No to school budget cuts in Fredrikstad!

Several factors prevented me from physically demonstrating tonight – but oh boy was I there in spirit!

Unfortunately I had some problems embedding this video – if you want to watch the video please click here.

Compliments of Fredrikstad Blad

Teach your child Norwegian

Hubby started his Norwegian lessons at Fredrikstad Internasjonale skole yesterday. I have no doubt that he will entertain me with many humorous stories of his escapades.

As for the boys – no sign of any response yet. I have been told via the grapevine that there has been a meeting and that there is a particular individual in the kommune who is refusing to budge.

According to this individual – Norwegian language lessons are not for children who speak English – basta!

After a little persistence I have managed to find out which books they use at Cicignon skole (which is where they have Norwegian language introduction classes for children).

Anticipating that the kommune will have some or other reason for why our school’s budget should not include language books for my boys (call me a pessimist) – I have taken the liberty of ordering the books myself from Bokkilden.

No doubt it has not occurred to the local politicians that if only we had been given the names of the books – we could have purchased them before the boys started school and thus had a head start.

For families with children from English speaking countries (or who are considered too privileged to qualify for Norwegian lessons) – the following books for children have been recommended to me :

For son in year 7: Ta ordet 1

For son in year 3: Finn et ord og bruk det nå

Did I mention that I am seriously considering opening my own bilingual school? Yip – just give me another few years and I’m your woman!

 

South African inspiration in Norway

I love Norway. Although it might not always sound like it – I am incredibly proud of my Norwegian heritage. Norway is a wonderful country and there is much to be proud of.

It’s just that I’m not really one for sticking to tradition. I love change – fusion – the blend of old and new – tradition and modernity – North and South. Some passion and creativity mixed with rhythm and spices – you get the picture.

Fashion is also exciting, not that I know much about fashion either. But I love the buzz and the passion that artists always seem to have. The creativity blows me away.

So the South African in me is particularly proud to show off Laverne – our very own South African fashion Diva in Norway.

I have only one thing to say – “you go girl!“

Bibabath happiness

Showers and small kids don’t go well together. When we signed the lease for this house I had no idea how vexing it would be to not have a bath.

But no point complaining.

Last week I bought a bibabath from Lilleprinsen. The two young ones love it! And of course it makes washing hair so much easier than scrambling around in a shower with a two year old. Even the eight year old fits into it.

An excellent purchase for those with young kids and only showers in the house.

Now if only I could fit into it……

Apenesfjellet – parkade gone ape

www.tvostfold.no

There’s a lot of construction work going on in Fredrikstad at the moment. The most extensive project is probably the parcade under the mountain – Apenesfjellet.

Norwegians are pretty good at blasting tunnels through mountains – I mean – there’s a lot of rock in Norway! But there’s still something distressing about having a ‘few‘ tons of dynamite exploding under your house.

I walk past the Apenesfjellet on a regular basis and every time I find myself thinking: “Oh boy, I’m so glad it’s not my house they’re blasting underneath!“.

But hey, The kommune (council) is in charge and I believe that all the residents were reassured that if there were any problems – they would be compensated.

Not according to the Wednesday news. Several homes (make that 60) have been affected by the blasting underneath. Only 3 have been compensated for the damage.

It now looks as if there will be a court case – or make that several.

What can I say – political blunder or just plain stupidity?

Freecycle in Fredrikstad

Or something similar. We are a ‘overproductive’ household. It blows my mind when I consider how much refuse we produce.

Maybe it’s because my kids have two warm meals a day and the grocery items are always overpackaged in unnecessary packaging!

Anyway the point is – we throw a lot away both in terms of refuse and old clothing and items. In the UK I used to put items we no longer wanted up on the freecycle forum and people would just come to collect. Very convenient.

Currently we have one big ‘mess’ in the garage – planks that when assembled make up a ‘cabin bed’ but right now I’m not sure what’s what! A baby change table with lost screws etc

Here in Fredrikstad I have been limited to the local Fretex which is not convenient because I have to take the stuff to them. The result is bags of clothes in the garage – not to mention other odds and ends which could be used.

I know it will keep building up until spring and then we will have to have a major clean up.

I’m a little puzzled that Fredrikstad doesn’t have a freecycle online group. I mean – they’re complaining about theft from the local rubbish dump.

Some of these ’stolen’ items contain sensitive data that could be used by fraudsters so I can understand that people don’t want others using their old hard drives. But there’s other stuff that I’m sure could easily be given away by a freecycle group.

But we do have a wonderful young chap who has initiated a gratisbutikk (freeshop).

Although I prefer the online concept of feecycle (come fetch and save me time) – I love the initiative of this young chap with his gratisbutikk.

I will definitely keep him in mind when it’s time for spring cleaning the garage!

Digging up Fredrikstad

We had an earthquake in Fredrikstad today. At least I thought it was an earthquake until my screaming daughter pointed at the giant steam compressor outside our house.

