A crazy day in Toronto - Jens' diary entry

Hi, dear followers! Today has been a wild day, and I can’t wait telling you guys about it. We are still in Toronto. Right now I’m sitting at the cheap hotel room, while Even, Anders and Benjamin are on a strip club… At least that was where they said they were heading to. I’m just tired after this day, and therefore I decided to stay at the hotel, just to relax. So now I’m going to let you guys know what happened today.

The fancy bus stop.

We started the day with eating breakfast at the hotel room, and everyone was kind of tired after some hard days here in Canada, and some wild experiences (Justin Bieber etc.). We quickly decided that we were going to relax today, and just hang around in the town, and maybe buy some gifts for our family. We decided not to make any exact plans, so that we didn’t need to rush with anything.

After the breakfast we made ourselves ready to leave the hotel, and then we went to the bus stop. The bus stop was a rare sight. We had never seen anything like it, and we thought that was pretty cool. But the bus came earlier than expected, so we didn’t really get to enjoy the sight of the bus stop. Luckily for us we managed to take a picture of ourselves by the nice and modern design work.

When we reached the town of Toronto, we didn’t really know what to do first. Benjamin suggested that we could do some shopping. Benjamin was really excited about this idea, and really tried to convince the other of us to join him shopping. The thought of just to go and see through the stores would normally be boring for me, because I’m not that into shopping, but today I thought it maybe would be fun. Therefore, we started looking for stores, but that wasn’t hard at all. It was plenty of them, all over the place.

Benjamin was shopping like I’ve only seen girls do. Me, Even and Anders were just following him into every store, and actually, I found an umbrella which I bought for my mom. She always asks me to buy her an umbrella, so I decided I finally would make her stop complaining about it.

It was when we walked out of that store, the craziness started to happen. We, all four of us, were walking silently along the street, when a dog suddenly jumps on my left leg. At first I didn’t really know what to do. The dog was biting and scratching my leg, and all I had in defense was an umbrella. In panic I began poking the dog with the tip of the umbrella, hoping he would let go of my leg. But then I suddenly felt it: The pain that was entering my body. I felt a pain I had never before been exposed to. I fell on the ground somehow, because it felt like I lost control of my left leg. I tried to cushion the fall by planting the umbrella on the ground. Of course, the umbrella couldn’t handle my weight, and it broke on half. When the umbrella broke it made a weird and harsh sound, which made the dog stop biting me, and it ran away.

The wound I got today.

Even, Benjamin and Anders were shocked and didn’t say a word, before they actually realized what just had happened in the last 5 seconds. They helped me back up on my feet again, but the pain was still there, so I just laid down on the ground again, and tried to be calm, while Even made someone call the Emergency centre.

I don’t really remember what happened then, because I blacked out. The next thing I remember was me waking up in a bed at the Emergency centre. Some lady, with a French accent, told me that I was going to be all right, and my wound luckily wasn’t infected. She told me that when I felt ready I could just leave the Emergency centre, but she recommended me to get some rest first. I did, and a couple of hours later we all went back to the hotel.

So, now I’m sitting here with a bandaged left foot while I’m eating some maple syrup. It’s really refreshing! My foot doesn’t hurt so much now; I just feel some pain now and then. I’m sure it will be all right. What I don’t understand is why that dog attacked me. Also, it didn’t look like the owner of the dog was there while it happened. That will still be a mystery. And I feel a bit mad for breaking the umbrella, but really, that was what made the dog run away (I think…). Maybe it was a good thing that it broke, after all. Well, anyways, now I’m going to bed. It has been a long day, and I struggle to keep my eyelids open at the moment.

Good night!

- Jens

A special experience!

Hello everybody, we’ve had a superb day, with a lot of funny, interesting and strange stuff. So first of all, we’ve arrived in Toronto. It was a nice flight, but we are starting to become tired of all the traveling. Fortunately we’re learning a lot of the different cities in Canada, and that’s what we are trying to do. Today we randomly met the Canadian pop artist Justin Bieber, and the funniest part with it, was that he managed to walk into a glass door, right in front of us. Also a paparazzi guy got it all on tape. Probably the funniest thing we’ve seen on this amazing journey, seeing a famous person doing such a mistake isn’t something you experience often. The paparazzi gave us the video clip and we managed to copy it over to our PC, only for our lovely followers and readers. You can see it further down on this post.

