Work Life Balance is Great but My Water is Cold

So... most people are aware of Norwegians dislike of doing the work. The typical work day here is from 8-4 with a 30 minute lunch and at my office they also take a 15 minute mid afternoon break. On average, although their are exceptions to every rule, work stops dead at 4:00 in the afternoon. I have been in quite a few meetings with StatoilHydro (Norwegian company I am working with) when there has still been much to do but meetings were stopped because it was the end of the day. Robin read in an informational book we have about Norway that the average Norwegian works about 165 days per year! That is right the average Norwegian works just over 45% of the time.

In general this is all well and good. Everybody thinks that Americans work too much and most people say that Norwegians have gotten it right. Norwegians work to live where as Americans live to work is how one author put it. I personally am looking forward to my 7.5 hours days and am going to have Robin pick me up promtly at 4:00 pm everyday. Tomorrow I don't have to go to work because it is some bank holiday in Norway (in Norway everyone gets bank holidays off not just the banks) and I love it.

The problem is that nobody works so trying to get stuff done at night, around holidays, or on weekends is impossible. For example on Friday afternoon our hot water heater stopped working. In the US this would be a pain but not impossible. You just contact a plumber and have them come out late at night or on a Saturday. It may cost you more but a worse you would be without hot water for 24 hrs. In Norway you are screwed! By the time we were able to contact the land lord (who is in the Canary Islands on vacation) it was 3:30 in the afternoon so there was no hope of getting somebody out on Friday. As I mentioned Monday is a holiday so nobody will be open then and god help you if you think you can get help on a weekend. My landlord has shown little interest in helping us until she returns on Monday because she is on vacation and a Norwegian does not mix vacation with work. By the way she has been on vacation 3 of the last 4 weeks (goes along with only working 165 days a year). So Robin and I are without hot water until at least Tuesday and I have no real hope that it will be fixed on Tuesday. Luckly we joined a gym and have access to their showers so I will be clean when I go into work on Tuesday. That may not be a problem though because we are going to run out of food tonight and won't have anything to eat tomorrow. Why you ask? Well it is because grocery stores were only open until 2:00 pm yesterday (normally open until 8:00 pm) because Monday is a holiday. I mean you wouldn't want to have to wait until Monday to start enjoying the holiday would you? So when Robin and I went to the grocery store at 4:00 to shop we were greeted by locked doors.

So work life balance is great but my water is freezing cold and I would really appreciate somebody fixing it.

Oh and good news we are supposed to have our internet hooked up this Friday. Of course this is just an estimate.