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Grey, yellow, gold
Winter can feel colourless. While the snow we’ve had in fits and bursts over the past month helps to brighten the surroundings, the world still seems drained of pigment, devoid as it is of greenery, flowers, people, the stuff of life. True, there are people, but they are solitary figures, trussed up in dark coats…
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A surprisingly optimistic season opening
In his first concert as the Oslo Philharmonic’s new principal conductor, Klaus Mäkelä showed he was willing to experiment, even if this was occasionally at the expense of coherence, writes Aksel Dalmo Tollåli. The start of the autumn season at the Oslo Philharmonic has not quite gone as planned. Audiences of more than 200 are…
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On being a blackbird chick, and other signs of spring
Spring takes a while to arrive in Oslo, almost 60 degrees north. It doesn’t creep up on you, like autumn seems to do in early August (the horror!); you have to encourage it, will it into existence. That’s a hard task after such a long winter. It’s April, with Easter mere days away, and the…
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More lovely places: Scandinavia’s capitals (part 2)
Oslo: Water Oslo’s fjord is its greatest asset. It is the focus of and the inspiration for a phoenix-like regeneration of the city, stretching for nine kilometres along the length of the urban waterfront. Out of necessity rather than care, this area was for years an industrial eyesore, valued for its shipyard and container port…
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Dejlige stæder: Scandinavia’s capitals
Walking through Copenhagen’s Kultorvet recently, I spied a second-hand bookshop named Vangaards. The offerings are renewed after seven weeks, and during each cycle, the price – which is the same no matter the book – is lowered slightly each day. I can’t resist books, especially old ones on sale! On that day, the asking price…
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German: an obituary
German has deeply shaped the course of my life. In the pages of my yellow exercise book and the little blue vocab book, I discovered a love for language learning….
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The Right Writing: Back to Blogging
And back to what I used to blog about: my life abroad. I first kept a blog on this subject over the 2013-14 academic year, which I spent studying in Lyon, France, as a beneficiary of the Erasmus scheme. Fast forward three years, and I am now in Oslo, Norway, still very much surprised to…