A Couple of Months in Minneapolis

Minneapolis skyline

It’s been a while since I wrote a post, so long, in fact, that I’m not even currently in the Arctic, although Minneapolis has seemed more 'arctic' than the Arctic over the last few weeks (a few nights ago it got down to -20 °C!). I’ve been in Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA since late August for a 4 month-long visit to take some graduate classes and get exposure to a different group of people who also like rocks, at the University of Minnesota (UMN).

Obligatory University of Minnesota campus photos

Almost 3 months ago I left an already cooling Tromsø for the summery heat of the Midwestern US. After 48 hours of travelling (including an 8 hour delay followed by a cancelled flight, a night in the Oslo airport hotel, and a re-routed flight path that let me explore 2 different Scandinavian airports), I discovered that summer here expresses itself as 30 °C and 90% humidity. Having been told that Minneapolis experienced a day last year colder than the same day on Mars, my suitcase contained mainly wool and fleece, and every pair of gloves that I’d bought in Tromsø during the preceding year, which meant I was promptly forced to take advantage of my newly discovered choice of clothing stores, complete with non-Norwegian prices, in downtown Minneapolis.

In my first weeks here I discovered that UMN, at least superficially, offered up all the stereotypes I’d had of American universities; greek row (sororities and fraternities) looks exactly like the ones we, the rest of the world, see in movies, football is a religion and the university stadium is bigger than some national team soccer stadiums in other countries, and it’s not uncommon to see a students wandering around wearing UMN hoodies, carrying UMN-embossed folders, and clutching UMN-emblazoned coffee mugs, which they fill from one of the many Starbucks coffee shops around campus. All of these UMN-branded things can be bought from the university bookstore which offers an interesting array, from stationary and clothing to baby onesies, Christmas decorations, gopher-shaped beanies, and dog clothing (yes, there’s a dog cheerleader dress).

University of Minnesota. From top left: Greek row, UMN football stadium, the light rail train track running though campus with downtown Minneapolis in the background, Pillsbury Hall (the Earth Sciences building), and the weekly Wednesday farmers market on campus.

What was more unexpected of a city in the US were the flocks of bicycles and kilometres and kilometres (or should I say “miles and miles”) of bike lanes around campus and around the city. Since UMN is one of the biggest US campuses (it is split across both sides of the Mississippi River and includes three light rail train stations), I promptly bought a bicycle, which has been my main mode of transport for the last few months.

Photographs from some of my biking during the summer, through the autumn (fall), and into winter. Top: Both photographs from Lake of Isles. Bottom: Autumn colours, and bike experiencing its first winter.

It has been interesting experiencing winter here. Having been through one arctic winter in Tromsø, I did particularly appreciate that autumn here carried on through October. However, since the first proper snowfall in Minneapolis 2 weeks ago, the temperature has already reached below the record low in Tromsø. I quickly discovered that despite salt-use on the roads and the flat topography (which makes winter cycling infinitely less death-defying than in Tromsø), cycling when it’s -16 °C outside hurts a lot and is not a good idea. Also, bike locks freeze shut, and having ones snot freeze in ones nose is an uncomfortable feeling.

The overall American experience has not been that surprising. Yes, there’s fast food everywhere and the portions are enormous (one portion of takeaway chinese food is 3 meals for me), the cars are bigger, it is possible to buy bowls made of bacon from the pharmacy down the road, too many people think that my South African nationality means that I probably have ebola and lions in my back yard, and I have actually been asked; ‘Norway? That’s an island with Iceland, right?’, but Minneapolis has also been full of surprises. Other than being very cold recently, I have had a great experience and there is so much that I’ve loved about this place. The access to quality beer for prices less than the cost of my firstborn child, owing to the microbrew culture, has been delicious, and I have also taken full advantage of access to locally produced, fresh vegetables that have not had to travel 100’s of kilometres to get to my plate. The university even as a weekly farmers market on campus during non-winter months.

Microbrew beer flights and bacon bowls.

Although the Mississippi River doesn’t quite make up for lack of Minneapolis’ coastal locality and lack of mountains, nature here is beautiful and accessible, and a quick cycle along the river to enjoy the merging of the seasons into one another is only 5 minutes from my door.

