Done with exams!

This should have been an article already 3 days ago; however, I kind of had to deal with other stuff that I had been neglecting before, like my job, the gym, and my laundry. And then, my next visitor arrived already!

Anyway, just a quick recap: after coming back from Tallinn and Helsinki and celebrating the 17th, I had to deal with my second school exam as well as my second paper. They were a bit different from the first ones, as in: the school exam was a pen and paper one, and I wrote the paper on my own instead of in a group. And they were rather close to each other. So I basically spent a lot of time on campus - not always the library, because that was closed on two days because of Pentecost. There are just way too many holidays during the May exam time... (Germany has all these holidays as well - except for the 17th, of course - but in Mannheim, they don't close the library because of that!) So I ended up studying in one of the study areas in the basement on Whit Sunday and decided I might as well study on the balcony of my dorm kitchen on Whit Monday. There, you get at least a bit of natural light. :P

Anyway, I ended up having a rather intense study period, or: I was a bit desperate just before the school exam.

You could tell that from the fact that I paused studying to go down and buy an energy drink - for the first time in four years. (Yup, was desperate in the spring 2014 exam time, too.)

Anyway, after a terrible night's sleep, I went to my second exam. Since BI has 3 hour exams and likes to schedule all of them from 9:00 to 12:00, they are lacking rooms on campus. So a lot of exams are taken outside campus - like mine. I had to take the metro to a tennis hall that was somewhere in Oslo where I had never been before. And where only one metro line goes - and it takes 20 minutes. Fun. :P

You could tell you had gotten off at the correct stop pretty easily though:

Lots of students getting off at the same stop!

The tennis hall was huge, and they held four exams in there at the same time, causing a bit of confusion. At least for me.

Spotting exchange students being like: but first, let me take a photo of the exam venue!

The exam wasn't the nicest experience ever, which was not due to the questions (they were ok, I think), but due to the circumstances. Fellow students talking through the whole exam instructions announcement, causing me to not have a single clue what I was doing there, exam invigilators not speaking English, and such... Oh, and then, you had to order your white, yellow, and blue copies of the exam (each sheet of paper actually consisted of three sheets, and you got to keep the blue copy, which I think is a very good thing) - and start queuing in order to submit your exam:

Amazing experience. :P

Even more amazing: I went home, had lunch, and then made my way to the library in order to a) complain to a fellow student about the exam, and b) deal with the paper. Repeat b) on the day after.

I'm not sure I mentioned it on this blog, but my topic for the Change Management paper was a bit... "alternative", as I chose the change process of Michael Kors going fur-free as my case instead of going for the usual mergers & acquisitions, restructuring, downsizing etc. Found it appropriate to wear this:

Very business casual. :P

Fortunately, this was not a printed submission, but a digital one. So I could just go home at some point (yup, I literally walked home from school for the first time in order to get some distraction), do the proofreading at home and then submit the paper while sitting on my bed:

You had to name your group, even when writing alone...

Oh, and just fyi: the deadline was not midnight, but noon on the next day. Unlike other people, I don't like going hard on the deadline. A fellow student submitted within 5 minutes before deadline three (!) times this semester - couldn't do that...

And just to end this entry with something nice-looking: after taking the school exam, complaining about the school exam and writing parts of the analysis for the paper half-asleep, I decided that I deserved to join my friends in the Oslofjord (no, not in the water: on Hovedøya and on the ferry round trip) in the evening. Luckily, sunset is around 10 at this time of the year!

Good decision, as I did not only get to see the sunset by the water, which never fails to make me happier...

... but also sheep on Hovedøya for the first time!

Oh, sheep! ^_^

P.S. If you don't hear from me anymore for the next time, that's because I'm going on a trip to ICELAND tomorrow! :)

17th of May!

Hi again!

I'm back from my trip to Tallinn & Helsinki and still have two articles to write (more everyday life from before my exam and the trip, of course). However, I decided to abandon the chronology of articles for once in order to publish this post in a timely manner. Can't really postpone the 17th of May until forever because, you know, it's the 17th of May! :P

So Syttendemai (pronounced Søttendemai, for no particular reason) is the Norwegian national holiday. It commemorates the 17th of May 1814, when Norway got its constitution, which is why it's also called Constitution Day (Grunnlovsdagen).

And unlike in Germany, the national holiday is a big thing here. I mean, I'm giving up the chronology of this blog for this:

Never before have I seen so many people anywhere in Norway! I think, a lot of people came to Oslo specifically for this day. That would at least explain why the city was so full of people when we came back from our trip yesterday evening: the airport train, the metro, the city centre - the 16th was basically one big pre-party for the Constitution Day. (I kinda got my private pre-party when I unknowingly entered the kitchen of my place upon return, just to drop my Grønland groceries...)

