I'm actually - literally - "Made in China" :-) That is, my parents were working on a boat on long-distance sailing when they discovered I was on the way. At the time they'd spent some time on vacation in China. But I don't have a stamp with "Made in China" behind my ears, so there's no need to look :-)
My first couple of years we were living in Sikthaugen, Fyllingsdalen - a little outside the centre of Bergen. Then we moved to Hjellestad in Ytrebygda bydel, after a few years there we moved to Espeland in Arna, then back to Hjellestad AND after a few more years we moved to Liland (not so far from Hjellestad). Then - finally - we moved back to Hjellestad and I lived there till around 1996 when I moved to Danmarksplass with my girlfriend at the time - Guro. In 1997 I served my tour of duty in the Royal Norwegian Army and when I was finished in the end of '97 I moved back to Hjellestad where I'm still living.
On the 5th. of January 1997 I joined the Army, I started at the Anti Air Craft Artillery officers school in Fredrikstad. I stayed in the Army, and in Fredrikstad till the 28th. of November 1997. There I was a UB-corporal (non commisioned officer) and squadleader in a Robot70-platoon.
Here's a page about my military career and my platoon
My working career started way back in time when I was around 13 years old. Then I was a paperboy. I covered my route for 3 years and I got the silver-pin from Bergens Tidende for my efforts :-)
Later on I was mostly doing Tae Kwon-Do, but once in a while I came back to being a paperboy, only now I was driving the papers around instead of biking. Then, when I finished High-school in '93 I signed up as unemployed at AETAT (employment office). There I got an offer to participate in some courses - one of my friends, Rune, told me to go for the computer-course they had. So, after considering it for about 20 seconds...I did :-)
I started the course in a place called "DataKunnskap Opplæring AS" where I followed the course for 1 month. Then - when it was finished - I was offered a chance to participate in one more course (same place)...that would take 6 months. 3 months in school and 3 in a business somewhere - "on the job-training". "Hey, why the heck not" I thought and said yes. AND there started my career in the wonderful world of IT (Information Technology).
Course started, first lesson we come to the classroom and we're told to open, disassemble and reassemble the computers there. Remember, many of the people at the course (including me !) hadn't touched anything but the on-button before so naturally we were a little nervous. Everything went fine though...exept for the computer in the corner, when it was turned on the pair that had reassembled it asked the clever question "Uhhh...is it supposed to smoke like this ???". DUH ! Naturally no, so the teacher unplugged it and THAT particular computer was not usable that day :-)
After 3 months of course it was time for practice - in a real firm. I was assigned to Statoil. There I was introduced to the people and put in the helpdesk. It was an interesting 3 months I spent there with Bjørn, my lab-partner from the course. Then I was asked if I wanted to stay on for another 6 weeks as they needed a holliday temp. Hey, I accepted. The pay was good - around 87,50,- NOK an hour :-) After this was finished I went to Russia to visit Oksana Medjitova (yeah - check out the link if you wanna know more about the trip and her). Oh yeah, on the 12th. of July 2002 almost to the day 10 years later Oksana and I got married :-)
After I got back from Russia I went unemployed for a while, then my parents told me about this firm called Manpower that had gotten a deal with Statoil about temps and consultants. Perhaps I could get back to Statoil ?!? I went to Manpower, had an interview with Steffen Aksdal, he sent my papers to Statoil and they contemplated it for a while. I guess it was something like..."Toranger...hmmm, oh yeah, he worked here last year...no problem...upstanding guy...clever...yeah let's hire him", or maybe not :-) Anyway, they said yes and on January 2nd. 1995 I started working in the helpdesk there again. I spent (almost) 2 years there this time. Then we got a new boss and he decided to cut down on the number of consultants and kicked 3 of us out. Gee, what a surprise when he had to hire 3 NEW GUYS about 4 months later when the strain on the helpdesk got too big...you can imagine I was happy about his decision right :-7
Anyway, Statoil hired me once a week for a period as a systems-operator until I got another assignment at Bergens Tidende (a nation-wide newspaper) - HEY, back to my roots :-) - and then for a couple of weeks (in December 1996) I was working in Vital Forsikring ASA (Vital Insurance Inc).
