Dave's Travel Journals
I Like Boxes
Bergen, Norway: September 17, 2001
By Dave Fox
Boxes are very useful things. I like boxes. Boxes are things you can put things in. You can also wear boxes on your head, and people will think you are funny. Boxes were invented in 1957 by a man in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. His name was Harold.
Here in Norway, society tends to be fairly technologically advanced. People have cell phones, and computers, and electric foot massagers. But some inventions take longer to reach this part of the world. The box, I discovered today, is one thing Norwegians are lacking in.
I went to the post office in search of a box. I wanted to send some things home. Throughout most of Western Europe, post offices sell boxes.
"Do you sell boxes here?" I asked the postal clerk. "I want to send some things overseas."
"I'm sorry," she said. "We sell boxes, but only the kind you can use to send things within Norway. We don't have boxes for sending things to foreign countries." She pointed to some pretty green boxes in a corner.
"But can't I use one of those boxes to send something to America?" I asked.
"No."
"Why not?"
"Because they're for Norway."
"But a box is a box," I said, feeling extremely clever. "Hey, I bet if I tried to send one of those boxes with an American address on it, it would get there!"
"No," she said. "You can't do that."
"But why?"
I could see my questions were irritating her, but all I wanted to do was buy a box and send some stuff home.
"Those boxes are for Norway. You have to use different boxes for foreign countries."
"And you don't sell boxes to send to foreign countries?"
"No."
I was baffled. "Do those boxes come with prepaid postage or something?" I asked.
"Yes."
Now we were getting somewhere. "How about if I just paid the extra postage to the U.S. then?"
"You can't do that."
"Do you know where I can buy a box that I can mail overseas?"
"No."
I went back to my hotel and asked at the front desk. "Where can I buy a box?" I asked.
"A box?"
"Yes. To mail some things to America."
"Oh," the receptionist said. "There's a post office right down the street."
"I've been there," I said. "They only sell boxes that can be sent within Norway."
"Yes, of course," said the receptionist. "Well the bookstore down the street sells boxes."
I went to the bookstore down the street. In Norway, bookstores often double as stationary shops.
They had envelopes. Big padded ones. But no boxes. I really wanted a box.
"Try the post office," the clerk said.
I explained my predicament. "Do you know where else in Bergen I might find a box?"
"No. I'm sorry."
Her apology sounded sincere. I continued on my quest.
I went to another stationary store. They tried to sell me big padded envelopes.
"Thank you," I said. "But I would like a box."
At my next bookstore, the clerk told me point blank not to waste my time trying the stationary store on the other side of the mall. "All they have is big envelopes," she said.
"Look," I responded, getting a wacky idea. "Let's play a little game. It's called 'Pretend you need a box.' Let's get really crazy for a moment and pretend a Norwegian wanted to send a package to another country. Hypothetically speaking, of course."
She looked nervous. She knew where I was going with this.
"Where might that Norwegian go to get a box? You know, like if they wanted to send pickled herring to a friend in Munich or something?"
She stared at me blankly for a moment.
"You know, I really can't tell you," she finally answered.
I was about to concede and settle for big envelopes when a desperate last thought entered my mind.
"Does Bergen have any other post offices around here? Maybe like a big one that might have a box department?"
"Well, yeah, the one right across the street specializes in packages."
It was too good to be true. It was the central post office for Bergen. It was big. I had to walk down a long hall, and up stairs, to a magical world called the package department. And they sold boxes! Not just the pretty green Norway-only boxes. They had plain white ones too and they told me I could mail them anywhere in the world. Even Seattle!
I skipped back to my hotel with my precious cardboard container. I put my first aid kit inside, and travel guides and maps and pungent laundry, CDs I play on the tour bus, and crumpled plastic grocery bags to pad it all. I lugged it back to the post office. They even gave me free tape!
I went to the counter and the nice lady remembered me from earlier. I would like to send this box to America," I gushed.
Now (here is the climax of this article)... this is the magic of boxes: I paid the nice lady 330 kroner and gave her my box. When I arrive back in Seattle next week, that box will be there -- poof -- like magic.
I met my tour group and we had our farewell dinner atop a huge hill. A beautiful sunset painted its way across the Bergen skyline, shimmering in the fjords below. In the morning my box would set sail for America. It was a beautiful end to a beautiful day.
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