For lack of a better title: March 31st

Today was just one of those days. You know? When you wake up with a sour taste in your mouth. I'm blaming the time change (we sprung forward an hour this weekend). It was not a bad day. Just a day where I felt like I was in a zombie, sleep like trance all day. It's all a bit of a blur, which isn't encouraging considering that I had a lab test.

Highlight of last week was Waffle Day: A national holiday, officially in the calenders. It was gloriously yummy. Sweden, being the secular country that it is, forgets that after Fat Tuesday we should technically be fasting until Easter, but hey, I'm so not complaining!


Last Thursday was our big physics final. We had reviewed a lot in class and gone over previous assignments and I thought that I had a pretty could grip on it. I still needed to study, but I didn't crack open the books until l0pm the night before (before you judge me too hard, I study better at night). I turned in around 12.30 and arrived at a day full of testing. Session 1 10.15-11.45 went really well. Felt pretty easy. Session 2, 2.15-3, was grueling. Mainly because of the ridiculous amount of time it took and also because it was pretty hard.

On Friday I ate a yummy Greek dinner alone. Jan and Yvonne had a giant dinner party and Anton and Gustav went to the pizzeria with friends. My great Friday night adventure was riding my bike to Elinore's. She lives pretty close and it was such a nice, mild night. We made smoothies and watched White House Down. The scary part was riding my bike home again but don't worry guys, I made it. I had a flashlight hanging around my neck as a light source.

On Saturday I went on a run and finished reading the Swedish version of The Fault in Our Stars. I was home alone at night so naturally I ate junk food, worked on some homework, and watched TLC. #turnup I watched some of The Breakfast Club before falling asleep. But eventually I did fall asleep.

On Sunday I spent a majority of the day sitting outside in the sun and reading, I needed long pants and a sweatshirt but the weather was beautiful.

And today was Monday.

I'm realizing more and more everyday that I'm coming home soon. And I feel like it's a bit wrong to say that I'm looking forward to coming home, but I am.

"Well at least you stopped wearing leggings"

Last Sunday my good friend Ellie and I went to Malmö. We volunteered together to make bead bracelets that are sold to raise money for childhood cancer research. We were there for an hour, I made 6 total while Ellie, an experienced braceleter, cranked out 9 bracelets.

The rest of the afternoon we wandered around and shopped and got Starbucks!

On Wednesday I had a super weird schedule. Swedish early in the morning and then Elna and I went to Espresso House and enjoyed some Chai Lattes. Then I had some physics. Next I had time to go to the gym and the library for several hours before I had to go back to school for my parent teacher conference. (But parents don't have to come). It was super creepy to be in the school when it was late and all the doors were locked. Anyway I had my meeting and no worries guys, I'm doing fine in school. 

On Thursday i finally got the chance to visit Brandorama. It's where my classmates go every week for 3 hours to learn how to become firefighters. The place is super cool. There are containers and tanks and railroad tracks and lots of classrooms too. We just had a psychology lesson. 

On Friday I slept over at Elna's. First after school her, Malin, and I went to buy some supplies for the evenings baking. We met up with Sofia on the train. Once we got to Elna's house we made white chocolate covered popcorn, and mud pie, and tacos. Yummy! Also Elna curled my hair!

We watched Oceans Thirteen and then Let's Dance. Malin and Sofia left that night and I was the only one who slept over. 

On Sunday morning we ate breakfast in from of the movie Stardust. Then her dad drove me home. 

I spent the day with some homework. Today I did the same. I also watched the movie Frozen for the first time today.  

Overall it was a very productive weekend. 

What's in the attic?

Yesterday at school my friends showed me the attic. My school has this attic that was at one point used as classrooms but they can't anymore because it's a fire hazard because there is only one exit. I had heard about the attic but I thought that there was just storage stuff up there. Well yesterday we had an English test that didn't take us the whole 80 minutes so we had some time to spare. Lina asked if I had ever been up to the museum. Museum? I was instantly intrigued. We asked our teacher Bert to unlock it for us. Up the stairs into the strangest place ever. I took a bunch of pictures to prove it to you. (Forgive the bad quality due to everything being encased in glass, but still!)

 There are a lot of books. 

 yes that is a small polar bear.

 yes, that is a peacock.

How crazy is that? I was so baffled as to why a school would need all this. No clue but it was super duper cool. And creepy.

Also Jan came home from his latest business trip yesterday. While he was gone Anita had been here. Last night Jan and Yvonne went to dinner at friends and Gustav was away so it was me, Anton, and Anita. Friday night is Let's Dance night on tv. The Swedish equivalent of Dancing with the Stars. Same setup and everything. Anita and I watched that. I was exhausted so I missed about half of it because I fell asleep. I did wake up in time to see who won.

Today Anita left to go back home. I have had no homework so I have just been chilling.

In other news, this week Sweden decided on its contestant for the Eurovision song contest. For those of you not familiar with it, it's a singing competition. There are a bunch of  semi competitions leading up to the final. The winner is chosen by 50% of the votes coming from panels from different countries in Europe and 50% from voters in Sweden. This year, in my opinion, the best song did not win, and, in my opinion, it will not do well in the competition which is taking place in Copenhagen in May.

Here are some pictures from the grilling on Thursday night.

If the wind will not serve, take to the oars. –Latin Proverb

Too Good to be True

The weather was so beautiful today. But I'm scared that we are going to have some type of winter relapse and that I'll have to go back to wearing thick sweaters. But for now I'm enjoying it.

