Gettysburg

When I drove to Washington, D.C. last weekend, I passed through Gettysburg, unexpectedly.  By that, I mean that I was on the right route, but I just didn't realize that it passed through Gettysburg.  It was getting late and I had already been stuck in more traffic than planned, so I didn't stop, but I was certainly intrigued.

Oooh, another national park to check off my (rather small, actually) list

On the way back home, since I wasn't in quite as much of a hurry, I decided to check it out.  Also, luckily, it was a beautiful fall morning -- sunny and pleasantly crisp.  Plus, I really like Lincoln.  Let me explain.  At St. Olaf, we were all required to take at least one ethics class as part of the liberal arts requirement.  During the busiest semester I ever had (because of challenging courses, leadership positions, and eight medical school interviews), I took Philosophy/Religion 278: The Ethics of War.  It turned out to be the best class that I ever had.  Professor Santurri's fierce conviction and quiet enthusiasm for the class -- as well as the way he was able to teach a highly charged issue without ever giving any hint of what personal views he held -- made me excited to read and think and write and debate.  One of his favorite topics is Lincoln, and you can be sure that we discussed Lincoln and the ethics of the Civil War from all sorts of different perspectives.  I had never cared much about the topic before that semester, but the class made me realize how much more complicated and interesting the whole era was.

The spot where Lincoln gave the Gettysburg Address

So, I have an appreciation for Lincoln.  I still have the Lincoln book we read for class, actually, along with two of the other more interesting books we read.  Last year, one of my medical school friends was perusing my bookshelf, and she asked why I had a book about President Lincoln.  I explained how much the ethics class had meant to me, especially since I had ended up in the military, where I am so thankful to have such a rich background in the ethics of war (something which many people do not have the chance to be formally taught).  My friend had not gone to a liberal arts school and was blown away by how enthusiastic I was about a non-science class.  In that moment, along with several other moments over the past year and a half of being away from college, I realized how lucky I was to have received such a well balanced education.  I also realized that I wanted to let my professor know how much I had learned and taken away from his class.

Demonstration in the fields of Gettysburg

So I wrote him a note and sent it in the mail.  I thanked him for the enthusiastic and thorough teaching, I told him that I was now in medical school (so all those days I skipped class for interviews were actually justified), and I let him know how useful the background had been as I entered the military and began to think more about the ethics of war, which now pertain to me more than they ever did before.  I figured it was the least I could do to.  A few days later, I received a very excited e-mail from him saying that my card had made his day.  In addition to making some very flattering comments about my future success in both medicine and the military, he said that he would share parts of my note with the current ethics of war class he was teaching, just to give them a little extra motivation.

The memorial for the Minnesotans who had died in the Civil War.  Every state had its own monument somewhere throughout the park.

There was really no point in telling that whole story just now, except to justify my comment that I like Lincoln. Yes, I like Lincoln because I had a phenomenal class with a phenomenal professor.  And I got to see Gettysburg on a beautiful fall morning, and walk through the National Cemetery in peace, and think about America and all of the things that I appreciate.  That was meaningful.

Norway: The Fjord

It never crossed my mind that Norway wouldn't cross people's minds. Growing up in the Midwest, with all its Scandinavian roots, as well as attending a college founded by Norwegians, has given me an awareness of Norway (and Scandinavia in general) equal to that of the rest of Europe. It's a country as equally familiar as the rest of those countries from which so many of our ancestors emigrated, like Germany, England, Italy, and the rest of the big players. It never occurred to me that Norway would be...unknown. Exotic. To a lot of my friends here, most of whom are from one of the coasts, Scandinavia is just that. They don't have much (or any) experience with Scandinavians (or people with Scandinavian roots); many don't even know what language is spoken in Norway! (Believe me. I've been asked several times.) However, if there's one thing people know about Norway, it's this: Norway has fjords.

Ridiculously deep ocean inlet surrounded by dramatic mountainous cliffs? Check.