The Mississippi River

I’ve also really appreciated the easiness of living in my native language again, and I’ve definitely welcomed the niceness and politeness of the people here after living in Norway. Having gotten used to the Norwegian way, at first I was taken aback when Minnesotans apologized if they bumped into me, and it felt unusual when a stranger opened a door for me, leading me to the realization that some of my manners had strayed off into the Norwegian fjords sometime in the last year and a half (sorry Grandma). In just over 3 weeks my time in Minneapolis will come to an end, and I’ll be sad to leave. I’ve met awesome people, learned a great deal in such a short time, and worked harder and been challenged more than in a while (thanks Thermodynamics). I'll miss the friends I've made, and the active research group with interesting discussions and seminars. I’ll miss the tarantala, dog, bats, mice and grad students that are my office mates. I’ll miss weekly happy hour and the wide choice of drinking localities. I’ll miss daily hot yoga, and the friendly yoga community. And given my newly acquired coffee addiction, I’ll definitely miss the cheap, easily accessible, good quality coffee.

Top: Office dog, and the first snow in Minneapolis. Bottom: Undergrad field trip to some sandstones a few hours outside of Minneapolis.

Mørketid (Darkness)

Just over a week ago the the sun disappeared below the horizon until 21 January, which means a rather unfamiliar symbol has started appearing on the weather forecast. It shows the sun below the horizon in the middle of the day, and whenever I see it I imagine that it is mocking me slightly, saying; "you could have a nice sunny day, if the sun actually rose today, but it's not going to, and someone else is enjoying your sun". It's also been getting so cold that I now consider 2 to 3°C to be a warm day, devoid of the need for gloves or beanie, and snow is starting to feel somewhat normal to me... or at least I no longer have the strong urge to run outside and appreciate it when it starts falling from the sky.

A "warm-ish" day followed by 2 not-so-warm days. 

Over the last 2 weeks the piles of snow that the snowplows leave all over the place have started resembling small mountains, cars morph into car-shaped mounds of white on a regular basis, and I have  gone from starting to feel like I live in the Arctic (in my last post about winter), to being completely and absolutely sure of it! In fact, the landscape has changed so significantly that I have even managed to get myself lost in an area I am usually familiar with! The summer and short autumn here lulled me into a false sense of security, and over the last few weeks, as the snow has piled higher, and higher, and higher, and it's gotten darker and darker, I have been left wondering around feeling distinctly like a very lost, wide-eyed African. 

 My neighbour's car merging into the 2m-high mound of snow it's parked in/next to. 

I've found myself googling more and more familiar South African things, listening to a lot of Johnny Clegg, and staring enviously at any sunny pictures that happen to enter my field of vision. I began having stints of proper homesickness for the first time since I moved here (I've had surprisingly little homesickness so far), and I think it's because any similarity that the landscape had to Cape Town (grass, trees with leaves, visible tar roads... etc.) is now gone, and I am dealing with a completely new way to exist in my surroundings. There isn't even the familiarity of the sun rising and setting each day!

The Geology department at midday. 

If one is used to a lifestyle in which people stay inside when it's dark and cold outside, as most Cape Townians are, the darkness, cold and snow here can initially feel very restrictive, and in the beginning I often found myself fighting the urge to go home from work at 2pm and get into bed. At the moment, we get a sort of bluish light for about 2 hours in the middle of the day (pictured above), and then 5pm feels like 10pm. 

I'm now getting used to the darkness, and beginning to emerge from my self-imposed bout of hibernation, and I'm discovering a beautiful world of light. A walk home on a crisp clear afternoon/evening/night through freshly-fallen, fluffy snow provides not only a surprisingly satisfying experience of being able to lay down the first tracks on new snow, but also spectacular views of the twinkling lights of Tromsdalen, a suburb across the fjord, reflecting on the still water. And a walk or a ski along the lysløpe (lighted track) through the woods, in the semi-darkness/darkness is probably one of the most peaceful things I've had the joy of experiencing. 

