13 August 2010
This is my second time facing North Korea–the first time being a tour of the DMZ organized by the USO–but this time it’s from China. I’m now in Dandong, a very industrial looking city with 600,000 inhabitants.
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As you can see, the Yalu (“duck green”) river separates China from North Korea–the Chinese side looks rather raucous and full of restaurants, while the Korean side… well, there are a number of smokestacks, and an unmoving ferris wheel. You can easily cross the river via the Sino-Korean Friendship bridge (provided you have a visa), but a more interesting sight is the bridge right next to it, the Yalu River Broken Bridge. This original bridge was bombed by the Americans in 1950 during the Korean War (in which China supported the North, being Communist), and the North Koreans have since then dismantled their side of the bridge. The Chinese side is now of course a tourist attraction: there is a 30 RMB entrance fee, a giant screen showing interviews of Chinese war pilots recalling the time (this is *on* the bridge), and finally a viewing area at the half-bridge’s end, where you can pay to use binoculars for viewing the hermit kingdom.
Pictures are forthcoming but you will have to wait; I forgot to bring my card-reader!
4 August 2010
Stavanger is Norway’s oil city, and so naturally I had to visit the oil museum. Norway was apparently a poor country less than two generations ago, but in 1969 oil was discovered in the North Sea. Since then, the government has been careful about limiting foreign rights to the oil. In 1972, Statoil was founded (though it was later partially privatized), and in 1975 Norway began exporting oil. Today, oil and gas accounts for a third of all of Norway’s exports, with 1/8 of its GDP coming from the petroleum sector.
One of the more interesting uses of this oil windfall has been the Petroleum Fund (now called the Government Pension Fund – Global), whereby surplus income generated from petroleum is invested in a fund. In 2004, the government established ethical guidelines for investments and have even excluded certain companies from the Fund that are considered to be in breach of these guidelines (for example, tobacco companies, companies that have caused serious environmental damage, etc.). Wal-Mart was added to this list in 2006.
Anyway, back to the oil museum! Here is a letter from the President of Phillips Petroleum Company to the Norwegian government in 1962:
Phillips Petroleum Company is interested in obtaining from the Norwegian Government an oil and gas concession covering the lands lying beneath the territorial waters of Norway plus that portion of the continental shelf lying beneath the North Sea which may now or in the future belong to or be under the jurisdiction of Norway.
Response:
Your application for an oil and gas concession cannot therefore be dealt with at the present moment, but I promise to keep your letter in mind.
Here are Norway’s 10 Oil Commandments: a declaration of principles governing oil policy that was adopted by parliament in 1971.
Finally, the value of the Petroleum Fund the day I visited the museum:
1 August 2010
Photos from the city tour organized by the Oslo International Summer School during my first weekend in town: Vigeland’s Park (filled with statues created by a single artist), the Viking Museum, City Hall (where the Nobel Peace Prize is presented each year), and the wonderful Oslo Opera House (designed to look like an iceberg from the outside).
20 July 2010
While Oslo is technically in a fjord (as defined by wikipedia), the Oslofjord is not all that impressive. But after this weekend, I can finally say that I have been to a real movie-worthy Norwegian fjord!
A couple of hours away from Stavanger (on the southwest coast of Norway) is Lysefjord:
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To get to the start-off point of Öygardstöl (strangely with a Swedish spelling), you first have to drive past hundreds of sheep and then get carsick several times from the small winding road (which looks very much like a single lane to me, but somehow accommodates two-way traffic). At this point you park your car and start hiking. After a strenuous 2.5 hour climb (a mere stroll by Norwegian standards), you will reach this beautiful view at Kjerag:
But even better is this, the famous Kjeragbolten
Just don’t ask about the hike down.
8 July 2010
I am currently taking a Norwegian course at the University of Oslo, and each day during our mid-class break I look for a treat at the cafeteria. Amongst the chocolate, waffles, and buns, you can also find conveniently-sized-but-overpackaged nugatti (nutella) in a tube:
though this doesn’t look half as exciting as the “mini kaviar”! oooooooooh
(unfortunately I discovered later that this is more like fishy spam paste than anything remotely fancy.)
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