Poor, Poor Hassan

A few weeks before we got married, Husband and I visited Stavanger.

Really, it was for me to check out the town, for him to work and for us to find a home.

While he went to the office, I was escorted by a woman named Tune (Tooooo-NAH) who had been hired to show me around and start the process of acclimation.

Along with driving me about and helping me learn, she also gave me this book.



I flipped through the pages and read about doctors and shopping and setting up house. Then I came to this page and gasped...



There was no way, I was going to get severe culture shock. I am not a textbook person and am certainly not irritable and hostile.

I am cheery and flexible and up for anything. Plus, I am not one to get in funks often and when I do, they tend to be low level funks. (I have a pretty high funk-tolerence, so even when things are their most tragic, it's really not all that bad...)

All this to say, I was slightly wrong. I've been in a bit of a funk lately. And that funk has been coupled with slight irritability.

Also, while, I refuse to say I've been hostile, perhaps I have been a little bit edgy.



And there is no one reason, but a charming combination of, but not limited to, the following:

1) Time zones
I keep missing all the windows of time to talk to my peeps because they live in highly inconvenient places like Georgia and Hawaii and California and Colorado. They also have jobs and kids, so the windows are even shorter.

2) I hate Car.
Every dang time I want to do anything, no matter how mundane, I have to make a major plan involving rush hour, hills and timing.

3) No one can read my mind.
This poses a major challenge for sweet Husband. Lillie could offer pointers because she usually knows exactly what I need:

A vist


A shake right


A shake left



A little footsie


4) I cannot work.
We got a letter a few weeks ago saying that my application has been put into the pile and that they expect an answer within the next 8-10 months. This is a multi-multi-faceted issue, which goes even further to even if I did have the permits, then what would I do? So there we have isolation and identity all piled into the mix.

5) My pants feel snug.
I haven't been eating and drinking more, perhaps I am just hormonal today or maybe my pants hate me.

5) Language
I have been studying for weeks and am not fluent yet.

All of which are semi-ridiculous on a variety of levels and I am usually not one to indulge these kinds of thoughts, at least not seriously but I have been lately (or at least in the past week or so...).

But today is when I realized that I have lost my mind and need to buck up.

Janice Soprano came over for our regular Wednesday morning lesson.

We're working in a book called "Ny i Norge" ("New to Norway").

And as we were making our way through Leksjon 5, we flipped to "Hassan sender en e-post"



Hassan is one of the recurring characters in my textbook. (Among others, we have Tor, the Norsk teacher and his wife Liv. John, who is from USA who moved to Norway to be with his wife Anne. Urai from Thailand and Larissa, the au pair from Latvia and her young charges Ingrid and Gunnar.)

Hassan, we learned today, was sitting and thinking about his friend Ali in Iran.



Ali is in school in Teheran. Hassan is a refugee and lives in Nordby.



So Hassan goes to the library to write Ali an email to say hello and to tell all about the traveling he has been doing. When he's finished emailing and looking up news about Iran, he leaves the library.

He eats a banana and is a little bit sad. It is a long way from Norway to Iran.



But then he runs into Larissa and Ingrid. Hassan carries her grocery bags while they talk. Then he heads off.

He cycles home. Hassan is not so sad now. He goes to the movies and watches a French film about love.



I am reading this out loud and translating and my voice breaks a bit. Janice, misreading my cues, says "It's a little bit silly, but good vocabulary and lessons."

I say "It's the saddest thing I have ever read. Poor Hassan, he must be so lonely for his friends."

She stares at me for a long minute and says "Ahhhh I know these signs. You are feeling a little bit isolated. We have only been having lessons here at this table. We will fix this. You need to practice with more people. I will help you."

So from now on, we're going to have lessons at the coffee shop.