In addition, because there is darkness all the time, it provides the opportunity to have Christmas lights on ALL THE TIME. With December having crept up on us (how did that happen?), people have begun decorating their balconies, windows and the pine trees in their gardens with sparkling fairy lights, which, together with the snow, makes it feel as though I've landed in the pages of a pretty Christmas storybook. This feeling is enhanced by the Christmas music playing in every shop, and the fact that Christmas-party season has started. More on traditional Norwegian Christmas in a future post though. For now, I think it's time to bring a little more illumination into my life by jumping on the Christmas-light bandwagon and decorating my windows for the very first time. 

Storgata (the main street) in the city centre, decorated with Christmas lights. The sidewalks are free of snow and ice because they're heated (yes, HEATED!).

Today I bought "sunlight"

Over the last few weeks it's been getting darker and darker. Today we had around 3 hours of the sun above the horizon (which equates to a long sunrise that merges into a long sunset), and in less than a week the sun will stop rising over the mountains completely, and we won't see it again for 2 months. This also means that I've been waking up to darkness every morning, and coming home to darkness every evening, for a while now. In the beginning, it didn't seem to be doing much to me, but over the last week I've been getting more and more tired, it's been getting significantly more difficult to wake up, and this morning getting myself out of bed was like trying to drag a disgruntled cat out of its favourite box. Granted, it was Monday morning, but I decided that it was time to do something about it. It seems quite common here that people buy daylight lamps, which provide doses of sunlight-like light, and which are supposed to combat seasonal affective disorder (SAD). So to kill two birds with one stone, I went out and bought this...

This is an alarm clock light that simulates a sunrise, so that you calmly wake to brilliant white 'sunny' light gently washing over your bedroom... at least that's what the box said. I have a feeling that tomorrow morning I'll wake feeling mildly blinded... but at least I'll be awake. The box also said this "wakeup experience" would "improve my mood and leave me energized"... fantastic! That should help me deal with this wonderful weather we're having that hovers around 0 degrees, so that precipitation style swings from snow, to rain, to hail, including everything in between. And which causes the ground surface to change from wonderful fluffy snow, to slushy mush, to a shiny polished icy layer of pain, then it snows, and the cycle starts over. Maybe waking up properly will improve my balance... maybe that's wishful thinking and I should just drink more coffee.

Fok dis koud!

Winter is here! The expression that comes to mind is... fok dis koud! And it's not the coldest it'll get yet. Tromsø has had a fair amount of snow in the last week and a half, so there is already a layer of at least 20 cm covering EVERYTHING. The amount of white everywhere reminds me of what I'd imagine it would be like to be in one of those mental-institution white-padded rooms, so I now understand why the houses up here are so colourful. Below is a picture comparing the same view 6 weeks apart.

It's definitely beginning to hit me that I live in the arctic. Over the last week the temperature has only barely gotten above zero, occasionally. Having never been in a city with snow or ice before, or a place that actually gets this cold on a regular basis, proper winter is a completely new experience for me. I've started wearing so many layers that I feel like the michelin man whenever I go outside, and I'm slowly getting used to having numb fingers and toes. I think I need better gloves. I have experienced snow previously, but it's something I've always associated with mountain-tops, or a visit to Ceres when I was a kid and one had to drive for 2 hours to find some half-mud half-snow that just about melted when you looked at it. This is NOT like that.

This is what the parking area outside of my apartment building currently looks like:

There are many unexpected things that I am learning as I go along. For one, I knew how snow and ice affects driving a car, but I had never really thought about how cars driving on snow on the road affects the snow... well, I've now learned the hard way that cars compact snow into hard-to-walk-on icy surfaces, and if the snow melts and then re-freezes, the ground becomes an even worse slippery surface of death. Having grown up in a place where road rules are more like guidelines, I have a healthy fear of crossing the road already, add ice to that, and it becomes an exercise in balance and concentration that makes me extremely grateful for all my previous yoga experience. Just this morning walking the 100 m downhill from the bus stop to my office was rather acrobatic, and I am more than grateful that I was wearing these boots:

They're particularly awesome, not only because they're lined with sheep, but also because they have retractable spikes! Most South Africans who've never had to contend with ice before are probably wondering "what the hell are spikes?", which was exactly my reaction several months ago when I was first told of their existence. Here mostly foreigners, and some of the older generation, use them to avoid falling on their faces when attempting to walk on icy surfaces, particularly up or down hills. Most Norwegians were born walking on ice, so they don't seem to use them much. Normally spikes are small metal pointy things attached to rubber bits that one wears over their shoes, however these boots are rather special in that the spikes are integrated. I have a feeling that they are going to be the only shoes I wear for a while!

