Norsk!

Å blogge på denne bloggen på engelsk ble like slitsomt som da jeg prøvde hvit tekst på svart bakgrunn. Så det får bare være, dette startet som et norsk prosjekt og norsk skal det forbli.

Så får eventuelle engelsktalende nøye seg med det nye bloggprosjektet mitt:
http://superterrestrial.blogspot.com/

Jeg kommer vel til å trenge et sted å tenke på morsmålet mitt nå som jeg har forlatt landet uansett.

Couchsurfing into the country

Right now I'm sitting in Sue's sittingroom, or maybe it's an office or something, I'm not sure, I think they use this room for reading and drinking tea. In any case it's been my sleeping courters since I got to Kingston.

I found Sue through Couchsurfing, a wonderful webpage where people with room on their couches and in their hearts get connected with people traveling around and who wants a cheaper and more personal lodging than a hotel or a hostel. When I say cheaper I mean free. Since I never tried couch surfing before I'm happy that this was my first experience as Sue and her husband has been incredibly hospitable and helpful. The original agreement was that I would stay here for just a few days, but when they saw that I had some trouble finding a place to live, they offered me to stay until over the weekend.

Moving to another country is never without it's problems and worries and even if I do speak the language pretty well I've never been to London before, it's quite big. I mean, when I moved to Oslo, five years ago, even that seemed like an enormous place. I'm so happy that couchsurfing allowed me to find Sue and that Sue made me feel this welcome. She even introduced me to an artist friend of hers when she learned that I was studying art.

Over all it has given me a feeling of security, like I have a life line in this country in case something happens. Although I doubt I will call them the forst time I feel lost, I am rather independent, it's reasuring to know that the option is there.


Now I only hope I will get the chance to help somebody else in return, though I doubt it will happen soon, because I don't know the lady I'm going to live with that well and I wouldn't know how she felt about it yet. Time will tell.

Arrived at Kingston

I totally miscalculated how heavy 50 kg would be to carry around on. Now I have a whole 'nother understanding of the word luggage after lugging the damn rubish around all day. My fingers feel like they're going to blister and I can't really lift my arms higher than my shoulders.

But... on a brighter side I'm in Kingston now, sitting on (or in) a very comfortable couch at the Potterybar, drinking a SanMiguel, waiting for my pan fried beef strips.

Oh hot damn, I'm moving to England.

So I've been putting of writing about this because I've been afraid I'd jinx it if I spoke too early. But now the buss to the airport leaves in 8 hours and it's starting to feel pretty real.

I'm moving to Kingston upon Thames, London, UK tomorrow and I'm moving there because I got offered a place at Kingston University to study art. I got offered a place and I still can't believe how terribly lucky I was to be in the right place that day in March.

I didn't really plan to study this year at all, I was planning to go north and work a year and put aside some money. I even had half a promise of a job and two offers to stay with people I know, but then it changes suddenly. I went to a students fair in March because I wanted to check out the Norwegian art school NISS and ask them if my portfolio was in order or if it needed improvement if I wanted to apply next year. Sadly,or luckily, NISS wern't much help to me and didn't even want to see my pitcures. So in the mood for some feedback from anybody I wandered around the fair talking to different schools and universities.

When the guy from Kingston wanted to see more pitcures I didn't even realise that he was in a position to give me an offer, so I got really flabbergasted when he said that my work looked very interesting and that they would like to offer me a place to study fine art. It felt like one of those e-mails that tells you you've just one a billion, but he singed a paper for me and shortly after I was contacted by "Across the pond" an agency which helps students go through the application prosess when they study in the UK.

Every step of the way I've felt like this could slip trough my fingers and disapear. Maybe they wouldn't like the letter in which I described myself and my goals, mabye my grades were too bad, maybe the fact that I've never studied art on any level before would prove to be a obstacle, maybe I wouldn't get a student loan, maybe I would fuck up somehow in some kind of significant way because I'm such a klutz and such an airhead.

But now everything is packed and the plane leaves at 7. I still havn't got a place to stay, but through couchsurfing.org I've found a place to sleep for a couple of days while I look for something more permanent.

I've got no idea what it is exactly I'll be doing over there, but I'm fairly confident that if kids fresh out of school can do it, so can I.

Now all I need to do is clean my room and post the keys to the student housing office. And then I can leave out the door to the great unknown. I've never even been to London before, oh man, but hey, I like adventures.