Homecoming

My wonderful arrival

It has been over a week since I touched ground in Norway and where embraced by my dear sister Anne Lise, and best friends Linn Hege and Erik at the airport in Oslo. Let me be frank and tell you that I have not yet landed in Norway from this year of travelling, and that I still perceive life the African way. Meaning that I might just show up for something three hours behind schedule, or not at all for that matter..  

My sister and me

Lets clear something else straight away. Im not “insanely” tan!! The last months in Africa where spent indoors or anywhere one could get away from the sun, and the last month going through Asia to Europe was spent either in a bad Bajo hangover or in a boiling tin can. Either way I see my self as excused.

Pearl Jam in Oslo!!!

After some amazing dinners and late night talks in my sister apartment with her boyfriend and Linn Hege, the night was finally there for Pearl Jam and the official end of my year away. It was INCREDIBLE!!! 

I arrived in Kristiansand two days later and after some hugs i could not possibly resist the urge to plunge into the sweet, salty, 15 degree Norwegian water. Finally! I was home.  

While i am climbing back up on land my “little” brother stands with his arms crossed, grinning like there is no tomorrow before he utteres a smug: “How tall are you really?”. It seems he has finally surpassed me, or as we say in Zimbabwe: “he has deleted me”.

Now im going to finish this entry simply because I have a lot of other things id rather want to do and I LOVE it!! But before I go, let me show you what I have bee living on since I set my feet back home and leave you with the statement that life is good ;D

Thank you all for following this blog and for supporting my writing with reading and feedback. It has been a true pleasure and who knows, I might just pick it up again one day ;)

The Trans-Siberian

Leaving Mongolia

Lets be honest, the ride started in Shanghai, regardless of all the time it took us to finally get to Siberia in Russia. I can sum up the “Trans-Sake” route from Shanghai to Beijing in 5-hours of steady sleep, never mind the children running up and down the isle 400 km per hour. The Trans-Mongolian, also known as the “Bloody-Bajo route”, sums into 20 hours of queasiness fighting my way back to consciousness and 10 hours of avoiding every single other person on the train that witnessed my attempt to mount the wagon shirtless, wearing my red cowboy hat and holding Karoline’s hand so as not to fall.

Karoline and our wagon

As for the trip from Mongolia to Irkutsk (Siberia) we took the slow train, and lord was that the understatement of the year. We moved at approximately 40km per hour and I was close to suggesting that we put up a ger for the night instead of sleeping in the cart, seeing as there would be a chance to catch the train at the next station 50meter ahead. Around 03.30 in the morning a big Mongolian lady and her tall son entered our wagon and noisily found their beds. Though, not before they dragged me out of bed to open the window for them and help them store their luggage. So, there I stood in my very short boxer, mildly confused and unsure if they could tell what I had been dreaming about, while doing interval baggage lifting and window pulling that would have made my Gyria and CrossFit friends proud. Meanwhile this Mongolian family sat and watched in amusement with astonished smiles on their lips.

Luckily we brought our own food seeing as the dining cart charged Norwegian prices. It tasted GOOD!

The Trans-Siberian stretch turned out to be something entirely different all together and for those of you that have followed my reports of life in Chinhoyi, Zimbabwe, I am tempted to rename the rout to “The Russian melting pot”, implying it was HOT! Now, I don’t mean girl-hot or smoking fun hot, just plain hot as our thermometer stayed faithfully between 30-35 degrees the whole 4-days. Add to that the deprived possibility of opening a window, a cart filled with topless and sweaty Russians and you are spot on for the ride of a lifetime.

I’m poring some water while Karoline documents the water poring out of me.

To be quite honest I have to admit that, apart form the heat bearing certain similarities to a hot room somewhere in Chinhoyi, the ride was really good and we where lucky to get the room for ourselves the major parts of the ride. We meet all sorts of weird people from all sorts of countries but spent most of our time reading if we weren’t standing in the hallway trying to get some cool air from the one open window.

Keero getting some air

Seeing as every man on the train discarded their t-shirts and walked around shirtless from dusk to dawn, I was quick to join them in an effort to stay as cool as humanly possible. Lucky for us, one of the homecoming Russian soldiers got drunk and smashed one of the windows in the hallway, making it possible to get a whiff of fresh air in between the constant stream of smokers occupying this little spot of chilly heaven.

The sweet smell of European nature

Some (or all) of these returning soldiers where truly excited to talk to Karoline and happily posed on several photos with her while showing us pictures of their time in the military. I’m not entirely sure what these guys did in the army but they sure had some “interesting” pictures to back up their claims.

