Oslo through the exchange student’s eyes

I knew right from the beginning of my studies that I want to apply for exchange, but at that time the destination wasn’t clear for me. After surfing on the different universities’ webpages I found an interesting master’s programme Health Economics, Policy, and Management from the University of Oslo – and that’s when the plans began to crystallize. I’ve been in Norway before, but only on the west coast, so Oslo was unknown to me until I packed my suitcases and moved there for the autumn term.

Oslo was a positive surprise to me – a nice mixture of culture, old and modern architecture and beautiful nature. For some reason I thought that Oslo would be flat and its nature boring, so the hills and lakes surprised me. It’s embarrassing to admit that I didn’t know that the famous paintings The Scream and Madonna were made by Norwegian artist Edvard Munch or that in Oslo there is a huge and impressive sculpture park, The Vigeland Park, which is the world’s largest sculpture park made by a single artist. Now I’ve seen all of that with my own eyes. In addition to that, I got to enjoy the ballet performance Manon in the Oslo opera house – the unique building which has won some architecture awards.

Student life in Oslo is vibrant. There’s a good variety of student associations and different kind of events organized for the students. In Oslo there’s also a lot of exchange students. Student welfare organisation has several services for the students and is taking good care of them. It has housing units, sport clubs, cafeterias, restaurants and health care services for students, to name some. Discounts for the students are quite good – and that is important in a city which was according to Deutsche Bank’s data second most expensive city in the world to grab a beer.

However, I didn’t go to Oslo to drink beer but to gain some priceless experience. And this exchange certainly has left a mark to my personal and professional way of thinking. Speaking about experiences, in November I got a great opportunity to attend as a volunteer to the national eHealth conference EHiN2018 – E-Health in Norway, which was arranged for the fifth time this year. The Ministry of Health and Care Services together with ICT Norway were the founders of this biggest conference in Norway targeting the digitization of the health sector. We as volunteers were helping with logistics, scanning the tickets at the entrance and so on. In addition to our tasks we had a chance to hear speakers from the different health care and IT organisations and companies as well as walk around in the expo area. It was an interesting and inspiring event.

All in all, it’s been interesting to compare the Finnish and Norwegian cultures, learning culture (examination system here is very old-fashioned and I’ve learned to appreciate more our system) and the health care system. I’ve improved my language skills and made some good friends. It wasn’t only a travel to a new country but a journey to discover my own abilities and strengths: that I’m able to study abroad in a foreign language and adapt to a new environment pretty fast. Based on my experience in Oslo, I can warmly recommend exchange to everyone!

Nora Hauhio
RN, PHN, BNSc, MNSc student