Parisian love - day 3

Ok, so now I actually have a valid reason for not updating my blog for ages; I've not had internet in my flat! It's a month since we came home from Paris and I guess it's time I wrap it up by saying what we did on our 3rd and on our last day.
We started the day at Café Marly. Then we went shopping at le carrousel du Louvre. Then we wandered over to the Eiffel tower. The original plan was to go up to the top, but we have both been up it before and the queues were massive - like they usually are. So we sat down in the grass and enjoyed the sunshine and heat.

After some more wandering and shopping (mostly window shopping as we were both kind of skint) we sat down at a restaurant and had a heavy meal. I must say we were both exhausted by that point. We killed about an hour or two there we went/rolled back to the hotel.

We fell asleep the moment our heads hit the pillow. It was a good thing as the next day was leaving day. We had breakfast in the hotel, packed and left. We had a few hours to kill before our flight; so we went to the local cheese shop and bought blue cheese and wine for Lee. I had already bought my souvenirs for my friends, so there was no need to shop, but of course I did anyways. When we got to the airport we raided the tax free; not for us of course but for last minute gifts for our friends.
All in all it was a wonderful holiday. I really feel like I haven't been able to express just how amazing it was. Maybe one day I'll become a better blogger =)

Parisian love - day 2

On our second day in Paris we spent the morning/afternoon in the Louvre. Most people know the Louvre is huge, but my brain still can't comprehend how much history and art you can squeeze into one building. Not that they actually have to squeeze because the building is HUGE. Connor and I spent around 4 hours in there and we barely even saw anything in there. What we did see was the Egyptian section:

There was so many treasures and fascinating things to see that my little head just went numb from it all by the end of the day.
The Roman section:

The roman section we hardly spent any time in at all. Or maybe we did? This is the problem with writing the blog-post 2 weeks after we have been there. Wops. I found the roman part a lot more fascinating than the Egyptian part. That might have something to do with the face that we have all seen Egyptian exhibitions before. I don't really know. I loved all the beautiful statues. Quite embarrassing but I cannot remember the mane of the first statue but the second and third one is Venus de Milo and Winged Victory of Samothrace

Then we came over to the rooms with all the pained ceilings.  I was truly amazed by those rooms. My neck started to hurt after a while due to me staring up all the time. I took so many pictures of this and I could honestly not choose a favorite one. I was blown away by all of them 

At the end of it all we went to see Mona Lisa, wedding feast at cana, and the young martyr. We were exhausted by this point and went back to the hotel for a nap. 

At night we went Pont des Arts and hung up our love lock. Then we went to a lovely restaurant near Seine and sat there hour hours drinking wine and talking. Before we went home we wandered a bit and took a few late night pictures.

It was all very romantic.

Parisian love - day 1

(actually day one and two, but since we arrived so late on our first day I'm counting our first full day as day number one) I know I promised to post this within a couple of days, but I'm lazy, OK? Good. Glad we got that out of the way and can focus on the task; writing the post about Paris. We went to Paris on the 8th of May/Connor's 21st/our 3 year anniversary. By the time we got to the Hotel it was so late that we just wandered down the street, grabbed some Chinese food and ate it in the hotel. Our Hotel was in the street next to Moulin Rouge and was nice and cosy.

A long and good night sleep in a hotel room that was just a bit too warm later, we wandered up to Sacré-Cœur. We lived in Montmarte so it was only about a 5 minute walk up there. The stairs up to the church is murder on the legs, but the view is oh so worth it. I would really recommend going up there rather than spending time and money on the Eiffel tower. Especially if you're on a budget. 

The metro was close by so we got on it and took it to Notre Dame. We wandered all the way from Notrea Dame to the Eiffel tower. It might not seem like much, but on the way there is so much to see and do that by the time we got to the Eiffel tower we had to sit down and chill for a while. It's hard trying to tell you about all the things we saw and did, simply because there was so much of it. 

At night we went to visit some distant relatives of mine. Claire-Jane and her husband Eric. We had a lovely meal and even got to meet her brother and a lovely little french boy who spoke English with a strong Birmingham accent. The meal was more than lovely actually. It blew me away. At night Claire-Jane and Eric took us for a ride around Paris and showed us a lot more than we would have been able to see without the car. I am so glad I got to know some of my French relatives. I have heard a lot of stories about them, so it was really nice to actually meet them. 

