First week in York

Right then, here we are! In the beautiful city of York! Katrine and I are here as exchange students through the University of Bergen for five months. The University of York has its own special place for Norwegian students, the Norwegian Study Centre (NSC), probably because of all the invasions (Its main building is called the Harald Fairhair building)...

The observant reader will have noticed that I am writing in English. This is mainly so that our friends and families of various nationalities can follow this blog, and partly because, hey, that’s why we’re here!

Just a quick sum-up of the previous week: Last Sunday (10 January) I arrived at our lovely and fully wall-to-wall carpeted Victorian cottage (read: terraced house). The house has a living room, kitchen, bathroom and toilet downstairs, two bedrooms (come on guests!) on the first floor and a storage room/study on the second floor. Did I mention the carpet? Yes, in the toilet, too. The owners are a lovely elderly couple who say ‘mooneh’ instead of ‘money’ because they are from around here. Love it. The first evening was very lonely and cold, as Katrine was still on her way from Houston, Texas and I had no internet. It was so cold that I lay curled up in front of the electric, and rather tacky, fireplace. But I had a good book and snacks, and survived.

The next day was an information day at the NSC. Lots of nice people, both students and teachers, and an interesting array of sandwiches and crisps. Later that day I picked up Katrine from the railway station and all was well.

Another info day the next day for international students, which was held in a big, freezing hall. This has been a harsh winter, apparently. They’ve had about a foot of snow and a few degrees on the minus side of the thermometer, and, quite understandably, the country has come to a creaking stand-still. ‘The Big Freeze’ they call it. Anyway, the lectures were interesting enough (when we finally got there. We took the wrong bus and got the long, scenic tour through York’s residential areas, and so were a bit late). We were told about British customs, fire regulations, student organizations, etc.

Other than that, we have walked a bit through the city, explored the local supermarkets, visited York Minster, been to a welcome party/gathering hosted by the director (or sumfin’ or other) of the NSC and been to a housewarming party. Katrine has had a few workshops already, but hasn’t much school as of yet. For me, school starts tomorrow. I have already got homework and everything is a bit hazy at the moment, but maybe things will look clearer after my first ‘practical’.

So, today was relaxing. As the aforementioned housewarming party was yesterday, we slept in a bit today. After some homework we went out for dinner. Along the way, as we crossed a bridge, we noticed that the river Ouse had oozed out over its banks, but nobody seemed to notice or make a fuss about it, so this may be normal. We found a really nice restaurant near York Minster where we had lasagne with hair (and so, for free) and York pork and herb sausages. After that we got spectacularly lost, but luckily this is a small city and we quickly made our way home again.

Well, good night! We will be sure to update whenever we experience something interesting (which you sort of have to if you have a blog). Cheers!