NORWAY - TRONDHEIM

Being back home is different from what I thought it would be. It seems as if the clock has stopped and nothing and no one has changed. But maybe after a week back I simply haven't noticed it yet. Or maybe I am just blinded by the familiar scenery of the old familiar. After this intense and exciting time in the unfamiliar, the sober routine seems to return to the familiar environment with the familiar people so dearly missed. What was expected to be an oasis of well-being suddenly seems boring and uninteresting. Was the unknown made familiar or is the unknown now familiar?

When I came back, it immediately felt the same as before. As if it was just a good dream from which I wake up again far too quickly and suddenly find myself back in the everyday life of those around me. The same thoughts, the same actions, the same patterns of behaviour come back. Although I am very grateful and feel privileged to call the country of Liechtenstein my home, I fear returning to an old life. One that I have longed for again to some extent, but with less sobriety. I am trying to integrate the flow - the new thoughts and experiences - into my old life, but it is difficult. It takes time to adapt, to escape the temptation of the familiar and to resist the loss of emotion. The answer seems to be the unknown. Starting in a new city in a new country with a new environment takes a lot of energy and flexibility. I remember automatically slipping into a new mindset and immediately forgetting the old. It takes a lot of concentration and focus in every moment to find your way day by day and learn to feel comfortable in the new home, the new public transport, the new university and the new nature. This seems to be the moment when you start to become familiar with the unfamiliar and start to develop personally. At first, everything seems very foreign, but after barely half a year, you already feel at home.

I didn't like the Gløshaugen campus, the main campus where the architecture faculty is located, at first, let alone the complexity of the infrastructure, which was more like a labyrinth and it was impossible to find the rooms without a specially developed app. As the semester progressed more and more intensively, the daily walk to the university, the rooms and the food became routine and with time you begin to see the beautiful side, you suddenly like it and identify with it. Perhaps this also has a lot to do with the beginning of the flourishing season of spring from mid May and the excess of daylight. Similarly, going to the supermarket was rather uncomfortable at first. Where are the products? Why does a pepperoni here cost the equivalent of CHF 9 and the salmon comparatively so little? How do I master the procedure at the checkout? The very limited variety of products took away the decision-making process, so to speak, and you take the one product that was available. Likewise, with time you know exactly what steps take place at the checkout - "Hei.", "Pose?", "Klitterung?", "Ha de bra!". Doing this the Norwegian way immediately feels much more homely and integrated. It was a bit more complicated to understand the public transport network and to be able to orientate oneself geographically. The latter seems to be the biggest hurdle to really feeling familiar. Only when you can orientate yourself spatially, know the distances and automatically understand the bus routes and announcements, you feel at home because you don't have to think about it anymore.

Of course and quite obviously, I could never have experienced the change from the unfamiliar to the familiar without the people I met during my time. In the studio, for example, everyone was rather distant and polite at first, but especially in the most stressful final phase of the semester, when everyone is suffering and you are forced to spend most of the time together working, you bond. I have also made friends through sport who share the same interests and attitude as me, so you bond again on another level. These have had a crucial influence on my perception and memories and are the main reason that the unknown has become the familiar. I would also like to mention the deeply rooted Norwegian mentality. Be it with strangers, between students, with lecturers or even in traffic from car to car, here people meet each other with the highest correctness in the form of respect, friendliness and helpfulness. People meet each other with distance, which can seem cool and off-putting at first, but can be judged as highly exemplary with the preservation of privacy. The collective thought of the Norwegian people was one of the most remarkable impressions of my whole stay and speaks for a stable and successfully functioning state system!

Finally, I was able to learn a lot about myself, since I was basically on my own. I enjoyed escaping the usual influence from home and also spending time with myself. It gives you a chance to find yourself by getting familiar with the unfamiliar