Been Home...

HEY THERE! It's been forever since I wrote in here, and I'm quite sure that no one is reading this anymore, but I will write in here none the less :)

So the parents came and we had fun. We left and I was home.

I can remember the feeling I had once I stepped foot in the good ol' USA again, it was weird. It was familiar, yet weird. I felt as though I hadn't actually left, which in turn, made me a little sad.

I've been home now for about 2 months, and I leave for the almighty ISU on Tuesday.

I miss Sweden sometimes, but most of all I miss the traveling, but I know that I will be returning eventually.

I should be sleeping right now, but I felt the urge to write....VERY strange for someone who dislikes the whole writing thing.

Just thought I'd write in here one last time, though, this isn't very informing in the least.

Well, for the last time, I bid you all Hej Da.

Lindsay

Valborg and My Birthday....

Hej Hej! Long time no update. Sorry about that, I get very focused on my procrastination.

So last time I posted was before Valborg, or the last day of April. It was very interesting. I hung out with my friend Lili from China the whole day. We met up, stupidly, at 9 in the morning, our goal being to grab a spot to see the boats go down the river....we waited for about an hour and a half, for nothing spectacular, but there were tons of people out and about. Since the boars weren't too exciting, we decided to do something else. Lili had to go to the bathroom, so we wen't to her
"apartment" (kinda, not really one) in Hotel Uppsala, in the center of town. We then walked around town, it was like the town exploded with people, it's the most crowded I've ever seen Uppsala. After walking around, we had lunch. We ended up buying strawberries, a must for the day, and we headed to the Main University Building were we listened to live classical music, choruses, and a skit that was in Swedish so I didn't get that much out of it. We ate half of our strawberries and found it time to go see the President of the University supposedly give a speech, but really only waved his hat from the main library...very anti-climatic. We ended up in the end, buying some ice cream for our strawberries, and sitting in front of one of the entrances to the cemetery, eating. The town was full of empty champaign bottles and garbage lying about.

The next Thursday I had my Swedish listening test. I think it went well for the most part, but the people talked so fast that it was difficult. I'm used to them slowing their speech down a little bit for the beginners, but they didn't. I have no clue how I did, nor do I know how to figure that out.

I turned 20 this past Tuesday and it was a lovely day. I opened the package that my parents sent me, and even skyped them before I went shopping with Jackie. We weren't very successful, but it was fun none the less. Stefan met up with us for dinner, which we had at MAX, not as "fancy" as my parents would've liked, but I can only have it for a limited time. Our goal was to see "How to train your dragon", but as it turned out, was in Swedish, not English like the internet told me. We ended up seeing "Kick-Ass", which was interesting... That night I skyped with my parents again.

I have my Swedish Written Test, my Swedish Ethnology Paper, and 3 more classes to attend before I can get distracted, but it's proving to be very hard, but just the paper writing part. Most of the time, writing a paper, to me, is like pulling teeth, so it requires motivation, which I seem to lack, much to my mother's dismay. I'm incredibly excited for my parents and Justin to be coming in 20 days! I am ready to come home :)

Well, there you have it, that's all that has happened that's noteworthy. Pray that I can get through these last 15 days of schooling!

Just some info: The sun starts rising at about 4 am and starts to set at 9:30pmish and dark by 10pm. That means 18 hours of sunlight! It's starting to screw with my mind!

Lindsay

Prague, Czech Republic...

My Oh My, I'm sorry for neglecting!

I've been back from Prague for a week! And I can tell you it was one of my favorite cities I've been to, probably second or third, London of course being number one, and will probably always be number one in my book, but I still love Prague.

The journey to Prague started way too early in the morning on Sunday. I got up at about 3:30am to meet everyone at the bus stop at 4:20. Stefan was running late, so he ended up riding his bike to the train station. We couldn't take the bus because on Sundays the bus doesn't start running until 6am. So we walked the 45 minutes to the train station, to supposedly get on a 5:15 train to Stockholm, but that was bad information, so we ended up waiting for a 5:45 train to Upplands Vasby then take another train to Stockholm, and then we took the hour and fifteen minute bus ride to Skavsta airport, not my favorite place. Everything was fine until we were on the plane and they told us something was wrong, so we stayed on the plane for another hour, until we were ready to go.