Today I only had one lesson, from 10:10 to 11:30. After this I went to the library to get some books. Next I went to the gym for a little bit. My next stop was lunch. I grabbed a panini at this place and found a place on some steps in the sun. I sat there and ate my panini and read my new book.
Next was a shop stop at h&m. Followed by this years first ice cream. It was such a good day. And just the fact that I could enjoy so much of it outside is such a bonus.

Now I am home but later tonight we are going on our monthly grill adventure with the other families. Should be fun!

The picture below is of a Fat Tuesday treat called Semlor. They are made up out of bread, whipped cream, and marzipan. Technically they are just supposed to be eaten on Fat Tuesday. But my family has been eating them since Christmas.
It just so happened that on Fat Tuesday we were working on a group assignment at a friends house. One of the guys in the group offered to go and get us all semlor. So these are those.

The Show Goes On

See I'm keeping the blog alive!

Lately things have just been rolling along. There's been a bit of school work inclding a chemistry lab report and also a chemistry test and a psycology test. But we made it through so now it's easy rolling. 

Saturday was the beginig of spring here in Helsingborg. I woke up and pulled up the shades and was greeted by blue skies and warm temperatures and it was amazing. Helsingborg typcally recieves 48 sun hours in February, but this year there were only 8. 8 hours of sun in a whole month. So spring was warmly welcomed. 

On Sunday we went to Sofiero. Sofiero is an old royal summer vacation place that a few generations ago was donated to the community. Now Sofiero is known for the extrvgent gardens and outdoor concerts in the summer. Not much has bloomed yet but it was nice to walk around and take a fika in the sun. 

Yesterday we played badminton in gym class. And after school Elna and I went to go buy salads to bring with us as lunch today. 

Why did we need lunches might you ask? Well today was a very excitig day! We went to Lunds University. The University has these days where high school classes can come and book themselves to different lectures and activiites. We met at school this mornig and took a chartered bus down. It was only our class so I have no idea why we didn't just take the train. Anyway our first stop was a hall where there were a bunch on mini experiments and demonstrations that studentss had made.

Elna!

Our next stop was a lecture on BioTerrorism and Food Poisoning. Very interesting stuff..

Next we had lunch. My friends and I had all brought our lunch so we sat outside and enjoyed the sun. 

After lunch I went to a physics and laser show that was super duper cool. First there were some cool experiments with liquid nitrogen, air pressure, fire, etc. But the best part was the end laser show that they put together. I have to admit that it was scary when the room was absolutely pitch black and whatever but the effects were so cool and magical. Very impressive. 

Our last lecture I'm sure was very intersting and about chaperone proteins. But I think I can speak for myself and the rest of my class when I say that we found it hard to stay awake. On the bus home majority of us fell asleep.

We got home at 4:20. It was a really fun day, Some interesting information but also just a beautiful day off of school with friends. 

I keep thinking that the nice weather is a joke. Because after so many days without sun, it's been sunny for 5 days straight. There is frost on the ground in the morning, but by mid day the temperatue is just right.

Happy Birthday Mom! Love you  

Hit Refresh

I know many of you have noticed my lack of blog updates since New Years and I apologize for that. Going from 9 posts in November to 2 in February never really was my plan but I've heard of several previous exchange students who experienced the same thing. Eventually things just don't seem new enough or exciting enough to share, dare I say that things feel normal? 

Knowing that many are eager to hear about even my day to day life I will eagerly try not to disappoint and I will keep writing with hopefully more frequency. 

This year has given me a lot of time to think. These aren't groundbreaking realizations but I think that just being outside of your comfort zone makes you think of other things. Though Sweden is a model country in the world, being here has made me more aware of the world around me and the problems that need to be solved. Maybe it's because I've watched the new more often or that Sweden seems more connected to the world. 
Also you think a lot about yourself when you're on exchange. Everyone you meet is a stranger at first. So it really makes you notice how you come off and how you act and how you react. Coming into this knowing nobody seems like the perfect opportunity to reinvent yourself. But it's amazing how hard that is and how you notice yourself resorting to old habits, good or bad. And maybe something you never noticed before about yourself becomes something everyone else notices in this new environment. It's interesting to think about. 
Many people ask if I think I've changed this year. Of course I have, coming back as the same person that left would almost be selfish and unjust. I think I've changed in ways that I myself can't notice. That is why I'm looking forward to what people notice is different when I come home. It'll be interesting. 

I'm also not going to pretend that this year has been a walk in the park. There are many moments of self doubt and questioning. I've never been the most graceful at taking criticism and that, if anything, is my downfall. You come in with this picture of what you're going to do. And then realize that half way through that's not happening. You wonder when you come home what you'll look back on and want to change. I often look back on things and wish things would have turned out differently but I'm too passive in the moment to act on it. 

What's the definition of a good year? What's the difference between pushing yourself and not staying true to yourself?

I've learned how essential it is to get along with people who are different than you. Not different that you in obvious way. But just people who value different things and simply think differently.

So this post is pretty much a hodge podge of thought's I've had. It may be hard to make sense of it all. I'm not sure I follow what I've written. But I thought it was refreshing instead of writing that I slept in, did a lab in physics, ate lunch at a coffeehouse while writing a lab report, then did a chem lab, went to the gym, came home, ate dinner, did homework. That's boring. 

June 25th everyone. Zionsville watch out, I'm coming home.


Jesper, this picture is for you: