Oh, *I* see...

I have realised that my plummeting mood is not only a larger than usual swing (thanks to the effects of taking oral steroids, gee willikers wow I'm so grateful etc etc), but because of the 'roids, I have a particular extra bonus wonderful ow-ey skin thing, always caused by 'roids plus stress plus fatigue.

THANKS to the smart-alec gods who thought up this charming combination of cause and effect.

THANKS to my ancestors for the genetic inheritance which makes me pre-disposed to this problem.

THANKS to the inventor of 'roids, who did a good thing even tho it are a bloody tricky drug and the side effects SUCK.

And lastly, THANKS to my body for being SO HOPELESS.

This evening brought to you by a lowering black cloud. Too far gone for purrfume. Incense is on altho not working much ... please send me cyber-immunesystemboosting vibes. I is not a happy vegemite...

Short report from Bergen

Short report from Wednesday in Bergen:

An ordinary start. Madame le Princesse wakes feeling horrid. Monsieur le Hero Husband delivers breakfast filched from the hotel breakfast room, across the street. MLP slugs down her roids and returns to slumber on't until lunch time.

After a light but restorative meal, we both repair to Interwebs cafe, Tourist Information Centre, Galleriat shopping centre, and do our various tasks. M finds out so much about the cultural life in Bergen we are now racing to touch even the surface of what we'd like to see. I discover that MY size in leggings or gym shorts is 'Buffalo Bum', only sold up a dark alley on the fat-mamma side of town. The hefty side. I galumph my way out of the H&M store [the non-slim-teenager-with-waistline version of this store, for bigger but not bigger enough sizes] feeling like Godzilla's mother. Again. Like I did the entire time we lived in China, in 1998. And I was rather slimmer then! Just hugely western, tall and the proud owner of a ginormous nose. Oh well.. now my bum appears to match.

M met me just as I was about to nip into a Telefon store and try to buy us two cheapo mobiles. 'Quick quick we have only 30 minutes to dash back to the hotel, get changed, and dash back down to the Fish Market to get on the free bus up to Troldhaugen [where Edvard Grieg lived every summer, and did most of his composing]'. We rush cautiously up the hill (wheezes still evident) and manage to get back to the bus in time. It takes us up a very steep hill, right on the edge of the city and the harbour, to the beautiful hilltop location of Grieg's house, composition hut, and now the Museum/Gallery and a concert hall. We have time to collect a few postcards, grab a cool drink, and look around. M goes down to the water-line to see the cliff-side grave of Grieg and his wife Nina. I eschew the steps, going up for a short walk through their house. It's so small, but was very modern for its time. The rooms that the public are allowed to enter are only three: the entry way, a room with no clear purpose (perhaps an open space used as combined cloakroom, welcome parlour, and access to the kitchen?). This leads into an open area with a dining room on one side opening to the main parlour or lounge. The style is very simple - scrubbed wooden floors and wood panelling on the wall. The furnishings echo traditional Norwegian textile patterning and folk themes. The window ledges are full of summer flowers. The very beautiful young woman at the door follows me suspiciously around, because I am rummaging in my bag and I think she suspects I will try to take photos.

The concert, a performance of a soprano and an excellent accompanist, is a delight. The tall windows behind the stage lead the eye 'above' the music to a view down to the harbour, echoing the view Grieg had from his composition hut. It's extremely peaceful but dramatic, with the steep hills rising quicky from the sea's surface. The view now is full of homes peeking out from the firs, but in Grieg's day it would have been essentially native forest overlooking the water.

We return just in time for a supermarket run ('Rimi', which is very like Audi stores - low price goods and you have to buy or supply your own bags). Neither of us really wants dinner, but a snack of Roddebrott (a very nutty black bread), ham and cheese, and some fruit, is just the ticket. M disappears downstairs to have a beer, because at the supermarket we discovered that they aren't allowed to sell the beer on the shelves after 8pm; 6pm on Saturdays! AND in this entire city of 280,000 people, there are TWO liquor stores. [Do the Bergenese - this is the correct word for locals - have a problem with the demon drinkk??)] We are trying to buy some supplies to take on the boat, as we have been informed that booze on board costs a bomb. As the entire cruise costs several bombs we are trying to save on fuses, so to speak. I must haves my gin! Apart from any practical reasons, it is the only alcohol I can even attempt to drink when my asthma is unstable. And a bit of a tipple now and then can turn gwumps into smiles very effectively.