                                        











 Justin vs. the glass

After Justin had spoken to the paparazzi telling about his little mistake, we had a conversation with him, and he actually invited us to perform live with him on Ricoh Coliseum, which is really the main court for “The Toronto Marlies”, a hockey team from Toronto. Standing on a stage with Justin Bieber was a special experience for us, to bring home to our Norwegian friends. The concert was truly amazing, especially since there were almost 10000 spectators, and none of us have ever performed for more than 100 people, even though we just stood on the stage this time. After the concert, we separated with Justin, because we had a lot of things to see here in Toronto.

Justin and us on stage. SICK!

In addition to meeting Justin Bieber, we had a little sightseeing round in Toronto because of all the famous landmarks here. First, we had a look at the huge CN tower which was a special sight. As well as its height, it is also very special, because of its appearance. Unlike other skyscrapers, this one doesn’t look like normal skyscrapers at all. It is long, tall and doesn’t have as many windows as other skyscrapers as seen in for example New York. The next thing on our see-list was the Hockey Hall of Fame. Only Benjamin wanted to see the Hall of Fame, because of his passion for hockey. The place was OK; it was a museum, where you could see the most important things from the hockey history, and the best players. I (Anders), Jens and Even were kind of bored, because of our lack of interest for the hockey sport. But Benjamin had nagged and begged to see the museum since we left Norway. 

The view from the CN tower

The Hockey Hall of Fame from the outside





Because of the concert, our schedule got a bit changed, so we didn’t get time to see more of Toronto’s attractions today. But we’ve had a nice time, so we don’t regret being at the concert. For a perfect end of the day, we ate some pancakes with maple syrup, while watching TV at our room. But the trip isn’t over yet, and we’re looking forward to tomorrow, when there hopefully is time to see some more attractions here in Toronto.

Good night everybody!


Anders Ulfsnes

Maple Facts - Winter Olympics

The 2^nd of July, 2003 in Prague Vancouver was selected to be the host of the 21. Winter Olympics. But some of the events were held in Whistler. Like Skiing and biathlon. Vancouver won with 3 votes over Pyeongchang. This was the third time Canada hosted the Olympics. The games started the 12 of February 2010, and ended the 28 of February.

The logo of the winter Olympics

Over 2600 athletes entered the games from 82 nations. They entered in 86 events in 15 disciplines. Canada became the most winning nation in front of Germany, USA and Norway. The most winning athlete was Marit Bjørgen with 5 medals. 3 of them were of the golden sort.

The medals in Vancouver

The calculated cost for the winter Olympics was a stunning 1.76 billion Canadian dollars. About 10.5 billion Norwegian kroner. Although the cost was massive, Vancouver and Whistler made a whole lot more. They have said that the area around the Olympics made about 10 billion Canadian dollars.

All in all the games went well, but one tragic thing happened. Nodar Kumaritashvili crashed in the last corner at a speed around 140 kilometres per hour. This death was a massive “eye-opener.” The death showed the entire world that the games aren’t the most important thing in the world.

Nodar Kumaritashvili after the crash

   

Maple facts - History of Canada

In the very beginning of the 11^th century the explorer Leif Ericson became the first European to discover Canada. Later in the 1497 John Cabot rediscovered Canada for the Europeans. From then many Europeans came to explore the land, mostly Frenchmen. The French colonization in Canada started in the early 17^th century, and Quebec was the first town getting settled by the Europeans. Later the whole Canada got colonized.

 Illustration of "The Seven Years' War"

When the Frenchmen established a trade agreement with the Indians, which involved trading of fur, the Brits did not get very happy.  This was because of that the Brits wanted to be a part of that trade agreement. Therefore, in the 18^th century, several civil wars between the Frenchmen and the Brits took place on Canadian earth. At last, in 1756 the “Seven Years' War” broke out. It ended in 1763, and when the French and the Brits made peace, the Frenchmen also ceded Canada to Britain. In 1867, Canada became Britain’s first dominion, as the “Dominion of Canada”. It was a united Canada, who now was self-governing, but still under the British emporium.  Due to this, Canada participated in both of the world wars, as Britain’s ally.

For a long time the Frenchmen in Quebec insisted that Quebec should be an independent state, and in 1977 French were listed as their official language. Now Quebec is a province in Canada.

In 1982 the “Constitution Act” claimed that Britain no longer was controlling Canada, in any way. Then Canada was fully independent.

Sources : http://www.caplex.no/web/ArticleView.aspx?id=9304034

http://www.snl.no/Canada/historie

http://no.wikipedia.org/wiki/Provinser_og_territorier_i_Canada

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Canada

Book : Verdens land og folk, Canada.  Published in 1987 by Time-Life Books B.V., Amsterdam.

A day in Ottawa

Hey!

