Texas

We´ve experienced some severe weather change here. As I said, it was like a Mid-West summer day when we arrived in Oklahoma City. When we left 1,5 days later, we had below freezing plus wind. Darn cold!! And it was raining like crazy when we approached Dallas, TX. And everybody said: we don´t get this, it´s the worst weather we´ve had for years, we´ve had wonderful sun and nice weather for weeks now, no rain for months.. okokokokokok, just rub it in will ya..! Hihi, ah well, I guess the world has seen worse tragedies than this. And they do get their much needed water. But I can honestly say that I´ve never had a single day of good weather in Texas. I was here in 2007 also. And what did they say? It was sooo nice and warm JUST before you came! Hrrmmppffzzgrr.. Ah well, the weather is what it is and it doesn´t affect our mood at all, even if I make it sound like it :-)

Dallas was a wonderful experience. We had a home stay in Richardson, just north of Dallas, and right by the University where the concert was held. We had excellent hosts and my contact person Gunnar picked us up a couple of hours before the concert. As I warmed up I got in touch with the piano students there and their professor. They wanted to witness my warm up routine. Routine? Me? Well I played a little bit and decided to talk with them instead. It was a really nice thing. Quite a few people came to the concert. And the General Consulate in Houston actually sent a delegate to witness the concert. So with professors, Norwegians, Norwegian-Americans and students in the audience, this became a really memorable evening. It actually hit me: this is pretty big! So I´m glad the concert was a success and that they´re talking about a possible return already next year. In the evening we had a party hosted by a nice family with a really big house. It was actually located very close to where Dallas, the TV series, were filmed. Do you remember Dallas? JR Ewing, Sue Ellen etc etc. They say that high hair, silk blouses and a fancy stairway where you can make a smashing entrance to the living room were common back then in Dallas! And they still have quite a few houses with stairs like that, included where we had the party. I don´t know if they have/had a bar in their offices like the people from the TV-series, but that´s a different story. Sue Ellen was the only alcoholic, even though everybody else all drank all the time too. Wellwell.

We decided to do something indoors the next day with the wet weather and everything. So we went to the World Aquarium in Dallas. It´s actually an indoor rainforest with all kinds of animals and fishes! All you can imagine really.. A very nice and relaxing to spend the day. Then we got a very good sight-seeing in the downtown area, for instance to where John F Kennedy was shot! (..yes because that was in Dallas you know.) .. and to the arts and culture area where they´re really busy building a brand new opera house. They put a lot of effort and money into culture in Dallas now, and that´s of course a good thing. Lotsa modern glass buildings, oil, money.. and a blooming cultural life!

We chose to drive to Houston the same evening. it was a 4.5 hours drive, and we arrived at a motel a bit south of Houston. Because today we visited the NASA Space centre! "Houston, we have a problem." Yep, that´s the place they´re talking to, and we were in that building. We were even in the very room where they controlled the space programs for the 60s, including the moon landing in 69. They sent people to the moon with a computer power that resembles about 15% of a digital camera of today...! We watched moon rocks, original space capsules, the world biggest rocket, the cockpit of a space shuttle and a lot more. In a place like this, they would also have good lunch! Ehh.. cheeseburger and bread crusted deep fried chicken with fries. Fork and knife? No, we don´t have tha.. we don´t need that. Ketchup? Yes please! Is it low intelligence that creates a food culture like that, or is it food culture like that that creates low intelligence? Both I guess. (Ps, financial interests creates food culture like that, but let´s not get into that...) But they have also have very good food in the US, mexican food for instance! And there are also plenty of very smart americans. I just wanted to mention that. Actually, we have quite a lot of pre conceptions against Americans. But you get a much broader picture from spending some time here. They are very outgoing and open for instance, and that´s very refreshing. It´s "allowed" to succeed here. There is actually a "jantelov" in Norway. And you easily get caught up in limitations instead of possibilities when you live in your little bubble back in Norway. But, everything has to be in balance. Balance is everything. 

Tomorrow I´ll have 2 concerts at the St Thomas University in Houston sponsored by the General Consulate. And we´ll drive to New Orleans on Sunday where I´ll have a concert the same day. So it´ll be a heavy, but interesting weekend!