As I already said, in most of 1997 I spent my time doing my duties to King and country - more about that on the page about my military career :-)
I finished my tour early due to the fact that I was offered a job (at Bergens Tidende actually) through Manpower - although then it was called Manpower IT Konsulenter and spesialized more in consultants and not temps ! Bergens Tidende lingered though, and since Manpower IT Konsulenter had started checking elsewhere I was then hired to Hydro instead. There I spent almost one year - most of 1998 - but then the contract was terminated because another company (wich I won't name here :-) headhunted 3 of my colleagues and persuaded them to resign their job in Manpower IT Konsulenter and get a new one in the un-named firm. Actually - I was told later on - the contract between Hydro and the firm specified that at least 3 of the previously working-crew in the helpdesk HAD to remain to secure continuity, so they HAD to get 3 people to sign on to get the contract. And this they managed. If they'd asked me my answer would have been no though - I liked the company I worked for and think I owe them that much loyalty (and courtesy) at least !
Anyway, as of December 1998 I started working in a insurance company called Vital Forsikring ASA. Yeah, same place I worked in '96 before going in the army :-) I stopped working there at the end of February 1999 to start working for Statoil again - hence, after about 4 years I back to where my adult working career started :-) Then in August 2002 there were some rumours about all of the helpdesk function being moved to Stavanger to "cut costs and work on centralization". Hmmm...did this remind me of my previous experience with a leader in Statoil...yeah...it probably turned out OK in the end. Time will show ! As for me - tough luck - I was outta there :-( It was fun and educational for the time it lasted though.
Going unemployed for a while, then getting some small assignements, one of them in Schlumberger, helpdesk, network maintenance and hardware-stuff, it was pretty close to home (4kms) and then another assignement in ABB Nera (Helpdesk). Then there was nothing for me for a loooong time and I was unemployed the whole time...not much fun there 'cept that I got to spend a lot of time with my wife and daughter. At least some good came out of the bad luck :-)
After some time I got into a taxi-course at AETAT (unemployment office). After the course my best-man from the wedding - Rune - hired me to drive for him and NorgesTaxi. Nice of him since I wasn't that good a taxi-driver (driving is easy, the finding-the-right-spot-thing is hard :-). After 4 months of this I went over to being administrative leader for Hordaland Kampsportkrets wich later that year changed it's name to Kampsport Region Vest. There I was for 6 months while the guy who was originally working there had a temporary leave contemplating early retirement. Unfortunately he decided against it and I was back among the unemployed. It was a fun and educational time though :-)
After 2-3 months of unemployment I was finally hired at NextGenTel, an ISP that is ALSO located quite close to where I live. I've been there since December 2004 and if they'll let me I'll stay for a loooong time :-) Customer-service there is real hectic and you get a lot of £¤¤€&@ from some of the customers that call in. But heck - it's still an interesting job. As of May 2006 I became a floormanager there. No more talking to customers on the phone.
...sometimes training Tae Kwon-Do and Eskrima and sometimes - very rarely - playing around with my computers or hanging round on the Internet. Actually it's spelled "Internett" in Norwegian, but when it comes to computers I prefer English (as you might have understood since this page is in English) ! In 1999 I also started SCUBA-diving and shooting (handguns). I also like photographing, so as you can probably imagine I don't have ANY problems with spare-time. That is - I've heard about it, but I don't know what it is :-) AND - as I've said earlier, on the 12th. of July 2002 I got married to Oksana and we got a daughter the year after. And then in December 2005 Vika popped her head out and said "Hi Mum and Dad". I also want to spend some time with them, so my extra-curricular activities are now WAY down compared to what they were before :-7
Do I sound busy to you...yah, well, I feel quite busy myself :-)
21:39 25.05.2007 Some extra text and removing some stuff
20:10 22.02.2005 Some extra text and removing some links :-)
17:10 16.08.2002