We FINALLY made it to Prague in the afternoon. I had 30 Euros left over from Italy, so I exchanged it for Czech Kroner, which has an amazing exchange rate at 18 Czech kroner to the dollar. Anyway, we hopped on the bus to the metro station, and of course, it was pouring out, but by the time we got off the metro, at Wenseslas Square, it was perfectly sunny. We made the mistake of going to a McDonald's for lunch which is very pricey in Europe because it's a luxury item. After we ate, we found our hostel, which was really close to the square so it was great. The Rosemary Hostel in Prague is awesome! Our room was 3 bunk beds and 2 beds up in a loft. We had a shower room and bath room, and our own kitchen. Thankfully, there was a computer with a printer, so I could print off my boarding pass to get back to Sweden. Nicki, Stefan, and Jackie took a nap since they'd been up for a long time, while I read on the couch, yes we had a leather couch.

When they decided to wake up, we found a Czech Restaurant, where I had goulash! It was very good. It was still early when we finished eating, so they tried to find a barish place, and we stumbled upon the Zombie bar, it was quite strange, and we were the only ones in there. We then retired to our room once again.

On Monday we wanted to take the free tour, but we ended up going in the exact opposite direction we needed to go to meet up with the tour guide, but thankfully there was a tour later on in the day, so we walked around and ended up finding a trolly to the top of a hill to climb an observation tower. Somehow I always end up paying money to climb stairs, and I don't really like that fact. I hated climbing, but the view was fantastic. It was almost time for the next tour to start, so we made our way to the Old Town Square where the meeting point was.

The tour guide, Ruth, was great, she was very energetic, and informative. The tour took 3 hours and I was happy to actually know things about the buildings I was taking pictures of.

Monday night the others wanted to do a Pub Crawl, and it was my job to make sure they got back in one piece. Well, I ended up getting everyone home at about 2:30, and I was exhausted and quickly fell asleep. And I surprised myself with knowing my way around this city already.

On Tuesday we all woke up late. Then we went back to the places we wanted to go, like the Jewish District and the Charles Bridge. We also made it up another big hill to the Castle and main Cathedral. This was filled with other amazing views. We pretty much just walked around all day and ended in another bar at night, where I had some awesome hot chocolate, mind you.

That's pretty much the whole trip in a nutshell. I'm sorry that it took me forever to write about it. It is an amazing city and I suggest it to everyone!

Other information: I'm done traveling until my parents get here. I am very okay with this because I feel as though I'm a little traveled out, and I would also like to spend some quality time here in Uppsala.

I think the volcano messed with our weather a little bit, seeing as though it snowed the past two days, I was not very thrilled at this, but it's supposed to get better now.

Next week is one of Sweden's holidays, I it's called Valborg ( go here for more information http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walpurgis_Night), and my friend Lili and I are going to see what it's all about. Lili is in my Swedish class and she's from China, in case you were wondering. She's been giving me Chinese lessons during our 15 minute breaks in Swedish class.

I also have my last dino class tomorrow! I'm very excited to be done with the ever so boring weekends that consist of dino class.

Hope all is well..... 43 days until my family comes!

Hej då!

Lindsay

Milan and Genoa, Italy...

Hej Hej!

So all in all the Italy trip was good although our accommodation were less than stellar and it rained most of the time.

Our flight left on Wednesday afternoon from Arlanda Airport, and we flew right over the Alps! We arrived in Milan at about 6:30ish and was welcomed by nice warm weather. We then took the shuttle bus to Milano Centrale Station, which took about an hour. Upon arrival at the train staion, we had to find the Metro and figure out how to get to our hostel. We got there pretty quickly but when we got out of the metro, it took us a while to find it. Once we found it, however, we had to figure out how to get inside because it was a call thing on the sidewalk, but we eventually found out which number to call and we made it in. The hostel was horrid, at least for the first night. We got there at about 9:30pm, and we were starving! So we asked the guy where we could find some food at this time of night and he directed us towards a market where all we found was a bag of chocolate chip cookies and juice, to which I acquired an affinity towards Grape-Fruit juice. Anyway, the mattresses were abysmal, they sank into the floor, and they only gave us one thin blanket which made me extremely cold during the night. And the bathroom....it didn't have toilet paper the first night, so that was fantastic...

On Thursday we bought a 2 day metro pass and bought a map, one with all the tourist destinations. Our first stop was the Duomo, the Gothic Cathedral. Upon arrival, there was a tourist trap...although they were everywhere, this one was a guy who would put bird feed in your hands and have the pigeons ascend upon you, I was NOT happy about this, but I still have a few pictures from this incident. We went inside to find that they were having a service inside, given that it was Holy Week, and it was a surreal experience, being in an old Gothic Cathedral watching a Cardinal do his thing in Italian. Anyway, we found out that we could walk up to the roof, but Jackie failed to inform me that there was en elevator, so I walked up 240 steps to the top, and it was worth it, it was a beautiful sight, and thankfully it wasn't raining yet.

