I CAN SEE CLEAR NOW THE RAIN BOW IN THE SKY

I can see clear the rain bow in the sky after
A long period of darkness even as early as
3:00 p.m, you would feel like going to bed since
It was night before the real night. This would
Be normal for the Norwegians but for a person
Who has come from a country where darkness
Falls at 8:00 p.m, this will be strange. Now I can
Feel the sun and the clear clouds in the skies and
Now Darkness falls at round 6:00p.m not so strange
Like in the early November where I could go to bed
At 3:00p.m and by midnight, I was a wake with no
More sleep, watching movies was the only thing
Could think of that time of the night.
My life has never been the same since I came to Norway
I have learnt a lot from the people, environment, and climate
I really believe this is going to be part of my life and my country.
Life here is cool and I hope some time I will come back to
Norway.

ME AND"GOD JUL" AS THE MOST COMMON SUNG SONG DURING DECEMBER IN NORWAY

December was the most interesting month for me here in Norway. Why am I saying so, because all the time there was a song being sung by all the people in Kristiansand including the e-mails that I received from my Norwegian Friends had this same song
Called “GOD JUL,GOD JUL” The first time I heard this word god jul I was totally confused since I didn’t know its meaning and also when people said this song to me, I would just look at them and didn’t answer anything. Then one day and bed Hus sorry this
Word may seem new for you but the Norwegians know it. Well it’s a small church that most youth in Norway like going since they look a church as a boring place. The reason as to why they like going to bed Hus is because there is no much preaching and also they have some games in this place including café. I have been to bed Hus and its fun to there. Well a friend of mine said to me god Jul I asked him what is the meaning of this song called GOD JUL? He then told me it meant merry Christmas. Is when I came to understand the meaning of god Jul and then I also started singing this chorus of god Jul.
Christmas celebration in Norway is different from that of my home country Uganda. At least in every house in Norway you would see a sign of this song that I didn’t know ‘god Jul’ including the compound showed the Christmas time. Every house had lights and Father Christmas and how is it different from my country? In Uganda Christmas is celebrated on 25 of December and decorations is on 23 of December and not every one can afford to decorate their homes with lights and Christmas tree. Here decorations start in November and every home has decorations.
I and my family contact went to church for prayers which were very brief compared to that of my country. It was full of god Jul songs and a short verse from the bible about the birth of Jesus Christ. We then went to my family’s home for dinner and guess what it was, it was a whole turkey. We sat around a big table and we were about ten people I was then served my pierce of turkey including Jul soda. After eating this innocent turkey, we sat down and had some ice cream. The most interesting part was the time for receiving our Jul gifts. The gifts were lied under a Jul tree I was surprised to see that the gifts were to be opened right then. It looked so blue for me and Moses because in my country you open gifts at your home. Since we were adopting the Norwegian culture, this was part of it and I got my gift and opened it to show every one but what I got you can not show it to other people most especially the elder people. I never wanted to show it but they asked me to show them and guess what it was? It was under wear and woman who was sited to me got a G-string and she held it with her to hands almost to my face and said I like this and I was what!, in my country such things are personal and they can not be showed to public. That day I and Moses got many gifts from friends including bed Hus. Jul was really nice for me.

