Reflections I: The Whole Money Bit

When I first arrived here in Norway, the exchange rate with the dollar was about 5:1 and a really basic sandwich from, well, anywhere was over 50 kroner. That means a ham and cheese sandwich was 10 bucks. I found that kind of ridiculous, but what was even worse was that beer was even more expensive than that at bars. A chicken breast or two ran about 100 kroner, and the list goes on. The exchange rate has improved drastically, thanks almost entirely to the economic collapse of the world, and is now at about 7.5:1. That said, this must be one of the top 5 most expensive countries to live in right up there with Switzerland and Luxembourg. And I've been to Switzerland; it almost seemed cheap in comparison. Part of this is due to sales tax, I guess. They tax gas pretty heavily, and the tax on liquor is 25%. But that only explains part of it. The sales tax at the grocery store, for example, is not any more than at a grocery store in the states. Another part of it is simple economics I'm sure, but I don't know simple economics so I'll leave it alone. The good news for Norwegians is that their jobs pay pretty well. The least you can make at a part-time job, according to the people I've talked to, is somewhere around 80-100 kroner/hour. So that would've been 17-20 bucks back in August and somewhere between 10 and 15 dollars now. Not bad. For me, without a job, prices looked pretty terrible at the beginning. Though that's eased up a bit now, I'm still looking forward to returning to a place where I can get $4 appetizers and beers that are in the single digits. To veer left a bit, I'm now officially done with coursework, tests, presentations, and the like, so the next 9 days will be a chance to say goodbye to everyone (yet another international student party on Friday) and clean the room. It's a small room, but it is a dirty one. Probably have to start tomorrow, I think 8 days should be enough time to clean. And that ties back to the money bit again. It's bad enough to buy a broom when you don't really want to but you know you have to so you do, it's worse to buy a broom at a ludicrous price and then know you'll only use it a couple times (yeah Curt and I are pretty dirty people). I guess I'd take it home, but a broom takes up a fair amount of space and I'd look pretty crazy carrying a broom on the train and they probably wouldn't let it through airport security anyway. To wrap things up, I will now list the 5 things I look forward to most when I return home (excluding friends and family): 1. Chipotle 2. Rock Band 3. playing music 4. having a TV 5. eating chicken.