit tricky.  I had a name but I could not find them in the telephone directory.  And I sent them a friend request on facebook but there was no response.  I contacted a friend of theirs and passed a message to them to contact me but that didn't work.  So I had the brilliant idea of creating a new profile called Ms M's Wallet with a picture of said wallet and lo and behold, friends instantly!  If that didn't work I was going to pass it to the police.

The girl actually lives 500+ km away from Oslo.  She's only visiting Oslo and staying with a friend who lives in Bekkestua which is 2km away from Stabekk.  She was going to go back home tonight!  So anyway we made an appointment to meet at 11:45am at Rimi Stabekk but she was late and I didn't meet her till 12:30pm.  To kill time I was window shopping in a sports shop and bought chocolates from Rimi.  I met her friend first actually, for some reason I just knew it was her friend.  Ms M wanted to give me money but I said to keep it in case she loses her wallet again. ;)  So instead she gave me a hug.  And I can certainly live with that. ;)  I also gave her the chocolates I bought in Rimi.  Yes I am just too nice.  You can just call me Superman!  She also sent me an sms with a <3.  I guess that's a good thing.

So that's my story for now.  Stay tuned to hear about the story of my haircut.

Two parties a week ago

A week ago I got invited to two house parties, one on the Friday (29th July) and Saturday (30th July).  None of the girls are Norwegian but everyone's European.  Sometimes it seriously feels like I'm like the only Asian in Norway!

It started out with an invitation to only 1 party, and at the first party I met Miss M and she invited me over to another party at a place the following day.  So, it wasn't really planned to begin with.

The first party was conversational and finger food,  I like good conversation.  Keeps my motor neurons humming.

Four women toasting to world peace, while I eat a piece of cheese in celebration of Obama's Hope(less) mission.

The second party was a bit bigger and there was a lot more stuff going on I guess.  I probably had too much to drink, not that I am a drinker to begin with.  But we went to a night club at 1:30am or so for dancing and I didn't get home till 4am.  It was quite a blur.  There were a lot of people.  Sunday was spent half the day lying in bed.  There were other people too, a brazilian guy and a few other Europeans.  Mostly from Serbia/Bosnia.

Maybe we could make a tv show, four European girls and an Asian guy.

So that was my weekend a week ago.  Delayed blog entry. :)

Today I went shopping in Sweden with a friend.  The weather was bad today, just rain and rain and rain.   Summer in Oslo is just fantabulous if you love rain!

Huk Beach in Oslo

This afternoon (August 6th) at 5 pmish a friend and I went to Huk Beach at the Bygdøy peninsula.  I guess going there therefore makes us Huk'ers. :P

Apparently a part of the beach is a nudist beach, but we didn't see any nude people.  Fortunately for me.  Or unfortunate for the friend.


View Larger Map

It is apparently one of the best beaches in Norway.  Quite a rocky beach and not the soft sand type that I personally prefer.  But maybe if I was a sun tanning lizard, lying on rocks would make more sense.  It's hard to go back from soft sandy beaches to rock beaches.  Sort of like going from a squatting toilet to a seat toilet.  You just can't go back.  One way only.  Times like these make me appreciate the travel opportunities that I had in Thailand, Australia and even Singapore.  I suppose golden soft sand is a luxury item here.  Perhaps someone could import sand from the middle east, that could be an idea.

We didn't lie anywhere, instead we walked around.  And I took photos.

Taken at 6pm.  One of the plus points of the long european summer days.

Some folks swimming.

Good bum padding required to sit on these rocks for an extended period of time.

The best seat in the house.

The building on the left is the Hukodden Strandrestaurant AS‎ restaurant.

The word Oslo is written on the signboard.  This is taken atop a little rocky ledge.

View of the Bygdøy peninsula.

View of the Bygdøy peninsula.

Some other memorable sights that I remember

• There was a man selling corn on the cob for 20 Norwegian Kroner (3.50 Australian dollars) each.  I didn't take up the generous offer.  I don't even know if that's legal.
• Filipinos still stick in groups here just like in Singapore.
• There was a pregnant woman laying on her side.  For some reason, that stuck out.
• Portable barbeque grills.  These are ones that you can buy from a supermarket.  Norwegians love their one time portable barbeque grills.

Dinner was Burger King at Frogner.  I know, I eat so healthy here.  It's amazing I do not look like this guy yet.  Tomorrow it's food shopping in Sweden.  But now it's time for bed.

More Sketching

Summer holidays are over soon and my graveyard work shifts will be coming to an end.  The weather has been surprisingly warm.  I say surprising because the past few weeks have been on and off.  Last week was really warm.  Bugs love my apartment.  They come in here, fly around and then die.  Then I'll have to sweep them up the next time I clean the apartment.  Thanks bugs.

Work has been quite slow since everyone is on holidays.  Good thing there is ice cream to look forward to at work.  I've been eating ice cream everyday for a while now.

I did more sketching tonight.  Took me an hour or so.  Same materials as the last time.  Except this time I used a clean sheet of paper.

Unnamed Girl

I'll start sketching more perhaps.  It gives me focus.  And I'm sure some people will appreciate my art!