A day in the life of a southern Norwegian

People kinda like these post, right? Anyway, decided to show my daily routine. I'm a 26-year old guy living in Kristiansand, Norway, which is the capital of southern Norway. As with most Norwegian cities it's nothing big. About 90 thousand people live here.

I usually wake up at 07:00am. I live in a rather old house, so the old wooden beams add a nice touch of detail to the room. This is my view from the bed.

First thing I do is check the weather the old fashioned way by looking out the window and... Right, this is Norway during the winter, so yeah, it's pitch black most of the time.

Let's try again with higher exposure. Here's my view. I live in the old part of the city, named Posebyen, which consist mostly of large white wooden houses. They are forming the longest continuous collection of wooden houses in northern Europe. Or so they say.

I prefer keeping breakfast quick and simple. A cup of coffee and some cereal is more than enough for me.

After that it's the usual wash and brush business before I leave the house. And get out of my pajamas, of course.

I enjoy listening to some music while I get ready, so this Bluetooth speaker is always sitting there. It's also nice to have while I watch stuff on my phone when I'm contemplating the meaning of life and how to solve all of the world's problems but not tell anyone. I'm also the type of guy who forgets to throw out his old toilet rolls...

At 08:00am it's about time to leave for work. It's still dark outside, but the streets are usually well lit. Though a lot of construction work is going on in the area.

Here's the Kristiansand Cathedral. It's one of the largest cathedrals in Norway, and a spot for tourists. also a popular place to get married. It looks better from the other side, but the entire square has been closed/blocked because they are building a giant underground parking lot. Fun fact: The Cathedral got thirteen (13) doors/entrances around the building. God knows what those old priests must have been up to back then that required so many doors...

Some Christmas decoration a shop has put up. A family of traditional Norwegian nisse. The dolls are all electronic so they all move, which is kinda cool to watch as you walk past.

Not much happening here at this hour, but this is the main shopping street in Kristiansand. Markensgate, which just translates to Market Street.

Bigass Christmas tree is mandatory!

Arrived at the metro station, which is right next to the port/docks, so a bit of a seaside breeze here.

The metro station where I wait for the bus every morning during the weekdays. Nothing too fancy.

The giant building is where you can buy ferry tickets if you want to go for a short trip over to Denmark. Which we do occasionally. Denmark is, after all, Norway's best liquor store. Color Line is one of the ferry companies, so don't worry. We don't do the whole segregation thing here anymore. I think...

Here we see proper Norwegian etiquette in the works. While waiting for the bus, or any other queue for that matter, make sure you stay at least 1 - 2 meters away from the nearest human being. The people in the shot are all waiting for the same bus. More people are standing around the corner of the building. It was hard getting a good shot with everyone so spread out...

Bus interior. Exotic.

After about 5 - 7mins on the bus I arrive at my stop, which always greets me with a bit of morning cardio. I sprint up these stairs every morning.

Gotta cross this bridge.

Over the highway leading into Kristiansand.

Close to 08:30am I arrive at work. This is my desk/cubicle area. I haven't really done much to personalise it, but I really can't be arsed. Only been here half a year.

The best part about working in an office. Unlimited free coffee and sparkling water! I usually go through at least 5 cups of coffee before lunch. And then another 3 - 4 after. The average Norwegian amount.

I work as a 3D visualiser for road construction. So the software I work with is 3DS Max, AutoCAD Civil3D, ReCap, Infraworks (pictured), Lumion, Navisworks, Novapoint and Photoshop. Basically whenever somebody wants to construct a new road through our beautiful landscape, we gotta make it look pretty and presentable. Unfortunately I can't show you anything I'm working on, so here's a terrain model instead.

What I can tell you guys though, is that it seems like the new road will be going right through a house. Now, I took a look at the house on some archived satellite photos, and only 5 -6 years ago it was just a small little square on the map. Now the house has been extended with an extra part/building, gotten a big fancy terrace, a nice driveway, a proper garden and a fountain. Some family have put a lot of hard work and money into that house these past couple of years. Too bad it will all be gone now. YOUR DREAM HOUSE SHALL NOT STAND IN THE WAY OF HUMAN PROGRESS AND INFRASTRUCTURE!

They will be compensated, of course.

Because most of the rendering and stuff is done locally, I get some downtime which I use to browse the web, read the news, and in this particular case, drool over the new pair of wireless headphones I'll be getting once they are back in stock...

It's now 11ish am and close to lunch. It's light outside now. Will be for a few hours. We haven't gotten any snow right now, which makes everything looks grey and dull.

For comparison though, this is the same view just a few weeks prior. Norwegian winters can be weird sometimes.

Anyway, lunch time! I enjoy eating at my desk. slices of bread with, from top left: Boiled eggs with mayo, hamburger(karbonade) with potato salad and onions, cheese and ham, mackerel with tomato sauce, and then some carrots on the side and a glass of orange juice.

The mackerel with tomato sauce is just called plane crash, because... well... yeah, I guess that is was you'd look like after a plane crash...

On certain days it's not unusual for somebody to bring cake, cookies and candy to work to share with everyone. Keeps the blood sugar at a reasonable level, I say. This was from a day prior to the one I'm documenting, but I still thought it would be nice to have it included.

