Oslo

Oslo is the capital city of Norway, and has in excess of 480,000 inhabitants. About 20% of the country's population (850,000) live in Greater Oslo. It's area covers 454 km2 (175 sq miles).

Statistically speaking, Oslo is Scandinavia's sunniest capital.

Oslo city's reference point is 59deg.55"N 10deg.45"E.

Oslo is the closest Norway gets to having a metropol.
Of course, the connection to the rest of the world is a bit lagged, so everyting that people belive to be cool comes here a year later.
Despite fashion, which is overestimated anyway, Oslo is a rather cool city. Here you can participate in all metropolitan hobbies such as grafitti, sitting at street-walk cafes, looking dumb, you can go shopping in over-priced stores, and you can get killed in trafic.

Among sights worth to see in Oslo are:

Grünerløkka, an old part of the city which used to be the working-class neighbourhood

Grønland, which is the imigrant part of town. (We don't have real ghettoes in Norway.)

Nationalgalleriet, a gallery devoted to national art. Some of the things here are really cool as a matter of fact

The subway system, called "T-bane" in norwegian. Here you can encounter all sorts of people, and riding the subway for a few hours gives you a good idea about the common man in Oslo.

Karl Johan, the main street of Oslo. Actually, there's nothing cool about the street, but you find quite alot of shops here, and there's quite alot of people here at all times.

Stortinget. This is the norwegian congress, I'd guess. The architecture is mid-18th century style, and there's quite alot of history here. Also nice if you are interested in the norwegian idea of parliamentarism.

Holmekollen, which is a great wievingpoint the city. You can also find the arena for the olympic games in 1952 here.

Fornebu. Previously main airport of Norway, now abandoned airport used for several things, such as concerts in the hangars, Big Brother, movie-sets in the terminal-building, where they shoot crappy norvegian films and a few comercials, and other things.

There are several other things worth seing here, but the most importaint thing is the people, if you get to know them.

More sights worth seeing, things worth doing in Oslo:

• The Astrup Fearnley Museum of contemporary art.
• The Munch Museum. Lively up your vacation with angst Edvard Munch style. Don't go here to see The Scream, it is in the Nasjonalgalleriet.
• Pubs and clubs:
  • Zoo Lounge. Redecorated by a new artist every sixth week. Supposedly a unique consept on an european scale. Nice place to drink coffee anyhow.
  • Mono, Blitz, Patagonia. Alternative hangouts.
  • Skansen, Head On, Jazid. Clubbing.
  • So What. Goth flesh market.
  • Blå. Norways most important scene for jazz at the moment.
• The great outdoors:
  • Frognerparken. Home of the Monolith, Norways cultural pride.
  • The park surrounding the Kings Castle. Wonderful place to sit in the grass and drink a cup of take away coffee.
  • The isles. Cheap transportation by boat provided by Oslo. See cute little bunnies at Gressholmen or ruins at Hovedøya. Or just go there to drink beer and swim.
  • Nordmarka/Østmarka. Large forest areas outside town. Clean air and beautiful scenery 15 minutes by train and a 15 minutes walk from the city centre.
• Blindern (The University of Oslo). Go there and get someone to bring you to one of the students pubs. Only way to drink beer without getting ripped off in Oslo.

That's about all there is to it, I guess.

Some more things to enjoy in Oslo:

• The museums of the Bogdoy peninsula: take a ferry from the terminal in front of the Radhus, and go see the Viking ship museum and the Fram museum. Fram is the ship used in Acrtic explorations by Nansen and Amundsen. (Bogdoy should have those 'o's with the stroke through them, but I don't know how to do that here.)
• Vigelandsparken -- a sculpture park just out of town (tram number 15). This is a collection of sculptures by Norway's most famous sculptor, and well worth the trek. And you get a nice walk in the park too. And did I mention it was free?

Also, you can see The Scream at the Munch museum. There are actually a lot of versions of this, and I think this one is better than the one at the National gallery.

Also, enjoy an evening stroll in the gardens down Karl Johans gate -- but take a small handgun for the inevitable piano-accordianists!

Also, .... um ... no, that's about it really. Oh, there's a supermarket on Grensen (and elsewhere) where you can buy food for a picnic. The restaurants will kill you (or at least your wallet). Actually, two I found that were OK were Mona Lisa on Grensen (your basic Italian food), and Sjakk Matt on Hakon VII's gate (also Italian, but more hip).

A nightclub in Austin, Texas. Located at the corner of 6th and Lavaca at a location previously occupied by District Bar and Grill. Opened sometime in late November or early December 2003. The design style is reminiscent of stark postmodernist Sweden. Lot's of white and metal. Normally, that kind of style is a bit too cold for my personal taste, but here, at least when filled with the glitterati, it works.

There are 3 sections, a main bar in front with some seating for the see-and-be-seen set, a back section with a fairly small dance floor (and yet another bar) and a central section which feels a bit...lacking in inspiration...but probably just serves to separate the main bar from the "dancing area".

The clientele mostly consists of people who are more worried about what you look like than anything that goes on behind your eyes. For instance, I walked into the bathroom and immediately heard, "I never kid about pussy!" Whatever the hell that means. My friend said that the main conversation in the women's bathroom was about their boob jobs. However, the energy is not as predatory as many clubs in town.

The music on the dance floor is a mix of hip hop and trance. The hip hop portions go a bit long, but the trance is good epic trance which has been missing in Austin since most of the good electronica clubs have closed (edit: Sky Lounge has reopened) and there hasn't been a decent rave to speak of in these parts in years.

Drinks are expensive and poured weak, but there's no cover so I guess if you were a teetotaler this would work for you.

Overall: one of the few places in town where you can hear decent electronica if you can deal with the hip-hop sets. I predict it will be gone in a year whenever something newer and flashier becomes the trendy place to go.