Please and Thank You are the magic words.

"Please", 'thank you", "your welcome", "sorry" and "excuse me" do not exist in the Norwegian vocabulary.

Sure there is vaer sa snill, takk, inge arsak, beklager, and unnskyld meg, but do they use them? NO! Everyone just cuts one another off like they dont exist. Its like the world revolves around them and it does not matter where anyone else has to go. Yet Norwegians are the nicest people I have ever met. How does that work out?
I went downtown today to get my bus pass for the month, my Norwegian student i.d., and a copy of the house key. I feel so official with it! But as we were walking through the mall to get to the public transportation kiosk, this woman just gets in my way, causing me to, metaphorically speaking, slam on my brakes, so as to not run into her. She didn't even say sorry or anything, and I know she saw me because she looked at me before she crossed in front of me and sped up so as to make it before I did. Had I not been in Norway, I would have said something. But being the foreigner that I am I kept my mouth shut, saved a mental image of her and planned my revenge for the next time I saw her, its a small town, ill get her!
Well I met my host dad, finally, he was away on business. With my host mom I speak spanish...which is funny because I have spoken mostly spanish since I got here, but with Stig, I speak English...hold on be right back, gotta go to the bathroom....ok I'm back, all that damn fiber in the bread...which by the way reminds me that my best friend would love it here! Shes a total hippie. Full of nature and the food is nutritious, no additives or instantaneous things. Anyways, host dad, he's nice, and he loves his country. He keeps teaching me things about Norway or skiing, what Zoyla calls his mistress, and just a few minutes ago we had a taste fest in the kitchen. He was having me taste a bit of everything Norwegian; cheeses, mayonnaise, sausage, jam, salmon, this not so good (to put it kindly) mackerel&tomato paste on ultra fibrous bread, and even brown cheese!! Yes brown cheese! A wonderful invention. I savored every second of that cheese chewing process and was confused as to how brown cheese was made. Stig, knowing lots about food, told me that is made from a mixture of cow and goat’s milk. Its sweetness is due to the way in which it is processed. The milk is cooked until the sugars in it have caramelized, giving the cheese its distinctive brown color and sweet flavor. The milk is then curdled and pressed. That way all the milk retrieved from the cow and goat is used and it is not wasted.
Brown cheese is one of the many new items in my diet. Luckily, embracing Norwegian cuisine won’t be too difficult. Only 4 days living in Norway and my American palate is a distant memory, happily replaced with cheese and bacon spread.
Well my lovelies, I shall part for the day. Tomorrow I meet Stig's cousin, who is 20 years old. We are going to IKEA, opening a bank account, getting a cell phone that will not work in the US and touring the city some more! I'm going to give it a shot at what I think I remember her name is, Rynsvine....nope I murdered it! Ill let you know later. She will also be going with us to Austria, so lets hope we get along or that she's not too shy! God Natt! (im sure you can translate that one!)