Not only did we visit a fjord, we visited the longest and deepest fjord in all of Norway: Sognefjord. Becca's friend, Mari, was incredibly kind to invite us to stay a night with her family at their home in Leikanger, one of the many small towns along Sognefjord. Our trip there was quite the adventure: First we took the regular train from Bergen to Myrdal. Then we caught the Flåmsbana, a smaller train taking a slower and more scenic route through the mountains, from Myrdal to Flåm. Next we boarded a bus to take us to Sogndal (and the bus took a ferry across the fjord), and finally, Mari's parents picked us up to take us the rest of the way to Leikanger. The traveling took a while, but the views as we passed through the mountains were worth it.

We felt as though we were traveling through Narnia.

Flåm sits on the tip of one of Sognefjord's many fingers.

Our time staying with Mari and her family was spent relaxing in the typical Norwegian fashion. We ate delicious meals (hot homemade soup for "dinner" at 4, mmm), drank coffee by the water, read, napped, chatted, ate some more, drank tea. I was struck the entire time by the incredible hospitality of Mari's family, and also by the incredible gift I was being given, to be allowed to experience life the way typical Norwegians do.

We bundled up to drink coffee by the fjord.

So peaceful, so relaxed

The next morning, we were able to see even more of the fjord when we caught a ferry that would take us all the way to Bergen. We traveled west through the rest of Sognefjord and then south down the coast to Bergen. We saw clear skies and sunshine for the first time, and what an impact it made!

Calm waters, snowy mountains, brisk air

Back in Bergen, we spent much of the day resting and making our plans for the rest of the week. By some miracle, we were treated to a spectacular sunset which we were able to view by poking our heads out of Becca's skylight. And that is what I will leave you with, until next time...

Bergen the beautiful

Norway: The Beginning

I think I'll break up the trip into three parts. No particular reason, really, except that it is easier to think of things in blocks. So it begins...

One major difference between my trip to Norway and all of my previous trips overseas was the lack of traveling I did once I got there. After I made it to Bergen, Rebecca and I stayed in the city except for one brief sojourn to a nearby fjord. I have to say, it was actually quite a relief not to have to think about packing, unpacking, repacking, hauling luggage, and doing it all over again every few days. Sure, I didn't "see" as much of the country, but I really got to know Bergen and had a wonderful experience spending time with Becca, getting to know her friends, and avoiding the stress of constantly being on the move. This unquestionable lack of traveling had to be made up for somehow, though, and it certainly was on either end of the journey: bus from apartment to subway station, subway to Penn Station, train to Newark, airtrain to international terminal, plane to Copenhagen, final plane to Bergen. Luggage lost between Copenhagen and Bergen. It didn't matter: I was in Bergen, and there was Becca to meet me!

My first view of Norway: Endless mountains covered in snow, broken up only by the shining blue of fjords reaching their spindly fingers into the mainland

The luggage was expected to come to the airport that afternoon, and then it would be delivered to the apartment. I was not concerned. I was staying in an apartment with Becca and her roommates; I knew that they would be able to lend me anything that I needed in the meantime. So what did we do on my very first day in Norway? We did what the Norwegians do: we climbed a mountain! Bergen is surrounded by seven mountains (a surprising feature, given that it is also a port city). Løvstakken, the second-highest, was our goal for the afternoon, despite rain and a persistent fog. I borrowed some waterproof clothes and shoes (seeing as mine were somewhere between Denmark and Norway), and up we hiked, along with Becca's roommates and some of their other friends. The rain and fog meant that we didn't have any view of the city at the top, but we still rewarded ourselves with hot chocolate and candy.

The trek up Løvstakken

Just as I expected, the luggage arrived perfectly fine at the apartment just as we were coming back from our hike, so I was able to join everyone else in changing into some warm, clean, dry clothes. Inga cooked Norwegian pancakes for us, and then we all watched Pirates of the Caribbean. Partway through the movie, I began feeling really drowsy, but I was glad that Becca and her friends had kept me so active throughout the day. It's so much easier to get over jet lag when everyone else is pulling you into their "normal" schedule.

The next day, Becca and I explored Bergen. We went to the morning service at DELK, the church which she and many of her friends attend (and which is conveniently located downstairs and on the other side of her apartment building). Of course I didn't understand the readings and sermon in Norwegian, but we followed the readings in Becca's Bible, and I tried my best to attempt correct pronunciations for the songs. (In fact, I had absolutely no idea what I was doing, and I still don't. Which vowels sound like what? Do you pronounce the J's and K's? What about the vowels with little lines and circles through them? A fun guessing game...) I had never thought about this before, but the hymns that we sing at church -- even the old ones with melodies from the 1800s or earlier -- are not necessarily common throughout the world. All of the hymns that we sang had melodies that came from Norwegian folk songs. They had a haunting, lonely quality that was at the same time mesmerizing and incredibly beautiful, evoking images of mountains and hard work and simple living.

