Spring Break - Modified excerpts from an email to Gili and Paula

I am a bad person.

I just realized I haven't talked to you guys since I got back... now that I need a favor *which by the way is:

1) You're at the IMUSE Beijing conference and have just attended a presentation by President Hu Jintao. You have the chance to ask one question. What is it and why? (max. 100 words)

and

2) The world today is undergoing a series of rapid changes, in the ways that people, think, work, and interact with one another. Describe briefly how you see the world changing in the next twenty years and where you see yourself in it (max 500 words).*

Anyway, THE BREAK! NORWAY!

I got back yesterday after, you know, 384720394 hours flying and 2938402 hours waiting in airports. Actually, I didn't wait that long in airports. It was all pretty smooth. But let me start from the beginning.

So, as you may remember, the entire thing was supposed to be a surprise. And then, Linda Chang wrote on my wall: "Have a nice time in Norway."

After I online-murdered her, I needed to do some damage control, since Gustav referred to Linda's message on a wall-post. Yes, FML. I didnt' know what to do, so I deactivated my wall and deleted both his and her posts. Not smooth at all, right, but still. I guess it was better than having done something actively.

I left Yale after lunch on Saturday, March 7th. It was a very sunny, warm day so it felt like a good augury. I got to Gardemoen airport on Sunday morning, my long flight was babyless and there was no major event before I got to Oslo from Frankfurt -- were I stayed for around 2 hours.

All was good.

Then I couldn't find my suitcase, my duffel bag, actually. But it wasn't only me, it was like, 30 people without their luggage. Pretty upsetting, but typical. Of course my luggage was going to get lost, particularly if the day had been sunny in New Haven and there was no crying baby in my nine-hour flight from New York. So I joined all the losers in line to ask the company to find my stuff and send it back to me as soon as possible, etc. The lady behind the counter said, and I'm quoting "They're pretty obsessive in Frankfurt about luggage. If there had been any problem, they would have told us. I recommend you to look around for a bit longer. It must be somewhere." Fucker. So, I looked around for a bit longer and then I saw a deep purple duffel bag thing coming out where all these other bags from Milan were spinning around indefinitely. "Oh my lord thank god," I thought. Because, silly me, I had put all the forms I need to get back in the US in that goddamned bag. It had snow on it, so the aforementioned documents suffered the consequences.

So I got my bag, my papers and I get out. Now, where was Elisabeth? Fuck. Unless she had been waiting there for around an hour for me, she must have left. She didn't though, and after calling her, we found each other. "Great," I thought. We hugged, hopped around a bit, and went back to her place in rich-people Oslo.

We then proceeded to plan our strategy. Alexandra wasn't there yet, but we knew she wasn't going to be particularly excited about planning anything special for our first years, so we had all Monday to plan our move.

After some rumination, we decided we were going to send them emails letting them know "there was something we hid during our second year at RCN that we thought was about time for them to have." "But Gabriel, who's they?", you may be asking yourselves. They are my friends (you know the lot) and Elisabeth's (Zuzanna, Francesco, etc.) Altogether, they were about 17 people who got an email from either us. We both wrote different emails to all of them and asked them not to talk about it to anyone. The "secret thing we hid" was supposed to be in Snikkarbua and they were meant to get there at 3:00 pm on Wednesday, the day we planned to arrive at the school. I had previously managed to book Snikkarbua for all four nights of our stay, so that was covered. By the way, also forgot if I ever told you this, there is this new policy for returning alumni by which we are only allowed to visit for three school days. We made that 5 by joining the weekend to our itinerary.

Aha, so we got Tove to place the first clue in Snikkarbua, the second one in the Kantina, and the third one by The Bench (I'm guessing you guys are familiar with The Bench, this place by the Bike Shed). We needed someone inside, that is, a person who knew about the entire thing that could help us in case we needed help. Yes, it was I who anticipated this. For some reason, Elisabeth told Tove about it, then she contacted me and said "I know your little secret" and I told myself "Tove it is, then."

The clues? I wrote them in the form of poems (abab abba octets), obviously not paying attention to the number of syllables. Yes, the rhymes were totally pathetic and infantile, but I didn't haven that much time, and hey, I'm no T.S. Eliot.

At the end of the hunt, we would be waiting in the forest surrounding The Bench, hiding until they approached the area and read the final clue. At that point we would start yelling their names and they'll all freak out and come to us.

Very nice plan -- I'm aware.

So, things started to go wrong when all the people I sent emails to freaked out and talked to each other. Surprisingly enough, none (and I mean none) of Elisabeth's first-year friends dared betray her in that way. Maria Smerkovich and Kathu got an email from her and on Wednesday, after cleaning time, Kathu was like "Ok, so, Maria... I have to go." Then she replies "Yeah ok. Me too, actually." "Really?" Kathu said, "And... where are you going?" So Maria says, "You know, just... out..." "OH MY GOD YOU ARE GOING TO SNIKKARBUA AREN'T YOU?!"*

So yeah, her friends 1, mine 0.

Anna Moses apparently freaked the fuck out and went to Lukas' room, to debate the nature of my email. They went on the Yale website and figured out that I was on Spring Break. They checked flight prices, saw that they were below US$ 600 and thought it was highly possible that I'd be coming.

