Det snør! It's snowing! Pretty wild for me. I've spent a week here and there in snow but I've never LIVED in a place it snows. It's truly my little winter wonderland....

I must admit, I just received my USC Alumni Association monthly email with a link to the flikr photo page. Scanning thought the photos (mostly SC send-off photos) I had this momentary 'goodness, how did I end up here?!' All these 'kids' in flip flops and sunny smiles with the SC band surrounding them. Cardinal and gold lit up by sunny days, green trees and blue water (it's SC folks.. these events are always in some fabulous outdoor location) It made me miss the fall in southern California a little bit... cool crisp air (but not too cool), clear blue skies, college football and the descent into the holiday season *sigh*..... But, fear not, this is not a sign of building homesickness. More of an appreciation of all I've had in my life and continue to have in life. Admittedly, I'm a little out of whack with this weather... shouldn't we be cooking turkeys and singing Christmas carols right about now? Oh... ops... we haven't even donned our best witch or pirate costume yet : /

Believe it or not, I’m done with the semester in just over a month. Wow! My last final, Petroleum Economics, is on Thanksgiving of all days- Nov 25th. I’m heading home to San Diego on Dec 8th so start looking for my smiling face (trust me, the grin will be from ear to ear I’ll be so happy to see my SD peeps!) around that time.

A few highlights from the past few weeks- my friends Bea, Max, Mike, Valeria and I did the ‘7 fjellstour,’ the ‘7 mountain tour’ a couple of weekends ago. It’s about 30 kilometers and 2300 meters cumulative up. An amazing day but very hard physically. Bea, Max and I finished just as the sun went down. A fabulous memory from my first semester in Bergen (and something not many people do…. quite a feather in our cap!)




And then there were 3







we did it!











Last weekend I was able to go to Trondheim as a representative for the international masters students here at NHH. It was a lot of meetings but it was also a chance for me to get to the city where the whole Olson family journey started. My great grandfather left Norway in 1866 on a sail boat bound for Canada (and then on to the states) with his mother, Ane, and siblings. What a strong woman! They sailed from Trondheim so it’s been a city of particular interest to me. Just the Friday morning bus ride from the airport to the city center was special- farmland running into the sea, mountains, trees, early morning fog- magical for me. I was able to sneak out of the meeting for a little on Saturday and go to the church which is the main thing to see in Trondheim. As a sight to see, it’s fantastic. But, for me it was overwhelming. As I surveyed the stones and old organ I was hit by this powerful sense of my history, my past. I was in a building my ancestors might have visited before they left. Am I standing where they stood so long ago?



I often joke Ane is probably rolling in her grave yelling to me ‘I worked so hard to leave, why are you back?!’ Yes dear great great-grandmother, you left a poor and declining land. But, things are very nice here for the time being. Who knows how the country will fair when the oil runs out. But, for the time being, Norway is taking care of its people and it's a land full of kind folks. It’s quite special to be back, and quite a pleasure with the comforts of fleece and polar-tec.

hugs from the snø, lisa liv

happy hiker!

PS, I know a lot of my pictures are from hiking... but it's so beautiful here I can't help but post them!  I will post some pictures from Trondheim and snow and other random things :)

Hello hello from the computer lab on the 3rd floor of NHH's main building.  It's about 8:45pm and I'm taking a little study/work break.  I have no pics to post but I'm purposfully posting to share some of my 'real life'.  Oh yes, it's fun to post pretty pictures and tell of all the fabulous adventures I'm having in Norway.  And they are great, they really are!  But, on a weekly basis, and specifically the last few weeks, I've been exploring the very exotic and exciting computer lab getting lost amongst the rows of PCs and meandering through the world wide web.  Fortunately, there's uaually a good group of companions for the journey making the lost and wandering hours not so lonesome and the victorious hours more celebratory.  When that AMPL file runs with no errors, you all want to shout 'eurika'!

Back to work.  Would anyone like to share their thoughts on the Elspot hourly energy trading market of northern Europe?  I'm all ears :)

hugs, lisa

Work, work and worked.

Dear blog readers, I am alive and well!  My absence is due to school finally kicking in and kicking my tosh.  In a good way.  While I’ve never spent so many hours in the computer lab at any school, I’ve also never been so interested and stimulated by studying and learning.  I’ve now calculated the remaining oil shelf life for Norway (somewhere around 20 years), run optimization models for the oil refining process, written on the electricity involved in water processing, transporting and heating in CA (and, by the way- this accounts for 20 percent of the states electricity use and 30 percent of natural gas use..  wowza), looked into the effectiveness of green certificates, and learned to snakker (speak) me some Norsk. 

I feel fortunate to have some great new friends from around the world.  Makes spending hours upon hours in the lab much more enjoyable and conversation around the dinner table (or wandering home from the bar) rich and diverse.

I’m currently sitting on the floor in ‘klubben,’ the on campus club/bar. (yes, the infamous ‘computer lab’ I refer to above and am sure I will continue to reference is 3 floors above me).  Bless the Norwegians, studying and drinking beer all in the same facility.  Very efficient.  So why I am I sitting on a beer covered floor?  We are queuing, (fancy way of saying waiting in line my American friends!).  This Friday evening is elections for the school council and, apparently, the party of the year (I feel like they say this about all parties).  Some of my friends and I decided we would finally queue for a ticket to one of these so called ‘best’ parties of the year.  Our reward for all the lab time. 

As mentioned, the recent weeks have been filled with school-work.  But, below are a few highlights non school related… 

Dad visited!  So great to have him see my ‘life’ in Bergen.  Though, it rained the whole time (I suppose he did get to see the ‘real’ Bergen)

Sharing some Rommegrot in the school cantine

MEBA, the council representing the International Masters student programs put together a social even for us on the coast, 'Snacks by the Sea' (ps. I was elected to the MEBA council as the Communication and IT chair)

With Bea and Vale

MatFest!  A weekend long food fest along Bryggen.