Keeero and her Russian army boys

Let me be the first to admit that there has been a lack of exercise these last few weeks and that we found a, possible, valid excuse not to workout in the heat in our wagon. Nevertheless I was able to do some push-ups and pull-ups in the mornings before the sun started boiling us alive, which goes to show that Nike is right and that you just have to do it, even dough you might not get your body temperature down for the rest of the day…

Pullups in the doorway before breakfast and an hour of increase in pulse

All in all, the ride was an exciting experience and a fantastic way of returning gradually back to Europe after spending a year in Africa. Although I have to say that if I am doing this trip again someday, it will be in wintertime…

  

JanTheKahn in Mongolia

The great Kahn himself 

After arriving in Mongolia and seeing the statue of one of the greatest conquerors and leaders of all time in the city square of Ulaan Bataar, Karoline managed to get us in on a deal spending four days out on the Mongolian plains with the natives, sleeping in their patented gers, eating their food and riding their horses and camels. What more can a huge Genghis fan ask for?

A ger

We where lucky to end up with two very nice Germans for our trip and together with them started our drive into the endless plains which is Mongolia. The sea has always astonished me and just having it close by lifts my mood considerably. Well, Mongolia is a sea of land and everything that walks upon it is in beautiful harmony with nature.      

Our guides, ze Germans and Keeero

The first night was spent in the semi-Gobi, meaning it’s the northern part of the Gobi desert and that it contains some vegetation rather than being just sand dunes as far as the eye can see. Here we got to ride some nice camels and spot the shade of several eagles soaring above us. I have never in my life thought that there might be so many eagles at one place, but Mongolia is packed with them!!

Karoline strolling out into the semi Gobi

All this fresh air and the return to living with nature gave us a remarkable urge to get in some exercise in between the riding and eagle spotting, using all the tools we could find.

 Karoline doing some pushups with a chair twist

Then camels where magnificent animals to ride and all of them had his/hers individual haircut that made the ride even more entertaining. 

Yes, I ride the camel very well

When night eventually came and the sun set, seeing as we are used to lights out at around 5-6ish, around 9-10 it showed us once again how beautiful and magical this land truly is with its clear air and immensely wide and open landscape.

The sun is setting over our gers in the semi Gobi

After a night on the hardest mattresses ever we moved to another ger like true nomads and meet a new nomadic family. I was in awe to see how the children of the family rode horses like they where born to it and how the young three year old taunted the Jak-oxen in their enclosure.

This one didn’t scare easily

Then we spent a day riding the charming Mongolian horses over the plains. I must say that these are some beautiful as well as pretty gassy animals, and after some hours in the saddle I actually felt like I was getting the hang of it. Oh, and it was COLD as the north of Norway (as a southerner I am assuming that it is always cold in the north of Norway) and im am truly happy that I brought my wool sweater and long pants.

Not quite ready to ride with the Kahn yet, but im getting there ;)

The nomadic family brought us a big bowl of Mongolian style barbequed mutton (sheep) thinking we would not touch it seeing as we where picky tourists. They where wrong… We ate the whole thing and cleaned it to the bone to our guide and my own astonishment, as I cannot claim to enjoy sheep very much. It this context it was no problem on my part and I enjoyed every bite of mutton, homemade yoghurt and cheese filled with sweet, natural fat and protein!!

Ze Germans and the Norwegians feasting on mutton

 More Mongolian fat and protein for the ride

After spending some fabulous days and nights in the legacy of Genghis Kahn, living as nomads in the Mongolian wilderness, we got some short hours to shower and eat in the capital before rushing to the train once again (its turning out to be our style).

Leaving Mongolia I swore to be back and explore more of this untouched wilderness of the descendants of the great Kahn someday in the future. For those of you who are considering it, stop considering and go, you wont regret it…    

Beijing Baby !!!

Here we go again

We arrived in Beijing after sleeping through the five hours it took with the bullet train from Shanghai. This was not as planed considering that we had been looking forward to experiencing this trip. I blame the sake in Shanghai..

Posing in The Forbidden City with the China symbol (peace sign)

Beijing is truly a city to bee seen and experienced with all its historical constructions and cultural heritage. I did some walking lunges on the emperor’s path through the Forbidden City, tried to se a mummified Mao bare-feet (not successful), slipped down some stairs at the Summer-Palace (luckily Karoline wasn’t watching, as I am sure she would have pointed and laughed hard, Zimbabwe style).

