Final meeting in Norway

We, the Norwegian delegation, know that we live in a country with a harsh climate, so my survey from June has told you. We do not necessarily have sunshine every day, or hot temperatures. We do not have many historical and grand buildings dated back to before Christ, nor do we have splendid cathedrals with world known ornaments and paintings. But we do have our nature, and that was where we wanted to put our focus when you came to visit us in Norway.

Since you all had different schedules here, arriving with different means to different places, we found out that we had to split up to receive you all. It was important for us, after everything you have done for us earlier, to welcome you in a positive way, making your stay here as nice as possible.

Our own sweet "troll" imported directly from Spain: Pedro F. Cantero

The first partners arriving were the Spanish guys. Bente received them in her apartment In Horten, close to Larvik, where their ferry from Denmark arrived. They came in the middle of the night, but were astonished about how light it was in mid-June. We had a nice time visiting towns like Nevlunghavn, Stavern, Kjærringvik and Åsgårdstrand on Sunday. Monday we spent in the prison of Halden, a modern and well known site in Norway because of it’s luxurious premises.

The Spanish delegation with Bente in the prison of Halden.

After this visit we went over the border to Sweden for a short visit, where we walked around the town of Strømstad. The day finished in the old town of Fredrikstad, where Manuel and Ali had a great time playing with children’s toys. (I hope you are friends still, although Manuel struggled a lot to get down from the toy on the photo).

Boys having fun on childrens playground of Fredrikstad

The Germans arrived Monday, and was picked up at the airport of Torp by Cherif. He invited them to join for an active Tuesday after settling in Grand Hotel, Kongsberg. The same day Henri picked up Ayse from Turkey and the French partners in Oslo. They managed to see the Opera building before they sat off for our little town. So next day, Tuesday, were spent with Cherif and Grete in the surroundings of Kongsberg. They went to a small water-fall, had a barbeque there and finally sat down for coffee and ice-cream in Grete’s garden. Here the Spanish people met the rest, and we were finally united.

Icecream and coffee/tea in Grete's beautiful garden

After tons of coffee and ice-cream we all went down to Bergstaden Taekwondo, Henri’s local where he and I do our training. It was funny to see how our partners enjoyed playing with stuff in the local, they kicked and boxed and got quite crazy, maybe some of you saw a new potential in yourself?

Laure shows her boxing skills with great eager.

Henri then had a light training session with us which was very nice after a long day with many impressions. And Manuel had a great opportunity of studying some techniques.

All training with Henri in his local

"This is not difficult!"

Henri, Norwegian champion of Taekwondo

Christian enjoys the training...

Our meetings were held Wednesday 16^th and Thursday 17^th of June. We started at 09.00 in the town hall of Kongsberg. Here we made a short presentation of the program, of the town itself and our social plans for the days working with the project. The social part is very important whenever we make our meetings, because it reveals a lot about the country’s culture and the people in it.

After the short morning coffee, we went into the church of Kongsberg. It is one of our countries most beautiful churches from 1761, as you may see on the full screen image here. It has a very simple facade, but inside it is highly decorated. After the church visit, we went across the street into the Fredheim school to participate in a 30 minutes “crash-course” in Norwegian.

Sajjad helps with the Norwegian pronounciation.

Grete and Bente were teachers, and the participants were mixed in two groups, helped by participants from many different countries from our school. Sentences like “Hei, jeg heter…” (Hi, my name is…) and “Jeg kommer fra …” (I come fom…) were repeated, and we teachers sincerely think that our partners made great progress in short time! Well done!!!

Hervé impresses Annette (USA) with his fluent Norwegian.

Of course there was a reason for our small “language course”. We wanted to draw attention to what “Without Barriers” really includes: that every immigrant in the beginning has a lot of barriers to deal with before they can integrate properly. We wanted to put ourselves into the shoes of an immigrant just arriving Norway. His/her problems will be:

• Need to learn the language

• Find out names of food and other necessities, where to buy it and prices/money

• Make friends, hopefully with native people too

• Need to understand the codes, culture, the rules and the system of the country

• Get a job and be independent

There are many obstacles to be won, but we partners have means to help everyone a step further, and that’s what we have been working with throughout this project.

We went from school to our local where we had our work-meetings. Bente showed a quick resume on a Power Point presentation of our meetings in the past; in Spain, France, Germany and Turkey. She also made some comments on peoples’ signatures, and drew the attention to how these can be meaningless to even try to read. It is a kind of "secret language", a signature could as well be written in Chinese, because it only gives meaning to the writer itself. Well, the presentation was of course meant to be amusing, and I believe our partners saw both the humor and the memories in it.

