ORIENTATION WEEK

This week I traveled to Oslo to take part in the US-Norway Fulbright orientation.  It was a great opportunity to meet the other Fulbright fellows and scholars, learn a bit about their backgrounds and what they will be doing in Norway.  For the 28 or so that attended, there was a large diversity of projects including sculpture, history, brain imaging, wetland/water chemistry, and theater to mention a few. In my future travels around Norway this year, I hope to visit with them again.  It turned out that this year 6 of the participants were graduates of St. Olaf College in Northfield, MN (including myself).  While this sounds extraordinary, given the connections that the College has with Norway and the fact that more than half of the students travel overseas while an undergraduate it's not that surprising.  We are going to try and put something together for the alumni newsletter.  A big thanks to the US-Norway Fulbright Foundation staff!  Tallented professionals with loads of relevant information for our Norway experiences.

The St. Olaf College 2011-12 US-Norway Fulbright contingent.

I had arrived in Oslo early as my passport was full and I needed more pages, so I was able to walk around the city. I had rushed into town on the train during a 6 hour layover in 2008, so it was nice to finally spend some time there.  The weather was beautiful (about 20C) and visitors and locals were out enjoying the sun.  After picking up a few things to bring back, I took a trip over to the Maritime Museums.  It was great to see the Fram, an ice strengthened wooden ship that was frozen into the Arctic pack ice by Nansen to evaluate the drift patterns in the ice for 3 years in the late 1800’s.  The ship was also used by Amundsen to get to Antarctica where he walked to the South Pole.  Seeing the inside ship and the cabin spaces was the most interesting for me to imagine what it must have been like on these journeys. 

The Royal Palace in Oslo.

As it turned out, I met the director of the Maritime Museum at the Fulbright reception at the US Ambassador’s house.  This was a memorable event hosted by Ambassador White and his wife at their residence, with guests including the Minister of Research and Higher Education and Research, Tora Aasland, and the Deputy Director General for the High North Project, Polar Affairs, Energy and Resources, Anne Kari Hansen Ovind.

US-Norway Fulbright Director Petter Naess, the Deputy Director General for the High North Project, Polar Affairs, Energy and Resources, Anne Kari Hansen Ovind, Ambassador White, the Minister of Research and Higher Education and Research, Tora Aasland, and me at the reception.

While on the trip Nicole and the boys remained in Longyearbyen.  I felt a bit like I had abandon them on an island in the middle of arctic (which I had!), but while gone, skype kept us well in touch and found out that that things were going well. They entertained a local family (the miner’s family I mentioned before) for dinner one of the nights and this was reciprocated the following night.  We were also invited to join the christening of their 3-month old and are looking forward to that cultural experience.

Arriving “home” felt familiar and comforting (despite the early snow!!).  We are certainly settled in.  On the work front, I met with a couple of students at UNIS to talk with them about their projects and planed the field sampling with two of the faculty. 

Picture of the week: Sunlight piercing through the clouds across Isfjorden.

My equipment should be showing up early next week and I am looking forward to beginning my data collection!