Karoline meditated by the “Birds Nest”, meaning the Olympic stadium for those of you who are as ignorant as myself regarding such and such. We bargained us through the infamous “Silk Market”, which was cakewalk after haggling with numerous taxi drivers in Zimbabwe, and we ate ice cream on several occasions.

Still, none of this could even come close to finally experiencing The Great Wall. This is something I have imagined seeing all my life and lately I have read so much about the history connected to this masterpiece of human construction that I was afraid my presumptions would lead to disappointment. This, however, was not the case…

Somehow we managed to elude all other tourists as we booked a sleepover near the wall and got an incredible stretch of wall all to our self. The first day we walked for hours and for every step I got vivid imaginations about how it must have been to man the wall and to be on the look out for the dangerous Huns or Mongols coming from the great plains of the north. For me this was just about as amazing as it could get.

Nøf said...

Then there was food. Chinese cuisine is not so bad if not for the INSANE amount of bad cooking oil that goes into it!! Trying local food usually meant that one would be inclined to pass some time on the porcelain at the backpacker, so we did our best to steer clear despite the huge selection to choose from in their wannabe bible menus

Luckily we stumbled over a really cosy sushi bar close to where we stayed and ended up as regulars in a couple of days. In other words: sushi saves the day, yet again.

Finally finding a descent English bookstore, we where approached by a Norwegian fellow named Rune. Rune was in Beijing to study the brain (yes, it is much more complicated then that, but it will do for an explanation), and Karoline and me got a shine to him right away, standing there in the fantasy section pushing him to read “A Game Of Thrones”.

Rune (to the left) explaining about the brain while our roomie British-Alex (to the right) seems to be paying attention.

We ate Peking duck on several occasions and it was great!! So great, in fact, that i´ll add a photo of it just to remind myself of how tasty it was when I read this to myself back in Norway.

Our days in Beijing, and China for that matter literally flew by and there was never a dull moment. If we where not occupied with seeing the sights, eating duck or eating ice cream, we strolled trough the many parks stopping only to read our books and eat more ice cream, blissfully unaware of the status of out bank accounts.

Awestruck of Chinese beauty

The last few days we went out for some duck and alcohol with our two new friends Rune and Alex. I managed not to order any sake but then I had heard so much interesting stuff about Bajo, the Chinese whiskey….

Alex, Rune and me cheering with our first taste of Bajo!!

Bajo turned out to be the closest thing to devils brew one could possibly get. Let me put it in other words: If Karoline had not refused to drink the stuff or (even more crucial) if Rune had not packed my bags, dressed me, carried me on his shoulders and put me on the subway at 08.00 in the morning, we would never have caught our train to Mongolia. Well, now we are in Ulaan Baator and in some hours we are going of for a four-day horse trek through the desert, so thank you Rune ;)

Thank you China for some amazing memories!!! 

Im coming back for shure!

         

                       

Shanghai

If your reading this it means I found some magical way of getting through from China. It might just frighten you a bit that im typing in English but I promised both Zimbabweans and Chinese this so ill stay true to my word. I’m going to keep this simple as there are so many other things I would rather like to spend my time doing.

China at last

                                                           

After three nights of very little sleep, 2 x 8-hour flights and some horrible or not existing meals, we finally landed in China the 08^th of June ready for a new adventure. Or, ready might not exactly describe neither our physical or mental state as we barely managed to stand upright at the baggage pickup and fell into a deep sleep as the taxi drove us into Shanghai.    

Keeeeeero at the nr #1 backpacker in Shanghai

                                              

The first night we slept 18-hours, yet again putting a point to my previous comment of being pretty messed up. We both awoke at three in the evening and decided that sushi was the only reasonable thing to acquire. So, following the expert advice of Anne Sofie, we headed to the beautiful market on Taikan Lu and sushi was consumed with great pleasure and a big smile. Finally we where in China!

Mmmmmmmmmmm Sushi................

                                                           

After spending some days in town we took the bullet train, going 300-400km per hour, to the “little town” of Hangzhou where we spent a day as tourist trying to understand this new culture from both a Norwegian and Zimbabwean point of view.

Buddah and me

                                                                 

Karoline, or Kaloline as she goes by in this country, is a superb travelling partner and gladly indulges my rather touristy crave for dressing up and posing in front of several astonished and laughing Chinese and their cameras. There was indeed a crowd and they where all truly wide-eyed (hehehe, that works on so many levels).

