Basically, I’m going home almost a month earlier than planned – June 29 instead of July 20. This has forced me to upset a lot of plans and a lot of people, but you’d better believe I have my reasons, and it wasn’t a decision made lightly.

First of all, after I made plans for July to catch up with Steve in Iceland and go to the wonderful-sounding Latitude Festival (seriously, Belle and Sebastian are playing, you think it’s easy to skip that opportunity?) in England, I found out that after my student visa expires on June 30 and I’m not allowed in the Schengen Area – that is, most of Europe – for either 90 or 180 days (can’t remember which). That means no Sweden, no Iceland, no Czech, no whatever. Just the UK, Ireland, and Croatia and stuff. So, scratch one trip to Iceland.

I found out the information about my visa along with an American friend, Breanne, in the exact same situation. So what do we do? Plan a road trip around the UK, ending up at Latitude, where we would meet up with Steve and enjoy the music. I booked (and paid for most of) the hire car, we paid for flights, and even reserved some accommodation.

However, as the time got closer, I started stressing about time constraints for when I go home. Uni starts back at the very start of August, which left me with less than two weeks to get over jetlag, catch up with family and friends in Victoria, move my stuff to Sydney, find a place to live, find a job, and get ready for school. Doable? Maybe. While remaining sane? Hell no.

I guess I should admit that it started a bit before this, though. Already I could see that I had almost a month and a half of straight travelling – from June 11, when I head off with friends from my Spanish class, to my flight home on July 20. One of the things that has surprised me about myself over the last while is the discovery that I don’t actually like travelling all that much. I mean, I loved coming to Sweden, and it’s seriously one of the best things I’ve ever done in my life, but it’s hardly travelling. It’s relocating and living in a new, interesting place for 5 months. I spent a week in both Munich and Paris since I’ve been here, doing all the proper touristy things, and while both were great, with fantastic company, I was incredibly glad to be back in Sweden again afterwards, and couldn’t have survived too much more.

Oh yeah, I hate touristy things. Really, I went to Munich to see Andreas and Barbara, I went to Paris to have a nice time with Anna, and I was going to the UK because, well… Because I got kicked out of Sweden, really. Basically, I like always having somewhere to call home, and I don’t like to be away from that place for too long. 19 days at the end of June is going to be pushing it enough, and I’m really only doing it because I want to see my Spanish friends at least once during the year (they’re all over here until December / January). Although thankfully the last week or so will be just Anna and I, and Anna is kinda like home.

Then there’s the whole thing about money. Usually I’m pretty carefree about money, and I don’t like stressing about it, but the month and a half of having nowhere to go ‘home’ to was going to put a serious strain on my finances. I probably could do it, but would be going home broke or even a bit in debt, which is not nice when homeless and possibly jobless. I still have to pay for mine and Breanne’s cancelled flights (hate you British Airways), and some cancellation fees for other stuff, but overall I’ll have a lot more left over than I otherwise would.

Some of these problems might be solved if I can organise what I want and am able to do my last semester of school in Melbourne, as I can just stay at home in Ballarat until I find somewhere to live, but it’s not really something to fall back on, especially as I’m not sure I’ll be able to get permission from UTS.

Anyway, I just wanted to get that out there. It was indeed triggered by something / someone, but I’ve been meaning to write something like it for a while, even just to re-convince myself that I’m doing the right thing. Some of the flak has made me rethink, but I guess that’s how it goes, and if my reasoning comes out unscathed, then I guess I can feel better, right?

So that’s that. I’ll miss you, Sweden, although not as much as I’ll miss my darling Anna, but I’m sure I’ll be back with you both in the future.

I accidentally missed class this morning because I was distracted and didn’t want to leave, but my project group skipped it anyway so we met up to work on our project instead. Then we didn’t feel like doing our project so we went home.

Last night I went out for Greek dinner and sat on the warm naked man statue; it was very nice.

Also, I am completely addicted to knäckebröd (Swedish hard/crisp bread), it is amazingly delicious.