Something else that I had never really though about is the fact that snow covers everything, changing the landscape, and obscuring many things that we often deem necessary for everyday life.... cars, stairs, the painted lines on roads, and sidewalks. Which means that walking anywhere is terrifying, not only because of the ice, but also because along many roads, the road and sidewalk have merged... and there are no lines visible. Add to that the fact that drivers have less control (despite their studded tires) because they're driving on ice, and well, you get the picture.

Also, the fact that snow covers everything means that you have to move it when you need to use the item it is covering... something I'd never really thought about before. This makes me extremely grateful that I don't currently have a car, because if I did getting to work in the morning would take exponentially longer due to the fact that I would have to: 1) find which car was mine under the snow, 2) shovel the snow away from the sides of my car that accumulated there overnight, or that the snow plough had pushed up against it when it cleared the road, and 3) clear the snow off my car and scrape the thick layer of ice and snow off my windscreen. I have watched people go through this process in the mornings, and I have decided that it is infinitely easier to take the bus.

Although, taking the bus has become a slightly scarier experience than previously too. Because the buses are hybrids and therefore don't have enough power, and are not really designed to exist in icy conditions, especially in a hilly place like Tromsø, they seem to slip a lot, and struggle to get up icy hills. And this is despite the fact that they have half the air let out of their tires, and chains attached for grip! Perhaps it's time I got some cross-country skis, and learned to use them so I could commute on those.

Now, I realise that so far I have made it sound like winter here is rather difficult to navigate. And yes, for someone whose previous definition of winter is a rainy and windy daily average of 12° C, it is extremely different. The thing though, is that at the moment every time I go outside I experience something else new, and that's pretty fantastic.

Going Home for the First Time

A view towards the back to Table Mountain from Steenberg Wine Estate

My visit to Cape Town was, sadly, due to the passing of my grandmother, and while it was a heavyhearted circumstance that provided me with the opportunity to return home, I am glad that I got the chance to celebrate her life with my family, and to see my friends.

Something that nobody tells you is how strange it is going home for the first time. You've changed and grown in the time you have spent away, and developed a whole new life, and most of the everyday things in your old life have stayed exactly the same. The sameness in Cape Town felt in direct contrast with the immense change that I feel within myself, and I think, irrationally, I expected Cape Town to have grown with me. At times, while driving along familiar roads, and seeing familiar sights, the complete differentness of Tromsø in comparison with Cape Town made the last four and a half months feel like a disconnected dream. A good dream, but something that is unrelated to my old life.

Although Tromsø is considered a city by Norwegian standards, it has, in reality, a smaller population than the towns of Worcester, or Stellenbosch. So it took me a while to get used to the intensity of a big city again. At first I felt like a kindergarten teacher trying to keep track of a large class of five-year olds hyped up on sugar and caffeine; I'd never experienced Cape Town as a chaotic place before, but now it seemed a bit too much. I had forgotten what it was like to sit in traffic, or what it was like to have to deal with beggars at every robot (traffic lights to non-South Africans). For the first time in months I had to concentrate when crossing the road, and I had to remember to be safety conscious again. I found it incredibly frustrating that I couldn't just hop on a bus, or cycle to anywhere I wanted to go, and instead had to drive. I also forgot that everyone outside of Norway actually drives at a reasonable speed, and so initially I felt as though people were driving dangerously fast around me. It did, however, only take 2 days before I was back to driving like an aggressive South African; dodging pedestrians and swearing at taxis. And driving on the left side of the road came back quicker than the time it took for me to inhale my first plate of reasonably-priced sushi.