By now I’m writing to you from a cafe in the capital of Canada, Ottawa. I’m sitting here drinking a healthy cup of coffee, Even just wanted Coke, but Andres and Jens tried to bye a couple of beers. When the waiter asked for their ID’s they laughed, and told him it was all a joke, and they ordered some Coffee instead.

We arrived at Ottawa this morning, and have just been tourists on a lovely holyday. We started the day with a cup of coffee at Ottawa airport, and then hooked a taxi. We went off in the centre of Ottawa where we started our tourist day. We went straight for the Parliament Hill, on the southern banks of Ottawa River in downtown Ottawa. On the internet we read about Parliament Hill before the trip and we really wanted to take some pictures of it.

Here is two of the pictures we took of Parliament Hill 

The next attraction we went for was the Canadian War Museum, which is Canada’s national museum of military history. Even is kind of in to that crap so he really wanted to go there. It was a pain in the butt to go around and read about old war history, and the only one enjoying it was Even. When we finely came out of the house of pain it was Jens’ turn to decide where to go.

The Canadian War Museum

And his choice didn’t surprise me. He has talked about the silly game golf the whole weekend. So we went to Ottawa Hunt and Golf Club so Jens could play a round. We watch him play against Yani Tseng and Se Ri Pak who is two awesome female golfers. They owned him, and at the last hole Se Ri Pak finished with a lovely hole in one. Jens was in a pretty bad mood for hours after the match, and wasn’t happy before we went in to this cafe.

The field where Jens played golf

After all this boring events we went to an Ice Hockey match at Scotiabank Place. We watched Ottawa Senators vs. Toronto Maple Leafs. Every seat was taken, and the sound level was incredibley loud. I have only seen NHL matches one the television, and couldn’t even imagine the atmosphere around the matches. People was shouting and crying. And some was even angry and some happy. At least Ottawa Senators won, and most of the people walking out of the arena afterwards were happy. This was a wonderful experience, and I would really like to go back for even more.

Inside Scotiabank Place, right befor the match starts

Now we are sitting here at the cafe. Jens and Anders is worn out, and so am I. We are going to Toronto tomorrow, and I’m already excited. Who knows what we will see there. I really looks forward to visit the Hockey Hall of Fame, but now we are going to rent a room at the hotel nearby.

Us before we enters the cafe

Benjamin Aune Brekken

Maple Facts - Geography and Climate

Canada is located north of the USA and is the second biggest country in the world, behind Russia. The country is divided into seven different regions, with different climate and topography. In the Northern part of the country, there are mostly subarctic climate which make it hard for vegetation to grow. Subarctic climate has cold and long winters, but short and warm summers. There are also arctic climate in the northern parts of the country, and gives the area very cold and long winters, and short cold summers. Only 12 % of Canada is arable, which makes Canada bad for agriculture. Even though the big amount of rain in the summer, makes these 12% of Canada good for agriculture.                                                             

                                                                                                                                                

Because of Canada’s though climate, most of the people have chosen to live in the southern part of Canada. The biggest cities in Canada are located here, and some of them are Toronto, Vancouver, Montréal and Ottawa. Ottawa is the capital of Canada, and is also the biggest country, with the highest population. Canada has a lot of untouched nature, which makes Canada a beautiful country. There are many organizations who work to keep the nature untouched. One of these organizations is Nature Canada, which is trying to protect the nature and the natural processes in the nature.

                                                               

                                                         Canadas beautiful nature

                                        

Sources

http://no.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canadas_geografi

http://nn.wikipedia.org/wiki/Klima_i_Canada

http://www.snl.no/Canada/natur

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_of_Alaska

http://nn.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subarktisk_klima

Maple Facts - Toronto

Toronto is the biggest city in Canada, and is often mistaken for being the capitol of Canada, even though it is Ottawa. This is most likely due to Toronto’s population and popularity. With Toronto’s population of over 2.500.000, it is the city with the highest population.  Toronto is located very close to the American border, on Canada’s “arm” as seen on the map. In 2002 a newspaper called “The Economist” listed Toronto the number fourth best city to live in, due to their low crime rate, good environment and a high standard of living.

There are many reasons to visit Toronto.  One of them is the CN Tower which is a 553 meters high building. It took 26 months to build the CN Tower and it was opened on June 26, 2006. The tower is a symbol of Canadian industrial achievement. The Royal Ontario Museum is also a reason to visit Toronto. In this museum you can explore the natural world and human cultures past. Toronto Zoo is a huge Zoo with over 5000 animals. It was opened in August 1974.

   The CN Tower in Toronto.  

Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto.

A map over Toronto Zoo.