After lunch we went back to our local where we decided upon our work which was to be done during the stay. We split into 5 groups (as in member-countries), and carried out some serious work before the Spanish delegation run to their hostel to watch the first football-match; Spain against Switzerland. (By the way, I maybe should NOT mention that Spain lost this game 0 – 1. This was probably just to make everything more exciting, I’m sure…)

After the Spanish loss (OH, I said it again) we met with towels and swim suits to start our competition: “Who will be the Viking of our project?”. We went to Fiskum, an inland fiord near Kongsberg. Even I must admit that the water was VERY cold, but some of us managed to put our bodies into it. The tuff people were: Ayse (Turkey), Victor (Spain), Hervé and Laure (France – the WHOLE French delegation, as a matter of fact), Christian (Germany – first one in) and finally Grete and Bente (Norway).

Henri and Birgit tried the water from water-pistols.

We had a great time almost freezing to death, but dinner afterwards was so much better for us! We ate salmon at a restaurant in Eidsfoss, a cozy and typical Norwegian old house with charming walls and interior.

The restaurant

Well, not everybody wanted salmon, so Ali got his number one meal instead; hamburger.

Dinner at Eidsfoss

After dinner Bente gave our project coordinator, our dear Pedro, a gift from Kongsberg; 2 coins made from the Kongsberg Myntverk (where coins are made in Norway). We hope he will enjoy them under a pair of wine glasses whenever good wine is served in his house in Lugo, Spain (and I hope to see them when I come back to taste more wine with you, Pedro!!!)

Thank you, Pedro, for the coordination-work with our project!

After the visit in the restaurant, strawberries and Norwegian Acquavite and acquavite-liquor was carried down on Cherif’s head – as usual. (I do not know what it is with this man and his lust for carrying alcohol on his head. Remember in France, do you?)

How things are carried in Africa...

Thursday we met at our local and made some final decisions about the final report. We also had the manager from the Culture Department of Kongsberg visiting, and she showed us a nice film about our town’s large cultural events during the year. Now that you have been here, you may watch this film again here. You may even like another presentation of the town…

Henri and Hervé then had a surprise for our dear Manuel; a “Black belt member of Honour-certificate" in Taekwondo including a “business card” with his own photo! (Little did Manuel know what the photo he gave Henri would be used for before now…). We all found this very amusing, since Manuel has been seeking to win over our Norwegian champion in this fight sport since we were in Turkey. The pictures will tell the rest.

Our "Taekwondo member of Honor, Black belt, 5th dan..."

Wednesday we were at the inland fiord (lake) of Eikern. Now it was time to climb mountains! We went up to Knutehytta to eat a typical Norwegian lunch; bread with ham, cheese, fish, caviar, jam etc. together with coffee, tea and a sweet cake called “kanelsnurr”. The weather was beautiful, and so was the lunch. After eating we all set off to climb up to Knutetoppen. I was amused by Pedro who many times during our climb shouted that “I hate you, Bente!!!” Well, this lasted until he came to the top. The hate transferred into love, and I was happy to see that both he and all the others loved the beautiful view we were rewarded with.

Christian and Víctor find snow in June on the way to the top

Ayse made a "drawing" of everyone in the book on the top of Knutefjell

The view from the top

In the evening, after a short shower and to collect towel and swimsuit, we went to our barbeque place. We had rented a hut to get this place, which lies nicely besides a warm and quiet water. Cherif brought two canoes and life-jackets, so anyone who wanted could paddle on like real vikings... oh, I mean indians. Again we invited everyone into the water, and Christian was first man in – as usual J The temperature here was totally different from yesterday, so I do not lie when I say that everyone trying to swim here, was positively surprised. It was delightful!

Sajjad (Afghanistan) and Henri (Kamerun), our chefs for the barbeque

Some of us by the shore of the lake

One of my dear participants, Sajjad from Afghanistan, had arranged all the food. He and I had bought everything in advance, but he was left alone with all the preparing. And he had done a great job – everything was so tasty and good! We enjoyed it together with wine brought by the German people (what – not all of you noticed that???), nicely chilled in the water.

Our German partners posing outside Knutehytta before we went to the top

Norway is a country with many qualities. I believe that there is not many countries in the world which can offer free nature experiences like Norway. Our policy is that every man and woman in this country shall be able to enjoy the nature, that there shall be a minimum of private property and limits to get access to nature pearls like fiords and lakes, mountains and woods. Our work with integration in Kongsberg focuses allot on this, we try to make immigrants see the immense possibilities our country offers – all year around.

Our Diva: Christian, enjoying Norwegian sunshine

Norwegians are very good at using the nature, and most tourists come just to take part of this too. Hopefully we succeeded in transmitting a little part of what we enjoy in our country, but also to make our partners experience what immigrants do. As long as we who have taken part for the last two years have managed to help just one single person each, I believe we have succeeded. Success is all the small victories, all the small points gained. Today we can compare it with what the Spanish football team did during the World Cup; collecting points – loose some – win some more – and we all know that their effort ended up at the very top: as World Champions. Congratulations, Spain!

The winners of our Viking-competition: Laure, Christian and Ayse. Well done!

With our very Norwegian friend, Víctor, we thank you for coming to our country of trolls.

Soo long everybody – we miss you all!!!!