Ah yes, sushi... Something I was forewarned about was what it would be like to go home to a country cheaper than Norway with my newly-earned, very-strong-against-the-rand kroner. Having gotten used Norway, where one beer in a bar costs R120-R160, and a night out at an average restaurant for one person will set you back upward of R550 per person, paying R20 (12 NOK) for a beer, or R30 (18 NOK) for a glass of wine, or R500 (300 NOK) for sushi and drinks for 3 people at a restaurant in Cape Town, just feels like I'm stealing! So I took advantage of the spectacular spectrum of multicultural cuisine and ate all the awesome things I've been missing. In fact, I ate almost two thirds of my total meals for the week in restaurants, and I probably have mild mercury poisoning from the amount of sushi I consumed, but it was totally worth it!

 A montage of some of the week's awesomeness

My move away and subsequent return visit definitely made me take notice of many things about Cape Town that I once found completely normal, or took for granted. I definitely forgot what proper rain and wind are. Tromsø has drizzle, Cape Town has torrents of water aggressively attacking you from the sky, usually accompanied by strong winds trying their best to remove the roof from your house. In comparison, what I've experienced in Tromsø is a pleasant light breeze. Nevertheless, the "winter" temperatures in Cape Town were rather nice and warm in comparison to most "summer" Tromsø days. I definitely found that my experience of temperature has changed, and while conditions around 30˚C used to feel hot, yet manageable, in Cape Town summer, when I got off the plane during my layover in Doha to 32˚C heat, I felt like I had landed in Death Valley during a heat wave.

Something else I had forgotten, or perhaps never noticed before, is how happy, friendly and positive South Africans are. On landing at Cape Town airport I exited the plane and was greeted by several of the ground staff standing next to the baggage trailers, waiting to unload our luggage from the plane, gumboot dancing on the tarmac, just for fun. On handing my South African passport to the immigration officer at passport control I received an ear-to-ear grin and an enthusiastic "welcome home", and almost every waiter I was served by during my stay was wonderfully friendly, cheerful and accommodating, a stark contrast to 90% of the service staff I have encountered in Norway. South Africans may not get much done, but we get not much done with a smile, which seems to be a very special quality.

However, something I definitely noticed more than I ever have previously is the amount of security in Cape Town. The security guards in many of the shops, who tape your shopping bags shut and watch everyone like a hawk, made me feel uncomfortable, when they never did before, and I realised that I have become accustomed to being trusted in shops in Tromsø. I also struggled with no longer having the feeling of being completely safe, a feeling I latched onto on arrival in Tromsø, have thoroughly appreciated since, and something I am very loathe to give up. It's a pity that these things are present in such a beautiful country!

All in all, living away from South Africa and experiencing a different place, and then going back home, has solidified for me that I am an African. I love living in Tromsø, and I find the lifestyle I currently have to be absolutely fantastic, but I realised that I appreciated South African culture more than I ever have before. And even though Cape Town and Tromsø are equally beautiful in their own ways (and I am fully aware of how lucky I am to have lived in two such beautiful places), the African blood in my veins, I think, will always draw me back.

A view towards Table Mountain at dusk

Three months!

I have officially been living in Norway for three months, and I'm still alive! No one's chucked me out yet, and I seem to be settling in pretty well. I even get mistaken for being Norwegian by Norwegian tourists, and all the small differences I was noticing before are starting to feel normal to me. I have even gotten used to the 24 hour sunlight, and the fact that the sun has now started setting feels a bit strange. A welcome change, but still strange.

It feels like yesterday that I stepped off an airplane into a new life full of unknowns and new experiences. I have definitely had some high highs and some low lows in the short time I have been here; from feeling lost a lot, to meeting awesome people, doing fantastic fieldwork in the fjords of northern Norway, and landing myself in hospital with a bad kidney infection. So, since I am bored, and lying in bed recovering from said kidney infection I thought I might write a post catching everyone up on my experience of the last 3 months.