I guess I will start where I left off and talk about fika! Kalmar fika goes for four hours, and I was there for all four. Breanne and I met at 12 and ate some delicious sandwiches. We were meeting up because we were going to see Florence + the Machine on Tuesday night, and wanted to vet each other to make sure it would be okay. It was! She’s really nice, and before we knew it, 2 o’clock had come around and some other friends turned up for fika and the language café. I didn’t learn much Swedish, but I’m getting there, and my Swedish this week is definitely much better than my Swedish last week.

On Tuesday, going to see Florence, Breanne and I had the best of luck for most of the night. Our bus ride to Stockholm was free (saved 80kr) because the cash machine was broken and we didn’t have time to go to the Pressbyrån, and I guess the bus driver was nice. I think it helped a lot that Breanne speaks Swedish fairly fluently, as opposed to me who would’ve probably just gone straight to English.

On the way to Debaser we went up Katarinahissen, which I also did last time I was in Stockholm (Breanne didn’t know about it though). It was a lovely view, but oh my gosh so cold. There are photos on Facebook and you can tell just from our expressions. Then we checked out Fiskargatan, which is where Lisbeth lives later on in the Millenium trilogy, which we had both read. Pretty nice place.

We found Debaser a lot earlier than expected, so we went for a walk and sat in a café for a few hours with coffee and food. Surprisingly cheap coffee and food for Stockholm, actually. When it was finally time to head to Debaser, we got there early enough so that the line wasn’t too bad, and waited around some more for the support.

Support (I have no idea who they were) were pretty good, but I hardly remember them because Florence was pretty much the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen, or close to it. Easily top five gigs. Breanne has a thing for standing right at the front against the fence, and I was so glad for it. I really can’t describe what Florence was like, except for lovely and amazing and just yeah amazing. Whew.

The trouble started on the way back to the Centralstation.  It took us a long time to get out of Debaser because of the coat checking line, but we still had plenty of time to catch the last train. Except when we got to the station… There was no train. No buses, either. No cancellation messages, just… Gone. Breanne rang a friend back in Uppsala, and everything was still timetabled online, but they just didn’t exist in real life. We were stuck without a way to get home!

I tried calling Bella, the only person I know in Stockholm, but her phone was off, so it was not much help. We were just sitting around wondering what to do when the Centralstation closed down and the police kicked us out into the cold. Argh! We ended up catching a taxi all the way back to Uppsala, which set us back about $75 each (total was 966kr). Eek. And I still had to walk back home to Flogsta from Uppsala Centralstation, but that wasn’t so bad. I think it was worth it for the excellent night, though.

The next day I met with Anna for lunch at Stockholms Nation, and lunch evolved into fika which evolved into dinner. I guess she’s pretty nice? I also hung out with her the next two days. Last night we planned to go to Kalmar for Smaka (the vegetarian restaurant), but it was not open so instead we rode to get a bottle of wine and I cooked kumara dal. It was delicious, and the best I’ve cooked it so far. It’s so much nicer cooking for more than one, I think. I need to do it more often.

Oh I also tried some tea on Wednesday, and really enjoyed it. It was Lady Grey, and very strong. I think that is the key – I strongly dislike weak tea, but if it’s strong enough it’s pretty delicious.

Now, tonight I’m either going to see Sambassadeur at V-Dala, or joining the FIFA competition with my flatmates. Hrmmm I will let you know, maybe.

My first Swedish class was pretty scary, because as I said, I missed the first three, but I did okay, and I should be able to catch up fairly easily.

The food and atmosphere were better at the Kalmar Reccegasque than the International Gasque, but it was still good fun; I got to sit at the VIP table! Actually I have no idea why I was there; the people around me kept getting up to make speeches and stuff, it was kind of weird. They were all super nice, though. Oh, actually they weren’t all VIPs. The girl opposite me was in exactly the same boat as I, so we kind of sat around confused a fair bit.

Afterwards, when the tables were cleared, they started up the music and whatnot for the afterparty. The music, quite frankly, was terrible. I found Anna, though, and we spent the evening chatting instead.

After everything closed up, I went to Max (Swedish McJack’s, with whatever else thrown in) for some food with Scott et al., which was pretty tasty at 3am. Then we got lazy and caught a cab home, although it was surprisingly cheap, considering what I’d heard.

