Money, money, money...

The Internet has changed our world irreversibly. There is no such field of life that would remain not influenced by this revelation. Politics, religion, education... And economy.

Nowadays, economy is based on exchanging information. Companies either have to adapt new rules or simply close down, especially when considering marketing or media. The Internet is a magical device that turns its user from consumer to participant. Of course it threatens some (i.e. how to know the value of an intelectual product, when it can get easily lost in trash?), but at the same time it gives an opportunity to people and organisations outstanding in their field.

There are ups and downs in every kind of work

(source: www.trabajemos.cl/ )

In the era of YouTube, and blogs and free access to social media (some time ago I presented the most popular options) it shouldn't surprise anyone that to some the Internet is a source of income.
I don't mean here clicking on adverts (not really worth trying...). You can earn money by doing what you like to do. Theoretically, the easiest way is writng commissioned texts or publishing reviews on your page. Also selling products on the web is a good possibility, because you don't need many employees or room for a display. Succesful web entertainers and most popular bloggers can even take part in an advertising campaigns, not to mention salaries from YouTube Partner Program...

However, working online is still working and after all requires creativity and systemacity. You won't get a fortune after a  week, so if you're not patient and your only goal is to get rich, I advice you: don't waste your time on things you don't enjoy. And don't believe in every thing you read - you cannot make money by doing nothing, unless you're Paris Hilton.

Whether one uses the Internet to make money or not, its influence on our society and culture as well is undeniable. Whilst discussing any matter connected with socio-cultural aspects it is simply impossible to avoid the topic of ICTs, especially when it comes to three most powerful things in human life: power, love and money.

Here are some useful links referring to this topic. Enjoy!

Five ways to make money on the internet
Why You Can't Make Money Blogging

Regards,

Agata

Update

I feel it's time for a small update! There are some photos I'd like to show. Not much talking.

Sometimes it's good to take a walk with Gosia and her camera... 

I can pretend I'm a photographer! 

It has been raining a lot lately. I think rainbow is one of not many advantages of this. Guess whose hus is this! 

Outline of the mountains looks stunning against the setting sun. I wish I could say I was sitting on a beach then, but it was just rocky shore...

That is what you can get during Norwegian classes with Claude - traditional Norwegian cake, Kvæfjordkaka. Delicious! I love experiential learning!

 Women's Day is international and deserves a party, even if you live in Nesna :)

And just a small comparison of view from my window: the state that I got used to and how it has changed recently. I liked previous weather conditions, without the rain and fog...

And that's it! I like to expatiate, but from time to time it's good to post pictures instead of wide description, even I know that. 

Regards,

Agata

Let's use our freedom!

In order to create this post I had to spend quite a lot of time digging the depths of the Internet. I want to write about our reality as it is. 

But first, what our reality is like? We are an information society, the Internet is a determinant of our era, technology defines our lives. Nowadays everyone (at least in theory...) has the right to share freely their opinion with the world through the Internet. There are different ways to do that: Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, those are the most common platforms. However, there are tons of others and one is free to choose where to write, how to share things or what to read. 

There's so many possibilities one can simply get lost

(source: www.wix.com)

There are many means of connecting with world: all you need is an idea! Here are some examples of interesting ways of using the Internet for spreading innovative concepts.

Tumblr:  I recommend an interesting blog Novel First Sentences, where someone posted (it makes me sad, but I have to use past tense...) first sentences of novels. Simple, but so innovative to have it all gathered in one place!

Facebook: Humans of New York is a fanpage of a Tumblr blog of a young photographer who publish photos of people met in NY with their words. It's real and often touching or amusing. 

Blogger: I'm not a fan of fashion blogs, but this one is really outstanding. Nadia Aboulhosn is a model, but her size is way bigger than is expected by the fashion world. She's a brave girl and I think her self-confidence deserves an applause. 

Instagram: You may have heard about this man: Murad Osmann is producing music videos and commercials, but he is famous for a different thing: photos of his girlfriend. The way those pictures are taken is really catchy and I'm always waiting for more.