During the afternoon, we walked around the Sentrum of Bergen. Becca is lucky enough to live within this area, which is among the oldest sections of the city. All of the houses are extremely well kept, cozy, and, for lack of better word, cute. They are. They're all cute. It's what every little cutesy tourist area in America aspires to be, but it's authentic, and it's old, and it's how these Norwegians actually live.

Cozy.

Later that evening, we went to Mass at St. Paul Church. It was the weekly English Mass, and it was packed. Apparently every Mass there is packed, since it's the only Catholic church in the city, but it was even more so because it was Palm Sunday. It was so good to have our palms and hear the readings in English, but it was certainly different than at home. The music was contemporary, but thankfully, as Becca put it, it was done in a "non-distracting" way. We even sang one song that I recognized from our old SPO songbooks, so that was a pleasant surprise. Bergen has a surprisingly diverse immigrant population, especially at the Catholic church, so it was also a powerful testament to see so many people of different cultures worshiping together.

Exploring Bergen in our skirts and rain boots

The next day was the beginning of our fjord experience, so I will save that for my next post. Two final pictures:

Bergen houses with Løvstakken in the background

Ahh, a familiar face at St. Paul's!

My Liberal Arts

There are many reasons I am thankful I went to St. Olaf. Going into all of those reasons would take far too much time out of my so-far-perfect day, so I will now just explain the one which has contributed the most to this day's beauty. It's the liberal arts. When I applied to colleges, I knew that I wanted to eventually go to medical school, but I also knew that I enjoyed most school subjects, even beyond the ones I was most interested in. St. Olaf helped me appreciate a well rounded education even more. I could talk about all the phenomenal professors and fantastic classes I had for hours, but here I'd like to focus on the one class that has had, in an unlikely way, the biggest impact on my appreciation for the world that I live in. The class: Vertebrate Biology.

I can recognize bird calls. My friends look at me as if I'm insane. I was elected to the medical student council in large part because my personal statement was the most unique: I somehow tied my enthusiasm for the job to my experience skinning and stuffing a squirrel. When I likened removing the skin from our cadaver to my semester project that involved skinning both a red fox and a newborn (stillborn) fawn, even my lab professors had to stop what they were doing, look at me, take a moment to comprehend, and then go back to work.

Clearly this was a unique class, and it's one that I didn't have to take. Once I realized that I wasn't going to major in biology, there was no reason for me to take any more biology classes except for my own pleasure. I decided to take Vertebrate because I had heard that the professor, Gene Bakko, was one of the most interesting, most enthusiastic, most caring professors out there -- and it was true. Even though my idea of fun was not necessarily memorizing the classification system of all Minnesota vertebrates (e.g. moose: Kingdom Animalia, Phylum Chordata, Class Mammalia, Order Artiodactyla, Family Cervidae, Genus Alces, Species alces -- and yes, I had to look it up on Wikipedia), the experiences I had in that class, including the 6:30 a.m., 3-hour, required field trips in the surrounding wilderness to look for waterfowl, were unforgettable. When else in my life would my response to seeing a dead wild turkey on the side of the highway be to pull over, investigate the partially disemboweled bird, take my gloves and trash bags out of my car, carefully pick up and package the still-warm turkey in plastic, secure it in my trunk, and excitedly bring it in to Professor Bakko the next day? (Yes, the turkey stayed in my trunk overnight. Don't worry, the temperature was essentially that of a refrigerator.)

