Its me, I will come here often,..

Hei-hei!

I was told that it is common steem-courtesy to write an ‘introduce yourself post’. I must admit that I am not really sure what that entails, but I shall dive in nonetheless and give it a go!
So a little bit about myself,.. My name is Shirin and I suppose I would classify myself as a ‘traveler’ and a student. Every now and then I will publish blog posts about where I am and what I am up to. Being accustomed to writing in Norwegian, I see steemit as a great platform to develop my English writing skills. Moreover, my non-Norwegian friends will be ever so grateful that they no longer need Google Translate to catch up!

I am currently pursuing a degree in Development studies through a Norwegian course which lets me live and study at a few world’s corners. Just the past year, from September’17 to September’18, I’ve been fortunate enough to have lived in Norway, UK, India, Nepal, Argentina and Vietnam, while having the pleasure of venturing some of the neighboring countries as well. I am now 26 years of age and have been travelling on and off since the age of 17, - reluctantly making my way back to Norway to work and save up some capital so I can bounce right out again. Although my study compliments my lifestyle well, then the sense of freedom which I find in travelling is something that I am simply not ready to give up, - and man was I happy when I found out that I could combine them! I would even go as far to say that I honestly I do not believe I would have studied at all if it wasn’t possible for me to do so abroad. The sheer thought of staying in one place over a longer period of time absolutely frightens me! It just doesn't feel productive somehow, and to some extent then I feel dormant and like “I am wasting time”. After having passed twenty years of age, the time simply never seems to be in one's favor, and I suppose I have too many ambitions to fulfill before ‘settling down’, or at the very least, slow down. Perhaps this is the curse Simon Sinek refers to when speaking of the millennial generation. Oh what do I know, I’m willing to work for it to happen if nothing else.

With the exception of seasoned work, then it has been almost 4 years since I’ve lived ‘full time’ in Norway. I ended that ‘relationship’ by cycling the entire coastline of Norway. It was carried out solo over a 3 month period on a pushbike, loaded with a tent among other equipment necessary for survival. At the time then I had given little thought to Norway being the Northernmost country in Europe, and by far also the ‘longest’ one, having one of the longest coastlines in the world. The distance cycled is equivalent to cycling UK’s length 2-3 times or Denmark roughly 30 times. Having next to no experience with Norwegian wildlife it was by far a learning process. In whatever ways I managed to complete that trip, I do not know, but it is definitely something I take pride in having achieved.

Literally one week after finishing, I moved to UK, where I by chance found a college where I could obtain my university eligibility which has led me to where I am today. To my surprise then I actually enjoyed studying, and so, I never stopped.

Spring 2018, I was enrolled with an Argentinian University based in Buenos Aires. It was there I happened to meet @youdontsay who have diligently been writing about our adventures in short here on Steemit. Like I said, it's a Norwegian course which makes this study possible, and so I had agreed to stay in a shared house with the other students. Little did I know that we would end up being 40 people sharing that villa, with 4 people being lodged into one bedroom. We were also surprised to discover that the house was shared with two other organizations, and that we would have people coming in from all over the world. People would come and go, while the Norwegian group remained both the veterans and the majority of the house throughout the stay. By the time @youdontsay checked in, I had already lived there for a couple of months, while it was his first time travelling solo abroad. He would constantly use Uber wherever he would go, so I urged him to get on the cramped and sweaty metro of Buenos Aires. He resisted at first, but after some convincing he followed by advice. Unfortunately for him then there had been a delay of trains, and so the trains were even busier than usual. He went for the ride nonetheless, thinking that the metro would always be this full. Shortly after entering the train, then he could feel a hand on his back pocket searching, searching, but he didn’t have anything of value there, so he waited patiently for the hand to find another bum to plunder. Instead he gets groped, and he learns that the owner of the hand is an old lady just standing behind him, exploiting the fact that he is unable to move due to the amount of people crammed up in the carriage. In many ways then I feel like this anecdote is able to summarize our last couple of months, where my good-will always seems to cause Ian harassment somehow.

I’d still argue we had fun though! We ended up travelling Northern Argentina, Bolivia, Uruguay, Norway, Thailand and Vietnam.

Our travel together ended just yesterday. We took a flight from Bangkok to Oslo, where he continued his travels to US while I took a domestic flight to my own home. I am sure we will see each other again. But for now, then I have an exam to write, and I’m lined up with 3 jobs to save up money for my next semester which will take place in Ghana. On that note then I can’t wait to see what 2019 will bring!