This is the blog of a Norwegian (Marianne, aka 'M') who moved to Australia in 2007 to be with Roger (aka R) and feels lucky to have escaped a comparatively communistic country with ridiculous weather!

Why you should never get a puppy from a pet store. Read this.

I have been saying for months that if pet stores are going to sell puppies and kittens, they should be getting them from the RSPCA, and they should ALL be microchipped and spayed/neutered. People should also be made to fill out a questionnaire to make sure they are suited to be pet owners.

Don't buy puppies at pet stores. Go to the RSPCA and adopt one that needs a good home, or go to a professional breeder.

In an article I read today, it says:

"Central to the Kyoto accounting systems is the idea that forests are a net sink for greenhouse gases because trees store carbon dioxide, while factories and cars, for example, are a source of greenhouse gases because they generate carbon dioxide. 

But the new research shows that while trees store carbon dioxide, they emit methane and methane is about 20 times more potent as a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide. 

So forests may in fact be a source of greenhouse gases."

So you could basically say 'help save the environment, cut down a tree'.

Alright, seriously, any methane gas emitted by forests will be a natural part of the earth's eco system.

Read the article.

A couple of nights ago I finally bought the fighting fish/betta I have wanted for the last 2 months. It's moved into my snail tank, which is about 15 litres, and fully equipped with heater and filter. I don't believe in keeping bettas in the microscopic bowls they are kept in at pet stores, and which they sell there for people to keep them in. I think that's a disgusting way to keep fish.

Anyway, he's a very kewl fish. He's a red CT, with blue irridescence on his body, and the tips of his tail are black.

I got him from one of the better pet stores, which keep their bettas in container with about 500 ml of water and even some gravel in the bottom. Most pet stores keep them in tiny see-through drinkings cups with about 100 ml of water where they can't even turn around. It was tempting to 'rescue' one of those, but that would also mean I would be supporting the store. So I decided to support a store that keeps them in slightly bigger containers.

Here he is (click for bigger version):

Mug shot:

And another closeup:

It's much easier to take photos of than my other fish. He'll swim for a bit, then stop and sit still for a bit, then swim some more. My other fish never stop moving.

I have lived in Australia for almost a year. Hard to believe eh? I entered the country on a one year visa, which means it's time to go through the whole visa thing again.

We've contacted an immigration company who are handling it all for us. It costs more, but then we also know everything is done correctly, and we don't risk the application being denied because of some silly mistake. There are still a few things we need to take care of ourselves tho.

We are applying for a de facto spouse visa, which means we have to prove that we are a genuine couple, and not just claiming to be so I can stay in Australia. So while AIS is handling the application, we have to provide all the proof.

That includes getting 3 statutory declarations from people who know us, where they say that we are in fact a real couple. We also have to gather old receipts and boarding passes from the trips we've been on together, bank statements showing how we support each other financially, utility bills addressed to both of us, old letters and emails we've sent to each other, photos of us together and we've also written and signed our love story (where we first met and how our relationshop progressed from there).

But not only do they have to make sure it's a genuine relationship, they also wanna know that I'm worthy of becoming a permanent resident in Australia. That means I have to have a full medical, HIV test and chest x-ray, and also get a police clearance.

The police clearance almost became a problem. Around mid March I called the police in Oslo to ask how long they needed to process it and send it to me, and the woman I talked to was particularly unhelpful. I explained that I needed it early in April at the very latest because of my visa application and asked very nicely if that would be at all possible. The woman said they need at least 2 or 3 weeks to process it. I then said 'but I really really need it sooner.. ' to which she replied 'well you have a problem then'.

That kinda freaked me out a bit, but then I got a very clever idea. I thought I'd call the police in Ålesund, my home town, to see if they would be able to do it quicker, being a smaller town and all. And sure enough, they were extremely helpful, and when I said what it was for and when I needed it, they said they would process it as soon as they got the application from me, and have it sent as soon as possible. Which they did. It arrived here a few days ago.