THE FACES OF HALD STUDENTS

MY FAST TIME TO EXPERIENCE A REAL COLD

This could be the hardest time and month for me where everything was cold including myself. Norway is really a cold country and I find it very hard to cope up with for having come from a very warm country. I had never experienced such cold before coming to Norway. If there is a month during my stay
Here that I had longed to get to Uganda just to sit under a warm sunshine for just a minute and then come back should be in December. The cold was more than I couldn’t hold in vennesla; I could not do things that make me a real Joshua, things like playing football. Singing, taking walks that I started doing when I just got to vennesla before it was damn cold. At first things were moving in a golden cup because I could play football, walk and meet my friends.
One other thing that made me home sick was the ground was slippery since I had to walk for 20 minutes from a buss stop to my house. My bad day was when I was going to work and I had just come out of the house and I slipped falling with my ass on the ground.oh, how I longed to go back in the house to sleep but I had to go to work. At school I was playing with the children a round the compound and I fell again, this time I wanted to cry but since the kids were a round me laughing at me, I had to join them by laughing but inside me I was actually crying. Last month I got complications that made me get many a assumptions of what was going wrong with me but never came up with the main cause even when I went to the doctor still he could not tell what was wrong with me than telling me that I was okay but still I was getting the same complications. but after some time of endurance, i started marking snow balls and guess what?... i now enjoy eating snow...... interesting. i have come to understand that time changes assumptions i thought there was no fun during snow but believe me now i know how nice is to have snow. I used to tell moses that there is no need for me to buy a fridge if i was a citizen of Norway. i would just put whatever i need to get cold in snow for some minutes.

SOME PICTURES IN VENNESLA

being in vennesla is another interesting thing just like
in mandal,but hey,the first cut is the deepest.

this is my memory of friends while still together in mandal

but this time we had gone to kristiansand.

being in vennesla does not mean i don't meet friends.i meet

them every Monday and Tuesday when i go for Norwegian lessons

i guess i also have time to hang out and take

some cool walks in vennesla.

i work with handicapped people and we make fun

and job alle sammen(all together).

Rafael is my work mate at wood work.he comes

from Germany.

in vennesla we don't only cut wood but we

also pack fruits inside a store.

i do take my time to rest when i get back

home and listen to some moving music that

drive me to a sleep.

every Friday we go to McDonald to eat pizza

and drive down to kristiandsand town just for

fun.

while at work i don't work nonstop but i also have to

rest and drink some strong coffee.

cutting wood is fun

i do work also in samkon school as a teacher of English and

also tell about my beautiful country Uganda and these are

some of my students.we look cool.

of course i don't walk up to kristiansand on

my feet but i wait for a bus at the bus stop

because its the only place that busses stop.

its different with my country where busses

stop anywhere as long as you say,`sebo maso

awo'which means sir stop there.and they will

stop even when there is no buss stop.

