Christmas traditions.

So this time, the unexpected hiatus seems to have lasted almost two months! Gee, there's been quite a lot going on since CoperniCam... I finished my obligatory PE classes (yay!), started a course on first aid, spent endless hours in the anatomy lab and heard the pre-mortem stories of some of the cadavers! I had a fun birthday weekend which inevitably included memorising the names of close to 100 structures of the skull and viscerocranium and spent the week before  the embryology exam particularly wisely by catching a cold which is still lingering in my thorax. Times were great as you can clearly tell ^_^
Natalie and I also went to Prague before we hit the study craze, which I should write about separately (and you should remind me otherwise I'll never do it). I learned how to sing the alto part of 'Deilig er Jorden' with the choir which we performed at a Christmas concert and as an element of surprise at the 6th graders' Christmas dinner :) I watched more than 4 seasons of Grey's Anatomy in a month and survived through another gloomy November. Sushi dominated as my dinner of choice, but I blame Anne Margrete for being an influential role model as she does the sushi thing like.. twice a week if not every day (yea, you would if you could, right AM?)


For the moment I hope everyone is having a lovely holiday. I for one am hardly doing anything but sleeping, eating and watching films for now before I have to start revising the central nervous system as we have another pair of anatomy midterms coming up the first week back at uni.

About our Christmas traditions:

This is a sketch we (i.e. half of the TV-owning population) watch at 9pm the night before the big day. I wonder if any other nation annually airs this with the same expectation of unstoppable public laughter even though we all remember how it ends  from the last time we watched it from the same spot in our couches as a break from decorating our Christmas trees.

As a prime example of Norwegian Christmas cuisine, this is what we eat every Christmas eve at 5pm sharp; looks like a pile of yucky mush but tastes like the most satisfying thing a non-vegetarian can have on December 24th. 5pm is when the Christmas bells are ringing and this well known boy choir sings carols on TV. This is the ultimate turning point when you know you have to stop cooking, start eating and already look forward to the leftovers while munching.

No idea how this all fits inside my stomach at once..

Before the cooking starts there's a mandatory film session in the morning. If you're lucky and the snow is falling down peacefully outside your window you're in for a great treat. Nowadays I just get up in time to watch the Czech film Tři oříšky pro Popelku (three wishes for Cindrella) which is one of the many things I need to do in order to feel the Christmas spirit. I missed Pinnochio this year which was a little upsetting but missing Cindrella would be dreadful. Honestly.

No idea why we are so obsessed with television during the holidays. Maybe my family is exceptionally asocial.  Oh, right, my family lives in a different country. Legitimate excuse for such entertainment while everyone else is swamped with visits and get-togethers with people they pretend to like for a few nights a year. Isn't that what Christmas is about anyway? ^_^

We never decorate properly before the 23rd. My mum becomes another tea-light candle holder richer every year and my dad always goes on about how he couldn't care less about Christmas lights, decorations and presents until he silently gives in while I unpack the only box of decorations he has and give him presents that he actually seems to need or even want after all.

We continue watching films, eat leftovers, think about the fact that we are not moving our bodies further than within the triangle that is between the kitchen, bathroom and the couch, and start fiddling with our presents for another two days until the town gets back to life. If in the mood we go out on boxing day and start socialising with friends from this day until new years eve. Going for coffee, taking advantage of reduced Christmassy items to add more decorations to the Christmas tree before it all goes back into the shoeboxes...... yeah, when you get all hosewife-y at some point in your life, the latter is one of the things you will adopt into your 27th-31st December schedule. True story.

New years eve is less of a traditional day for me personally. It won't upset me as much if I don't get to do things the way they're supposed to be because there is no right way in my mind. As long as there are sparkles!!! This year I will be celebrating with a small group of friends at Sara's childhood home with the complete turkey-dinner, board games and great company :) 

So that's all I could think of right now. Will be back soon with all the updates you've been longing for =)

CoperniCam '11

This has got to be the most well executed student-run event I've been a part of.

[insert line break for extra emphasis on sentence above]

I'm going to humbly say that it EASILY beat (past tense of beat=beat??) the BioSoc biology ball in Edinburgh, Teviot halloween party in Edinburgh, the halloween party I attended here a few weeks ago and (probably stepping on thin ice now-) the ScandiSoc vikingfests.....!

CoperniCam was arranged for the 3rd time as a student film festival with every little detail from the Oscars being adapted to suit the Kraków scene. I'm obviously referring to the red carpet, stilettos, bow-ties, moustaches (we're in the month of MOvember after all) and paparazzis eagerly filming and flash-photographing everyone.

The doors were to be closed by 8pm for the show get started- Natalie, Weronica and I came through the back entrance and sneaked our stuff back stage as we were going to sing later. CoperniChoir (which I joined a few weeks back in case I have not mentioned this earlier...) uses labcoats and red ties/bows as 'uniforms', so we dumped our bags and got mingling. I was in awe by how posh everyone looked and did not even realise that we'd managed to get upstairs without walking through the backdrop-area where everyone got their photos taken before actually entering the reception area! So Natalie and I jumped down the stairs and got a sneak shot before finding our seats next to Mia and Johannes to watch the show.

  Another bunch of lovely girls in my class: Marita, Mia K, Ann Cecilie, Kaia, Tina & Rachel

The show started off with a short intro film where you saw the host/hostess getting dressed and all made up before they jumped on to a motorcycle and got on the road (very well filmed by the way). Then they arrived outside the venue where the film stopped and suddenly out of the blue, there was a motorcycle groaning its way through the aisle. They were obviously met by an amazed crowd. Very impressive!