Today I slept in, got up for a bit, put on some nice music, went back to bed to listen to Oh, Inverted World, and generally didn’t do much. Oh, but I cooked a surprisingly delicious and easy dinner (chicken satay stirfry) and bought some toothpaste. And walked in the super-big, super-slow snowflakes, which was amazing. It’s so nice at the moment – not cold (hanging around zero) and no wind, either.

Tomorrow is fika with Breanne and then more fika with the Kalmar language cafe. Cool. Okay I really should do some homework, eh.

Man, this was supposed to be a short post. Sorry…

Arriving in Munich, Andreas and Barbara picked me up from the airport and we zoomed along the Autobahn to Germering, where they both live. I was staying with Barbara and her family, and got a whole bedroom and bathroom to myself! Pretty nice.

Andreas had an exam to study for, so Barbara and I met a friend of theirs, Michael (which I can’t pronounce, because ‘ch’s are horrible in German), and we went to the Olympic Tower and BMW World. Olympic Tower was pretty cool, although we couldn’t see too far because of the fog. BMW Welt was okay, and there were lots of pretty BMWs, but I was pretty tired at that point.

Okay so I’m already forgetting the timeline, so I’m just gonna list things in random order.

One night we went out to Hofbräuhaus with Markus, who is Austrian and has a funny accent, apparently (I wouldn’t know…). He was the only other one that drank beer, but we did a pretty good job of it and consumed a few litres between us. I also had pretty good food for dinner, but I can’t remember what it was called. Bavarian food in general was delicious, though, and I can understand why a lot of people eat a fair bit of meat there. Mmm. Over my time there I got two home-cooked proper Bavarian meals, too, one from Barbara’s family and one from Andreas’.

Oh and also the night of Hofbräuhaus we went to a nice cocktail bar where I forgot about tipping regulations again, then went to apologise to the waitress. She appreciated my apology but refused my tip, and then proceeded to bring out shots of something for all of us, free. It just made me feel even worse! But also better, you know? Anyway, it was pretty fun.

Another night we went to their friend Martin’s birthday party, which was nice except nobody was very talkative. Not just to me, but in general. So I mostly talked to Andreas and destroyed a candle. Andreas and I turned up a bit late to it, because we got distracted drinking cocktails at another bar. Oh! I remember why we were out before now. We went to Allianz Arena with Christine (Barbara’s mum), but it was closed so we only saw the outside. Afterwards we went for dinner at Tapa Tapa, a nice Spanish restaurant with nice German bier, and then headed to the aforementioned bars and party.

After Martin’s party we went out to a club which nobody had been to before. It wasn’t brilliant, but kind of cool at the same time. We stayed out until 3am, which was pretty late for me, but I didn’t notice too much because of all the dancing and whatnot.

One night a bunch of friends came over to play board games, which was excellent fun. I already knew Michael, and also got to meet Melanie and Julia and someone whose name I forget who left early anyway. My train fell off into the ocean first (so I lost), but I did well in UNO and beat everyone at the game where you have to list words in categories for a certain letter that I can’t remember the name of. This was mainly because we played in English though, so I kind of had an advantage.

Also Andreas took us on a tour of Munich. He printed out notes from Wikipedia and was a pretty excellent guide. I got to see the city centre, Schloss Nymphenberg, the Residenz, Bavaria and a few dudes on horses. All were pretty amazing, and you should mostly just look at Facebook photos to save me explaining it badly here.

On my final day I went with Barbara, Christine and a friend of Christine’s to Starnberger See, a lake south-west of Munich. It was so pretty, and you could see the Alps across the other side. We had coffee and cake and a generally lovely time, except for the evil swans.

That night, we went out with a few people for my ‘farewell’ (I refused to call it this, it seemed embarrassing). I didn’t know anybody except Martin and his girlfriend (and Barbara, of course – Andreas was sick), but got chatting to Benny, who was really cool. Oh and then Miche turned up, so I knew him too (he is really nice). The only detractor was that they haven’t banned smoking in German bars yet, so I came out smelling a bit ugh. I didn’t really notice it anywhere else, though (maybe they had better ventilation, or individual places ban it).