And the police in Oslo would've needed 2 or 3 weeks to look me up in their computer, put down that I have no criminal record, and stick it in the mail box o_O

So most of it is taken care of now. The only thing left to do is to go through the medical stuff. I have the x-ray tomorrow, and the HIV-test and the full medical early nexy week. Oh what fun. I insisted on getting a female doctor to do the medical. There is no way I'm letting some guy see me mostly naked and grope various parts of my body. (I don't believe that males lose interest in young naked females just because they are doctors. Being a doctor is a job, not a lifestyle.)

And the very last thing we do is go for the interview with the immigration people. That will prolly take place a day or two before I have to leave the country, which is April 21st, and hopefully they will approve it.

We have been calling Odo a pain and a terror for months. He bullies Thomas, and will regularly attempt to rape Beanie.

He doesn't feel pain. Being slapped on the butt is his idea of a cuddle. He's not scared of anything. He will go to the door and greet visitors. We can vacuum 1 metre from him and he won't even wake up from his nap.

The first 3 months I lived here he didn't care what I did. Whenever he was about to do something wrong I could yell all I wanted and he would ignore me. I had to call to Roger 'stop Odo' and Roger would yell at him and he would stop what he was doing.

We have to keep all the windows locked. If we don't, he will open them, and then push right through the flyscreen to get out. Any cardboard box will be reduced to hundreds of tiny pieces within a day or two.

Our neighbour came to our house today and said he wanted to talk to us about Odo. Apparently, Odo has been going in to our neighbours house through the dog door, and has been knocking things off the shelves, as well as clawing and tearing the flyscreen on the windows.

The little terrorist.

Odo in his favourite spot - R's in tray.

As R and I started on our walk today:

R: I don't feel like walking.
Me: Why not?
R: I have more important things to do.
Me: More important than staying healthy?
R: Yeah, why would I wanna stay healthy?
Me: You'll live longer.
R: But, is the time I gain greater than the time I have to spend gaining it?

Good question.

It has been snowing in England yesterday and today. England hardly ever gets snow in winter, and now it's snowing heavily in mid April. Something is obviously not right.

Don't often see this in England:

Photo from fotothing.com

I find it rather fascinating that on about half the shows on tv, the women will be showing heaps of skin and cleavage, while the men will be fully clothed.

So here's a whole generation of women going on about wanting to be equals and treated with respect, and at the same time dressing in a way which is basically telling men 'here are my breasts, please look at them and make me a sex object'.

It's like there's something not connecting in women's brains. You can't have half your breasts hanging out of your top and then get upset when men perv at you.

To women, breasts are lumps of fat. To men, breasts are everything.

If you wanna be treated as an equal, behave like an equal, and not like something to be used for men's pleasure.

I have now finished preparing all my visa stuff. I had the medical today and the application is signed, and now it's just a waiting game. Can take up to 6 months apparently. My current visa expires on April 21, so from then until the visa application is approved I'm on a bridging visa. With no work rights.

Anyway, I had my medical today. Roger has a friend who went through the whole visa thing a while ago, so he asked her what would happen at the medical. She said she got a male doctor, and he did a breast exam, making her take her top and bra off, and then proceeded to fondle her breasts, disguised as poking and squeezing to see if there were any "lumps" and a pap smear.

Because of that, I made sure I got a female doctor. (I don't know why women think that men lose interest in young, naked, female bodies as soon as they finish their education to become a doctor. I certainly don't. That's why I make sure I only see female doctors.)

I mentally prepared myself to be violated and groped, being slightly comforted that it would be by a woman. She did the basic tests - blood pressure, heart, lungs, reflexes, eyes, ears and balance. I then expected the more advanced stuff. But nope, she informed me that she had finished and would just fill out some paperwork. A pleasant surprise. I didn't even have to take my top off! Total time : about 10 mins.