I have a new respect (not to mention knowledge) of nature because of Vertebrate Biology and Professor Bakko, which is something that I appreciated today during my run in the gorgeous, 55-degree, sunshiney weather. I saw a juvenile red-tailed hawk. No, it wasn't flying or high up in a tree; it was on the ground, 10 feet away from me, hungrily tearing out the organs of a freshly killed squirrel. I watched it for a while, thinking to myself how amazing the circumstances were, thankful that I could appreciate the beauty of the scene. I also had the chance to observe other people's reactions to it. One middle-aged man out for a walk on his own was clearly excited; he pulled out his cell phone and began taking pictures. A set of young boys yelled to each other to hurry up and come see it, smiling and laughing and trying to inch closer until their parents yelled at them. One 5- or 6-year-old boy mischievously threw pinecones toward it; I think he was just curious to see what it would do, but it was still sad to watch him try. Luckily, his parents yelled at him, and the hawk just kept eating its delicious meal. A group of three teenage girls, probably high school age, thought the scene was interesting but disgusting, crying out things like, "Ewww, I'm gonna barf!" "That's so cool!" "Poor squirrel!" and, "That's so disgusting!"

Personally, I didn't feel bad for the squirrel. I was actually wishing that I could get closer and see its little organs, now that I've seen what the human equivalents look like. The hawk, though, was beautiful and fierce and an incredible sight to see. I wonder if it killed the squirrel, or if the squirrel was already dead. It looked really fresh, so I'm guessing the hawk killed it. Cool.

Italian Surprise!

Another comparison of this year to last: December 8, Feast of the Immaculate Conception. Last year, it was on a Monday, which happened to be my busiest day of classes every week. With the exception of chapel time and a brief hour between anatomy lab and band, I had no free time from 6:45 a.m. until after the Norseman hayride (and dinner and bonfire). Masses at St. Dominic were all during my classes and activities, so a contingent of us Norseman Catholics discovered that our only option was to leave the hayride early to go to Annunciation (how appropriate!), a small church a few miles outside of Northfield. Normally there would be nothing wrong with this; I had been to Annunciation before and didn't mind driving there. Last year, however, there was a snowstorm on December 8. By the time we left the hayride, the gravel roads back to Olaf were slippery under 2-3 inches. After picking up more churchgoers at St. Olaf, for a total of 8 (yes, 8!) of us in my tiny Saturn, I drove slooooowwwwwllyyyyyy through the quickly accumulating snow to the little church on the hill. Mass was warm and beautiful, and you could feel the little-kid excitement throughout the congregation because of the snow. As we left church, the snow was still falling quietly, peacefully -- and had deposited several inches on the vehicles. There was an attitude of congeniality despite the difficult driving conditions, and everyone helped each other clear the white powder from the cars. Everything about it -- the feast day, the people, the church, the weather -- was beautiful.

This year on the Feast of the Immaculate Conception, I followed the Minnesota blizzard with interest, mostly because I wanted to be there myself. There's something about extreme weather that's exciting to me. Here in the Bronx, though, it was a sunny, warm day (although most of my classmates would skewer me for saying 40 degrees is warm). I decided to go to Mass at St. Clare, and I assumed the schedule would be the same as a typical weekday schedule, with Mass at both 7:00 and 8:00 a.m. I also assumed that, with the typical 15-minute daily Masses, I'd be able to make it to my 8:45 class on time. My assumptions were only marginally correct. I arrived at 7:55, heard the priest greet an old couple with a quiet, "Buon giorno," and thought nothing of it. We are, after all, in a very Italian neighborhood. Turns out I should have thought something of it. Since it was a feast day, the church was on its Sunday schedule, in which the 8:00 Mass is in Italian. And there was music. Music in Italian. After an initial moment of confusion, I realized what was happening, and then I started beaming. Mass in Italian! It was wonderful. I ended up being 10 minutes late for lecture, but it doesn't matter. It was a beautiful morning, with a joyous service, a sunny walk, and an Italian surprise.

Lefse

About a week ago, Cat and I ventured into the city to participate in that great Scandinavian tradition that Ole alums do oh-so-well: making lefse.

Cat viciously guards the spatula that will save our lefse from the evil, lefse-sucking wooden board.

Ruth, the lefse expert, gives us all a lesson. Not too thick, not too thin, not too hot, not too cool, not too much flour, not too sticky...etc.

Cat vies for the "Most Creative Lefse" prize with her spectacular lion's head (she's even getting into the St. Olaf spirit!)

The contest entries. Notice the gigantic lefse front and center: that would be mine. Cat's lion is to the right. Together, they won us a sushi pen.

The professional judges

Afterward, we feasted. It was delicious.