Stavanger

Norway is cold. and dark. I arrived here last night and am so happy to be staying with my old Young Life leader Katie and her husband Thor, and their two children, Hannah and Nora, here in Scandinavia. Katie and Thor are on Young Life staff in Stavanger, Norway (www.younglife.no, or www.younglife.org) and are so great and encouraging to be around!

The last two weeks I was in the Lazio region of Italy in a small town called Marta. The place was fairly rustic (no internet access hence the lack of blog updates) and rained heavily almost every day but I was fortunate enough to have a few days of sun to ride a bike through the Italian countryside and visit the ancient town of Tuscania. I also felt like I was in a two week Italian immersion language course because the family I stayed with had three children (Tommaso 9, Cecilia 7, Constanza 5) who didnt speak English and were the best Italian teachers a girl could ask for!

In the meantime I am so excited to be in a new place where its incredibly clean (unlike some of Italy) and instead of seeing a lot of dark haired, short, olive skinned people, I'm meeting plenty of tall, pale, blonde hair, blue-eyed Norwegians! I am also very happy to be in a heated house, have plenty of internet access, an american phone line, a dryer, and english tv shows! I will be spending four days of Christmas on one of the Norwegian islands with Thor's extended family so that should be wonderful for experiencing real Norwegian food and culture. The sun is only out for a bit during the day this time of year but that's not so bad - it's fascinating to really see the effects of living this far north!

I'll update more later, hope all is well back at home!