There is a shopping place, that's also on the map for tourist destinations, right next to the Duomo. We walked through it, it was filled with Designer stores and loads of people. There was ballet troupe that was out dancing promoting something, but I can't recall what exactly. After a gourmet meal at Burger King, we were going to go to where "The Last Supper" painting is. We got a little side tracked when we got out of the Metro, we meandered to an old looking building, which coincidentally was on the destination list. And after walking through the building we walked through a park that was next to it, and found another Arch, but unfortunately it was being repaired or something so it was covered in scaffolding.

We eventually made it to the place with "The Last Supper", sorry I don't know any names of things other than the Duomo, only to find out that you had to make a reservation to see it 2 weeks in advance, and they only allow 24 people to go in at a time. Even though we didn't get to see it, on the other side of the building there was an exhibit of other original Leo De Vinci works, so we saw that, and was pretty awesome. By this time, we were going way too fast through our tourist destinations, so Jackie said she wanted to take a nap. I, however, didn't want to take a nap, but I had nothing else to do in our room, so I asked if we could go to a bookstore that we found back by the Duomo, before we went back. As soon as we got to the book store, it looked like it was about to rain, so we quickly went inside and found the English books, thank the lord, and I ended up buying Harry Potter: And the Deathly Hallows. I figured it was a long book so I wouldn't finish it any time soon, plus it's the British version, which makes it even better! By the time I picked out my book and went back outside, it was pouring, so we quickly took our exit and made our way back to our hostel via the Milano metro system.

After Jackie's nap and my reading, we decided to find some grub. There was this section of the city that was suggested for good food, so we took the metro for about 30 minutes to get some authentic Italian Pizza. Again, I apologize about not remembering ANY names, as I forget the name of the Restaurant. The service was great, and we were seated, ordered, and done eating within a half an hour! Unfortunately, we were hoping it would take us longer than that, you know, to kill some time, but we went back to our room and I continued reading, and went to sleep early.

Friday was a lovely day, it didn't rain! Since we didn't want to exhaust our tourism, we let ourselves sleep in, and I fully appreciated this. Our first stop was to find some food, and guess what, we went back to the Duomo! That seemed to have become our main area. On the metro, I saw a sign that advertised an exhibit of Goya paintings and drawings, an artist I learned about in my art class last semester and really liked, his most well known painting is Saturn eating his children. So we tried to find that, it was supposed to be around the Duomo, but we passed it so we just decided to walk around Milan, and we did so for about 2 hours. I actually forget the exact details from this day, but we did end up finding the museum with Goya, and it was very good.

Saturday we left for Genoa. It wasn't a long train ride, only about an hour and a half, however, it was raining this day. It was pouring when we arrived in Genoa and we then spent the next 2 hours trying to find our B&B, and I suggest to everyone that you shouldn't stay in a B&B that you find alongside hostels. We eventually found it, it was the smallest sign I've ever seen for a place, and to make it even better, it was facing in the opposite direction form us. The problem after we found it is that you're supposed to call the person when you get there, however our phones don't work there, so we tried the pay phones, and guess what, those didn't work either! Suddenly, when I was about to just go find a nice hotel by the train station and I would pay for it, I was NOT going to spend the night homeless, the guy whose wife owns the place found us. Apparently he had been getting my calls, they just dropped after the initial ring. I was so relieved when he showed up! The place was right on the port, so the view was nice, but there was scaffolding blocking our window. So we dropped off our bags and we set off on our adventures in Genoa. We went to the center which isn't very big, but it's a port city so there were tents and touristy things. we walked all along the port and kept getting bombarded with people asking us if we wanted to buy an umbrella.

After loosing ourselves around the awesome old streets, we didn't know what else to do, so when I saw a tourism van, we jumped on. Thankfully we did this because we wouldn't have known what to do on Sunday. After the tour we went and got a great meal, and I actually had a glass of wine! Go me :)

Sunday, Easter, we woke up and began getting ready because we didn't know when we were supposed to be leaving, but when we were finishing our two rolls and orange juice breakfast, Maura, the owner, came scrambling in and told us we had to leave, basically ordering us out, thankfully we were ready. It wasn't a very fabulous place to be, but whatever, it was an experience. We took our cue from the previous day's tour and we went towards the mighty fountain in the center of town. We made our way to the shopping street, which unfortunately was mostly closed since it was not only a Sunday, but Easter no less.