At one point I truly thought the roof was about to collaps on us! Although this sturdy old house was built in the 1950’s – I don’t think it was built to withstand much more than a slight snow fall.

The kommune is digging up the old drain pipes to replace them with bigger ones. Fredrikstad has grown so much during the past decades that the drain pipes can no longer cope.

They have now finished on the other side of the road and are coming to our side. This means noise until late at night. They only seam to pack up at about 9pm.

It’s hard getting a two year old baby to sleep when you have bulldozers digging outside the bedroom window.

We made a discovery last week. If you use wheelie bins from England – the local council rubbish collectors will not take them. At first I couldn’t understand how they could know the difference. Besides we paid a lot of money for our wheelie bin in the UK!

Having a huge wheelie bin full of refuse standing in my drive way forced me to look it up on the local council website. We have to phone the servicetoget to make arrangements to ’swop’ our little Norwegian wheelie bin – we can not use our big one from England. Or maybe we can as long as we pay the increase in annual subscription.

The Fredrikstad county website has become my best friend – I love that we can find all the information we need so easily.

Now that life is settling down and we are finding a routine – I am looking at studying again.

Once upon a time I had a dream of becoming an Educational psychologist. I now find myself interested in almennlærerutdanning (teaching). Maybe time to get back on track again.

Fluevaccinations in the cinema Foyer

Hubby loves technology. Wherever we go he brings along a laptop or two. When he asks me if I want to bring my laptop my standard response is :”no, I won’t be needing it”. He brings an extra one every time – and I end up using it every time.

We are currently sitting in the fabulous Fredikstad kino waiting for hubby to get his flu vaccine (the dreaded swine flu vaccine) whilst both typing away on our laptops (much to the amusement of the older citizens watching us).

Above my head is a giant spider that looks like an eight legged octopus. I think somebody forgot to tell them that Halloween ended last week.

In Norway they are currently vaccinating the risk groups – hubby being diabetic falls into the risk group.

The past week has been awfullly eventful with birthday parties galore. I love meeting new people – meeting a new person is like opening a treasure chest -you never know what’s going to be inside.

We went to the folkeregister yesterday to register hubby for his personsnummer (ID number). This means that he will be able to open a Norwegian bank account and register with a local doctor. The actual number will only arrive in the post in a week or two.

He is excited about the prospect of having a ‘normal’ life again.

Big boy went ice skating today (for the first time ever). The school took them to Stjernehallen – the local ice rink. I confess I had hoped that the boy would be overcome by ice hockey enthusiasm but not quite. He had fun but has no desire to try it again in the immediate future.

I might be forced to buy him skiis instead of skates for Christmas.

Tomorrow is Remembrance day or ‘Poppy Day’ as they call it in England – so the schools are closed. The perfect day for little fingers to do some baking!

Am currently giving some serious thought to changing my career path and going back to school. Will share once I have made a decision.

Approved family reunification for hubby!

Hubby is officially a ‘family reunion person’ living in Norway! I’m so excited – I have to celebrate with some of the wine we bought in Sweden today.

Oh and I found this little chap in Sweden – isn’t he just adorable! Oh Lordie – I’m going all Norskie – next thing you know I’ll be eating lutefisk……

Fredrikstad and international schools

So I’ve been wondering why Fredrikstad doesn’t have a proper international school. I know there’s FRIS – offering Norwegian language classes for adults.

But why is there no real international school like in Sandefjord or Bærum?(or Stavanger, Arendal, Trondheim and Telemark). An international school that offers primary, middle and high school education in English. A private international school.

Fredrikstad – the 6th largest town in Norway. Fredrikstad – the town desperately trying to promote itself as the ‘place to live‘ (they even give you a welcome package worth Kr 2500 when you move here) but yet the international school is on the other side of the fjord. In Sandefjord of all places? Why is that?

I mean … nothing happens in Sandefjord! I must be missing something because how is it possible that they get to have an international school and we don’t (read the envy in those lines)!

It baffles the mind! All this talk about having the best movie house in the country but nobody notices the shortage of teachers and schools?

Fredrikstad is approx a 1 hour train ride from Oslo (capital city). It’s even closer to the Swedish border, not to mention that it has stacks of tertiary educational institutions both in and around the town.

There’s currently a shortage of qualified teachers in the Government schools and there’s not much to chose from in the area of private education for primary and medium schools.

If Fredrikstad had a real international school then international companies based in Oslo could consider basing their international staff in Fredrikstad.

Norwegians with international ties could have the option of English medium instruction for their children. Foreigners could have the option of paying for Norwegian lessons instead of sitting around and waiting for their ID number.

So why has nobody opened an international school with English as the medium instruction? Surely Fredrikstad has the potential to provide for a successful International school?

Maybe Sandefjord does have more happening after all!