So! Now I’m back in Sweden, swamped with assignments and other commitments to do over the next week or two. I have my first Swedish class tomorrow, after missing the first three, and I realised that I’m going to miss one next week, too, because of Florence + the Machine. Oh my gosh! I feel like a terrible student.

But I do at least have company for Florence in Breanne, who I don’t know yet but we’re going for fika on Sunday to meet up beforehand. We both know the same person on Tumblr, and didn’t really feel like going to Stockholm alone, so it works well! She is from Oregon and likes Jens Lekman, so I think we should get along okay?

Also I am yet to call Anna to organise fika with her, partly because I have no idea when I’m free and partly because I am a little bit afraid. I think I will do it tomorrow, though. Wish me luck?

Monday I went to Stockholm to meet Craig and Rob (my bosses from emotum) for lunch. I got there a bit early, so spent a couple of hours wandering around Södermalm (mostly Slussen). On the way there, though, I walked across Gamla Stan, and found myself in what I think was pretty much the most tourist-centric street in all of Sweden. I was glad to be rid of it. Stockholm is so amazingly pretty though, it’s just a shame it was so cold and all I wanted to do was get inside.

Lunch with Craig and Rob was really nice; it was great to catch up with them again, and a jolly time was had. On the walk back to the Bredbandsbolaget offices (they had meetings for the day), Craig pointed out lots of interesting places around Stockholm (you can see a lot from Katarinavägen!), and also offered me a job of sorts. So I’m testing out the 3G network (and how our software interacts with it) in Sweden in return for 3G Internet. And, you know, lunch, and accommodation in Oslo, and a summer tour of the fjords. The usual. (I’m pretty excited).

After lunch, I was still cold so I found a museum in Gamla Stan near the palace thing. Turned out I picked the most boring museum in the entire world – the National Museum of Economy. It was a bunch of coins and medals. There were only a couple of things that were mildly interesting, the best being a thing about Sven Svensson, who I took a photo of, to send to my old manager back home. He appreciated the joke.

After that I still had a few hours to kill, so I sat in a cafe with some varm choklad, morotskaka (hot chocolate and carrot cake, which I totally ordered in Swedish) and read my book. Maybe a bit of a lame way to spend my first day in Stockholm, but I really enjoyed it. Afterwards I headed out to Stockholm Universitet to meet Bella and see a Cinema Politica documentary about Coca-Cola and paramilitaries in Colombia. The documentary was pretty badly made, but it was interesting, and good to catch up with Bella again.

Then I’ll skip to this weekend, because I’m pretty sure that although I had a nice week, not much happened worth writing about. Friday night I went to Smaka, the vegetarian restaurant at Kalmar, with Julika, where we met up with Axel and his friend Madeleine. The food was pretty delicious, and afterwards we (well, not Julika) went back to Madeleine’s for a while, where I got to try glögg, a traditional mulled wine mixed with spices and served hot (I’m assuming at least part of that description would be unnecessary if I knew the meaning of ‘mulled’, but eh). It was so delicious! I want more and more and more, forever. I also managed to score myself an offer for a Spotify invitation (haven’t got it yet, though… getting worried), which would be pretty cool.

Due to this diversion, though, I missed out on pretty much all of Markus Krunegård, who I had a ticket to see at Katalin. I figured there would be a support, but apparently not, so I only saw the last song. Scott and I were thinking of going to a festival in Umeå, though, so we would get another opportunity to see him there, too.

Last night (Saturday) was the Reccegasque – the gasque for all the new students – which was amazingly good, due to a great number of factors. The first bit – speeches by random University people, all in Swedish – was kind of boring, mostly because I generally had no idea what was going on, but the rest was good. Dinner was delicious, and I met some lovely new tablemates. We sang lots of Swedish songs (I got a songbook for this purpose) and generally had a good time. Oh, and I mixed at least 5 kinds of drinks over the course of the evening (not my fault, they were given to us!). Surprisingly okay this morning, though.

After dinner we went to the afterparty at Smålands, which had a pretty terrible cover band playing. Good fun though, and I finally ran into Anna again, and we danced the night away. Very extravagantly, mostly, making fun of the band. Afterwards we were chatting, and we’re having coffee when I get back from Munich. That alone made the night a win.