We saw Christopher Columbus' house! That was really cool, since I pretty much owe him my whole life as I know it. We found some stairs that led up to a great view of the city, and we followed it to see if we could find the Mediterranean Sea, which we found after about an hour of walking, we found a beach, however it wasn't the cleanest beach, but a beach none the less. We sat there for about half an hour until we got too chilly and started to head back to the center of town. That took us a while, and when we made it back to the center, we thought we'd try and get to the Medieval Lighthouse that looked awesome, so we tried to take the bus. We ended up in a different town because the bus didn't actually pass it even romotley. So we were on the bus for about 2 hours and when we got off, it was time to go to the train station back to Milan.

That was pretty much it. I wish I had better weather and better accommodations, but what are you going to do?

I'm sorry this was a little overdue, I'm just a huge procrastinator!

I leave for Prague in about 7 hours or so, so I will let you know how it goes, hopefully sooner than this time.

Hope everyone had a lovely Easter :)

Lindsay

Italia...

Hej Hej!

So, tomorrow afternoon, my friend Jackie and I, are embarking on a trip to Milan and Genoa, Italy!

I did get a new camera so there WILL be pictures this time :)

Speaking of pictures, I got Kristen's pictures and I posted them at the shutterfly site that has a link on here, to the left. If you see two old people, that's Grandma and Grandpa Buck, VERY English people.

Tonight I signed up for my classes for Fall semester back at good o'l ISU. If you'd like, here's what I will be taking:

ANT-274: Principles of Archaeology

ANT 350- Principles of Paleoanthropology

ENG 143- Unity and Diversity in Language (yes, I know, I'm taking an English class,oh no, but it also is an anthropology class)

MUS 181.01- Marching Band

PHI 207- Indian Philosophy

SOA 212- Sociology of Death

I have my English Class on Mondays and Wednesdays from 2:00- 3:15, and I also have Marching Band on Mondays and Wednesdays from 4:00- 6:00

On Tuesdays and Thursdays, I have my remaining 4 classes in a row, with an hour break:

ANT 350- 9:35- 10:50

PHI 207- 11:00-12:15

ANT 274- 2:00- 3:15

SOA 212- 3:35- 4:50

And then I just have Marching Band on Fridays from 4:00-6:00.

In other news, last Saturday we FINALLY had our Day Light Savings Time, so I'm now back to being 7 hours ahead of you, and makes it harder to SKYPE my parentals.

I'll report back with story aplenty from Italia on probably Wednesday.

Ciao!

(The picture is a google image of Genoa, we'll be there for Easter :))

March...

Hej Hej!

Wow, it's only been about a week since I last updated, go me!

NOt much has happened in the last week or so, just been going to class and such. I bought a new camera so I you'll have many pictures from my upcoming adventures.

Information I do have:

I'm leaving from Milan, Italy on the 31st and staying there until the 4th. I'll be in a city called Genoa for Easter. Genoa is right on the Mediterranean Sea, and we're staying at a B&B, so it should be fun!

My next trip after that will be April 11th until the 15th in Prague, Czech Republic. It was between there and Amsterdam, but more people wanted to go to Prague and it was cheaper. I will be using Ryan Air again, but I'll just have to deal with it, the price was only $100 round trip, so I really can't complain.

Then I want to go to Ireland for my last hurrah and for my 20th Birthday, and I'm really excited.

Then I get to take tests and write papers the rest of May until my family arrives on June 5th.

Everyone at home is, or at least was, experiencing lovely Spring weather, however, I haven't had that yet. The snow is slowly melting down from the heaps it was, but it's creating awful slush and I'm not particularly fond of it, although I enjoy the warm 40*, yes 40* is warm here :) However, today we had another Blizzard, which I hope is the last of the season. By 2 this afternoon, we already had about 3 more inches of snow. It makes me want to leave for Italy now!

I register for my Fall semester classes on the 30th at 8:25pm my time, and I hope I get all the classes I want, but thankfully I'm all over with General Education classes. I will let you know what I'm taking when the time arrives.

Hope everyone is doing well :)

Happy Spring (kinda)!

Lindsay

London And Paris...

Hej Hej Everyone!

Sorry about the lack of updates recently. However, I'm here to tell you all about my trips to London and Paris :)

London:

We traveled through Ryan Air this time, so we had to get to a different airport called Skafsta. The problem with that is that we had to take a train into Stockholm then an hour and fifteen minute bus ride to the airport. Since we were worried about not getting there in time, we left at about 1:40 for our 9:40 flight. We ended up having about 5 hours to sit in the smallest airport I have ever seen. The entire trip went very smoothly, which was a great difference to the other trips. We arrived in London's Stansted Airport at about 10:50, but then we were then herded into a long immigration line that took us about an hour to get through. After we finally got through, we practically ran to catch the last shuttle to our hotel, The Days Inn, which we caught, thank goodness. We checked in and signed up for breakfast in the morning. The room was nice, much better than a hostel.

In the morning, it was raining, which made me a little sad, but it got better during the day. After we ate our breakfast, we got back on the shuttle to take us back to the airport. At the airport we found the train to take us downtown, which was about a half hour ride. We arrived at Liverpool Station at which we then proceeded to buy our Tube tickets for the day. Our destination was the British Museum, and after a few minutes trying to figure out how to get there with all the tube closings on Sunday. We made it easily to the British Museum but stopped before we got there to admire the parks around us. After about 2 hours or so, we started heading to a tube station. At the station, we saw directions to Charles Dickens' house, so we decided to find it. We made it to the street it told us to go to, but after we got to the street, we couldn't find it, we walked up and down the street for about a half hour until we finally found it, although we didn't go in. We then made our way back to the tube station and headed for Leicester Square. We were starving by this time and headed for some food. We ended up eating at KFC since Kristen wanted to. After sitting in there for about an hour and a half we just started walking. We made it to Piccadilly Circus and then down to St. James Park, which is right by Buckingham Palace. After walking around for a while, we decided to do our last thing for the day, we went to Kings Cross Station of Harry Potter fame. We took some pictures and then started to figure out how to get to our hosts' house, I shall refer to them as Grandma and Grandpa, or rather Liz and Robert Buck. We apparently took the long way round train which took us about an hour and a half, but G-ma and G-pa were very nice about it. They picked us up at Reading Central Station and then took us to dinner. Dinner was delicious and they made us get an appetizer, entree , and dessert. They are so incredibly nice! When we got to their house, which is beautiful, they showed us where we could sleep. There was one room with two twin beds and one with a big queen sized bed. Emily and Kristen took the one with the two twins and I got the other one since I would be waking up before them and making noise and such. And we also got our own bathroom, which I want. It was pink and white polk-a-dots, and oh so adorable.

On Monday, we decided to spend the day downtown again. In the morning, G-ma made us breakfast, and G-pa took us to the correct train station, Twyford, and sent us on our way. Our first stop in London was Notting Hill. I must say, that if I ever move to London, that would probably be my first choice, it's so pretty there. The weather was great too, at about 45*, I could take off my coat and be very comfortable. We came across Kensington Park/Gardens, which we walked around for a while, and Kristen and Emily tried to avoid the pigeons. When we were good to go, we left for the Tower of London. First stop: Pictures of the Tower Bridge. Before we went in, we had lunch outside on the steps, also trying to avoid the birds. The Tower of London was just as I remember it, cool. The crown jewels were pretty, and made me a little sick to think about how much money all of that cost, you could sell just one thing and feed a whole 3rd world country! After we were out, we decided to get ice cream since it was so nice outside, and then went ON the Tower Bridge. After another half hour, we made out way to Big Ben and Parliament. Lots of people just standing there. We were going to go inside West Minster Abbey, but we got there too late, so we decided to head over to Harrods. That store is so fancy, so we didn't spend much time there. We were trying to find a gift for G-ma and G-pa, however, we failed, so we headed back to Reading. We took the right train this time, and when G-pa picked us up, he got us fish and chips for dinner. IT WAS DELICIOUS! We were so tired by then, we planned the next day and then went to sleep.