I'll write about the other two and a half days later. Knowing me it might be a week or so until I finally get around to it.

17th of May - Scottish style

After a math exam in the morning I rushed into Stirling and jumped on the train to Edinburgh. Today is the 17th of May; Norway's constitution day! There is a parade in Edinburgh every year and last year I missed it because of placement. I was determined not to miss it this year! Connor came with me in the parade. The parade goes from parliament square to the Norwegian stone in Princes street gardens. The sun was out and I felt really really emotional when we sang the national anthem. When we came home we made a cinnamon cheese cake with the Norwegian flag made out of raspberries, cream and blueberries. All in all a wonderful day. Gratulerer med dagen

Love lock

This is mine and Connor's love lock on Pont des Arts in Paris.
We came home to Scotland yesterday after 3 wonderful days in Paris. I will post a blog post about our French adventure in the next couple of days so stay tuned! 

Songbird

Not much has happened since last time. I only have one weeks of placement left to go then I am over and done with semester five. It's only ten days until Connor and I go to Paris and 34 days until we move into our flat! I have so many reasons to be happy right now and I truly am enjoying every second of life. Yesterday I got up at 6am to get a lift from Stephanie into Edinburgh. I wasn't supposed to be going to Edinburgh this weekend at all due to Connor's exams, but I needed him to sign the contract for the flat so hey ho there we go.
I got to Connor's house really early, luckily he was already awake. It would not have been fun sitting downstairs for a couple of hours waiting for the rest of the house to wake up. Once I got to Connors room he handed over a packet with the two Bioshock Infinite necklaces we've been waiting on. I couldn't decide on which one I wanted, so Connor bought me both! (Yes, so maybe I'm a little spoiled). At night we had Jambalaya that Connor's mum made. It was awesome, but oh my lord I felt full for ages and ages afterwards. After dinner Connor, Jack and I went to the Omni center and saw Iron Man 3. It was a good film, but like expected it could not be compared to the first one at all. I woke up to a sunny day that quickly turned into a rainy one, but it changed it's mind several times and was sunny the first minute and rainy the next. Stephanie came through to Musselburgh and picked me up to drive back to Stirling. Once we got home we had a lovely nap and then went to the cinema to see Evil Dead. The movie was scary and had plenty of scenes where I got quite uncomfortable. It didn't have much of a story line though and when it came to the torture scenes it seemed to only want to be gross and not scary. I felt quite sick afterwards. After the cinema I had a lovely Skype date with Eva and Tanni (and we we're supposed to have Karianne there as well, but she ditched us for her grandma. Shame on you Karianne..). It really makes me happy speaking to my friends even though we're so far away. I really do miss them a lot <3

Amazing times!

This weekend has been a truly amazing weekend. It all kicked off with spending the whole of Saturday viewing flats with Connor up here in Stirling. The first flat we viewed was a decent size, but slightly old looking flat very close to where I am living at the moment. The couple who owned it were lovely and the flat had a stunning view. I guess a lot of my love for the flat was simply because of the fact that it was the first flat we had ever seen together. I think a huge part of it was the excitement that comes along with the thought of moving in with each other. The second flat we went to see was huge in comparison to the first one. However, it was dirty, dark and obviously moldy in the toilet. The person who had lived there before us had also at some point punched or kicked a whole in the wall. The flat had a study room. This was the flat that I was sure I wanted before we went to see it. I just don't see how the letting agency is expecting to let it out to anybody when they haven't even bothered hoovering the carpet. For the third flat we went to see we showed up at the letting agency's (Homes for U) office and got walked over by a lovely lady called Marie. The flat was on the top floor of a well looked after building. It makes a nice first impression not to smell cat piss the moment you open the door that leads to the stairs. It's on the third floor (fjerde etasje er det vi hadde sagt i norge) and when we finally made it to the top I needed a moment to catch my breath. Stairs is truly my worst enemy. The flat itself was bright, open and just beautiful. I am not too keen on the green sofas, but again that is just a minor detail that can be over looked. The flat was clean and had a nice big size bedroom and a walk in closet in the hall. My words can not explain how much I loved this flat. Which is also why we ended up taking it. The last flat we saw we saw just in case it would blow our minds and knock the third flat into the ground, but it didn't, because it couldn't.