So it's quite obvious to me that the male doctor who examined Roger's friend took advantage of his position, seeing as there was no need to do a breast exam for a visa application. That's what being a male doctor is - a licence to molest women.

Women need to be educated, or males will continue to abuse their position in this way, pretending they "need" to examine their breasts. if your male doctor says he needs to, just refuse and ask for a mamogram. At least in Australia, I can go to any doctor I want, whenever I want, instead of being "assigned" one, as is the case in Norway .

Today it has been one year since I arrived in Australia. It has been fun, I love Australia and I even got homesick when I was in Norway for Christmas:) I've been told by several people that they can't detect any accent, and I'm quite proud of how well I'm adapting to a completely different culture.

I am also 4 kg heavier than I was when I arrived. Not quite so proud of that. I blame Australia. Everywhere I go there's some chocolate or food that I've never tried before and I just have to try it. Eating out is also very cheap here, which means we do it at least once a week. In Norway I would never ever eat out, except for having a drink at a café with my mum two or three times a year.

It's quite an achievement for me to put on weight actually. Since I was 14 my weight has been carved in stone at 56 kg. Even when I drank coke and ate chocolate every day, and later on when I went to the gym 5 days a week for a year, my weight never changed.

So I'm not entirely sure whether Australia can be blamed. I might just be getting old and my metabolism is slowing down. But I don't like it and I have put myself on a diet. I refuse to be above 60 kg.

I have realised that mollies and swordtails breed like rabbits, and they are just about the most commonly kept fish, which means they are difficult to get rid of. There's no hope of selling them, you are lucky to be able to give them away. I guess you can say they are like kittens. Except the mum gives birth to 20 of them once a month.

So I have decided I cannot be bothered with the hassle of rehoming hundreds of fish babies every year, and I am giving away the adults, along with the molly babies. I am keeping the male swordtail. I have a swordtail baby which is about a week old, so it's too young to be rehomed. Hopefully it will turn out to be a male, because then there is no problem.

I posted an ad in 3 different aquarium forums a few days ago. Yesterday I got an email from a woman who wants both swordtails. Today I got an email from a guy who wants ALL of the mollies. All 11 of them. Lucky me, I thought.

I had just arranged for all of them to be picked up on Friday. Then I looked in my tank and found two tiny fish babies. My molly has given birth... again. Cuz she couldn't just hold them in until Friday evening. Noooo, she had to go and give birth.

I have only found three, so I'm hoping that's all there is, and I just asked the person who's picking them up if he would like some newborn fry in addition to his 11 mollies. If not, I'll have to keep them around for about 6 weeks until they are big enough to be rehomed seperately.

Yesterday I stumbled across a couple of blog entries about how sensitive some parents are. Especially in forums. If you say anything about how you like to raise your kids, everyone who does it differently will have a little fit because they think you are saying they are bad parents for not doing it the same way. Which is ridiculous.

R and I don't like kids so the natural choice for us is to not have kids. Having kids is also the worst thing you can do to the environment, so it works out quite well for the environmentalists in us too.

But we can't tell people that. We know people who have kids, and we can tell them we're not planning on having kids, but we avoid telling them why, because for some reason it offends them. They think that because we think having kids would be inconvenient for us and bad for the environment, we are telling them they have made a bad choice in having kids. We don't understand why people would choose to have kids, that's true, but it's up to them what they do with their lives. We don't care.

When we wrote our love story for the visa application, we were told to include our plans for the future. So we wrote that we plan on avoiding having kids because it's bad for the environment. And then we were told we shouldn't write that, because the immigration person doing the interview might have 6 kids and it might offend him/her. So our story had to be edited.

Why does it offend people so much? I don't get it. It's like they're saying 'everyone has to have kids, and everyone has to think it's a great idea to have kids'. If anyone feels differently then people with kids get offended. It's like they are so insecure about their choice to have kids that they can't handle anyone questioning it.