Oh, and on Fridays we also celebrate the start of the weekend with free ice cream for everyone. Yay!

It's now 04:00pm and I'm off work. It's dark again. Waiting for the bus to take me back into the city.

Back in the city. Now to do a few errands. The building with the Shopping sign is a small mall I use as a shortcut to take me back to the market street.

Making my way back through the mall. It's called "Lillemarkens" which means "Little Market" since it's right next to the main market street.

Back in Markens. Bustling with more people out doing their Christmas shopping. I often drop by the GameStop to the left once or twice a week to see if they have some goodies. Today is no exception, and they actually did have something. Bought it without a second thought. Anyway, that's not my main objective today. Onward!

Here's another look at the cathedral square. Covering up that parking lot now.

Now I've entered another mall in the other end of the market street.

And this store is my destination.

Because I need one of these. Despite not being an awfully cold winter, the nights are still pretty cold, and the old heater that I have in the bedroom died on me last week.

Home again! Now to assemble this thing. Luckily it's just the legs that needs to be attached.

Tada! Even though it's a simple job, doing stuff like this makes me feel like a real handy dandy man. It makes me a little happy.

With that out of the way it's time to turn on my computer! This is where I spend most of my time after I get home from work. Yeah, I work in front of a computer all day so I can afford to sit in front of a computer all day. My hardware is a mix of both new and old. I have a habit of not switching out something before it breaks and/or get too outdated to be used.

The leopard blanket is also a makeshift curtain. I realised that the curtains I have are doing a ridiculously bad job at keeping the light out, and when it's dark outside, everyone can see straight in if I have the lights on. So, yeah, this was the best solution I had at the time.

I also have some artwork on the walls that I'm quite happy with. I'm a bit of a Nintendo/Zelda fan. That wooden beam is placed right above my head when I sit down, so I have to be very careful whenever I get up. It's not always easy living in an old house when you're 190cm tall...

And being such a Nintendo fan, I just had to buy this when I found it for half price at GameStop!

Around 05:30pm now. Dinnertime. since it's Christmas season I needed something Christmasy. Traditional Norwegian julepølse and medisterkaker with fried potatoes, boiled carrots and mustard!

And drinking some delicious julebrus!

And for dinner entertainment I watch a julekalender (Advent calendar). Now, I thought this was a concept that several places had adapted, but after talking to some foreign friends, this seems to be a Scandinavian/Nordic thing.

Simply put, it's a short TV series with an episode for every day from December 1st until the 24th. Each episode are usually about 10 - 15min long, and there are many different julekalender shows out there. They vary from year to year. Though I prefer to just watch whichever one I like, so I have a few of them saved on my computer. The show I'm watching now is called Vazelina Hjulkalender. It first ran back in 2000, and it's a personal favourite of mine. It's very, VERY silly and stupid, but at the same time, awesome and filled with great songs (yes, most of these julekalenders are musicals).

The episodes are avaliable on Youtube, but not with any subtitles as far as I could see, so unless you understand Norwegian it probably won't make any sense whatsoever.

Anyway, it's not Christmas for me before I've seen a julekalender and Hans Gruber fall to his death.

It's around 6 o clock or so in the evening now, so it's time to go work out. I try to work out at least twice a week.

Here's the gym I work out at. It's just a short walk away from my flat. This picture was taken at an earlier occasion, but the place hasn't changed much since then. Usually aren't that many people here.

I don't work out because I want to get big or anything. It's all mostly just to keep my back and shoulders from aching too much.

The wardrobes are relatively clean and neat. While all the lockers seems like they are available, many times I'll open one only to see that someone else have put their bag/stuff there. Not many people bother to put on a lock. I've even heard an iPhone ringing from inside an unlocked locker. I don't know if things get stolen, but I think it's nice that people still trust strangers enough here to be confident that nobody will take their stuff.

Back home again, and after workout a quick (in my terms, about 20 - 30mins) shower feels just great!

With all my chores out of the way it's time to relax with a few rounds of Overwatch! Getting those skins and rank up(hopefully) a bit!

A bit disappointed that Mercy didn't get a holiday skin this time around, but oh well...

After a couple of rounds with Overwatch I enjoy sitting down and draw. I'm in the middle of trying to improve my art skills. This is my second attempt at a proper portrait drawing, so I'm still pretty new to the concept and I draw a lot of helplines that I use to get everything right.

Side by side comparison of the drawing and the reference photo. Yes... I've actually used a ruler and pencil to draw those helplines on both the picture and the paper I'm drawing on...

It's getting late and almost time for bed, so I'm making myself a quick little meal. Two slices of bread with Nugatti (Norway's version of Nutella, except better and tastier). I'm not super obsessed about what I eat, but I do think I vary enough to stay relatively healthy.

It's around 12:30ish am now, so time to sleep. This was actually the busiest day of my week, which is why I decided to document it. The other days I'll go to work and then come home and sit in front of my computer, playing and drawing. Not the most exciting life, but I enjoy it. Hope it was somewhat interesting for you guys.

Cheers!

FP Edit: OK, this became a lot more popular than I ever imagined. Thanks for all the kind comments, messages, questions and feedback!