God Jævla Jul, Alle Sammen!
Jul here is pretty fun, but it can get very quiet in this house. I miss the kids crashing around, the constant sound of music, Christmas stockings and decorating the family tree, slowly drinking tea with my mother on Christmas morning while everyone else rushes into the basement, anxiously awaiting our finishing so they can make with the presents, and even Peter and Jennifer's screaming matches! Oy!
Christmas Eve is when the presents are exchanged in Norway, and I was so happy that Grethe's family was over here. Simon, Daniel and Anki and their baby Andrea, and Anki's previous child, Melinda. Anki's mother, Elin, was here as well. We ate a traditional Norwegian dinner of pino chut (I didn't spell that correctly), which is smoked, salted ribs of lamb. It was boiled for most of the day, and served with boiled potatoes and turnips. Very tasty, actually. After the previous lamb meal (which I did not enjoy so very much) I was pleasantly surprised.
It did get a little 80's-television-drama over dinner, which was quite hilarious in a way. My little sister, Camilla, announced to my father that she was pregnant. A month and a half in, with her boyfriend of a year. She is 17, and he is 23 and a garbage man, as well as a bouncer at the local pub, Ben. His family is apparently more pissed off than my family was. His mother threatened to kick him out of the house. So, that got pretty heavy pretty quickly. Also announced was the new engagement of Kim to his Romanian girlfriend, Corina. I guess they have only spent a couple of months together so people are pretty skeptical of motives and whatnot. Anyway, it was all pretty crazy! I jokingly came out of the closet just to complete the picture.
After the meal a pretty significant pile of presents were distributed from beneath the tree. Another difference is that here everyone exchanges gifts the weeks before Jul and we open everything from everyone all at once. I don't like that nearly as much as home. I enjoy watching people open the gifts from me. The looks of joy, or of, "What the hell did you give me this for?" are really what gift-giving is about. At least for me. This seemed so impersonal. Christmas morning I talked to Eva, who thanked me for my gifts to her and the family, and I sent my love, as well as that of all the Canadian family. I guess I will see her later in coming week. We opened gifts for about four hours! I don't know how Daniel and Anki will keep track of all the gifts they received! Oh yes, and somewhere in there Dad snuck away and dressed up like Santa Clause (although he's called Jule Nisse here) and came back to give some gifts to the little ones. That was pretty cute.
Christmas morning I awoke at 11am. Ah, sleeping in on Christmas morning... I didn't have Leif to pound my door until I awoke. I miss Leif. At 11:30 the same crowd as the previous eve showed up and we all had a breakfast that Dad and Grethe had prepared. Bread and meats and scrambled eggs and coffee. Afterwards many people lit cigarets, what a nice aroma to finish a good meal with. Daniel and Simon found another person to tell the story of the Free Willy whale to: Anki's mother, Elin. Apparently the Free Willy whale was actually freed after the film. And, ironically enough, he starved to death pretty quickly and washed ashore in northern Norway. I guess there's a tombstone there now. Those two really enjoy telling people about it. It amuses me to no end.
A short while after breakfast we all piled into cars to visit Grethe's sister, Liv, and her husband, Gunnstein, for another large, Jul meal. Turkey and stuffing and veggies this time. More North American this time, it felt a little like home. Christian was there from Oslo, and his brother Ørjan from Bergen. I look forward to visiting both of them in the new year. Gunnstein and Liv live near a kick-ass slalom ski slope, so I will be visiting them a number of times in the new year as well. I am so breaking my ass on a mountain next year!
They don't have "Boxing Day" here either. Instead they have what they call 2nd Christmas. Dad and Grethe had big plans of taking the day off and mentally preparing for work the next day. No fun for me, so I spent the day with others. And I can't remember who, or what we did that day. Eep, I'm so senile sometimes. Okay, just checked my photographs and one thing I did see was an incredible sunrise! Okay, maybe the sun didn't actually come over the horizon, but the sky turned a bunch of great colours for a time. I have pictures on my fotki site, in the 2005 Norge Jul album. Another great thing about the Jul season here is that everyone comes home for it. So we wind up with a tonne of talented musicians who want to jam. So in the evening I went to one of the local watering holes and saw a great little band. Talking to the lead singer, Espen, after the show, I found they hadn't played together in over two years. Espen hadn't picked up his guitar in over a year! But they rocked that joint! And did a great Jethro Tull!
Yesterday was the first day the stores were open after Jul. Camilla and I went to town to run some errands, her to get a ring from Ben resized (not a wedding ring), and me to buy school supplies. It's weird to think that I go to full-time language school on the third of january. In the evening I visited with Simon and his father and step mother. Much beer was consumed. They wanted to "turn me into a Norwegian" by force-feeding me heaps of cognac. I refused, claiming that half my DNA was Norwegian, so that should be good enough. They agreed and we watched a movie instead. I played with the kids for a while and got them really wound up. That was fun. Many photos of them being nuts are now on my photo site. Enjoy!
Comment theme for the day: Crazy Eighties Television Drama Holiday Dinner Moments! Tell us about things admitted to your family on holiday dinners. Come on, it will be fun. Like living those horrible moments all over again... You know you want to.