It's weird. We've had people with kids over for a visit, and the cats cuddled up to them and were being all cute and adorable, and our visitors looked disgusted and told us they don't like cats. I don't understand how anyone could not like cats, but I accept that some people don't. I don't feel that my choice to keep cats is being criticised and even if it was I wouldn't care. I like cats so I choose to have cats, other people don't like them so they choose not to. Simple as that.

And it's kinda funny, because when people don't like cats I keep my cats away from them. It's the respectful thing to do. Yet people with kids insist that you hold their baby, play with their kids and make you sit through boring kid stories. I don't particularly enjoy the smell of kids, nor do I enjoy being dribbled on, but if I ask them to keep their kids away from me they'll prolly hate me and never invite me back.

Well, I figure if people can tell me they don't like my kids, then I can tell them I don't like theirs. And that's what I'll be doing from now on.

I have recently participated in a discussion about opening hours in a Norwegian forum. The discussion is about letting all stores stay open 24/7 if they want to. People seem to get strangely passionate about this...

In Norway there's a set number of hours in which a store can be open. To stay open longer it has to fulfill certain requirements - such as being under a certain size - and they have to apply for permission to keep their stores open. Shopping centres usually close at 8 pm Monday to Friday, 6 pm on Saturday and are closed on Sundays. Grocery stores are usually open to 9 or 11 pm Monday to Friday, 8 or 9 on Saturday and closed on Sundays. All stores have to be closed on Sundays, except service stations and kiosks/newsagencies.

The reason for being closed on Sundays is because Norway claims to be a Christian country, as such everyone has to rest on the 7th day.

Most of the people in the forum seem to think it would be a total disaster for these rules to be changed. Their argument is basically 'this is the way it's always been, it's always worked, there's no reason to change it' and 'as long as we are a Christian country we should get Sundays off' and 'people will never have any time off, they'll have to work every evening/night and never get to spend time with their families'.

Just because something has always worked, means it should never ever be changed? Norwegians are so scared of change. How is society every supposed to improve and evolve?

And employees never get to spend time with their families? Such a communist attitude. 'People can't be trusted to manage their own lives'. Most people are capable of taking care of themselves, and the people who would work in the evenings and nights would be students and young single people. They would the thrilled to get some extra income, and they don't have any responsibilites that would stop them from being able to work. If they don't wanna work nights, then they can just get a different job. Jobs are not difficult to come by in Norway, most people are just too picky.

Why do people even care if opening hours are changed? It doesn't affect them. If they don't wanna do shopping at night, then they don't have to. No one is going to force them. It will however benefit people who work shifts at unusual hours. It will make their lives easier and give them more choice in when they go shopping, instead of them having to do it on their one day off when they can actually get to a store in its normal opening hours.

How is it fair that the Norwegian government is restricting how much money your business can make? That's what they are doing in forcing stores to stay closed on Sundays. Most people get weekends off, meaning that's when they have the energy to go shopping. The government is taking away half of that time, where the businesses could be making heaps of money.

And Norwegians are being very unrealistic about this as well. They think removing opening hour restrictions means that ALL stores will choose to be open ALL the time. It doesn't.

Here in Australia there are no restrictions. Stores can stay open however long they want. But they don't. All stores close at 5 every day, except Thursday when they are all open to 9. Grocery stores and Bunnings (hardware store) are open to 9 every night. They don't stay open later than that because it's not profitable.

And that's what it's all about for stores. They wanna make a profit. They don't wanna be open 24/7 for people's convenience, they will only do it if they're making money. That's also why on weekends when we are at the shopping centre we see stores starting to close at 4, even tho the shopping centre is open to 5. They're not getting enough customers, so instead of wasting time and money, they close early.

While in Norway stores will stay open until whatever time it says on their door. It doesn't matter if there are NO customers. They HAVE to stay open just for the sake of staying open. Obviously it would be in the best interest of the business to make as much money as possible, which they are not when they are paying to keep their store open but have no customers.

