Long Time Comin'

På On Wednesday the 5th my class went skiing. We skied a small place nearby called Hestra. Elna and I tried out snowboarding but gave up after half an hour. It was a really fun day.

On Sunday the 9th we had a YFU meeting. My family wasn't going so I got a ride with Franziska (from Ängelholm) and her mom and sister. We got there right in time for lunch and we all brought food from our home countries, it was an international buffet! We spent the afternoon doing necessary YFU stuff. The highlight was getting the letters that we wrote to ourselves several months ago at the arrival orientation. Afterwards we took a detour through a place called Skumparp. There was a statue of Franziskas host moms grandfathers grandfather who was influential in making educational universal in Sweden.

As soon as the Olympics started I watched that as much as possible. They are by far my favorite sports phenomenon. The best part was when a Swede who was originally dead last in a race ended up getting third because the three guys in the middle crashed.

On Friday the 15th we left for vacation! After school we gathered in Domsten and rolled out around 17.00. We drove all night and arrived in St. Martin, Austria around noon on Saturday. The day we got there was sunny and beautiful. Every morning after that was pretty much the same. Woke up around 6.45, breakfast, then the bus would leave for the slopes at 8. We skied at various places all week. There were about 70 of us on the trip. So there were lots of people to ski and spend time with. The bus left at 4.30 every afternoon. At the hotel there was apres ski for the adults followed by dinner. Us kids played cards, watched movies, and other stuff.
One day there was a lot of heavy powder and me and three other girls got stuck off piste and had to walk in waist deep snow for an hour to get out.
Every day for lunch I ate Gulashsuppe and Skiwasser.
On Tuesday, instead of going home, we just changed shoes by the bus before renting toboggans and heading back to the top of the mountain. We ate dinner at a lodge up there and after, the race began. It was madness. We all lined up along the start line and then we were off! There some crashes in the beginning and it was so crowded that there was no chance of steering. The whole run down the mountain took about 13 minutes. There were lots of mechanics to how to lean and pull to maneuver the tight corners.

At end of each ski day all the people who had crashed went to the front of the bus to tell everyone about it. And then we voted on the best one for each day. The winner got to wear this crazy hat that we all knitted for the day.
Some days were really awesome and sunny others were blizzardy and foggy. The temperature was right around freezing, plus/minus a few.
Most people took a day here or there off but I skied 7 days straight.
It was a fulfilling and yet exhausting week. We left Saturday after skiing all day. We wanted to leave earlier than usual in order to make it  home for the Olympic hockey final with Sweden vs. Canada. The bus made really good time and we were back in Helsingborg by 11 Sunday morning.

Since then we've been back to school.