Christmas Eve is when the presents are exchanged in Norway, and I was so happy that Grethe's family was over here. Simon, Daniel and Anki and their baby Andrea, and Anki's previous child, Melinda. Anki's mother, Elin, was here as well. We ate a traditional Norwegian dinner of pino chut (I didn't spell that correctly), which is smoked, salted ribs of lamb. It was boiled for most of the day, and served with boiled potatoes and turnips. Very tasty, actually. After the previous lamb meal (which I did not enjoy so very much) I was pleasantly surprised.
It did get a little 80's-television-drama over dinner, which was quite hilarious in a way. My little sister, Camilla, announced to my father that she was pregnant. A month and a half in, with her boyfriend of a year. She is 17, and he is 23 and a garbage man, as well as a bouncer at the local pub, Ben. His family is apparently more pissed off than my family was. His mother threatened to kick him out of the house. So, that got pretty heavy pretty quickly. Also announced was the new engagement of Kim to his Romanian girlfriend, Corina. I guess they have only spent a couple of months together so people are pretty skeptical of motives and whatnot. Anyway, it was all pretty crazy! I jokingly came out of the closet just to complete the picture.
After the meal a pretty significant pile of presents were distributed from beneath the tree. Another difference is that here everyone exchanges gifts the weeks before Jul and we open everything from everyone all at once. I don't like that nearly as much as home. I enjoy watching people open the gifts from me. The looks of joy, or of, "What the hell did you give me this for?" are really what gift-giving is about. At least for me. This seemed so impersonal. Christmas morning I talked to Eva, who thanked me for my gifts to her and the family, and I sent my love, as well as that of all the Canadian family. I guess I will see her later in coming week. We opened gifts for about four hours! I don't know how Daniel and Anki will keep track of all the gifts they received! Oh yes, and somewhere in there Dad snuck away and dressed up like Santa Clause (although he's called Jule Nisse here) and came back to give some gifts to the little ones. That was pretty cute.
Christmas morning I awoke at 11am. Ah, sleeping in on Christmas morning... I didn't have Leif to pound my door until I awoke. I miss Leif. At 11:30 the same crowd as the previous eve showed up and we all had a breakfast that Dad and Grethe had prepared. Bread and meats and scrambled eggs and coffee. Afterwards many people lit cigarets, what a nice aroma to finish a good meal with. Daniel and Simon found another person to tell the story of the Free Willy whale to: Anki's mother, Elin. Apparently the Free Willy whale was actually freed after the film. And, ironically enough, he starved to death pretty quickly and washed ashore in northern Norway. I guess there's a tombstone there now. Those two really enjoy telling people about it. It amuses me to no end.
A short while after breakfast we all piled into cars to visit Grethe's sister, Liv, and her husband, Gunnstein, for another large, Jul meal. Turkey and stuffing and veggies this time. More North American this time, it felt a little like home. Christian was there from Oslo, and his brother Ørjan from Bergen. I look forward to visiting both of them in the new year. Gunnstein and Liv live near a kick-ass slalom ski slope, so I will be visiting them a number of times in the new year as well. I am so breaking my ass on a mountain next year!
They don't have "Boxing Day" here either. Instead they have what they call 2nd Christmas. Dad and Grethe had big plans of taking the day off and mentally preparing for work the next day. No fun for me, so I spent the day with others. And I can't remember who, or what we did that day. Eep, I'm so senile sometimes. Okay, just checked my photographs and one thing I did see was an incredible sunrise! Okay, maybe the sun didn't actually come over the horizon, but the sky turned a bunch of great colours for a time. I have pictures on my fotki site, in the 2005 Norge Jul album. Another great thing about the Jul season here is that everyone comes home for it. So we wind up with a tonne of talented musicians who want to jam. So in the evening I went to one of the local watering holes and saw a great little band. Talking to the lead singer, Espen, after the show, I found they hadn't played together in over two years. Espen hadn't picked up his guitar in over a year! But they rocked that joint! And did a great Jethro Tull!
Yesterday was the first day the stores were open after Jul. Camilla and I went to town to run some errands, her to get a ring from Ben resized (not a wedding ring), and me to buy school supplies. It's weird to think that I go to full-time language school on the third of january. In the evening I visited with Simon and his father and step mother. Much beer was consumed. They wanted to "turn me into a Norwegian" by force-feeding me heaps of cognac. I refused, claiming that half my DNA was Norwegian, so that should be good enough. They agreed and we watched a movie instead. I played with the kids for a while and got them really wound up. That was fun. Many photos of them being nuts are now on my photo site. Enjoy!
Comment theme for the day: Crazy Eighties Television Drama Holiday Dinner Moments! Tell us about things admitted to your family on holiday dinners. Come on, it will be fun. Like living those horrible moments all over again... You know you want to.
posted by Shaun at
1:07 p.m.
2 Comments:
Sorry Shaun, our Christmas can't compete with your drama-filled one. It was pretty quiet. Me, Matt and the dog. Lots of prezzies though and a big surprise from Matt, Aaron and Krystle - they got me a rabbit fur jacket, it's pretty awesome. No pregnancies or engagements on this side of the pond...Dawn's moving to Calgary with Marcus, but you probably know that.
We just got back from Matt's family Christmas dinner which was pleasant and subdued.
I miss my family and how bonkers they get around this holiday :(
Well I'll not tell everyone about my "holiday"
I'll be coming over for New Year, and we'll talk...
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