Oh yeah, Munich! I was looking through my diary the other day, trying to figure out when I have some free time to travel, and it turned out I had quite a bit next week. So I got chatting to Andreas, and I’m going to stay with him (actually, I’m going to stay with his girlfriend’s parents, but same thing?) from Tuesday until next Tuesday. I’m pretty excited; a whole week in Germany with excellent company and bier!

And that pretty much sums up the week. I don’t know what my Internet access will be like in Munich, but I’m sure it won’t be terrible. So maybe you’ll hear from me, or maybe you won’t. Until next time!

Last night we went to a ‘gig’ at Kalmar, but we got there before 9 and the band (Liminals) didn’t start until like 11 or 11.30 and then they were not very good anyway. I mean, I’m sure they were good for what they are, but I’m not a big fan of techno electro stuff. Fun night though, with good conversation had over a few beers. Also! On our way home we stopped at the restaurant in building 9 for some food, and while ordering got chatting to a couple of Swedish girls, who we sat with to eat. They proceeded to tell us about how much they love sauce, and food they can eat with spoons. Seriously, one of them ate all our combined tubs of sauce with just the leftover lettuce! I have a feeling it’s more a them thing rather than a Swedish thing, but I could be wrong.

Then tonight we went out again, this time to V-Dala to see Daniel Gilbert, who were actually pretty cool. Also they were a proper band, which helped. V-Dala is really nice and has good taste in music (Jens Lekman, Suburban Kids With Biblical Names, Peter Bjorn & John, Bloc Party and more!), although I’m still glad I chose to join Kalmar; it seems a lot more friendly and cosy.

We also got chatting to some American/Canadian/Mexican girls that Scott knew, who we are going bike riding with tomorrow, after fika. They were very nice! Also a random girl came up to me, grabbed my arm and said something in Swedish, then walked off. I was very confused, so when she walked past again I asked her what she said, and she told me, although I still don’t know what it actually was. Then she walked off again and I got chatting to her friend, who is absolutely obsessed with Australia. Then the original girl came back and I chatted to her while Scott chatted to the friend and then she kissed me on the cheek and then apologised a lot (she was pretty drunk). Then when we went outside for a bit (I was in my t-shirt and very cold) she kissed me for real (fo’ shiz, even) and then apologised even more (it didn’t occur to her that I didn’t actually mind). Weird times! But also fun times.

Then Scott and I rode our bikes home and I took some video before my hand got too cold, and I will post it asap and link to it on my twitter and/or tumblr but for now my phone’s bluetooth is being a bitch (as always) so I’ll have to wait and connect via a cable.

Anyway yeah that is my last two nights. It’s 2.30am right now! Oh I have more though. On Monday I’m going to Stockholm to have lunch with Craig and Rob, my (old?) bosses from Emotum, which should be really nice! I’m very much looking forward to it. Then I have the option of either heading back to Uppsala to go speed dating, or sticking around in Stockholm and going to see some political movie with Bella. Speed dating on Facebook has like 11 attendees, most of which are guys and most of which I already know (therefore defeating the main aim of meeting new people, rather than actually trying to find a date, although it makes the date thing hard too), whereas the political film is supposed to have had legal threats trying to stop it from screening, so it’s pretty dramatic. Also I’d have more time in Stockholm.

Okay so I should actually stop writing now, I’m struggling to type properly (combination of alcohol and tiredness, although I think it’s mostly alcohol as I’m not actually very tired). Okay bye!

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I had to (well, more or less had to) ride home while it was snowing, after it had already dumped a few inches of fresh powder (oh yeah I am up with the lingo) while I was in class. This is not an easy task! So glad I bought a mountain bike, even though I still haven’t fixed the upper 14 gears (they were not necessary today).

I guess riding in snow is a lot like riding in sand, except snow has icy ruts and is cold. Entertaining, though. I probably didn’t even fall off more than twenty times!

You’ve probably heard me mention by now that it’s generally dark by about 4pm here, but during the day it’s surprisingly light, despite the fact that I’ve only seen the sun a couple of times. Apparently this is because the snow reflects all the light, so everything is bright. In autumn, before it snows, it’s all dark and depressing and miserable. It will probably be like that for a while during spring, but nowhere near as long. And then I get beautiful summer!

Anyway, yeah, snow-climate weather observations. Cool (in both senses).

Sunday night I went to the sauna again, but not for long. Three out of the four of us had colds, so we weren’t up to a big night. Mind you, the fourth now has a cold. Saying something?

Monday night I went to some ‘Welcome’ function for exchange students in the main university building. It was pretty lame, except the building itself it really nice and we got free alcohol. Yes, what?! University here is weird, apparently.

I keep trying to think what I did Tuesday, but apparently it’s Tuesday right now. I went to class today, which was pretty good except I’m still not properly enrolled, and we got groups for our first assignments (due Thursday!) but I didn’t get one because I’m still not properly enrolled. Woo. At least I have a good excuse though, right?

Tonight was, as I said, amazingly good. It was the Kalmar welcome thing for… Well, I’m not sure, actually. I would say exchange students, but there were Swedes there too, so maybe just new students? I think so. We found out all about the different activities (speed dating, anyone?) and I signed up for some, and then we went downstairs to the pub for a nice dinner and drinks and songs (so many songs!) and what have you. I went knowing two people, and came out knowing… A lot more than two people. Kalmar is really nice you guys! So glad I joined it, and not silly old Stockholms or Värmlands or something.

Anyway so yeah I’m going out for dinner at their vegetarian/vegan restaurant and then on the pub crawl Friday night, which should be very fun! I will let you know how it goes probably.

My life has actually not been awfully exciting since Friday night, as I’ve come down with some sort of cold, but it hasn’t stopped me too much. I can’t work out what it’s from, but my best guess is actually second-hand airplane sickness. It’s too late for it to be from my flight, but one of the other Australians here was pretty sick last week and I spent a fair bit of time with him. Grrr.

Oh well, it didn’t stop me from going to fika at Kalmar this afternoon with Julika, which was really nice. I like Kalmar a lot, it’s nice a quiet and cosy and relaxed, and the food was delicious and cheap (can’t say the same about the coffee though). We spent a couple of hours just sitting around and chatting. She’s better company than the other Australians I’ve been hanging out with (not so into the whole drink-party-drink-party-drink thing).

Back on the subject of names from last time, though, I don’t like to say Julika out loud. Not because it’s a bad name or anything, I just keep screwing it up and laughing. I want to say it in the Spanish way (with an ‘h’ sound for the ‘j’), even though it’s a ‘y’ sound, and to me both sound really odd. At least I can pronounce it.

I spent yesterday sitting around and organising my room. It’s surprisingly hard, as I can’t get the furniture arranged in a way that feels ‘right’. Maybe there are too many bookshelves or something. My plan was to put photos up of how it currently is and ask for advice, but I can’t seem to get them off my phone. Stupid Bluetooth.

Anyway, dinner time! Catch you later.

Then yesterday I went to class again (on time), and made sure I did talk to people, even though it’s scary! I met some Spaniards and hung out with them at lunch, and they said I could be in their group for the class and then the lecturer said we got assigned groups. Oh well, not sucky enough to get me down.

This morning I woke up with a sucky throat (still there a little bit), and was tempted to go ‘oh no another sucky day’ but then I decided against it and decided to have an awesome day. So… I did. I went into town to grab a few things (slightly sucky because I bought a mouse and it turned out to be PS/2, but eh it was cheap), took some photos (coming soon, probably to FB), got scared by large explosions (seriously massive, but I think they were maybe firing cannons), saw a group of students wandering around chanting (not sure what about, but a while later I heard them yell ‘aussie, aussie, aussie, oi, oi, oi’ a few times, so who knows who they were. They had some Norwegian flags?). And then, best of all, I met Ylsa. Which is extraordinarily hard to pronounce being Australian, apparently.

