Silent scream and a Munch

1706 hours
Oslo, Norway

After almost a week in the backcountry and less populated areas of Norway, we descend upon Oslo. There are people of all nationalities and races speaking Norwegian here, and the sun is out, no more need for raincoats, yay!

Having arrived on the night train at 6:30 this morning, it's seems we also got the earliest start to the day of anyone in town. Step 1 was a search for food and coffee. With emotions bittersweet, I report to you, I have seen neither Peet's nor Starbucks for 2 weeks. There *is* no chance of getting coffee at 6:30 in the morning. (Ok fine, there is...but I believe the technical term is "swill".) No matter, we found the hotel buffet for the Scandic hotel, ate waffles with gjetost-oh-my-god-yum, and moreover, watched a guy get arrested who needed about 6 policemen to hold him down.

Still being for lack of coffee, we snail-paced our way to the National Gallery, where they have The (?) Scream...or at least, a picture that looks very much like The Scream and is signed by Edvard Munch. As you might imagine, it is very quiet. Wow!

Then to Cafe con Bar, which not only appears to be both cafe and bar...but is elaborated by menas of giant fist rising out of the sidewalk. It must have happened recently, this rising fist, because the bricks are all askew, and the rose it is holding still has all the petals. Never mind that the whole thing is silver and bigger than a breadbox. In fact, it is even bigger than Trevor.
(Wouldn't this be a good time to be able to add pictures to my blog? Yes, yes?? "Dear Birthday Fairy....")

The munch that we ate was also delish. Trevor had a lovely penne pasta with scallops, shrimp and a nicely disguished white wine lemon sauce. I, on the other hand, had "Funny Tuna", which explains a lot, doesn't it?

Anyhow, the National Gallery was excellent, not just for the Munch room, but also for the Picasso room, and the Art Deco-y room (did you know there were *girl* Norwegian painters?? Google "Rustning, Armour" by Ragnhild Keyser. Very cool. Apparently the girl painters felt pressure to tone down their work so the rest of the art world would accept it.)

That was 1926 though. Luckily, it is now June of 2006, and tonight we're gonna party like it's 1999...plus a few. Ciao!