Crunching Roenne and Hidden Kvalvik

                                                          

The first cultural behaviour that hit us in China was the constant hawking and spitting that occurs EVERYWHERE and ALL THE TIME.  And then there was this strange way for men to lift their shirt in order to release the belly and rub it in plain sight that amazed us!

Yupp, im bringing this style back to Norway for shure

                                              

Our last day in Shanghai was spent in the great company of our new friends Steven and David, who where introduced to us by owner of FitnessRoom and my colleague in Norway Knut Georg. They made our last 24 hours amazing!! First Steven and his colleague took us for a guided tour around the city, filled with exciting Chinese cuisine, temple visits and pampered us with taxi rides everywhere.

Two new friends in Shanghai

                                                        

David gave us a free pass to try out his amazing gym: One Wellness, and we didn’t decline. From one year of being starved on workout possibilities and weights, One Wellness was almost too much with its posh design, beautiful weights (Ziva off course) and friendly staff. After some good two hours of sweat and reuniting with the feeling of a true weighted workout, we where invited to join David and his friends for a unbelievable sushi dinner before ending the night with to much sake in his top floor apartment across the street from both the restaurant and the gym.

One Wellness, your numero uno gym in Shanghai

Three sleep-deprived hours later we where rushing to the Chinese-time bullet train in our standard African-time way. Luckily we made it by 2 (!!!) minutes, and hopefully ill be able to post something about Beijing as well before we head for Mongolia.  

Shanghai by night

Beijing coming up asap if the country provides it....

                                                           

End of Service Zimbabwe

Juni 2011 ankom seks Norske idretts-fredskorpsere Zimbabwe storøyd og opprømt over hvordan det skulle bli å jobbe et år i dette landet. Vi har alle møtt både store og små utfordringer på mange forskjellige plan, men slik har vi også lært oss å kjenne Zimbabwe og verdsette alle ulikhetene og mulighetene dette året har gitt oss. Den aller siste uken har vært utrolig hektisk med avskjeder fra både vertsfamilier og kolleger, avslutnings fester oss imellom og rapport/ eksamens skriving.

Etter å ha sagt farvel til vertsfamilien min i Chinhoyi bar det inn til Harare og siste møte med SRC. Her fremførte vi våre tanker og meninger om hvordan dette året har vært arbeidsmessig og sosialt, før det ble håndtrykk og bilde tagning med samtlige av koordinatorer og kontor ansatte.

Hele SRC gjengen på Zimbabwe stadion 

Mandag 23. feiret vi med middag på Zimbabwes mest fancy restaurant hvor vi delte mange fine samtaler og mimret tilbake på året som har gått. Neste dag dro rødekorserne Sigbjørn og Ingvild hjem til Norge, men ikke før vi fikk tatt flerfoldige bilder av den samlede gjengen her til lands.

Så var jeg så heldig å få bli med på avslutnings middag med Stephanie (Karolines "vertsfamilie") ettersom jeg har tilbrakt en del tid under samme tak og ble innlemmet i "familien". Steph er utrolig flink til å lage mat og vi hadde mange fine samtaler sammen på tross av at jeg ikke spiser brød ;)    

Stephanie, meg og Karoline

I dag avsluttes 1-år i Zimbabwe og jeg kan ikke annet enn å kalle det et utrolig spennende og lærerikt opphold. Vi har vært en del av den hvite minoritets gruppen i et politisk "interessant" land, vi har sett store deler av det sørlige Afrika og vi har skapt sterke vennskapsbånd oss i mellom og til lokale Zimbabwere. 

Vårt første nasjonale idrettsarrangement i Zimbabwe. 

Her avbildet med gutta fra mitt kontor

Da gjenstår bare å legge ut den aller siste blogg-posten fra Zimbabwe, spise noen egg og sette seg på flyet på vei mot nye eventyr i Kina, Mongolia og Russland! Jeg håper å kunne holde bloggen i live med regelmessige oppdateringer fra reisen hjem, men forbeholder meg blogg fravær om dette skulle bli vanskelig. Helt til slutt: Tusen takk til NIF og fredskorpset for muligheten til å oppleve dette året, thanks to host-families, colleagues and everyone i have encountered at work, og sist men definitivt ikke minst tusen hjertelig takk til alle på bildet under for et magisk opphold og opplevelser for livet!

Fra venstre: Runa, Angus (Runas kjæreste), Ingvild, Sigbjørn, Maje, Marvin (Annes kjæreste), Anne, Andrea, meg, Karoline, Emma. (missing Cainan)

China here i come!!!

;)