On Sunday Connor and I spent most of the day watching TV series, eating and napping. About 5 pm we got in the car with Stephanie and drove to Edinburgh. Stephanie has just started working in The George Hotel in Edinburgh and as a part of her job it is required that she does a guest experience. Which means she needed to spend one night in the hotel, dinner and breakfast included for free AND she could bring a friend. Sounds like the best place to work ever if you ask me! Once we had said goodbye to Connor we checked into the hotel, got ready, went down to the bar and collected out (free) glass of champagne and then went to the restaurant and had our lovely meal. I had a smoked salmon for starters and huge steak for my main course which of course was beautiful and we shared a bottle of wine. It was lovely just sitting chatting away at dinner. It is lovely just being two friends out for a meal having time to listen to each others life stories and not feeling rushed in any way. We also somehow managed to squeeze some room for ice cream at the end of our meal. Once we got up to the hotel room I had a shower and some more wine (oops) before we got ready and hit the town. We ended up in the Opal Lounge where we had an amazing night. The club was right next to our hotel so we didn't have to get a taxi or freeze our asses off walking home. My alarm was set for 9am so we could go down stairs, eat breakfast and phone the letting agency. I phoned the letting agency just in time to get first refusal on the flat and BOOM Connor and I are moving in on the 1st of June <3

I walk the line

Yesterday was such a beautiful day. I woke up after about 12 hours sleep (which I needed badly). After placement on Friday I went home and picked up my stuff then hurried down to the train station. I arrived the moment my train left. It is safe to say I was not a happy bunny. Luckily the trains between Stirling and Edinburgh goes every 30 minutes on weekdays; or else I just might have had a break down. Placement is great fun, but being on my feet all day really is tiring. When I finally arrived in Edinburgh it was 45 minutes until my train to Musselburgh arrived. I had my bike with me so I couldn't get the bus. After moaning to Connor for a bit him and his mum picked me up from the train station in Musselburgh. I do love how well looked after I am whenever I'm here. After a shower and some food I fell asleep on the sofa while watching the Hobbit with Connor and Lee. I think 'dead to the world' might be the only way to describe my conscious state at the time. So anyways, the next morning the sun was out and I decided to go for a walk. Musselburgh has a beautiful beach that goes all the way to Protobello. I left my trainers in Stirling so I only had my pretty but uncomfortable shoes with me. My short walk turned into a 3 hour long wander down Musselburgh beach and all the way to the end of Portobello beach and then back again. It was beautiful, warm and sunny. When I got to Portobello I bought myself an ice cream just because it was that lovely. The beach was filled with families going for walks and playing in the sand. I love how Britain comes to life the moment the sun is out <3That being said, it did start to cloud over on the way home again (but it wouldn't be Scotland if it hadn't) .

Are you having lots of fun?

Spring time is here in Scotland and I am really hoping it is here to stay. I had a day off/study day today and I am really happy I didn't "waste" this day being stuck inside the hospital. I got up quite early (for a day off) and walked into uni for my last occupational health appointment. My next jag is due in 2017 so there is no more being treated like a pin cushion. My whole arm always feels numb after a vaccine so I can't really say I'll miss it. After my occupational health appointment I went over to one of the tutors at uni and spoke about the elective placement in semester eight. Hopefully I'll have some answers on Friday or at the latest Monday. If not I will bug him half to death until I get the reply I want. I got really excited after this meeting and had to phone my dad. On my way to the library I saw a lovely poster that said having fun will give you STIs. I laughed at it so I really hope I don't get AIDS or chlamydia. After that I went to the library and did some uni work and then I went to the gym. There is very few places I hate as much as I hate the gym. It's a place I associate with pain and irritation, so I was only there for half an hour before I gave up. The weather is simply beautiful with a really warm sun and cold wind. Dad reports cold weather and general suckyness in Norway, so maybe Scotland isn't so bad after all.

