America letter # 1. From New York to Dubuque.
September 23, 2007
Dear friends,
I have been in the USA more than a month already, so it is time to write a common letter, an America letter. When I call it America letter, I think about the Norwegian immigrants coming here 100 years ago or more. I am not an immigrant, and I do not know if I will get any experience like those the Norwegian immigrants had. But I have already met many sons and daughters of these immigrants. “Yes, my great grandparents came from Norway” is a commentary I have heard quite a few times when I have presented myself as Hanne from Norway. I thought most of the Norwegian immigrants had gathered in Minnesota, and it is probably right to a certain degree, but there are some of them here in Iowa too, and I have heard that New York for a period was the city with the world’s second largest Norwegian population (after Oslo).
I started my America stay visiting friends in New York, with a week in New York City and a couple of days in Buffalo. “Why do I visit friends when it hurts to leave them again?” I asked myself when I had to leave them and travel on. It is probably because the joy of being together with them is stronger than the pain of separating from them, in the long run. I also remembered something Sherpa Eldfrid-Marie taught me when we separated in the middle of Nordmarka and she went back to Oslo by bicycle while I continued to Ringerike: You can still be with me. Eldfrid-Marie was with me the rest of the trip, though I went “alone”. Lysander, Levi and Paul, and the new people I had come to know, were with me to Dubuque, though I traveled “alone”.
So now I am in Dubuque. In New York they thought I was traveling to the End of the World, and most of them just looked at me when they came to know that I was taking the bus (26 hours from NYC, 18 hours from Buffalo). “Normal people” do not travel with Greyhound bus. But I do. I have understood that I have a hard job convincing (white) Americans that it is possible to go less by car and plane. I think Dubuque is quite central, east in Iowa in the Midwest. It is not quite flat, as the rest of Iowa, but has some nice hills. Dubuque is a town with 60.000 inhabitants. It lies by the Mississippi river. The area is often called “Tri-State”, as one of the bridges over the river goes to Wisconsin and another to Illinois, so then you can find it on your map even if it does not show small towns like Dubuque. Most Americans have not heard about the town, but if they have heard about it, it is normally because of racism issues.
For those who have forgotten, or not come to know, why I am here, I can tell that I am an exchange student at Wartburg Theological Seminary. We are three weeks into the semester, and I find it nice already. As former Norwegian students here have said, the academic level is probably a bit lower than in Norway, but there is lot of work, and it is relevant, and so I think I have learnt something already, and I see connections between the courses already too, so it is fun. The educational system is different than in Norway, where we can study theology for six years right after high school (12th or 13th grade). Most here take a bachelor / undergraduate degree in arts before they study theology. The seminary is four years. The first two years are at the seminary, then a year internship in a congregation, then a last year at the seminary. So it is more general education than in Norway, but less specific theology. All the exciting courses will get a more detailed presentation later.
Almost all the students live on campus. I live a 10 minutes’ walk down from the main building. I share an apartment with Toromare from Madagascar and Stephanie from Germany. Stephanie came yesterday night, so I do not know her yet, but Toromare came three weeks before I came, so she knew the area already. Toromare is a wonderful, strong woman, who always has something to teach me. I feel we are a family already, and I am concerned about having to leave her. But I let the joy of being together with her be stronger than the future pain of separating from her.
The library is open every day, so the Internet access is good, but if anyone wants to write a real letter, we have a mailbox too. The address is:
Hanne Tommelstad
1925 Pulpit Rock lane # 104B
Dubuque, IA 52003
USA
America greetings from traveling Hanne.
Dear friends,
I have been in the USA more than a month already, so it is time to write a common letter, an America letter. When I call it America letter, I think about the Norwegian immigrants coming here 100 years ago or more. I am not an immigrant, and I do not know if I will get any experience like those the Norwegian immigrants had. But I have already met many sons and daughters of these immigrants. “Yes, my great grandparents came from Norway” is a commentary I have heard quite a few times when I have presented myself as Hanne from Norway. I thought most of the Norwegian immigrants had gathered in Minnesota, and it is probably right to a certain degree, but there are some of them here in Iowa too, and I have heard that New York for a period was the city with the world’s second largest Norwegian population (after Oslo).
I started my America stay visiting friends in New York, with a week in New York City and a couple of days in Buffalo. “Why do I visit friends when it hurts to leave them again?” I asked myself when I had to leave them and travel on. It is probably because the joy of being together with them is stronger than the pain of separating from them, in the long run. I also remembered something Sherpa Eldfrid-Marie taught me when we separated in the middle of Nordmarka and she went back to Oslo by bicycle while I continued to Ringerike: You can still be with me. Eldfrid-Marie was with me the rest of the trip, though I went “alone”. Lysander, Levi and Paul, and the new people I had come to know, were with me to Dubuque, though I traveled “alone”.
So now I am in Dubuque. In New York they thought I was traveling to the End of the World, and most of them just looked at me when they came to know that I was taking the bus (26 hours from NYC, 18 hours from Buffalo). “Normal people” do not travel with Greyhound bus. But I do. I have understood that I have a hard job convincing (white) Americans that it is possible to go less by car and plane. I think Dubuque is quite central, east in Iowa in the Midwest. It is not quite flat, as the rest of Iowa, but has some nice hills. Dubuque is a town with 60.000 inhabitants. It lies by the Mississippi river. The area is often called “Tri-State”, as one of the bridges over the river goes to Wisconsin and another to Illinois, so then you can find it on your map even if it does not show small towns like Dubuque. Most Americans have not heard about the town, but if they have heard about it, it is normally because of racism issues.
For those who have forgotten, or not come to know, why I am here, I can tell that I am an exchange student at Wartburg Theological Seminary. We are three weeks into the semester, and I find it nice already. As former Norwegian students here have said, the academic level is probably a bit lower than in Norway, but there is lot of work, and it is relevant, and so I think I have learnt something already, and I see connections between the courses already too, so it is fun. The educational system is different than in Norway, where we can study theology for six years right after high school (12th or 13th grade). Most here take a bachelor / undergraduate degree in arts before they study theology. The seminary is four years. The first two years are at the seminary, then a year internship in a congregation, then a last year at the seminary. So it is more general education than in Norway, but less specific theology. All the exciting courses will get a more detailed presentation later.
Almost all the students live on campus. I live a 10 minutes’ walk down from the main building. I share an apartment with Toromare from Madagascar and Stephanie from Germany. Stephanie came yesterday night, so I do not know her yet, but Toromare came three weeks before I came, so she knew the area already. Toromare is a wonderful, strong woman, who always has something to teach me. I feel we are a family already, and I am concerned about having to leave her. But I let the joy of being together with her be stronger than the future pain of separating from her.
The library is open every day, so the Internet access is good, but if anyone wants to write a real letter, we have a mailbox too. The address is:
Hanne Tommelstad
1925 Pulpit Rock lane # 104B
Dubuque, IA 52003
USA
America greetings from traveling Hanne.
posted by Hanne at 7:25 PM
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