It's like Norwegians are completely religious about their opening hours.

Australian kids fascinate me. In Europe, people call their kids 'love', 'sweetie', 'honey' and so on along those lines. When a kid falls over it will scream, usually for sympathy more than pain, and the parents will run to its rescue and give it a big cuddle, reinforcing the behaviour.

Aussie kids are different. They are not babied, because if you're a whinger you'll be looked down upon in Australia. Parents call their kids 'mate' and when a kid falls over the parents will say 'brush it off, mate'. And the kid will get up, brush it off and continue with what it was doing - without shedding a single tear. If the kid does cry, the parents will look it over and then go 'stop whinging, you're not hurt!'

Like the other day when we were going for a walk, we saw this 4 year old boy riding his pushbike a bit too fast downhill. As he attempted to slow down, he fell over, and it looked like he hurt both his knees and his hands, and he almost smashed his face on the footpath. Being European, I expected a good scream. But no, the kid got up and was having a good laugh about it! And the parents who were following about 20 metres behind didn't run over or anything, they just continued at their normal pace and expected him to be ok.

I like it. I've never liked that kids are treated like babies.

What's with newsreaders always pointing out how many kids people have? Such as 'this guy killed a mother of two' and 'this father of four died'. Why not say 'this guy killed a woman' and 'this guy died'?

Is a person's value determined by how many kids they have? And the rest of us who don't have kids are just expendable?

I don't have kids, but I'd still be missed by a lot of people. If I get murdered, I'd like them to say 'companion of 2 cats'.

I have been reading a very interesting book called 'Raw energy' which is written by Leslie and Susannah Kenton. Their theory is that eating a diet consisting of 75-100% raw fruit and veggies will makes us less prone to diseases such as the common cold, flu, diabetes and cancer among others. In some cases people with diabetes, cancer, migraines, arthritis etc have changed to and all raw diet and been cured.

The idea is basically that any processed food - including cooked/fried food - causes a degenerative process in the body which accumulates over the years. That explains why young people can eat all the junk they want and still be relatively healthy, while as you get older you have to eat more healthy food to stay as healthy as you used to be on a junk food diet.

Here's what the book says about cancer:

I'd like to quote the whole book, but I think it might be a bit long...

Any cooked food is bad for you. If you cook your veggies before you eat them, they are useless and bad for you. The book gives an example of this: There was a nutritionist who took an interest in this all raw diet and decided to give it a try. He and his wife, who was breastfeeding at the time, ate nothing but raw food for 3 months, and reported feeling much better and more energised. They then ate the exact same food, but cooked it all first. They got so ill they had to abandon the experiment.

I think there's something to it. Popular belief has it that humans are omnivores, like dogs. I disagree. Have a look at your dogs teeth, then have a look at your own. Not very similar are they? Now compare your teeth to those of a horse or cow. Yeah, humans are herbivores.

I figure it's in my best interest to avoid getting cancer and living for as long as possible, so I have decided to give this diet a go. I'm not doing 100% raw, because I enjoy my chocolate too much, but most of my diet is now raw fruit and veggies.

I've had what resembles irritable bowel syndrome for the last 5 years. It doesn't bother me, I'm used to it. But after one day of eating mostly veggies and fruit, there was an instant improvement. The first day I had a mandarin and yogurt for breakfast, apricot snack for lunch, and my own salad for dinner which consisted of broccoli, cauliflower, lettuce, peas, corn, 4 kinds of beans, pasta, LSA and salad dressing. I also had a chocolate bar in the evening, and I drank berry juice and water.

I'm also making sure R eats pretty much the same food. Because it's been known to cure migraine, I've told him if his cluster headaches ever come back, he will eat nothing but raw food to see if shortens the cycle.

This book is a must read for everyone who cares about staying healthy and live a long life. Meaning everyone.