JOSH IN VENNESLA

Life in Norway looks very different from that of Uganda everything looks to be new to The environment, climate and the social life of the people is absolutely another world to me I mean the food, dressing and the means of transport is not the same with that of Uganda. For my first six weeks I was staying in mandal where life was boring for a week since I was still new in town but after some time when I got used to the environment and meeting people from different parts of the world most especially people from Peru, Bolivia, Brazil,Norwegians of course and same people from East Africa like Kenya and Tanzania who are my neighbours. I really felt at home though some time I would become home sick looking back on the friends and the lovely children in child restoration outreach that I was missing since I grew up knowing them as my sisters and brothers. And here comes another moving moments when we were to go to our practise places in different towns of Norway and also the Norwegians were to go to the southern countries. I felt there was something that I was going to start missing that was my friends at hald since we had become one family and now I was to go to Vennesla were I had no friends with no idea of shopping places than I knew at hald or Mandal.On the day of departure, I almost cried when seeing my friends leaving. My first day in Vennesla was the most boring moments that I have ever experienced in life. The place was very quiet with few people in the centre and this made me ask myself questions where the people in this town? Have they got a party to attend and how many people live here? It looked like some place that have been attacked by rebels some few minutes before my arrival. On getting used to a place, life started changing in vennesla.Its no longer a boring place than when I just got here. I have managed to make new friends and this is through football, right now I have ten friends that I play football with and what a nice moments that we have after playing, we sit down to relax and talk together ourselves what we like doing I mean hobbies. They some time invite me to their homes to watch movies also we ride bikes around vennesla.
While in vennesla I go to Samkom School on Tuesdays, wednessdays and Thursdays. I teach English in grade five, six and seven and some time I teach about my country Uganda and tell them about Africa since Uganda is in Africa. The schools in Norway different from that in Uganda. the population in class is less than that of Uganda here 18 to 20 pupils in one class with two to three teachers managing the class but in Uganda you find more than hundred pupils in one tiny class room with some time one or two teachers managing the class.Another amazing thing is that children some time don’t respect teachers while the teacher is teaching.
The pupil does what he feels like doing in class while the teacher is teaching.
We also work with mentally hand capped people and at fast I asked myself what I was going to do with this people, I was a bite scared since in Uganda, most hand capped people are left to move in town and be in garbage places. This made me ask person in charge of this place what type of work I was to do here. He told me that we actually don’t work I mean he said there was no work but the most important work here is to make this people happy, they need care just like any other person. What I learnt is that people like this should not be seen as useless people since they never wished to be like this they should be given respect, care and love but they should not be considered as useless people in the community like the way they are treated in my country Uganda. This is the most thing that I enjoy doing in my practise place is to be with this people talk to them and to bring smiles to their faces.
I live in an apartment with Moses from Uganda and I enjoy being with him since we come from the same country and same project. Finally, I dearly enjoy being with my contact family since they are so caring to us and I truly a appreciate them for the wonderful things they are doing to us.
Joshua.Life in Norway looks very different from that of Uganda everything looks to be new to The environment, climate and the social life of the people is absolutely another world to me I mean the food, dressing and the means of transport is not the same with that of Uganda. For my first six weeks I was staying in mandal where life was boring for a week since I was still new in town but after some time when I got used to the environment and meeting people from different parts of the world most especially people from Peru, Bolivia, Brazil,Norwegians of course and same people from East Africa like Kenya and Tanzania who are my neighbours. I really felt at home though some time I would become home sick looking back on the friends and the lovely children in child restoration outreach that I was missing since I grew up knowing them as my sisters and brothers. And here comes another moving moments when we were to go to our practise places in different towns of Norway and also the Norwegians were to go to the southern countries. I felt there was something that I was going to start missing that was my friends at hald since we had become one family and now I was to go to Vennesla were I had no friends with no idea of shopping places than I knew at hald or Mandal.On the day of departure, I almost cried when seeing my friends leaving. My first day in Vennesla was the most boring moments that I have ever experienced in life. The place was very quiet with few people in the centre and this made me ask myself questions where the people in this town? Have they got a party to attend and how many people live here? It looked like some place that have been attacked by rebels some few minutes before my arrival. On getting used to a place, life started changing in vennesla.Its no longer a boring place than when I just got here. I have managed to make new friends and this is through football, right now I have ten friends that I play football with and what a nice moments that we have after playing, we sit down to relax and talk together ourselves what we like doing I mean hobbies. They some time invite me to their homes to watch movies also we ride bikes around vennesla.
While in vennesla I go to Samkom School on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays. I teach English in grade five, six and seven and some time I teach about my country Uganda and tell them about Africa since Uganda is in Africa. The schools in Norway different from that in Uganda. the population in class is less than that of Uganda here 18 to 20 pupils in one class with two to three teachers managing the class but in Uganda you find more than hundred pupils in one tiny class room with some time one or two teachers managing the class.Another amazing thing is that children some time don’t respect teachers while the teacher is teaching.
The pupil does what he feels like doing in class while the teacher is teaching.
We also work with mentally hand capped people and at fast I asked myself what I was going to do with this people, I was a bite scared since in Uganda, most hand capped people are left to move in town and be in garbage places. This made me ask person in charge of this place what type of work I was to do here. He told me that we actually don’t work I mean he said there was no work but the most important work here is to make this people happy, they need care just like any other person. What I learnt is that people like this should not be seen as useless people since they never wished to be like this they should be given respect, care and love but they should not be considered as useless people in the community like the way they are treated in my country Uganda. This is the most thing that I enjoy doing in my practise place is to be with this people talk to them and to bring smiles to their faces.
I live in an apartment with Moses from Uganda and I enjoy being with him since we come from the same country and same project. Finally, I dearly enjoy being with my contact family since they are so caring to us and I truly a appreciate them for the wonderful things they are doing to us.
Josh.