Sitting inside at my computer, facing the rained-out backyard of my apartment in Berlin feels just about right on this Saturday night. My 56-hour stay in Oslo must be the source of my simple satisfaction with the coziness I’m now indulging in. Choosing quiet, sky sounds and travel reflections over the smoky, warm-lit, beat infused interior of one of one thousand bars on a Saturday feels for once, possible in the Big B.
The names of foreign cities- majors and capitals- indicate to my corn-fed ears some metropolitan pulp, concentrate, worth losing some sleep over. Only recently have I stopped expecting European cities to be vertically oriented. I recall in particular my first trip to Paris in 2008 during which I felt an extreme disorientation in face of my inability to find some thriving, glass and metal tower empire in which to feel hopelessly second-hand and slow. Oslo’s offerings in this department exceed those perhaps of the European capitals generally thought of as ‘Old Europe’ but still lacks the de-humanizing grandeur with which fast walking skirts and slacks baptize the casual tourist in the good ol’ US of A. Oslo has time for you.
But you may have to adjust your clocks to Scandinavia. That means- get up early. See the sights. Buy your evening beer supply before 8pm. Not only does Norway have regulations on alcohol sales that limits its availability to bars in the evening, but most stores and many restaurants have relatively early closing times. After a series of frustrating encounters- hunting down a lakeside waffle hut in April that isn’t open until June and subsisting off of purchases from 7-11 and grocery store snacks to appease our appetites and our budgets in an expensive city- Amelia (my Oslo co-traveler) and I resolved to utilize the power of the interweb to find a proper dinner.
I’d received several recommendations from a friend familiar with Osloian food and attractions. There was Blitz, the occupied building in the center of the city that offers an inexpensive, vegetarian meal to its visitors- from noon until 6pm. No dice. Perhaps Amelia and I had adjusted too completely to our temporary Berlin home and its late late night hours. We hadn’t started looking for a restaurant until 8:30pm. But for the anarchists to be packing up shop at 6pm? Fine. Whatever. Next option. Rice Bowl. “good, cheap, Thai” read the notes I’d scribbled next to the name of this recommended dinner spot. Amelia types the address into the Google Wonder and voilà! Rice Bowl is close. Rice Bowl is open. We are desperate for warm food on what has evolved into a brisk, rainy evening. Outward!
A ten-minute walk and five minutes of hunger induced confused wanderings later, Amelia spots the neon sign for Rice Bowl. Entering, I am immediately enchanted and surprised. The interior is all dark wood settings decked with Sriracha. Candlelit tables seat satisfied-looking customers hovering over platters of bean sprouts and noodles. We win. Taking a table near the back, Amelia and I begin to take in the scene, checking around for laminated menus and eyeing greedily the platters that surround us at our neighbor’s bellies. Just as a sense of restaurant-orientation sets in, a server walks to us, addressing us in Norwegian. I kindly correct his mistake- “English???” “We are closed. No longer taking orders.” A fresh, steaming plate of coconut milk noodley goodness emerges from the kitchen door like goods delivered. “Uhh…” I squint at the man with confusion. He in turn, kindly walks away to continue satisfying the needs and desires of the other patrons.
Amelia and I continue to sit, dumbly it would seem. On the verge of outrage, I decide to choose the route of denial. Discussion ensues regarding the unlikelihood of the server’s trustworthiness. He was wearing an Aloha shirt. He was translating from Thai to Norwegian to English in his mind. I make the mistake of establishing eye contact with a second waiter. He says from across the small room, “We are closed. Aren’t taking orders anymore.” The rage- from hunger, a day’s worth of frustrated culinary dreams, and sogginess- boil inside of me. A pugnacity emerges from within my grumbling belly and I jolt up, prepared to comfort Amelia- “Don’t worry. I’ll handle this.” and fight, plead for a plate. Should I tell him we’ll take whatever is leftover? I don’t eat meat, anyway. Could we please just get some fucking noodles?
The kitchen had closed approximately 3 minutes prior to our arrival- 45 minutes prior to the official closing time of the restaurant. Amelia left dumbfounded- this is what socialism does to the restaurant business. These people have no respect for the money I am willing to throw at them, three minutes late for a hot plate of delicious. I left incredulous and seething, resenting the happy bastards still at their dinners. Oslo was putting the brakes on a steamroller of late night consumption possibilities to which I had become accustomed. Here, in Oslo, there are closing times. There are rest times. There are surrounding lands of lakes and green for camping and fishing. There is a nation of Maine. And down the way there is a comfortably mediocre falafel joint that stays open until 11pm on Fridays.
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