Though none of them wanted to believe. They were all like "Nah, it can't be true. He's not coming." "No, there's no way." "You are right. I'll see you later guys. Good espionage skills, by the way."

But they had an idea, and I could see it on their Facebook wall all the way from Oslo:

Exhibit A:


Exhibit B:


I had to do something, so I wrote on my blog the whole California thing as a diversion.

Yeah, yeah, I'm amazing. Back off.



Aha.

Then Alexandra arrives, she thinks out plan is totally ridiculous and tries to convince us to act otherwise. Elisabeth is sort of flimsy about it, though she initially showed a lot of enthusiasm. I don't let her change our mindsets, and we stick to the plan. We just needed to get to the school long enough before 3:00 pm so that we can find Tove and give her the clues. And she needed to get the keys for Snikkarbua. And run very fast.

We flew from Oslo to Førde (which was amazingly cheap and scary at the same time. Mixed feelings). We spent the morning there, since we arrived at 9:00 am or so. Bough food, Alexandra went shopping, had breakfast. The usual Førde things. But then.

Bad thing number one: the only bus from Førde to Dale was going to get us there by 2:00 pm. Fuck. Ok, we can handle that. We just need to call a cab to the school.

Bad thing number 2: the two cabs that exist in Flekke were book. Fuck. Ok, we can handle that. We just need to hitchhike, or take the bus to Flekke and then hitchhike.

Bad thing number 3: after having taken the bus to Flekke, it was already 2:45.

BUT THEN!

Kip was there, driving to the school with little Philip. He hates me, and apparently he also hates Elisabeth and Alexandra. But he was nice and polite and we loaded his car with our stuff and drove. We arrived at Teachers' Hill at 2:52 or so and Tove was already there. With bigger boobs and longer hair.**

After all the happiness and joy of the encounter, we moved fast. She ran with our stuff and we went to our destinations. We had to go all the way down Teachers' Hill to the forest by The Bench and wait there, crossing our fingers in the hope that everything would work out.

And it did. It just did. Everyone was there (except for Espen, who was doing his English oral, and Lawrence Parkeriana, who was just late and went back to her room after having found Snikkarbua locked -- tard) and we all hugged, and kissed, and teared a little.

HIGHLIGHT: Maria Smerkovich, Kathu and Xilo said hi to me. I. Kid. You. Not. They all hugged me. They all TALKED to me (yes, I just italicized and capitalized that). Like, not in a hypocritical way, not in a cynical way, not because they had to. Or at least it felt like that. I was so, so freaked out about seeing them again (particularly Smerkovich) and was so relieved to be comfortable around them. It was great, and it sort of made everything else even better.

Then we walked back, got our stuff, checked in at Haugland and went up to Riggen to drop our luggage.

And then I can't really explain.

I mean, I wasn't that drunk the entire time, but it is just too good to pin down with silly words in a language that I don't really own.

I talked to everyone I had to. I renewed friendships. I laughed like I hadn't laughed in so long. I went to the new Smokers' Corner. I saw the Vagina Monologues again. I met zero years. I talk to Xiaohang, which was nice. I talked to John Lawrenson, which was plain hypocritical. I hid from Pete. I had lunch at David's house (free food. Stop gagging at the screen). I danced. I had First Prize food. I went to a Saturday Party and stayed there for 2 minutes. I had Sunday Brunch and made egg salad. I talked to them about living in the States and how it's not horrible and people are decent. I talked to them about Lauren Motzkin, whose name they pronounced "Loaded Foreskin" or something. I hung out in dayrooms. I never walked to Flekke. I danced salsa and merengue in a Latin American workshop held by Marisa and Kathu. I saw videos of my friends for their Spanish class. I didn't have sex with anyone. I had White Russians. I made new inside jokes that don't make any sense. And I just... was next to people I will never, ever let go.

I was happy. Like, my level of happines, if I were a made-up character in The Sims, would have been 100 the entire time I was there. It could not have been better.

Then we left. It was a healthy good bye, no one cried. Everyone was just... fulfilled. Very serene. Elisabeth and Alex left the next morning and I stayed for two more days in Oslo, because my flight was departing on Wednesday. So, yeah, I used my time wisely: slept a lot and read a book for my English class.

Coming back, I didn't check in my bag (lesson learned) and was therefore able to put the two bottles of alcohol I got in Copenhagen (the city I happened to stop by this time). My nine-hour flight was amazing, though there was a crying baby that weirdly resembled the horrid sounds a pig makes when it knows it's going to die. The stewardess kept refilling my wine glass and bringing me cans of beer on demand, though I was obviously flying coach. Yeah, I got pretty drunk and watched like 4 movies in my very personal touchscreen. Exactly, I do not know why all seats in Economy Class had a personal touchscreen with games, music, movies and flight information. Oh yeah, I also played Tetris and reached level 8 out of 10.

Ok I think I've summarized this pretty well, but please do ask if there's any question concerning anything. I know I was a bit general about the actual stay at the school... but yeah, I could elaborate but I'd be mundanizing it.

Hope everything is alright. Reply (I need those short essays before next weekend),

Gabriel

(*) This conversation may have gone differently.
(**) Or so I was told.