Letters To Home - Norway

by Leslie Shalduha

August 1, 2025 Norwegian Update

This week Emma and I find ourselves "on the job" at our house-sit in Mjondalen, near Drammen, in a neighborhood on what the hostess called a hill but Emma says is a mountain. Mjøndalen does not have much of interest in terms of being a lively town but it is easy enough to get to Drammen, which we explored yesterday. Our hostess left her car for us to use which has been really nice, especially considering the heavy hill upon which we find ourselves.

Here we are caring for a dog, a pit bull named Petunia whom our hostess just discovered is five weeks pregnant! Let's hope I do not have to use midwifery skills while we are here. She is a sweet girl and has taken to us well. I take her for two walks every day and play ball with her in the backyard to keep her active. On our first walk Petunia was reluctant and I had to coax her quite a bit. I wondered why she was like this, maybe missing her family? Turns out she has a route that she likes and once I gave her her head, she became a more willing participant. She took me down several flights of stairs carved into the hillside and led me to some people standing in their yard. Turns out Petunia loves their dog and I guess she just wanted to visit them before leading me to a park. A couple of days later she took me the opposite direction for another route that she prefers; she knows what she wants! There is also a cat, Ollie, who comes and goes as he pleases but stops in for some big love and biscuit making every day. 

We arrived here by train and bus. The day started off in Oslo with a cleaning of our lodging before Emma and I went to have lunch at my favorite place to eat in Oslo, Cultivate Food. It is a happy vegan restaurant with many GF options which means that I can eat easily and well! After eating we were heading back to our lodging to get our bags and start the journey to Mjøndalen. However, the trams were not running. Tons of people were standing around on the streets and there was no info about what the deal was for over twenty minutes. Finally an announcement was posted that there was a fire somewhere in the city and they had to shut down the trams which run on electricity. From there, it would take us about forty five minutes to walk home, a long yet gentle uphill hike. Unsure how long the shut down would last, we began to walk.  After some time we began to see replacement busses running the tram lines and once we were about halfway home, the trams began running again. We hopped on one, grateful for a little break, and just before our stop the tram turned off onto another route with no warning. We jumped off the tram at the next stop, which was sadly at the bottom of a very heavy hill! Ugh! So off we trudged, walking another twenty minutes to our place. 

We manhandled our luggage back to the tram and rode into the Oslo City Center to catch a train. Once we boarded the crowded train, a woman “helpfully” grabbed Emma's very heavy carry-on suitcase with a backpack attached and put it in the overhead and then tried to do the same with mine. I was unwilling for her to help me in this way, explained the getting it up top was not the problem, rather getting it down due to size and weight. I am just a little girl, you know! Finally, a gentleman discovered an empty luggage rack space ahead and moved it there. Just before our stop the woman grabbed Emma's to pull down again, leading to a dicey situation but all did end well. On arrival at the train station, there was a replacement bus due to train track construction. We never did figure out where that bus was supposed to be, had to take a different bus into Drammen and then yet another bus into Mjøndalen where our hostess met us with her car, thankfully. It was a crazy day of unpredictable travel snafus with heavy luggage. What does not kill us makes us stronger, though, right?

This house where we are is lovely, a real house with a kitchen and laundry, yahoo! It feels so nice to cook after living on salads, sandwiches and restaurant food for a month. Luckily Emma is familiar with how to use the appliances here, which are very different than what we know in the US. Dryers are not really a thing here; this house has one but it does not work. Many people just hang laundry to dry in the house so we have adjusted easily to this. In Oslo, we had to take a tram to do laundry, pay $10 a load to wash before hauling home the heavy, wet clothing on a tram so it is quite nice to have a washer here!! Although the laundromat was located in a bar/cafe, so there are worse ways to spend while waiting for one’s wash to get done!

We did decide to splurge a tiny bit and get massages the other day. After sleeping on a pull-out sofa bed for a month my neck could use the help and Emma continues to struggle with her own neck pain and tension. The spa experience was interesting here; we each had a thirty minute massage followed by sixty minutes in a private sauna/jacuzzi room, stocked with hot tea, orange infused water and a plate of chocolate cookies. Partway through that, the massage lady came in to apply the sugar scrub on each of us in the sauna before rinsing it off with cold water. What a neat experience!! 

Speaking of saunas! For my birthday, in Oslo, Emma spoiled me with breakfast at Oslo Raw, a vegan cafe. Not that I am a vegan but am dairy free, and this cafe means I get to enjoy sumptuous treats which too often are hard to find. Alex joined us and we spent a few hours at the Oslo Badstuforening saunas on the Oslofjord. On a wooden pier floating out on the fjord, we could go between several different wood or propane-powered saunas, each with its own deck from which we jumped in the freezing cold fjord. For the first time, I did this the proper way, including a scary high jump from the top of one of the saunas into the fjord! One only turns 51 once, right? We finished the day off with a tasty, tasty meal at my fave dinner place, Delicatessen Tapas. Spoiled!!

Alex joined us here a couple of days into our stay and we have been enjoying some quality family and home time—cooking good meals and binge-watching shows. The weather has been dreary, which we love.

We continue to wait for news regarding our visa to Iceland. It is so crazy that we do not know yet (school starts in a couple weeks!) and that, apparently, this is normal. 

When we leave here, I return to our original lodging in Oslo for three nights before moving to an airbnb on Nesodden, which is a peninsula jutting into the Oslo Fjord, for our final week before heading to Iceland. Emma will be staying with Alex as we wrap up our time here in Norway.

I hope you enjoy reading about our adventures! I will send another update in a week or so. Hearing back from you is so meaningful in a time of such upheaval for us. I look forward to hearing back from you, even if it is just a little note. The small things matter in a big way to me!