Having gotten off on a bit of the negative side, Norway was really rewarding!! I super love the country and feel that it is one country worth going back again, as I really admire their design works. If asked to summarize what Norway feels like in one word, after having a glimpse of the locals and their interactions, I would say HAPPY. Second word would probably be content. That everyone somehow feels satisfied and just glad with their lives. They didnt give off the "life is very stressful" knitted brows or the "i am in a rush" stern looks or the "sick of this country" facial expression that well many of us Singaporeans are used to seeing each other with. The people in Norway looked so content with life and striking a conversation with each other randomly beginning with a smile. I guess smiles are contagious and it goes around! The only frowns that I saw were found in the 7 Eleven outlets, behind the counter. Apart from that, everyone gave off a very positive vibe, just simply talking to one another and also to us tourists! I felt welcomed in Norway and did have a good chat with the locals too, although i wished i had the chance to find out more about their lives. I asked the locals if they were bored of the northern lights but apparently they aren't! Every time they see it, they still marvel at it. Which i felt was particularly interesting as I thought that they would have been bored of seeing it already. 

Norway is really scenic, but it is more of mountains and fiordes to look at, whereas Iceland is more of waterfalls and volcanoes. However to say that it is more scenic than Iceland, it would be not giving the Icelandic waterfalls their due credit. These two photos were taken from the Vigeland Sculpture park which I felt was really nice! Not as nice as a tourist attraction but really nice to have such a park in your country. I believe the weather played a pivotal role too! It's like saying Gardens by the Bay would be REALLY nice if we had a chance to go there in winter conditions. Nevermind the occasional icy floors but there is just that certain sense of rustic feeling to it, as depicted in the photo beneath.




The lighting in Norway, although did not give me much confidence in using 35mm film, brought out really beautiful shots with my Sony A7ii! Once again, that cool, rustic feeling brought out through the Zeiss ZM 28mm biogon lens.

Norway is a country that is really beautiful, I believed I only chipped the tip of the iceberg as cloudy skies obscured some of the Northern Lights and a really lethargic body paired with the winter clouds hazed out the beautiful fiords i was so keen on seeing (and photographing) (and videoing). One thing that I wished Norway had more of, and knew that they used to have a lot of, was snow. Due to global warming, i've heard so many locals mention that they used to see so much more snow but now what is left are patches of cold water on the rocky floorings. They say that the change has been really big and it was only when we went to the mountain/hill top? did we manage to experience snow, as well as in towns further up north like Lofoten. It was quite a stark difference when I compare it to Finland, two years back when exiting the airport was just heaps and heaps of snow everywhere! The entire Finland airport was just snow whereas in this case, it looks pretty normal as seen in the photography above.




That's me and brother in a slightly bluish photo which would look good when turned black and white. This shot was taken with a tripod and a timer. Just gotta frame the shot, press the shutter and start running while praying to the camera shutter gods.

Going to try to keep this post short if not a lengthy post might start getting a tad boring to read! Assuming you are not bored up till this point.

The Northern Lights was wohoo! Lucky me have seen it it Finland and Iceland already, hammering this encounter into the glacier as the third time! Third time and it never fails to amaze me. This time round, camera setup was all good so I did take some nice shots of nature's wonder!








Apart from the lights, the amount of stars really amazed me! it's such a fortunate thing to be able to marvel at the crazy amount of stars in the sky! Due to the movements of the cruise while taking this night photo, it created little hearts in the sky!




Norway was a really nice trip, and it offered great practice for my photography skills! I took the trip with a tour group under EU Holidays and it was a really laid back trip, with an enjoyable tour guide, Chris. If given the chance to, I would visit Norway again, especially to Oslo to see their minimalist design work. Their minimalist design, albeit looks simple but you can tell that lots of thinking was put into it to make it simple but yet visually appealing. Which is very different from the conventional "minimalist" designs that are flooding the market whereby many products are just done simply and marketed under the theme. The difference is the amount of thinking that went into it. No offence but I do realize that many products have tons of effort poured into them, but the way how the Norwegians/Swedish resonates better with me and that i should learn from them.

PHOTO ALBUM HERE

Highly suggest to watch the video on a big screen and in HD.
Hope you like it :)