I was lucky enough to arrive in Tromsø towards the end of the academic year (up here the year starts in August-September and ends in May-June, and there's a long summer holiday over July-ish), which means that there were no new international students clogging up the immigration office, and I managed to get my temporary residence in a record time of just 4 weeks! So I only had to survive a month without a bank account (note: sarcasm). Life is so much easier now that's sorted out! Note to anyone moving to Norway, especially those from obscure non-EU countries: make an appointment with immigration before you get here, even if you've already been granted a work permit! It takes a while to get your ID number (mainly due to the waiting for your appointment), and without it, you might as well not exist.

During my first week in Tromsø I was thrown in the deep end, and I spent the week on two fieldtrips, the first a masters field trip, and the second a 3-day first year field-mapping trip where I was expected to understand the field guide (in Norwegian), and assist with teaching the first years. The teaching, being first-year level, was fine, and nothing harder than I've done in Cape Town, and even though the students speak english, trying to demonstrate when the teaching material and professor's explanations are only in Norwegian, provides a significant challenge! I learned geological mapping terms in Norwegian very fast!

Anyway, I spent the rest of my first 2 months learning how to live in a new country for the first time, which for me entailed; living in the university guest housing, figuring out how to do grocery shopping in Norwegian (my food vocab improved fast!), learning how the university and the geology department worked, preparing for my PhD fieldwork (i.e. reading lots of papers and staring at lots of maps), meeting new people, getting to know the other PhD students, discovering the climbing wall, and generally exploring the city and forest on Tromsøya (Tromsø island). I also found time to squeeze in a half marathon, and a visit from Åke.

My search for a more permanent place to live was a rather stressful one as the rental situation in Tromsø is a bit dire, with much too little supply to satisfy the current demand. After several "visninger" (viewings) of potential apartments with my now housemate, which always ended with the owners choosing one of the other 30 people who showed up to look at the place, we lucked out and found a fully furnished, really nice, 2nd floor, 2 bedroom apartment, with a big living area and kitchen, perfect for entertaining. It is situated about 2.5 km along the lyslope (ski/bicycle track that traverses the top of the island, through the forest, and which is floodlit in winter) from the geology department, which means an 8 minute cycle to work in summer, and a (probably significantly longer, at least at first) ski to work in winter, and I can also pop out my front door and go for a walk/run/ski in the forest whenever I want. It has fantastic views of snow-capped mountains (I imagine they'll be completely snow-covered soon) and fjords towards the north, and towards the south we can see the top of Tromsdalstinden peeking out over the houses and trees. The fact that our living room windows face north also means that we get the midnight sun streaming into the living area in summer, which feels rather magical, and I'd imagine we will also have rather fantastic views of the northern lights over the mountains in winter.

I only got to live in this wonderful apartment for a week before I left for my first stint of fieldwork in northern Troms and Finnmark with my supervisor, and a constantly changing international group of geologists. Northern Norway is an absolutely spectacular place (see previous posts for more details and photos), and I learned so much during those three weeks that that most nights I went to bed feeling like my head was about to explode. It was, however, a very different kind of fieldwork compared to what I am used to. There was significantly more luxury (from tent in Namibia, to "hytte" with a dishwasher in Norway), and it felt more like a geotourism and sampling trip than the field mapping-type fieldwork I am more used to. After 3 really good, but very tiring weeks of this I had 3 days back in Tromsø to recover, do washing, fetch my hire car, and book accommodation, before heading back up north for more fieldwork, this time on my own for what was supposed to be 3 weeks. Åke joined me as a slightly over-qualified field assistant for the first week, which thankfully softened the blow of suddenly having to do fieldwork completely independently. Several days after I dropped him at Alta airport, and at the point where I was just getting used to being on my own, I got very sick and had my first taste of the Norwegian health care system, 300 km from anyone I knew. Fun! As it turns out, the system is pretty good, and my entire 5-day hospital stay was completely free. Yay for first world health care!