9 films were screened in total and the ones I remember the best were titled "Jon Bond", "CSI: Kraków", "From Kraków to MD" and "The Tale of Jagiellonia"- last one made by some guys in my class which you can see here:

After the first break, the old members of CoperniChoir got on the stage and sang a song they'd previously sung at UKA in Trondheim. Then, us newbies joined them to sing a 90's medley which sounded awesome! I barely remember the journey from the stage and back out form the rush of people cheering. Fun times! And here we are: 

 

CoperniChoir :)

The awards were literally trophies of the Copernica logo and were awarded to the best actor, actress, for the best photography/editing, best manuscript and best feature. I don't even remember who won what because I was way too busy looking at the people giving away the awards running up to the stage after their individual "intro" videos aired on the side screens (another 'pro' adaptation of the Oscars which I thought worked really well). Anyways, after clapping for 20 minutes my hands got just as sore as my feet and I decided to make my way home. Excellent night, though! And the weekend has been the equivalent of a mini holiday with casual amounts of reading (which I am catching up on as we speak), Saturday cake-time and two trips to the cinema. Love my life (will probably take this back the week before the next round of midterms!) 

Laterzzzz!

All photos are from Copernica's profile on facebook by the way ^^ 

I should really get myself a point-and-shoot camera..

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ELEVEN!

Since everyone is in such a sharing mood today I will do the same: I am sure you are all dying to know what I did at 11:11 11/11/11.... I made myself a cup of tea and watched this video:



This will never get old. EVER!

As a tiny piece of trivia: today is also one of the several national holidays in Poland (independence day). It will be an exciting day indeed as I plan on going over the twelve cranial nerves and seeing "immortals" (??) at the cinema as a final treat. Weehey!


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Daily amusements.

Today I biked into a giant groove-like area between the road and the pavement so hard my lunchbox made an upside-down-U-shaped jump out from the front basket and landed on the ground without shattering or emptying its contents. It's only just after noon and the fact that my lunch survived this incident has made my day already (as I can imagine a different outcome if  the exact opposite had happened!) What a great start of the week ^_^

Happy Monday to you all!

Ja mieszkam w Krakowie!

Photos of the flat coming up!

 

 

 

:-)

'11 Wishlist.

It's the same ball rolling every year. ...and this list is only displayed here because people tend to ask and I never know what to tell them. Will update the list if anything else comes to mind.

Midterms, visitors, Halloween....

I had my last midterm LAST thursday and it was a big relief to get it over with. Another example of how this place is rather well organised is how we get our test results almost immediately afterwards- i.e. the next day, which hardly ever happened in Edinburgh! Then again they stressed us out a little before the histology test as the invigilator called out our names at random at the front of a huge lecture theatre and we were seated as we had collected our answer sheet. then once everyone was seated they handed out the question booklets and the whole thing just messed up our heads just because nobody knew what was going on and even filling out the answers/signing the papers seemed much more complicated than necessary. Anyways, this turned out to be my best exam out of the four, so I am not complaining!

The subjects are quite enjoyable. I am particularly liking anatomy and histology so far and have finally managed to get all the paperwork done to get exempted from general chemistry. This was a big 'hallelujah' moment as I am grateful for every bit of chemistry I can get away with!

Now it's back to studying for the next block of topics in all three subjects. I also have a Polish midterm soon which is more of a nuance than a concern at the moment. Anatomy and embryology however are the things I need to dedicate my life to for the upcoming week!

I truly wonder how my desk ended up like a bombshell just hit the place. Feels like I tidied it yesterday! Gaaaah!

 And it's sad to say that it has taken me 4 years to understand how ovulation really works and how eggs get fertilised.... The good thing is that from now I'll never forget it!

As I mentioned previously my parents visited two weekends ago and while their stay was short and sweet it was good to see them again and be able to show them around town. They both loved Kraków and particularly could not get over how good the shopping is here. So all you people from Norway (or the UK for that matter) who want to visit- while I'm studying for the day I'll be sending you off to Galeria Krakówska for a few hours to mingle and spend some potatoes (i.e. Zloty). Aska and Agata also came to visit a few weeks earlier and it was so good to see them again ;) Fun times!

Fitting three in a row in my bed is clearly not a problem!

My halloween costume was quite well executed (though not as A-MAzing as last year's teenage mutant ninja turtle outfit) and I got to make use of the pirate sword/sable that I found in the flat ;) Haven't seen any good photos from the night so you'll have to imagine how awesome it was ^^ We went to a flat party and arrived at the same time as the cops (i.e. policja!)- slightly silly how we walked up the stairs and came straight down again as they kicked us out immediately after stepping inside the flat at the top of the building.  A good bunch of the people hired their costumes and the variety was immense- well, in addition to at least 3 cats and 5 pirates including myself there was the entire Winnie the Pooh gang, an xmas tree, a rubics cube, the black swann, Edward Scissorhands, Wolverine, a crocodile, and Lara Croft +++ ! The party we went to later was inn a  "vault-like" club with lots of rooms and stairs, a decent DJ and incredibly soft, velvet-y walls! I could have rested on those walls for hours!

...from Malene's photos. Shame you can't see the entire awesomeness that is my pirrrrrate outfit 

.yearrrrrh!