Twitter: It is incredible how social media influence every field of our lives. Barack Obama, the president of the USA, has an official account on that platform and he's on the third place of most followed people. That's how politics get to the people.

deviantArt: If you're looking for extraordinary images, that's the place. Everyone interested in photography can create an account there and publish their work. My friend, Margaret, did it and you can find many of her photos taken in Norway there.

YouTube: It's not only home for music videos or comedians. In fact, it is filled with knowledge about everything: from tutorials on curving hair to history. JamesESL English Lessons is a source of knowledge about English language and I found it useful many times. 

If you are looking for a good messaging apps for your mobile you can check out the article about the ten most popular. 

I've covered the most popular places available for free. I could go on like that, but I think you got the point: everything starts with an idea, it depends on you which way of sharing this idea will be yours. 

Regards,
Agata

Norsk kultur og norsk språk

Hogskolen i Nesna knows how to surprise us! Spanish teaching you English? Why not! French man teaching you Norwegian? Of course! Polish teaching ICT in society? Seems legit! American teaching…  ok, that one is not the best example.. he actually teaches American and British Literature, but I think you get the point? ;)

In this post I would like to focus on Norwegian (Norsk for internasjonale studenter, actually!). I really like it and it really helps to understand the culture of this country. Our teacher, Claude, is from France, but he lives in Norway for 11 years (if I remember correctly) and – what I find absolutely  amazing - he teaches Norwegian people Norwegian language :)

When we started I was a little bit skeptical. Yeah, sure, it’s great that we will have the chance to find out more about the country and its language, but probably it will be boring, I won’t learn nothing useful and it is organized only to keep us busy. I was wrong, as very often. Classes are interesting, we take up different activities, we don’t sit in the classroom all the time, we try traditional food and so on, and so on… And after some time it is easier to understand customs and character of Norwegians. 

Once I almost held a conversation in Norwegian! Almost. I was at the second hand shop and saleswoman didn’t speak English, but still she wanted to talk with me. My answers were only ‘ja’ and ‘nei’, but at least I understood when she was asking me where are we from, how long are we going to stay in Nesna, how do I like the place… For me it’s an incredible achievement, especially because she said to me ‘Du snakker litt norsk’ :) Again, I almost speak Norwegian. But maybe at the end of May I will be able to really answer for those questions.

Apart from learning basic sentences, such as 'Jeg heter Agata og jeg kommer fra Polen', we mostly learn through the experience. Food is always a good idea! So we made traditional Norwegian waffles, three different kinds. 

They say 'too many cooks spoil the broth' but we took the risk...

... and it payed off! 

Nesna is a place simply made for hiking, so one time we just prepared matpakken (lunch, but packed Norwegian way) and we went on a trip to Bjørndalen ('Bear Valley' without any bears).

Frozen lake is a perfect place to have fun!

Here is our teacher, Claude, with the best stone I've ever seen! Sliced like a bread... How awesome is that?!

Me and Ada... Just being professional models...

In Nesna you can also visit a museum with exhibition about lives of local inhabitants. The exhibition contains dried fish (we even tasted this 'delicacy' today), farming and fishing tools, old photographs, clothing and many other exhibits. 

Traditional shoes from this region.

In this museum you can touch everything. And sit everywhere.

Some found an idea for future profession... 

... whereas others found a true love!

Obviously, we spend some time in classroom learning some facts about Norway. Last time we've got some information about history and today we were talking about Sami people. It's so strange that I didn't even know about their existence! Culture of Sami people is really similar to the culture of native Americans and it would be interesting to do a small research about this nomad nation. And today Nesna surprised me once again: one of well-known Sami artist, Mari Boine, was teaching musicology here! 

Traditional Sami hut located in Bjørndalen (as you can figure out those people didn't use locks).

Naturally, if you think that much for so long your brain needs energy, so today during the break we tried different Norwegian dishes!