Time flies

I don't really see why I even try and keep this blog updated anymore. Whenever I do go on to update it I look at the last time I posted something and think "oh that's been ages, not way will I ever manage to write about all the stuff that has happened since then" - so I simply don't. However I am going to give it a bash this time. My four weeks with the Diabetic Specialist Nurse Team is over and it's has been a fabulous 4 weeks. Even though I thought I did; I didn't know much about the diabetes before I started. I realize I probably still don't know all there is to know, but that is OK. I think I need to start accepting that I will never learn everything there is to know. Even though it's hard. My mentor was brilliant and kept on quizzing me. I have not have a mentor who has been that interested in teaching before. It made all the difference!
Today I had my first placement with the Urology outpatient department and it seems like I will once again have an amazing placement. I wonder if I will ever find an area of nursing I'll hate.
This weekend Connor has been up here in Stirling. It has been amazing being just the two of us with no deadlines, essays or exams ruining our time together. Over the weekend we finished watching Firefly, went up to the Wallace monument, went to the pub with Stephanie and slept and ate tons. It was a lazy and really nice weekend. I am really looking forward to Connor being on his summer holiday so I don't have to share his attention with Heriot Watt University.

In other news; on the 8th of May it is not only is it Connors 21st, it is also approximately 3 years since we started dating. So that calls for a wee holiday to Paris. Hotel and flights are all booked and now all I am waiting for is my current placement to finish to we can get going! It is going to be mine and Connor's first ever holiday together where it is just the two of us and this makes me even more excited. Last time I was in Paris was with my sister in 2010. She got me a holiday for my 18th and I cannot describe how amazing it was. I really hope I'll have an equally as awesome experience with Connor. Here are some (of the many) pictures from last time I went

We are staying at a hotel called Hotel 19 Lepic for four nights. It has good reviews and was fairly cheap. Not that the hotel matters much as I am assuming we'll spend most of our time exploring the city. The hotel is located in the center of old Montmartre, so the location is brilliant. If I'm not completely wrong me and my sister didn't stay very far away from Montmartre last time.

Ready for another placement

My bag is packed; my uniform is ironed; my alarm is set; my lunch is made. I am very excited to start my placement with The Diabetic Specialist Nurse Team tomorrow! Now it would be great if I could actually sleep. In my last blog post I wrote about my elective placement in semester 8. I might actually have found somewhere to go and I've just started applying. So fingers crossed I can scrape together the money to go. I'll share a bit more information about this later. Not much has happened since my last blog post. The most exciting thing that has happened is me buying myself a brand new bike. It might even be the most exciting thing to have happened in 2013 so far!
I better get back to trying to get some sleep before placement tomorrow, I might actually manage to fall asleep now =)

Anywhere in the world

Today I went by the Royal Norwegian Consulate General in Edinburgh to pick up my new passport. The Consulate is in Rutland Square and is TINY! I wound never have been able to find it if it was not for Google maps and the Norwegian flag hanging outside the door. It felt strange Speaking Norwegian with a stranger in the center of Edinburgh just like that. Today has been an absolutely beautiful day; so beautiful I actually bought a McFlurry, laid down in Princes gardens and soaked up the sun. I really feel like I need to make the best of the few sunny days we have here in Scotland. My mum has always said "you know you're getting old when you actually start looking like your passport photo"; however my passport photo ended up being a lot nicer looking than I expected. This made me incredible happy as I'm supposed to have this passport for 10 years (I'm not even going to show yous my previous one, ugh).

This week is pretty much a full on study week. We were in for half a day on Monday for a skill session and apart from that we're "off". Next Monday we have a group presentation and then the week after that we start placement. I am really looking forward to my placement. I was on the phone yesterday and they seem really nice! In the skill session we were to care for "Terry" who was supposed to be a 45 year old man that had had abdominal surgery 3 days ago. Terry is (as you can probably see) not a real person. I personally find it really awkward caring for a robot. I can't take it seriously and I forget to treat him as a real patient (probably because he's not..)

In semester 8 we have something called an elective placement. That means that we can choose where we want to go. This means pretty much anywhere in the world. I have been trying to get a placement at the A&E in Oslo, where my mum works, but they don't have the capacity to accept any more students than the ones they already have. So now I'm sitting here and thinking; I can go anywhere in the whole world! I'm not sure where I would go, or how I'd manage to arrange it, but I could if I wanted to go anywhere. To be honest, I will probably end up just doing the placement in Norway or in Scotland, but it's always nice to dream =)

Back to School.