All in all, it's been a pretty action-packed 3 months; I taught myself to drive on the right hand side of the road (including the weird give-way to cars coming from the right rule), which after doing so for the last 2 weeks, I have to admit, now feels like the correct side of the road. Shifting gear with your right hand, if you're right handed, really does make a whole lot more sense! I've immersed myself in my PhD, and after doing lots of reading and a month of fieldwork I still think it's a fantastic project (thankfully!). And after my hospital ordeal, which dragged me sharply into reality, the feeling that I was on an extended holiday and would at some point go back to Cape Town, has disappeared, and I have come away with a very strong sense that I live here and that Tromsø is home, at least for the next 3 years and 9 months.

Fieldwork and Fever

The trip started out well. Having already done 3 weeks of fieldwork this summer, this was the second half of my time in northern Troms and Finnmark, I was already somewhat in the fieldwork frame of mind, and I was lucky enough to have Åke along as my field assistant (at least for the first week). We spent that week hiking around, and mapping Arnøya, an island northeast of Tromsø. It was fantastic, the weather was amazing, the views were spectacular, and we got some really good geology done. Here are some pictures:

Top left and right: Pretty views. Middle left: Giant kyanite crystals. Middle right: Squishy, foldy carbonate. Bottom left: A pretty pool. Bottom right: Yes, that does say 27˚C, in the Arctic! It probably overestimated a bit, but still a warm day at 70˚N.

Unfortunately it had to come to an end, and I dropped Åke off at Alta airport so he could fly off to go run 250 km in Iceland over the following week. We spent a day driving to Alta, said goodbye, and I moved to Storekorsnes (an hour's drive north of Alta) to begin my first fieldwork on my own. I was staying in an old, empty school, partially converted into accommodation, usually used by workmen and fishermen. I say partially converted because it was basically still a school with some bunk beds in classrooms. Much of the school equipment was still there, black boards still in the rooms, and with school desks shoved away in one classroom. The school hall still equipped with a stage curtain, and the basins in the bathrooms so low down that washing my knees would have been easier than washing my hands. All in all it felt like a good setting for a horror story. My first night there was on my own, and then I was joined by a dutch couple, a pair of documentary film makers, who, ironically, were researching a book about a dutch geology PhD student who did fieldwork in northern Norway in the 1960's. They were good to talk to, and stayed for two nights, and for those two days I spent my days out mapping, getting used to doing fieldwork alone, and in general appreciating the fantastic weather.

Gorgeous evenings (actually these were taken in the middle of the night) at Storekorsnes.

Then I got very very ill. Yes, an African, who's been exposed to all sorts of weird African diseases, got bested by a bug in Norway! I hadn't been feeling 100% for 2 days, however when I got sick properly I got really bad very fast. My fever started at about 10pm, and by 12am I had more back pain than I have ever felt, and a fever so high I was hallucinating. I couldn't walk for periods of time, and my vision got so blurry I struggled to see. The hallucinations were actually rather beautiful, swirling rainbow colours floating around my room, and if I hadn't been so scared, or in so much pain, I would've rather enjoyed them. For the next 2 days my back was incredibly painful and my fever was high, but never got as high as that first night, although I was definitely not capable of driving myself anywhere. I also couldn't eat anything. However, I naively thought that if I took enough vitamins, drank enough water, and lay in bed, I'd get better. I hate antibiotics and am not a fan of doctors, and I when I am ill (which is very seldom), I usually fight it off on my own. I also had no idea how the health system worked here, was apprehensive about dealing with a foreign hospital and doctors, and didn't feel capable of driving the hour to Alta. So when I though I was feeling a bit better, I got in my car and drove 20 km to Kviby, a settlement with the nearest shop, and bought myself a lot of paracetamol and a thermometer. That was a very terrifying drive, and involved a lot of pulling over just to breathe and take breaks. When I measured my temperature for the first time I was shocked to discover that it was 40˚C, and that was when I was feeling better! I shudder to think how high it was previously!