We ate almost everything that Claude brought for us! Yummy!

I'm sure I will miss this kind of classes back in Szczecin. It's interesting to try another type of giving lessons, but now I will have to find out how to get use to the regular ones. Fortunately, I still have time to enjoy it! 

Regards, 

Agata

Northern Lights

I think this one will be really short. According to one of my friends I created this blog to brag. Of course I denied it! But well, that's what I'm going to do now! 

The only reason for this particular entry is to brag about the Northern Lights that I have seen this evening. 

As I highlighted before, this phenomenon always strikes me with a tremendous force. So when I saw it tonight shortly before the midnight I ran straight to my flatmate, Ola, I wrote to Gosia, and we went together to the shore to soak up the view. Gosia, of course, took her camera and there is a possibility she'll let me use some photos she has taken. In the meanwhile, me and Ola stood there staring at the sky, extraordinarily full of bright, glimmering stars. 

It was so weird: because of indisputable beauty of those millions of stars I could not focus on the green lights in the northern part of deliciously black surface above us... Everything was perfect... I would only place this moment in the middle of summer, so that I could lay in the grass and enjoy it for longer... To make it even more exciting, shooting star show up for a split second... I hope my wish will come true - it's possible, I will just need some favor of the fate :) 

Considering the fact it was freezing and we didn't plan to go that far for so long, we just got cold and decided to go home. Believe me, this decision was heartbreaking! But all in all, after a while the lights disappeared almost completely so we didn't miss much. 

As I got home I prepared some tea and sat in my armchair right next to the window with an amazing view to the fjord and mountains on neighbouring islands. I couldn't help myself and I was gazing all the time on the (still a little bit green) night sky. Aurora borealis wasn't that bright as before, had some ups and downs, but eventually I got a lot of extra pleasure from looking at this scene of fading. 

In the end, I draw a conclusion that the travel to Norway was worth the effort at least for such view. I'm sure that my companions will agree with that! 

Regards,

Agata

P.S. I was wrong, it's not short at all....

Try

I hear very often that I am soooo brave because I decided to go on an exchange. Friends, neighbours… It makes my parents proud of me.

But is it really like this? I don’t consider myself a brave person. For me, brave are people who fight for their freedom in  Ukraine or Venezuela, people who commit themselves to do voluntary work in some African country on their own expense or those who risk everything to make their dreams come true.

My decision was not brave at all. Actually, I’m in a very convenient position right now. I live in probably the safest place on earth with all needed facilities. I’m financially secure and my only responsibility is to show up during classes and complete necessary tasks. I can travel and representatives of Høgskolen i Nesna are willing to help me whenever I need anything. And still, for some my decision of coming to Norway is a clear demonstration of bravery.

So hear me now: you don’t need incredible courage to do something like I did. You just have to take this chance. Such offer won’t happen again and you will regret you didn’t do it. If you hear about Erasmus – try. If your university offers you apprenticeship in different country – go for it. If you come across AIESEC project – take part in it. I know it’s easier to complain about life, but opportunities are everywhere and they don’t need courage, they just need your will to do something with your life. Memories are created by us and our decisions, and when one have a family and work and is a serious man with serious stuff to do, it is much harder to leave everything and start to gain experience.

I always push my friends to do something more and torture them with my enthusiasm. In my perfect vision I inspire my friends and in return they inspire me. Unluckily, in practice it doesn’t always work that way and I think that is why sometimes it is so hard to do my best (or to do something at all…). But at least I try! And I know that someday I will woke up and I will be happy. I haven’t even slightest idea when it will happen, where will I be or what will I do then, but it’s not the point. The point is to try.

That is what I am doing now – I try. I hope that in the future I will – with full awareness! – admit that I did something demanding bravery, that I tried and I was successful with my trying.

That’s a little bit messy, I know. Probably it doesn’t make any sense and when I’ll see it later I say ‘WTF’. However, I have to accept the fact that writing this blog and sharing my weird thoughts is quite nice experience, even if no one will bother to read it.

Regards,

crazy Agata

Impression

It’s so quiet and peaceful around me… I ate breakfast and started to wondering what should I do now, since I don’t have any specific plans. I think this silence prompted me to write something for my (still empty) blog. But I don’t want to write about everything that has happened here or about every place I’ve been. I’ll do it differently. I don’t promise it will be in interesting, but I want to share some of my favourite moments with you.

I'll start with my very first impression from Norway. Oslo-Torp. Plane landed, me and Gosia found the way from airport to the train station and we got into the bus. Thanks to unbelievably kind bus-driver we could drive with him for a little while until our train came. But in my memory this driver is just an addition to more important things.

Imagine: the only reason why you like winter is Christmas and snow, and for some reason (global warming and such things, I guess…) the last months in your country were basically snowless. And then, you get the opportunity to go to the land of snow. Sounds perfect. And so it was. Tons of snow everywhere, magnificent forest , lovely horses walking around, small houses largely sprinkled with white powder… Amazing view! I couldn’t feast my eyes! But our train arrived, we got in and as the travel proceeded north there was only less and less snow. We don’t have any snow in Nesna now, but I believe it’s only temporary…

Another view that I ABSOLUTELY fell in love with was the sunset during our way back home from island called Onøya. The trip itself was really interesting and pleasant, but when I was standing on the boat, outside, with wind dispelling my hair in every direction, with salt everywhere, with this beautiful sky and vast sea around me… It’s so hard to describe this beauty, but I was simply ecstatic then! Especially that small islands were scattered here and there. And in all that my favourite piece of landscape were waves created by the boat I was on. Foaming and noisy, but somehow perfectly fitted to the scene. I liked it so much that I used the photo taken that moment as a background for this blog :) 

The last picture is the hardest to describe, in particular because it amazes almost in the same way every time. Northern Lights. Who haven’t heard about them? Northern Norway is famous for them, but I didn’t expect that I’ll see this wonder of nature so many times… To be honest, before I came to Nesna I wasn’t excited about Northern Lights at all, just some lights in the sky, somewhere in the northern part of world, whatever. Ohhhh, how wrong I was! When I first saw them I changed my mind completely, and from then on every night I sit in front of my window waiting for something to show up. Funny thing about this phenomenon: when forecast says it will happen tonight, it just don’t happen, but when you’re sitting at home in your shorts scrolling Facebook wall: Yoo-hoo, here it is, waiting for you… But of course there is no time for dressing up! You run like hell! And then you end up standing in the cold night, staring at the sky and just admiring those gorgeous green waves sliding through the starry black surface.

When I look at this wall of text that I just produced I can hear ‘tl;dr’ comment in my head, but I wrote everything in a good will! I only wanted to share with you a glimpse of what I see and how seemingly ordinary view can become much more exciting if you simply look at it from different perspective.

So that’s my message for today: if you think there is nothing beautiful around you, it means you just don’t open your eyes wide enough!

Regards,

Agata

P.S. All pictures used in this post were made by Margaret :)

The beginning

I will be honest. I have no idea what I should write about in the very first post... I simply hate this emptiness, so I'll just go with the flow!

I've spent almost two hours on personalizing this site and I'm really proud of myself. The idea of creating the blog was in my mind long before I came to Norway, so when I found out that having the blog is a basis for the course I'm enrolled on, it became a must. And that's great! If not ICT in society I would never start writing. Well, that's me - combination of laziness, enormous ambition and lack of motivation... It's so tiring to want something but at the same time not be able to achieve that... Especially when your current university gives you a huge vast of free time for individual work (read: a lot of time for facebook, tv series and sleeping).

BUT here I am, with my new blog, with some ideas in my head. If you want to learn some details about trip to Nesna, accomodation and everything closely related to the exchange itself, I recommend you to take a look at my friend's blogs (you can find them on the right side ->). 

I think it's time to finish this blabbering. Beware, new posts are about to come! 

Regards,
Agata