However, this morning, on my way to the city centre, public transport was obviously more crowded. Basically like rush hour, just that it was probably like this the whole day. Only then (to be fair: and when my Norwegian fellow student texted something about heading home to change into a suit) I realised that BI's international office had been serious in their post on Facebook to inform us internationals about Syttendemai: dressing up for the national holiday is a thing here!

If you're wondering about the people in the gowns in the background: these are bunads, traditional Norwegian dresses. They look different depending on where you are from, and people wear them for important occasions, like the national holiday. I felt like generally women were wearing bunads and men suits, but I also saw some men in traditional clothing and, obviously, women in non-bunad dresses.

Upon arrival at Nationaltheatret, the T-bane station closest to the royal palace, things got a bit messy. As in: there were just so many people! They actually created two lanes at the entrance/exit for people coming and leaving and had people guiding the masses there. And yeah, Karl Johans gata, the main street which the parade was taking on its way to the palace looked like this:

Us three confused exchange students actually managed to find a spot where we could see something when the Kongens Garde (the King's guard) and its corps passed:

Then, we - and a bunch of other people, obviously - made our way to the palace. Fortunately, we had found out beforehand that you needed tickets to make it to the area closest to the palace. You didn't even have to pay for them, you just had to get them in advance, e.g. at the tourist information centre. I literally got mine while waiting for the airport train on the day of my flight to Tallinn. So this ticket has travelled to Estonia and Finland before coming back to Norway. :D

Yup, somebody got a flag for 30 NOK. xD

Yeah, and the area of the palace place was were we spent the rest of the event. The centrepiece of the Syttendemai celebrations is the children's parade. Children from around 150 schools in the Oslo area (including a German school :D) as well as marching bands (not only playing marching songs, I also heard Chained to the Rhythm, Eye of the Tiger, and When the Saints Go Marching In) constituted this parade on Karl Johans gata to the royal palace. I have never seen so many flags and heard so many "hipp, hipp, hurra!" calls ever in my life!

Enjoy a bunch of photos!

Oh yeah, the parade didn't end at the royal palace for no reason: the royal family was standing there, waving at all the children for at least three hours!

And about the children: I heard different things about who gets to attend the parade today. So apparently, attendance is mandatory at some schools for certain grades (pupils aged 8 to 10 or so). However, some schools do not attend the parade every year - somebody even said some schools only do it every 7 (?) years, so you only get the chance to participate in the children's parade once in your school career. And the schools have to register/apply for the parade, I think. So I guess it all depends on your school...? I should probably ask actual Oslo people about the details...

However, next to a lot of small children, there were also the high school graduates. Remember when I said that the 17th is the climax of russeknuter? There were surprisingly little graduates among the parade. Except for the few that were members of the bands. And it was fairly easy to spot them obviously...

Dress code issues: graduation > band!

However, they came in crowds at the end of the parade:

Still crawling to graduation at the palace...

... and greeting the royal family!

All in all, it was really nice (peaceful, emphasizing children and education rather than the military, and surprisingly little police presence - they were probably somewhere in the background though), so I'm gonna refrain from commenting on "nurturing patriotism" for once. :P

The most annoying part was getting out and taking the metro back afterwards, actually. And even that was not too bad. The "major disruptions" my public transport app warned me of were mainly delays on all metro lines - to be expected...

In the afternoon, we celebrated in our own way: we took the ferry to Hovedøya, the first island in the Oslofjord, and had a picnic there. (Not my photos, not my filters!!)

Before going back to the real life, we stopped by the monastery ruin again and of course made the whole round trip with the ferry rather than just going back to Aker brygge directly.

Flags on all means of public transport.

That one's always there though. :)

And something I discovered when writing this article:

google.no today :)

Sign of life

Yup, I'm still alive. And I still have a draft for an article here - but I seriously do not have the time to write it... Sorry about that! Meanwhile, enjoy this photo from when I last took the round trip ferry in the Oslofjord about a week ago!

(There are gonna be more sunset-by-the-water photos if I ever manage to turn that draft into an article.)

So just a very brief update: I had my first school exam at BI yesterday, for the block course about "Creativity in Individual, Group, and Organisation" I had taken in April. It was computer-written, which I had never done before in my life. However, it worked surprisingly smoothly. No internet connectivity issues, no laptop crashes, all good. The exam was also ok, I think. (We're gonna get the results in June.) And I'm quite glad I don't have to deal with a hundred Venn diagrams anymore. :P

And now, don't expect to hear anything from me for the next time, as I'm literally just leaving for a trip to Tallinn & Helsinki!