Sportlov i Göteborg, Tekniskdag på Lundsuniversitet, Lasagne och Crêpes, En Picknick i Göteborg, Våffeldagen, och Säkra Datum

Again, it's been a bit more than a month since the last time I updated and there's quite a bit the write about, though unfortunately I have basically no pictures to go along with things because of an unfortunate event with my camera, of which I'll talk about later. But first...on to IKEA!

I just thought I mention the fact that I took my first ever trip to IKEA this last month and boy oh boy was it an exciting experience. There's truly not a whole heck of a lot to say about it, just that it happened and let me just say that I am soo excited that they're putting one up in Portland (which should be done, or nearly there, but the time I get back!).


Me on probably one of the chicist couches in the world. See the mag? Yes, that means I'm in IKEA.

The school year in Sweden, at least in Varberg, begins about the middle of August and then ends the middle of June. That means that we go a few weeks longer in school than back home in Philomath, at least it seems like that. In reality, here in Sweden we just have more free days during the school year, thus making the time in school about equal. One of these days, or well a group of these days I suppose, is something known as Sportlov or "Sport-Break" which occurs around the middle of February for a week. This is time for families to go off skiing, ice-skating, sledding, etc. Time to go off and enjoy the winter through the multitude of winter sports there are. My host family, however, had just got back from South Africa and are soon heading off to the States to visit my host mom's parents, so decided against going off to do any sports. My host parents thus ended up working that week, so I headed up to Göteborg and spent a good part of the week hanging out with all the exchangers up there (most my friends at school were off in the mountains with their families).

Göteborg and Västra Götaland (the region or län that Göteborg is in) is on a different school year than us down in Halland (the län that Varberg is in), so the time I spent up there, my friends had to go to school. Two days I followed Hallie to school, thus letting me meet all of her friends and just see how her school was different than mine, and let me tell you, I think she goes to like the coolest school in the world. The building that it's in was at one time appartments (and part of it still is actually), so there's like tons of stairs and little hidden rooms and spiraly stone stair cases and there was no way to get to some rooms than to go through other rooms. It basically was like wandering through Hogwarts, which equals amazing. It was also great to meet Hallie's friends and see who she spends her free time with when not with us exchange students.

It was while staying with Hallie that the unfortuante event of my camera in the night-time occured. One night while up there it started snowing a whole hell of a lot, but it was like really nice, peaceful flakes. So Hallie's host mom said "ohh, you guys should go out on a night walk!" and we're thinking in our heads "no way in h...." at which point she throws a pair of intense winter jackets on us and basically shoves us out the door (after we got a picture of our rediculous snow monster outfits).

So we're going on our walk, everything's good. Then we decided to skip down a hill. Bad choice. My camera was apparently hanging precariously out of my pocket when it happend to fall out, landing on the snow-covered concrete path we happened to be skipping down. A few explatives were exclaimed and I picked up the camera, everything seemed to be fine. That is until I tried to take a picture at which point I noticed the the little button you push to take a picture was missing. We headed back to the scene of the crime, though so much snow had fallen since that the butten was covered up, never to be found again (even after I proceeded to pee on the spot hoping to melt the snow and reveal the button, though the only thing I got out of that was a happier bladder). Luckily after checking online, I came to find out that my camera was still under warranty and has since been fixed and returned to me :)

A few weeks later on a Thursday my class, which is in the science program, headed down for the city of Lund where Sweden's biggest university is located to attend something like science day or something. We each chose various seminars and speechs to watch throughout the day on different sciency subjects. Those were slightly boring, but the best part of the day was our lunch break. We had like 3 hours or so to go off into the city, find somewhere to eat, do some shopping, and just explore. And let me tell you, I loved Lund. It was such a cozy, medieval-looking city with cobble stone streets and lots of historic buildings which housed nice cafés and restaurants. It sucks my camera was MIA at the time, otherwise I'd have some slightly amazing pictures for ya'll.

As it's getting slightly late in our exchanges, it's time for people to begin visiting and seeing how life is over here in Sweden. Chloe's sister Isabel and Hallie's friend Jennie were two of those people. Because they came to visit we thought it was slightly crucial for them to get a chance to meet all of us, so we did what we always do, had a dinner party! (don't we feel so middle-aged?) I headed up to Göteborg and helped Hallie and Jennie do some shopping for the event and make our famous vegetarian lasagne (the only reason it's famous is that we make it about every time we need to make something for dinner). Following the dinner party I stayed the night at Stéph's house where we stayed up late chatting about all sorts of things...which seems to happen no matter which person you're staying with in this group. The following morning we invited Hallie over for breakfast (she got up really early and drove Jennie to the airport for her flight back to the states) and Stéph, being the Frenchie she is, made us amazing crêpes for breakfast after which we decide it's time for me to get a hair cut, so we handed Hallie a pair of scissors and she went to work :)

The next weekend us exchange students decided that with the amazing weather (yes, that's right folks, spring is officially here!) we needed to have a picnic, so that's exactly what we did, down by the river that runs through Göteborg. Stéphanie had a friend from France visiting her, so that also gave us a chance to meet her.

The 25th of March in Sweden is officially Waffleday, which means everyone has to eat waffles, so I headed over to my friend Angelica's house where we and some other friends ate dessert waffles (with ice cream and jelly, etc.) and watched movies. It was a nice time and an incredibly good holiday to have.

Some exciting things are coming up and all travel dates have been confirmed for both my family coming to visit and me heading home. On Sunday, the 1st, I'll be heading off to London with my art class for 4 days where we'll be heading to museums, doing some shopping and experiencing London! The day before that trip I'll be moving to my 3rd host family, the Lindströms and a few weeks after that all of our Italian friends will winging their way up to Sweden to stay with us for a week.

Official dates:
23th of June - My mom, dad, Berkeley and Megan leave Oregon and arrive in Sweden the 24th
27th of June - We all head for the Czech Republic to visit Kamca
1st of July - Back from the Czech Republic
9th of July - They all head back home
11th of July - I arrive back in Portland, around 9:00 at night

So much is going on and time is flying by and before you know it I'll be back home and it'll be as if none of this ever happened.

I like comments and e-mails :)