As I drove down the winding roads outside of Bemidji, Minnesota, it was hard not to wonder what I'd gotten myself into.

I was leaving for Norway in about a week and a half, and I had recently decided to trek the two hours away from my home in Moorhead to attend a Norwegian at . Signing up had been a spontaneous act, and I was starting to wonder if I should have taken a few more days to think about it. I didn't know a single person, had no idea where I'd be sleeping, no idea what I'd be doing, and only a rudimentary understanding of Norwegian, about as much as a 300-day Duolingo streak can teach you.

I also knew that, for me, Duolingo was never going to cut it. I could read basic norsk, but I had no idea how the language sounded and no idea how to form the words in my mouth without sounding obviously American.

My upcoming trip to Norway was the initial catalyst for looking at CLV classes, but I always wanted to learn Norwegian. My paternal grandfather grew up speaking Norwegian at home, and my dad remembers him speaking Norwegian with the neighboring farmers. Unfortunately, my grandpa passed when I was barely 3 years old, and the language died with him. I took Spanish in high school and French in college and loved them both, but my heart always returned to the "mother tongue" I wished to find again.

So, I arrived at . I got out of my car, promptly got lost twice, and had to continually ask for directions (the fault of my own inability to navigate — the camp was very clearly labeled with signs). As would become a theme for the weekend, I was continually met with warmth and enthusiasm with each question I asked. 

Once I got un-lost, I lurked around the corners of conversations before activities started. I had been alone for mere minutes before I was approached by a woman who said, "We don't leave anyone out. Tell me about yourself." 

I quickly learned I was not the only newcomer. I was one of many. There were also many, like my new friend, who had been coming for years. The advertised age range for the weekend was 18-99, and that range turned out to be almost literal. The first woman to offer me directions was 21, and another woman in my language classes was in her 80s. 

I shared a cabin with a woman from Bemidji and another from Texas. I danced a traditional Norwegian dance with an actor from California. I met an herbalist in training who offered us a tincture of herbs to help our focus. I met a sweet service dog who understood words in half a dozen languages. Another attendee knit more than 60 gnomes so we could each take two home. In no world would I have ever interfaced with any of them outside of Skogfjorden.

I regularly talk to interesting people through my work with Concordia, but rarely have I encountered so many passionate people in one place. Before coming, I worried about my ability to fit in … I worried about age differences, about language barriers, about wildly different interests. But as I talked, I found that though our lives were vastly different, we were all joined by the love of learning. We were all there because of a desire to learn and a desire to find community and togetherness.

On our last night, everyone gathered for a banquet where we were served some of the most gorgeous Norwegian food I've ever eaten (including, forgive me, what I had in Norway). After we ate, some of the returned "campers" spoke about the Skogfjorden family they found and formed.

And despite my reservations a mere 48 hours prior, I found myself genuinely surprised that I considered myself part of the fold. Me, a 29-year-old marketing professional, was family with this group of immensely interesting and kind people. These were people who were bonded by the sheer fact that they all deeply wanted to be there in that moment, learning and laughing and playing together. As we were cut off from our daily lives, we were nevertheless reminded that we are all citizens of a vast world where language is the most important tool we have.

As I drove home, winding once more through the forests of northern Minnesota, I found myself baffled — I had not expected to have that much fun. It seemed an unusual cocktail on paper — enjoy a weekend in the woods with 30 or so strangers mostly conversing in a language I barely understood. And yes, I learned a lot of Norwegian; enough to understand some of the things people said to me a week later as I landed in Norway. However, it's the people I hold dearest in my heart — the radical acceptance I found as I stumbled through my elementary norsk and the kindness I was met with around each corner.

I can't wait to go back.