Toronto is also well known for sports. In Toronto you can watch ice hockey, baseball, basketball, football and soccer. Toronto Maple Leafs is the hockey team of Toronto. They play in the Northeast Division of Eastern Conference of NHL. Toronto is also served as the home to the Hockey Hall of Fame.

 A play at Toronto's NHL team Toronto Maple Leafs

Sources

http://www.trueknowledge.com/q/population_of_toronto_2010

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toronto

http://gocanada.about.com/od/thebestofcanada/tp/best_places_to_go.htm

http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimania_2009/Bids/Toronto

http://www.canada.com/topics/travel/story.html?id=057d78dc-4964-422f-ba85-361425ea8126&k=3499

http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.com/index.cfm?PgNm=TCE&Params=A1ARTA0006988

http://www.toronto-travel-guide.com/toronto-zoo.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toronto_Maple_Leafs

http://images.travelpod.com/tripwow/photos/ta-0099-1a76-df2a/the-nc-tower-lit-up-toronto-canada+1152_12735139340-tpfil02aw-1134.jpg

http://photos.igougo.com/images/p296772-Toronto_ON-The_Royal_Ontario_Museum.jpg

http://s3.amazonaws.com/bzzagent-bzzscapes-prod/toronto-zoo-map-lrg.png

http://nicolesharlene.files.wordpress.com/2010/04/toronto-maple-leafs.jpg

Maple facts - Religion in Canada

Canada is a multi-cultural country, and this is shown by the multiple religions practiced there.

A survey done in 2001 showed that 77 % of the Canadian population are Christians, and 16 % are non-religious. The most of the Christians are Roman-Catholics (around 45 %), and the rest is generally a part of the Protestant Christianity. There are also other religions practiced in Canada like; Islam, Judaism, Buddhism and Hinduism. However, these religions are not very widespread in Canada, and compared to the Canadian Christianity, they are not practiced by as many.

Canada is a country with acceptance for different religions. There is no official religion in Canada, and it’s important for the Canadian politics culture that every religion is equally treated. This is the reason for the many religions appearance in Canada.

For some time ago, the Christianity was central and took place in the everyday of most Canadians, because the Christianity was integral in the Canadian society, but this has now changed. Today Canada can be considered as a secular country. Maybe most Christians don’t go to church as often as they did before, but they still consider themselves as Christians.

Sources:
http://atlas.nrcan.gc.ca/auth/english/maps/peopleandsociety/religion
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion_in_Canada
http://www.snl.no/Canada/religion

My diary - Even

Hey!

What’s up our lovely followers? I’ll tell you what’s up here. Nothing! Absolutely nothing. The other guys have hit the sheets, but I’m not that tired. I should be although. Because after we landed in Canada we have seen and done so much. Nevertheless, I can’t fall asleep. So I’m going to write a little diary for you, about our first day in Canada.

The whole experience started quite badly. The trip over to Vancouver went fine, but when we went to pick up our luggage things started to go more badly. You guest it. We had lost our four bags. We immediately confronted the staff at Vancouver airport, but it was no good. They promised us to track the luggage, but for now we had to live without them. I tried to keep the spirit up, but that is a tall order when you are traveling with Jens, Anders and Benjamin. Jens got so mad he kicked a lamppost on the way out. Witch leaded to even more misery for him, and his right big toe. We found a taxi and headed of to the hotel.

- We became very disappointed 

Even the hotel wasn’t good enough. Anders comes from a rich and wealthy family, and is clearly not used to sleeping on hotels with a bit lower quality. Nevertheless, Benjamin and I convinced him to give it a shot. And based on the fact that we were only going to use the room for getting some rest, he took the “chance”.

One of our hotel rooms

Since Vancouver is one of my favorite cities in the whole wide world, I quickly took responsibility for the day. And the boys respected me for that. To a certain level at least. As you may remember, Vancouver hosted the Winter Olympics earlier this year. And I was nearly going, but that was not my destiny. So I ended up in front of the TV as everyone, instead of being there and feel the action. I was so disappointed, but this time I was determined to at least see the stadium and location were it was hosted. Nothing could stop me. Not even my traveling accompany.

I wanted so badly to see Northug live

So we got ourselves a cab and headed for the Olympic stadium. During the ride all three of my fellow companions complained about the fact that they hadn’t chanced clothes.  I wanted to disagree with them and give them a mouthful, but I agreed with the three boys. Yesterday had been rough, with a long preparation before this trip. I could use a shower and a new boxer.

