Life in Norway has been way different than I expected. I'm amazed at how much I love living in Norway. It was somehow a scary thought to be here. I was entering a whole new world. New atmosphere, new people, new food and a new routine. I thought the transition was going to be easy but it was not at first.
Coming as a foreigner to Norway definitively requires some patience especially if you are from a culture where you're immediately accepted into a group of friends. In Norway it takes time for people to let you into their lives. However as Norwegians say, once you have a Norwegian friend, you have a friend for a lifetime. I cannot fully express to you how happy it makes me when I see the Norwegians come to me and talk, oh and when they smile, that's the best!
Before I came to YWAM Grimerud, I didn't have expectations about my time here. All I knew is that one of the biggest highlights in my life was seeing young Swedes getting excited about following God. Now I would have the opportunity to see the same thing happen with young Norwegians. I really do love the mission that the ministry I work with has.
"To see a movement of young men and women living out God's calling in their lives"
The first three weeks I was here I still didn't know what my role would be here. When I first got here everyone knew me as the new staff for the "4.12 DTS" or the young leaders DTS. After a few weeks of just attending the lectures and being able to speak what God wanted to say to some of the students, I was able to sit down with my leader to talk about my future in YWAM Grimerud. He had seen how I interacted with the DTS and how God would speak through me. Since I don't speak Norwegian we decided that it was best for me to work with the DTS for now. I'm really excited to be part of the team even though I don't have full responsibilities this year. I would love to share with you what it means to be DTS staff until the DTS in the next fall.
I want to see my opportunities expand in Norway and an essential part to that is to learn to speak Norwegian! I have been praying for an easy way for me to learn. One of the options is to pay for Norwegian classes which would cost about 900 dollars per month. The other way is by full immersion into the language, basically learning as a kid learns a language. I'm asking God to see which one is the best option, and so far the second one might happen so please pray it does!
Here is a video of learning some Norwegian by ThatNorwegianGuy: (sorry for some of his language)
I also posted new photos! If you want to see photos of where I live go to the Photos section!