Actually, I went to Kalmar nation to join up, because they sounded the coolest. Live music, 80s disco, vegetarian restaurant, etc. Cool! So I found my way in (complicated) and said hi to Ylsa, who was the girl signing people up. We got chatting, and it was just nice to finally have a really nice conversation with a Swede (besides my flatmates), and she seemed really lovely. Turned out I forgot most of the stuff I needed to sign up, though, so I had to pop home and then back again. Eh. So now I am officially part of Kalmar!

Oh! Last but not least, I ordered some food in Swedish properly today! First time! Up until now, I’ve been like “En ***, tack”, which is okay, but not great. So today I said “Kan jag få en ***, tack”, which is like ‘may I have’. I’m not sure if I got it entirely right, and it was really slow, but I got my food fine. The girl didn’t say anything odd, so I have to assume she either realised I was foreign or thought I was retarded. Pretty sure I didn’t fool her for being Swedish, but it feels pretty good. I do feel terrible about not knowing the language, but I’m slowly starting to get the absolute basics.

Hej då! (not 100% sure about the spelling there)

Spent most of last night in the sauna on top of building 3 (there’s one on every building in Flogsta) with AU+NZ+US friends, it was super fun. I’d never been in a sauna before, and it was pretty hot, but we drank beer and laid around in the snow a bit and had cold showers in between bouts so it was nice. I have a feeling it may become a fairly regular occurrence.

It’s 4pm and already dark. Crazy, but at least apparently it’s a lot better this time of year than November and whatnot, because the snow now brightens everything up during the day, whereas before all the snow it’s just really dark and miserable all the time. Picked the right semester!

Bought a bike today. Messaged a few people who put notes up on billboards around Flogsta advertising second-hand bikes. Checked one out, and it had non-working back brakes and only semi-working front brakes. I declined, and instead went into town and got a pretty okay yellow mountain bike. It says ‘Mt Hotham’ on the side, which I was pretty excited about. I was also excited about the brakes working (even though the levers are opposite, so the back brake is on the right). When I go higher than first front gear it screws up a bit, but the seven on the back work fine, so it’s not a big issue. Cost me 900 kronor though (including new lights and a lock). Bikes here are all excessively priced and broken. But it should get me out to the Polacksbacken – where my classes are – just fine, once I find the right path.

When I went out there today, to organise my subjects, I walked a few kilometres because I didn’t know what bus to catch. Awkward, but it’s not too bad walking when it’s lightly snowing and you have a good jacket. Except the snow kinda gets in your eyes and it’s cold. Also the Polacksbacken is so incredibly pretty, I’m excited to be going there regularly! I’ll post photos soon, maybe.

Last but not least, kiwi accents are really cool! I’ve met three since being here, and they all have super accents. A girl last night had such a strong accent none of us could understand her sometimes, though. Yeah.

Oh, and the photo above is the view from my window. You might be able to see the Domkyrkan (cathedral) and Uppsala Castle in the background.

Sernandersväg 10 – 617
752 61 Uppsala
Sweden

And my mobile number is:

+46 704 050 159

I’ll probably chuck my Australian SIM in every once in a while, but don’t count on it. Internet is the best way to contact me!

Anyway, back to the interesting stuff. Flight? Flight was pretty good. I would recommend Thai Airways to anyone any time, with the only exception being that my flight from Bangkok to Stockholm didn’t have video players in the backs of the seats. The first flight did, though, and was excellent. The whole journey took almost exactly 24 hours, not including the trips to and from the airport.

As I was getting off the plane at Arlanda, I heard a guy about my age say bye and thanks and “mate”, so I figured I’d say hi to see if he was somehow in a similar situation to me.

Me: “Hey, are you Australian?”
Chris: “Nah mate, I’m a kiwi.”
Me: *slaps forehead “Oh man, sorry, I didn’t hear you speak enough.”

Thankfully he brushed it off, and turns out he’s studying in Uppsala too! In the other university though. He had also met a fellow New Zealander on the plane, Bella, who is studying in Stockholm. We hung about the airport for a couple of hours, recuperating and playing in the snow (Bella and I made snow angels; photos pending). When it was time to leave, Chris and I caught the train to Uppsala and I headed to Flogsta and Chris to his hostel.