I am about to go to sleep, while M is having a major rummage through all his luggage, intent on getting us to a post office at the crack of the midnight dawn, to post our first parcel of goodies/unwanted bits and pieces home. Mostly goodies. but M accumulates brochures, newspaper cuttings and booklets almost as effectively as I sense a coffee shop in a 2 km radius, or find a purrfume sale in a fish market. Which I did, last night, but I didn't tell M!

Today brought to you by an audible sense of relief, eau de rain on Bergen cobblestones, and the aroma of the shampoo I had to use to wash the yoghurt off my trousers. And a great big happy heart because I had a fabbo email from my darling dorter, AND my dad.

PS: and WHOM is Dr Wombat, writing to my blog? Is it someone I know and should be able to identify? OR might it be the excitement of a second unknown blog-reader actually replying???? Btw, all you lot out there who I DO know, where are my replies? My witty responses??? C'mon, give me a reason to feel homesick!!!

Getting to Bergen, a second view..

The end of the trip was peaceful enough. We got a taxi easily, got to the hotel, discovered we were at the wrong hotel, but the right one was just across the road. M went over to register, leaving me sitting on cases. A good move, because the hotel is in two parts, and the part our room is in is right next door to the wrong hotel. Got that?

A strapping young Viking called 'Peer' came along to help with the bags. He amused me by running up the three high flights of stairs with all our bags. I stomped up, feeling somewhat odd, developing an ache in my chest. At the top I dropped my backpack, thinking it must be muscle spasm.

Our room is hot, small, and is really a loft, with one window in a sloping wall, so M's side of the bed is a bit dangerous. I hate it. But it's now 1am and too late to start fussing. I try to hold it in, but M says rather bitterly 'this is the cheapo hotel I booked instead of the much more expensive one our travel agent found', so I say 'well if we need to move [for which read: if *I* can't stand it] I'll pay the difference for a posher hotel'. Hmf says M.

I have a shower, unpack the minimum and fall onto the bed. But I can't get to sleep, because no matter how many puffs of Ventolin I have, I can't seem to catch my breathe. Suddenly I erupt into a major, violent attack. M sits helplessly holding my hand while I fight for breath between coughing and trying to hold the puffs of Ventolin in my lungs long enough to do some good. M has dug out his spacer, so at least I can use the 'rebreathing' technique, which is a life-saver. We look at each other, both thinking 'how the fuck are we going to find an ambulance and/or a hospital this time of night in a completely unknown city???'. Not a happy situation.

The attack settles in about half an hour, a very long half an hour, especially for M, who has to watch me go through it. I have always thought that one of the worst things about asthma is how awful it must be for people to have to witness it, people who care about you and want to make it better, NOW.

When things are calmer, and I can get a peak flow reading which isn't in the danger zone, we discuss our next move. It's a toss-up between finding a hospital, and taking a big dose of oral steroid. The tablets, at nearly 2am, win. I chuck them down the hatch, crying a bit, have another shower to wash off the sweat from the attack, and fall somewhat hysterically into bed.
~~~~~~~~

NEXT DAY
I wake feeling pretty frail, but not wheezing. I take the next dose of tablets, fill up on my puffers, and lie around thinking FUK IT'S HOT IN THIS HORRIBLE ROOM until M wakes. He, the saint, goes out for coffee, because I really don't feel well enough to move.

After the coffee [and the muffins and doughnuts he thoughtfully adds to his shopping], I try another shower. Then we totter over to the other bit of hotel to the reception. I tell them quietly that I have very bad asthma and is there any chance of a room lower down? Three flights of stairs being a major challenge right now. And, hurray, there is. With very little fuss we stuff our bags with the few things we'd managed to unpack, and M lugs it all down two flights. This room is MUCH nicer, has three huge windows and less sun (because the window upstairs was sloping up the roof, and therefore is exposed to more of the sun). It also has a kettle, so I have unpacked the plunger I bought in Stockholm (for rather too much, my maths was wrong, dammit), and the ground coffee I bought in Bangkok. Tomorrow morning, multicultural coffee!

We've been out for an excellent fish dinner, to a restaurant attached to a major pub complex. The restaurant is named 'Wesser Steigl' and claims to be the most famous restaurant in Bergen. It was certainly a lot cheaper than other restaurants nearby. Our meal is slightly spoiled by an American woman sitting at the next table, who whinges about the heat 'My, it was hot in the States, and now it's hot here' (DER!!! It's norther summer in both places!!!!), the slow service (it wasn't), 'do they call this CHICKEN??' she said, etc etc. I was glad when they left, and I hope they heard my remarks about 'lard-asses' and UNDERSTOOD THEM.

We walked slowly through the main 'square' - part closed-in street, part grass and sculpture area - down to the fish market at the harbour. The fisherman are hard at it selling their catch. At 8pm! The Bergers (Bergenese? Bergen-meisters?) are out in force, walking the children, showing off their purrfect '16-years old and lookin' good in shorts' tanned legs, taking the air with a few fags to improve the texture. The setting of this city is nothing less than spectacular - a shining harbour, beautiful Scandinavian architecture - all of the old buildings kept in excellent condition - and very close by, a mountain range rising a lot further than Mount Ainslie! We can see a funicular rail running up to a castle or perhaps resort of some kind. We'll investigate tomorrow when we go to the Information Centre.

The city is incredibly clean (see below for why!) and orderly. I love this orderliness, it means that a bit of logic applied to our general Australian/Western understanding of what you find where in a city, will have quick results. M always needs a newsagent, I always want lots of cafes and the odd 'shopping oppurrtunity'. Although I am trying to contain myself to small examples of local textiles or crafts, or little prints of typical artwork. Ahem. Failed that challenge in Stockholm and Bangkok ... Bangkok, says she defensively, WAS a planned spend-up at the tailor, but. As for Stockholm, I am delighted with my Viking t-shirt, which has gone straight into service as an extra pyjama top for M; my Svensk national colours of bright blue and yellow boxer shorts which are very airy (ahem, sorry dad, TMI); our new teddy bear to be Sophie's friend, and the doo-dads which I am posting home tomorrow, some for us, most for friends. So there.

~~~~~~~
I am happily settled back in the room now, grateful for the extra comfort, the lack of wheezing, and the very good news that the daily temperatures will go down by 10 degrees in the next few days. The forecast is that by Saturday, when we sail off to the fiords, it is expected to be 18 degrees and raining. Yeah! M told me earlier today that Bergen is famous for, among other things, the highest rainfall per annum in these parts. I looked askance at the hot blue skies above us and thought a few evil thoughts about bloody amusing Viking gods toying with my equilibrium.

And so to a good book (a psychological thriller), some vanilla yoghurt, a few more drugs, and the happy end to a rather anxious day. M has tootled off, re-energised by dinner and two huge tins of Aass beer (heh), to a department store called 'Galleriet' which is only a block away. To buy a fan. I will lug it, uncomplaining, however unwieldy, however heavy, around the rest of the world if necessary. Smiling as I shove it into my bags, gleaming with pleasure as I tote it on my back and pay extra double excess baggage for it on every bus, train, camel, Vespa, whatever. I will even offload purrfume to make room for it.

He is my HERO. He returns with a fan. LUVLUVLUV!

PS: I bought a German patchwork magazine because M said he could 'easily' translate it for me. We'll see!

GAWjuss!

I gots me some wonderful new trousers!! Thank you Mr. Tailor. They are worth every kilometre of nerve-endings shredded in the process. Ppls, you will be delighted to know that I can now swan off around the world in colour coordinated, long enough, wide enough, pocketed, placketed and elastic-waisteded daks, fit for a queen, or better still, a woman thrice-crowned. Yippee!

I even got a discount of nearly a fifth of the price cos two things I specifically ordered didn't get done - the wool trousers weren't lined, and the other wool trousers didn't have the silverfish holes in the bum mended. Mr Tailor offered to fix them on the spot for a mere !!!! $35 dollars, but dorter and I exchanged swift glances and I said no. She/I/we can mend them for about 30 cents, if we get to it, or as my ever-practical darling girl said "just wear black undies and no-one will notice". True. Cos they are dark grey daks. So that part of the precision-packing process is in my opinion finito. Phew.

I also decided that trying to find time to go to pick up ultrasound films of both my hips, for future reference, was fairly low in the pecking order. The radiology business which made them neither delivers to my gp, nor agrees to post anything. So they can have the pleasure of being able to look at my ball-joints for the next three months, til I return and make the effort to give a stuff about retrieving them. And, for the record, the jury is still out on the overall effectiveness of the shots of steroid. I am not perhaps as stiff or sore in the hips, but as my daily routine is highly disordered atm, it's not a level data-recording playing field. I think the real test will be how easy it is to walk/manage luggage when we get off the plane in Bangkok after 8 or so hours of high-altitude sardinery.

We had a big family dinner tonight, several branches of us converging on an unsuspecting Italian restaurant. Parents, two sibs plus offspring, plus husband's sis and her husband. It went well in spite of the rather slow production of food from the kitchen. The youngest member of the party was was getting a bit crunchy, but the waitress spotted the restless girl and came over to reassure her that tucker was only minutes away. Unfortunately the gwown-ups had to wait a bit longer.

This makes me wonder (a lot) about rituals - the farewells. It seems to me that we all need to touch base with important people to say our farewells, and the bigger the reason for the absence, and the longer period it covers, the greater the need to invest the farewell with meaning. Meaning which is often (somehow) gathered through sharing a meal, exchanging gifts, pressing messages of goodwill and hope onto the leaver and the leavee, elaborate assurances of the possibility of communication upheld, and a sort of 'final requests' conversation about items, deeds, events and plans. All in all, as if one were about to die.

I'm not very good at farewells, especially when combined with airports. Too many occasions of real wrenchings of the heart, like when my kids were flying off to their interstate home... and once, knifing into my heart, my son point-blank refusing to get on the plane and sobbing as if HE were about to die. Such a dilemma, and going totally against my instinct, which was to say 'of course you can stay with me darling'. I won't forget that. He did agree to fly, but walked down the hallway to the plane with the flight attendant, his little back shuddering with sobs.. no amount of gin and tonics or chocolate fixed me after that experience. Since then I've been even more hopeless at airports. I start getting homesick for myself before I get into the carpark! Meeting ppl at airports is marginally less worrying, altho the mind can always summon up a quick cartwheeling aircraft hitting a cow on the runway, a mis-timed bolt of lightening, or a missing-the-plane disaster at the other end. Sigh. An imagination is a terrible burden sometimes isn't it?

Getting myself onto a plane, with so many good wishes and heartfelt farewells and promises of things to come - it all makes me uneasy. It CAN'T be so simple!!! I don't think I have a death wish, or any kind of determination to be pessimistic about the trip. I just hate all the noting of my departure. The absoluteness of it. Too much like 'here ya go, just wiggle ya hips and the coffin will fit nicely. Now, can I get you a neck pillow or a pre-flight champagne???'. Nup. I want to creep away, waving a very little wave at my cats, and leave my natural orders happily, quietly, naturally ordering themselves around in their informal way without me, so it's all just waiting here for me when I return. So that the BIGNESS of it stops feeling so bloody big! So that rather than carrying the burdensome 'my gosh aren't you lucky WHAT a huge trip how will your health stand up where will you be for your birthday did you have a typhoid shot as well you WILL send photos and cards to us all did you remember the iPod" thoughts of the umpteen ppl I leave behind, I can just sort of be around on email; be just as impossible to ring up before lunchtime; and can ease my way back into physical contact with as little fanfare as possible. Why, ppls go away all the time. They do. And do we spend months worrying about their welfare and being aware of their physical absence and thinking what a hole they leave behind and goodness won't their hair have grown? Well, I hope not. I know that the more you care for the ppls, the more you think of them and want them to be here for hugs and such. And I do like it that ppls care for me, really I do.

I think I just want the uber-crazy fare-thee-well take care HERE I AM HAMMERING IT IN THAT YOU WILL BE GONE stuff to stop. I know I'll be gone. But I has a secret - I know I'll be BACK. I pwomised the cats.

Today brought to you by a strong feeling that the catbox needs changing, a good application of Prada shower gel, and for tonight, a two-generational wrist and cleavage-ful of Enjoy. Yes, dorter and I wearing matching purrfume. Dags R Us!