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2008-07-27

3S Summer Trip : OSLO  


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I dont recall much about my short trip to Oslo. We never intended to make it short, but due to some scheduling problem, we decided to stay in Oslo less than 24 hours. YEs, with no lodging.

We arrived in the morning by bus from Stockholm. After storing our luggage in the Bus Terminal, we decided to walk around the Terminal for a bit. Its still a little early in the morning, so the city seems a little bit dead. We practically hang around 7-11 and chat with a nice Pakistani lady there for almost an hour before the tourist office nearby open.

Since we have only a few hours here, we decided to board the hop-on-hop-off bus. Obviously we got lost a little too many times finding the right spot for the bus stop, but like in other Nordic country, u just need to "looked lost" and some nice lady / guy will offer u help.

Our first destination is some Sculpture Park (The Vigeland Park). Its basically, a park...with lots lots of sculptures. I cant see what really special about this nudes sculpture, and some arbitary, yet obviously phallic -like statue. But then again, its art...and Im no art expert. I learnt that although the park consist of almost +1k statues, it took only a short time to be completed. Now, that will be impressing...

Then we head to the Main Street leading to the Royal Palace. The Royal Palace seems almost too simple, with clean, sleek design - unlike those founded in Stockholm. Not too harsh for me to say it looks like our District Hospital in Volgograd (if the Hospital is renovated to its best). So u get the pciture here..its small, have some roman pillars, and ...thats it.

The City Hall stand proudly in the centre of Oslo, with two big tigers statues guarding its entrance. Why tigers? see above.
On its right wall there's a metal plate commemorating Fridtjof Nansen, the founder of Nansen Passport.

The most inspiring thing in Oslo, is perhaps, the Nobel Peace Centre. There's a temporary exhibition being held there about city-slum. The view of usual people living in "slum" (read: setinggan) really left a deep impact in me. I mean, an 18 years old living under a bridge, said it his home and how it is sweet just like other people home, and he dream to be a doctor. Today, I cant never watch my dad's Indon worker without recalling that thought.
Anyway, the Nobel Peace Centre is more sophisticated and futuristic compared to Nobel Museum in Stockholm. Apart from all the Nobel Prizes, the Nobel Prizes for Peace is awarded here in Oslo, and is commissioned by a special committee from Norwegian Government. Why? u have to ask Alfred Nobel why he decide so in his famous will.
I spent half of my day in Oslo wandering around the Nobel Peace Centre, and touch and feel what it means to fight for world peace.

Later that day, meeting back with Sdar n all along the main street, we spent the rest of our evening eating Kebab, wandering around the small stall, picking overpriced souvenirs (with Tax-refund, that is) , and lastly, loitering by the bench checking out Nordic chicks and lads. Gorgeous. Period.

Just before we board our bus that night to our next and last destination, Copenhagen, we met with a pair of Philipinos ladies. They were leaving to Copenhagen as well, since they are now living / studying there. We have a nice chat n all, but we cant manage not to laugh when we saw the "kiasu" style that is all too synonym for South-East-Asians. Even before the bus door open, they had already lined up and urged us to line up as well so that "we can pick the nicest seat".
"Faster, faster..we must pick the nicest seat". They even save us our "nicest seat". So thank you very much.

We dont know how to say that in Tagalog.

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