I spent that afternoon and night in a haze of paracetamol-goodness, feeling much better, and under the delusion that I was on the mend. However the next morning, I had developed a new symptom, and could consequently not keep any water down. That's when I decided that it was time to go to hospital. I didn't need to add dehydration to my list of woes! I dosed up on paracetamol and drove myself to Alta, where I spent a good half an hour trying to figure out what part of the hospital I needed to be in. On receiving my blood test results, the nurse gave me a very worried look, told me my blood was "bad", and immediately put me on a IV drip (a first for me!). The doctor, who didn't speak much english, poked and prodded at me for a bit, silently, and promptly told me "you stay night.". I asked a nurse what was wrong, the response to which was "I think you have a bad kidney infection". I got an IV bag of antibiotics and moved to the ward for the night, the first night I would ever spend in a hospital since I was born! The relief of finally not having to worry about looking after myself for the first time in what felt like ages made me feel a little better, and for the first time I admitted to myself how sick I really was.

The next morning, a nurse looked very worried when my temperature was 40.3˚C, and immediately called the doctor who examined me, told me (via a translating nurse), that the antibiotics should have brought my temperature down to normal in the night, and that they would probably have to send me to Hammerfest (2 hours drive away), where there was an actual hospital (Alta hospital is actually just a big clinic) that could perform more rigorous tests. They took my blood, and disappeared for several hours. Luckily the blood tests came back showing just enough improvement that the doctor decided I could stay in Alta, but needed to remain in hospital for several more days, under observation, and receiving antibiotics via IV. I should have been bored, given that I left all my books and laptop back at the school, however I spent a lot of time sleeping, and didn't really notice their absence.

One of the funny things though was that I was probably the only person in the ward under the age of 65, and most were at least 70. The older generation here often don't speak much english, and sometimes none whatsoever. However, many of the old people, who seemed to have been there for a long time, and who were used to all the routines, were very curious about my presence, and made several attempts to speak to me. One woman in particular was quite persistent, and would grab my hand and earnestly start speaking norwegian to me. When I told her "jeg forstår ikke", she would just get more insistent, hold my hand tighter, and speak faster norwegian more seriously. Thank heavens for the nurses rescuing me!

A second very funny (in hindsight!) incident that happened was that I was mistaken for a mental patient. On the third day of my stay it was decided that I was okay enough to make a short trip to my car to fetch a bag I had packed with toiletries and some clothes. A trainee nurse showed me out of the hospital, and then left me to fetch my stuff on my own. On trying to get back into the hospital I discovered that the door she'd shown me out of was locked, and I realised I didn't know how to get back into the hospital. All the signs are in Norwegian and so it is difficult to tell which are doors for the public and which are not. Also, my brain was very very foggy, and after having a fever for so long, my thoughts were all quite confused. I ended up going in through the sliding doors at the ambulance entrance, half aware that I probably wasn't supposed to use those. A nurse therefore found me in the emergency ambulance area, slightly confused, in a hospital gown and Nike's, holding a backpack. She immediately asked me if I was lost, and where I was supposed to be, however when I told her "the ward", we had a bit of a language issue, and she didn't understand what I meant by that, and promptly asked "are you a mental patient? do you belong in psychiatric?". After trying to convince here I was not, which I don't think worked very well because I started trying to describe, rather incoherently, what a ward was to her (I think I described it as "the place with lots of nurses and beds"), she dragged me off to a computer where she could look me up on the hospital system to work out where I belonged. It turns out a ward is called a "sykestua" in Norwegian. That's definitely something I'll never forget!

Eventually, my fever disappeared 4 days after being admitted to hospital and starting antibiotics, and the doctor decided I could go home. He (via a nurse) explained to me that when I arrived I had been extremely sick (something no one told me at the time), that he was pretty sure I had a severe kidney infection (something that can lead to fatal complications), however couldn't confirm because they didn't have the facilities to test it, but that my blood CRP level (which goes up when you have an infection) was 320 when I was admitted (it's supposed to be 10!). When they released me it was at 166. Now I am doing much better. I still have a way to go, and more antibiotics than I have ever seen in one place to take over the next 10 days. Two friends drove the 6-7hrs up from Tromsø to fetch me and my rental car, for which I am eternally grateful. Thank you so much Tim and Annfrid (and Mary the dog)! After going through all of that alone, and 300km from anyone I know, it was such a relief to see familiar faces.

All in all it was a rather unpleasant experience, but it showed me how strong I am on my own, and I know now what I am capable of dealing with, with very little support. I guess what doesn't kill me makes me stronger!