When I was collecting my keys, I happened across Patrick, who also goes to UTS, so we hung out a fair bit and explored. Uppsala is so pretty! And so cold! Actually the cold has been a lot less severe than I thought; that was my main fear leaving home. It’s been fine, really, although it’s considerably warmer than it has been the last few weeks. I did buy a new jacket, though. It seems really nice, and was only $120! (SEK 750).

I’m a little bummed that I haven’t met many Swedes yet (just my flatmates), but I’m sure I’ll meet plenty at Uni and stuff. So far it’s mostly been Australians (there’s a lot of us!), Kiwis, an American girl and a couple of Scots. They’re very nice, but, you know, not the same. Or too much of the same.

My Swedish has got to the point where I can say hi, yes, no, thankyou, sorry, and “I don’t speak Swedish”. I feel terrible and rude, and I’ve been told Swedish classes don’t start until February. I’ll have to make do with my phrasebook for the time being, and check pronunciation with my flatmates.

Anyway, I’d better go cook some dinner. Tomorrow is a big day! I get to figure out my subjects and timetable and whatnot. Hopefully it all works out nicely.

Adjö!

One of the reasons this was so good, though, is that it seems that lately all our time spent together (normal Steve included now) is work time, and it’s not so fun as it used to be! Hopefully the holidays can provide lots of fun and chillin’.

Yesterday was so lazy and nice, although I played a little too much Assassin’s Creed II in the afternoon (finished it!). I did go out, though, and had three nice encounters with random people. One of them I can’t remember, but I remember there was three. The first one was an old lady who probably should not have been going to the shops by herself, but I guess that’s her thing, and the second was some other person going to the Carols in Vic park.

Speaking of Vic park, I went there again today, just because it’s nice to get out of my apartment every now and then, even though I often wish I could just go to my (non-existent) backyard instead of a public park. Still, Vic park is nice, and I talked to the birds a little more and read my book and ate lunch. My book is really fascinating, actually. It’s The Outsider by Albert Camus, and it was a gift from Alex for my birthday. She apparently has excellent taste in books. It’s a strange read, though. I wouldn’t say I’m enjoying the story, per se, but I’m definitely enjoying the read, and it’s interesting to think about.

Now I’m just listening to records, and I did some work earlier. Successfully, even. I am the bug master! The master of finding and fixing bugs, that is, not making them. I also make them sometimes, but I would hope that I am not a master of that. Or at least I hope (think) I’m more of a master at finding and fixing them, which I did today. Yup yup.

So I’m up at, uh, just after 4am, because I can’t sleep, because I’m stressing about getting my Swedish visa organised in time. I have to make a lot of phonecalls and get a lot of documents together, all in the next week or so. Eek.

I already tried 30 Rocking myself to sleep, but it hasn’t worked yet. Might try again now (I’m on season 3, what will I do next?).

As for the photo, it is, from what I can tell (I don’t understand Swedish very well), the IT faculty of Uppsala Universitet, where I’m studying. I’m assuming it’s more than just the IT faculty (it’s rather big!), but still pretty cool. The photo above was taken January 5. I’m arriving on January 16, so I’m guessing it will be similar. I have never seen anywhere near that much snow before. Exciting, but scary. I’ve been studying the photos with people in them to try to see what they’re wearing, because I really have no idea.

Link for more pretty photos (sad I’m missing autumn).

So what did I do? Well, we went to the Lansdowne for cheap lunch and drinks, then proceeded to play Rock Band all afternoon, followed by more food and drink, this time at the delicious German restaurant Essen.

A rather fitting end, I would say, given the amount of German beer we’ve consumed over the past semester/year(s). And the amount of schnitzel we’ve consumed and Rock Band we’ve played, for that matter. Wow, we’re a creative bunch.

It’s on Thai Airways with only one stop (Bangkok) – pretty much everything else had two – and excellent timing. See, I move into my accommodation on January 16th, and I will get into Stockholm at 6am on that day, so can just wander up to Uppsala and say hello and move in right away! Also it leaves Melbourne at 4pm on the 15th, which seems a very reasonable time.

Pretty excited! (Just don’t ask how much it cost (thanks for the loan, Mum)(actually, just don’t tell Dad how much it cost)).