Busy times...

The past month or so sure has been eventful. With Jeanette and I welcoming Emma in to the world, defending my masters thesis and all the new sleepless routines which come along with having a baby... its fair to say that things have been a little crazy around here. But alas, everything is coming along quite well... I have been interviewing for jobs and feel hopeful, my defence went well and most importantly Emma is doing super well. I have been taking quite a lot of photos, but of course 99% of those have been of the baby. We have however had really good weather this past month and have had the chance to make a few trips out to the beach and around nearby towns. Hope you enjoy the photos.

Emma Margartia

Well, she is here! My and Jeanette's daughter Emma Margarita was born last week (June 13th) in the hospital in Frederikstad Norway. She was almost a couple weeks early but came to us very quickly and in perfect health. Needlness to say, Jeanette and I (and our families) are just thrilled. Thank you to everyone for the good vibes and messages, we are over the moon!

Ch-ch-ch-changes!

The Bowie reference sure is apt. Many a changes these days. If you follow this blog you will have probably noticed I haven not posted in well over a month and a half... which is rather atypical. The reason for this was that after my Baltic trip to Finland/Estonia real crunch mode on my masters thesis really got underway. It was quite the ordeal but I am happy to say that I finally submitted my thesis yesterday! The other major change since March is that my wife Jeanette and I have moved out of our tiny apartment in Oslo and in to a new place in Østfold (her home town of Moss to be precise). Since then the weather has really taken quite a sharp turn, all the snow is gone and we have been blessed with intermittent days of wonderful weather. Moss is a very small place and there is not all that much to do, but there are lots of parks and biking paths... so that is cool. I do however miss Oslo and really hope we can find an affordable place there sometime next spring/summer. Jeanette is now over 8 months pregnant and doing wonderfully; its really crazy to think that this time next month I will be a dad (fingers crossed!). What a trip. We have all the baby stuff set up and are anxiously counting down the days! I am now in job seeking mode which is of-course not that much fun, so if any of you fine readers know of any jobs opening up in the region, give me a shout! Anyway, hope you enjoy the photos.

Guest blogging!

As readers of this blog know last week I travelled to Finland to participate in the Nordic Sustainable Campus Network seminar. I was asked to write up a blog post for the Grønt UiO blog... so if you are interested check it out.

Also, over the past few months I have written up a couple short articles/interviews for the Norwegian Latin American Network (NorLARNet) blog. These can be found here.

That´s all for now!

Baltic Adventure part 2: Tallinn

After things wrapped up at the NSCN seminar in Espoo I made my way to the docks in Helsinki to catch the boat to Tallinn. The boat was quite decent and really quite fast... which of course was nice. Tallinn is really charming and is a interesting mix of medieval and soviet influences. The city was damaged quite heavily during the second world war, but they have really done a good job of fixing it up and bringing Estonia's capital back to its former glory. I had quite a nice time walking around the city taking photos, however the one major downside was the weather which was quite cold indeed. One of the nicest things about Tallinn is how cheap it is, especially when you compare it to Helsinki or Oslo. Even in the most touristy parts of the old city it is not that hard to get yourself a decent meal and beer for around 8 euro... so yeah, loved that! Anyway I hope you enjoy the photos.

Baltic Adventure part 1: Helsinki and Espoo

This week I made my way to Altoo University (thanks to a grant from Grønt UiO) in Espoo Finland to participate in a two day seminar hosted by the Nordic Sustainable Campus Network. The seminar brought together representatives from several Nordic universities concerned with promoting green issues on and off campus. While efforts such as setting up on-campus recycling programs and making it easier for students to bike to class are positive in of themselves, the most important role these kind of university organizations fulfill is that of providing an example to the rest of society. Needless to say the seminars where very interesting and I feel fortunate to have had the opportunity to attend and meet so many wonderful people. Anyway after the conference was done I decided to poke around Helsinki a bit and then head over to Tallinn for a couple days (which I will cover in tomorrows post). Finland was really quite beautiful... though it was incredibly cold; when I arrived the thermostat marked a chilly -22 Celsius. It was however really pleasant and I really enjoyed trekking around the campus snapping photos and then making my way in to those world famous Finish saunas. I have to confess that I thought the whole sauna thing was just a stereotype... well it turns out its not, saunas are everywhere... in most apartments, in student housing dorms, in hotels, community centres, you name it! Being Yucateco the idea of making yourself that hot on purpose (upwards of 80c.) seemed rather counter intuitive... but I have to admit that I came to really enjoy it! Anyway I hope you enjoy the pictures and that you come back tomorrow for the Estonia pics!

Beer run to Denmark

Last week I took an over night cruise to the northern Danish city of Frederikshavn to pick up some groceries and beer in what seems to be turning in to a yearly tradition for me. Though prices are quite a bit lower in Denmark than they are here in Norway, the shopping was really just an excuse to take advantage of the free trip the cruise lines offer during the winter... presumably because they realize it is way to cold for any sensible person to want to travel. The cruise company makes back the revenue by selling over priced food and trinkets in the on-board shops. Yes the food is mediocre, yes its over priced... and yes the selection is not that great, but the prices (and much of the selection) are still better than in Norway so once those shop doors open people just flood through. The the town of Frederikshavn itself is small but fairly nice... however cruise passengers don't really get to see to much of it since only a couple of hours are afforded to exploration and off the boat shopping before the ship is Norway bound once again.In any case here are the pics!