The conversation quickly switched over to a more comfortable theme. We discussed what the rest of the journey would bring. Benjamin was excited about going to Ottawa. It wasn’t a must for me, but he wanted it so bad. Jens and Anders only talked about a famous gamer from Canada. Time flue by, and before we knew it, the Olympic stadium was right up in our faces. The stadium and the locations were amazing. And I guess the guys were happy after all.

The guys and I in front of the Olympic statue

We ended the day at “George and Coffee”. And we agreed upon that it was one of the tackiest names for a coffee shop ever. After a good laugh we set on discussing how Vancouver had been, and luckily the boys had enjoyed the stay.

George and Coffee

  

Even Jordet Bruheim

Maple Facts - Canadian Flag

Canada’s Flag is probably one of the most recognizably flags in the whole world.  It is called the Maple Leaf, because of the big maple leaf in the center of the flag. This leaf is there to represent and symbolize the nature in Canada. The leaf has eleven edges, and someone thinks it is because of the 10 provinces in Canada plus one for the territories, but no. They found out that a leaf with eleven edges is the least blurry during strong wind. Therefore, eleven edges. 

 - The maple leaf

The flag is separated in to three squares. The two squares to the sides are red and the center square is white. The leaf is also red and is placed inside the white square. The squares and the leaf are red and white because George V ratified those colors to be the national colors of Canada. Red for the St. George’s cross, and white for the French royal emblem. The Canadian flag was first used in 1965. February the 15 to be more precise. This date is also celebrated annually as National Flag Of Canada Day.

Sources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_of_Canada

+ all the links at the bottom of the Wikipedia website.

Maple facts - Justin Bieber

Justin Drew Bieber is a 16 years old male Pop/R&B singer. He was born March 1, 1994 in Stratford, Ontario, Canada. Bieber was discovered by Scooter Braun trough the video website Youtube. Braun helped Bieber to get an audition with R&B star Usher. Braun is now Bieber’s manger.

Justin young, and newly discovered


His first single was “One Time” with Usher and was released in 2009. This video is now viewed around 186 000 000 times on Youtube. And his first album “My World” was released November 17, 2009. He sold over 1 000 000 copies of this album, and became a teenager star in no time. His single “Baby” with Ludacris is now the most viewed video uploaded on Youtube, and has around 366 000 000 views. His second album “My World 2.0” came out March 23, 2010, and a few weeks later a combination of his albums came out, titled “My Worlds”.

Justin and Usher


Justin Bieber also has a look that someone loves and other hates. His hair style is kind of a signature, and he really likes to wear purple clothes. He is a musical gifted artist and knows how to play the guitar, keyboard and drums.

Justin dressed in his favorite color

Sources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Justin_Bieber
http://www.billboard.com/#/news/usher-introduces-teen-singer-justin-bieber-1003966989.story
http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,20350064,00.html?xid=rss-music-reviews-My+World+2.0
http://www.billboard.com/news/justin-bieber-the-billboard-cover-story-1004074692.story#/news/justin-bieber-the-billboard-cover-story-1004074692.story
http://www.allmusic.com/artist/justin-bieber-p1152032/biography
http://www.billboard.com/artist/justin-bieber/bio/1099520#/artist/justin-bieber/bio/1099520
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm3595501/bio
http://www.youtube.com/user/JustinBieberVEVO#p/u/6/kffacxfA7G4
http://www.youtube.com/user/JustinBieberVEVO#p/u/9/CHVhwcOg6y8
http://www.youtube.com/charts/videos_views?t=a

Questions?

Hey!

Some of you have asked us some questions, and we have decided to make a question round.
So if you are wondering about something, make a question for us.
Post the questions as a comment for this post.

The maple syrup guys are PEACE!

Our first post!

Hey!

What's up our lovely followers? This is the first post on our blog. We're a group of 4, containing Anders, Even, Benjamin and Jens. Right now we're at the airport, and I'm looking at Anders who is determined to get a free cup of coffee from the Narvesen shop, but it doesn't seems like he's going to get that. I(Jens), Even and Benjamin are just laughing at him for being so pathetic. Haha! We're enjoying our last meal in Norway for quite a while also. We got no plans for this journey, it's all just improvising. All we know is that we'll be heading to Canada. We will do our best to upload loads of both fascinating facts and enjoyable experiences in and about Canada. We promise you will see a lot from us in the future, on this blog. See you later; we have to catch our plane. It leaves in 15 minutes, so we're in a bit of hurry!

This is us at the airport. From the left:
Even, Benjamin, Jens and Anders.



 Here is Anders trying to get a free coffee. The queue was long! --------------------------->



 

What do you, our lovely followers, think about Canada? Leave a comment.

(By the way, Jan Terje, this is not Jens' individual post)


The maple syrup guys are PEACE!