So I went back to uni ages ago. There has been a lot to do and nothing interesting to write about; so I simply didn't write anything. I have been on a few nights out that has made my wallet hemorrhage money; I have also been shopping a bit with the same results on my financial status as my nights out. My sister and I had made plans for her to come over and visit me; that did not work out like planned and I decided to go home to Norway for a weekend instead. I passed my semester 4 essay resit and my semester 5 exam. It's safe to say that I am extremely happy about that! The last few days my wisdom teeth have been bugging me a lot. The only good thing about it is that now I actually booked an appointment with the dentist who I am going back to on the 26th of February, hopefully then they will be able to give some more info on what to do with these painful teeth of mine. So far semester 5 is going really well. I have a lot of work to do but I am feeling very optimistic. For my placement this semester I have a split one; something that means I'll spend 4 weeks with the Diabetic Specialist Nurse Team and 4 weeks with the Urology Out Patients. I am really excited about this. My weekend home in Norway was amazing. I didn't do much apart from hang out with my family, but there is truly no better way of spending my time <3

Adventures in Morocco

On Friday we got back from a week in Marrakesh and oh my it felt good to be home in Scotland again. I loved being home in Norway and I loved our holiday to Morocco, but there is nothing quite like coming back and getting ready to work again. Had my first day of semester 5 today and our lecturers did a great job scaring us half to death! We have tons to do and not all that much time to do it on. However this is going to be a great semester, I can just feel it in my bones.
Back to Morocco; I had a great time while being there and seeing a culture that is very different from ours (both British and Norwegian). I suddenly also realized why it takes a generation or two to adapt to our culture. I guess you can say it opened my eyes in a way. Marrakesh was more or less exactly what I had imagined it to be; some beautiful buildings and really cool markets but still had a lot of poverty all over. We spent most of our days in the Medina and saw most of the things worth seeing. I didn't know much about Morocco at all before I went and I really regret not spending more time researching the city before I got there. Jack had a bad reaction to some of the food and that made me reluctant to try anything new. I was going to try a camel tagine though, but they were currently sold out. Words can not describe my disappointment. It was an exciting city to be in, but a week was a bit long. A long weekend or 5 days would have been enough. We went to a square called Djemaa El-Fna where during the day there were snake charmers there who scared the crap out of me (I hate snakes) and people with monkeys in a chain for you to take a picture with. Before I went to Morocco I was told by the person who gave me my vaccines to NOT touch any of the cute (or not so cute) animals, as they tend to carry quite a few nasty bugs about. I kept this in the back of my mind and stayed clear of any monkeys. During the night there was a lot of interesting shows on. However, it just didn't feel safe. Some thing was just not quite right and when I guy was arrested tings got really uncomfortable and I was dead sure a riot was going to break out, so we stayed clear of that place after dark.

Also in the Medina there was the Souks. This was like a huge market. It was very magical the first time we went there, but we would never have found our way out of there is it wasn't for Connor's map on his phone. The place was huge. The sales men in there were very pushy and always tried to rip us off. Being a foreigner there pretty much meant that they would offer you things at British prices. Luckily my mum used to take me to flea markets as a kid and bargaining is my thing. Even when I ended up paying one tenth of their original price they seemed pretty satisfied when I left. I bought tons of earrings and a tagine plus some souvenirs for my family. They sold the strangest of things there and I really wish I had taken the time to buy a camel leather bag, just because that would be awesome.

Everything was in French (just like you'd expect from a previously french colony). Luckily Connor and Jack both did french in School and we could kinda make out what most things meant. It made ordering things in restaurants a bit harder though. We stayed in hotel Hotel Assounfou which was really nice. They say they have a pool, but was empty the whole time we were there and did not really seem worth going to. There was also only wifi in the reception area. It made my bragging on facebook quite limited. Everywhere we went there were orange trees and so much sun! I loved the holidays despite it's flaws. New experiences are always welcome and I am already looking forward to going somewhere else and explore the rest of the world!