On Tuesday we didn't go into the city, we went to Windsor and Oxford. G-pa drove us to Windsor, just 25 minutes away, and let us tour it for about 2 hours, then he drove us to the train station so we could get to Oxford. G-ma had, gratefully, packed us lunch so we could eat it on the train. We had to teach her how to make PB&J. Oxford is a great city, however we did start out in the wrong direction. However, we found a map and got onto the right course. We ventured into many school shops, where I bought an Oxford sweatshirt, and many other things....I could't resist on buying a messenger bag with the British flag on it. We saw a sign that said that the college in which they filmed the first Harry Potter was there, so we tried to find it. On our mission, we found many courtyards which we also ventured into. We ended up not being able to find the right college, we bi-passed it at some point, but that's okay. On the treck back, we thought about what we wanted to get G-ma and G-pa and it was the last chance we had. We stopped in front of a fudge shop where the person making it asked us if we wanted a fresh piece of it, and of course we said yes. So we decided to get them some fudge since G-ma has many signs in her kitchen that says she likes chocolate, for example, one of them says "7 days without chocolate makes one weak." We got back to G-ma and G-pa's earlier than usual, which is ok since she made us homemade Shepherds Pie and Tercel Tart (the favourtie dessert of Harry Potter..). Both were absolutely delicious. We used G-pa's computer to see what show we could make on Wednesday. G-ma said that if you go on the day of the performance, you can get really cheap tickets, so that's what we were going to try to do. We wanted a day performance, so we decided either Les Mis or The Lion King. We found out where the theaters were and then went to sleep.

On Wednesday we had to leave G-ma and G-pa. G-ma packed out lunch again. Our first stop was to see if we could get tickets. We put all our eggs in the Lion King basket, since Les Mis isn't really an uplifting show. We walked to the theater and they DID have tickets on the ground floor for only 20 pounds! We had about an hour and a half, so we went to St. Paul's Cathedral and Millennium Bridge. Then ate our lunch on the way back to the theater. The Lion King was filled with children, but it was a great show. We then tried to go see the Shakespear's Globe Theater, but we had bad information from G-pa, so we didn't get to see it. We then proceeded to the London Eye. We had about 5 minutes to get tickets and get on, so Emily and I ran. Kristen didn't want to go on it, so she waited for us on the ground. The city looks beautiful at night, and I am happy I decided to go on it again. After that it was time to head to the airport. Thankfully that airport is open 24 hours so it wasn't as terrible as Berlin.

I didn't try to sleep in the airport. I thought that if I tried to sleep and wasn't successful, I would feel more tired if I just stayed up, so I just read and listened to music. By the end, I walked around the airport seeing where we had to go once they posted where we could check in, and also where security was. Our plane took off at about 6 in the morning. I slept the whole way there, and I also slept on the bus back to Stockholm and the train ride home. So I was a little rested for my class at 4 that day. That night I didn't go to sleep early however, I played cards with Jackie and Stefan. It would make sense that I slept most of Friday. On Saturday I had my Dino class from 9 to 4 and again on Sunday. This didn't give me a long time to recover from London. On Monday, I had class that got out at 8pm, to which I went to bed straight afterwards since I had to get up at 3:50 to catch my 7am flight to Paris.

We had a taxi pick us up at 4:40 since the buses don't start until 5:15. We took the train to Arlanda airport and everything went smoothly. We only had to wait for about 45 minutes before we boarded. The flight was about 2 hours and when we arrived, we had to figure out how to get downtown. We eventually figured it out, thanks to the directions on the Hostel website. We made our way to the Vintage Hostel easily from Gard de Nord. Thankfully we were able to leave our luggage in the Hostel while we went out that day since we couldn't check in until 4. We were pointed, in the wrong direction may I add, to the nearest Metro station. The problem with being in France, is that it wasn't in English, so thankfully the man working near the ticket dispenser helped us, with his little English, and then another lady helped us also. I had very good interactions with the French while I was there which I was not expecting, and was a nice surprise.

Our first stop was the L'arc de Triumphe. However once we got to Champes Elysee, one of the main streets, lunch was necessary, so we went to McDonald's, THEY'RE EVERYWHERE! It was extremely busy there, but we managed to get our food rather quickly. Photo Ops were then taken from a distance, and while we were doing this, we saved a few Italians not get killed trying to cross the horrific trafficked street that goes around the Arc, by telling them to go underground. We decided to go to the top of the Arc, but what we didn't expect is that we had to walk up the 100 or so steps up to the top, but it was worth it. It was an amazing view with the Eiffel Tower. We watched the traffic beneath us for a while, wondering how they know when to go and when to stop for other cars, it's bewildering.

After the Arc, we did some window shopping on the Champes Elysee, with no luck. So then we went to the Eiffel Tower. One thing about the Paris metro is that it's not as clean as the Tube in London, and it's a little sketchier, AND it's a little more confusing. We spent most of the day at the Eiffel Tower. We went all the way up to the top, which was interesting because the others, Kylee, Emily, and Kristen, aren't particularly fond of heights. When we got down from the top, we went into the lawn that's in front of it and took many a picture. It was dinner time, so we went in search of a Cafe, and we were in luck because there was one that was amazing about 20 ft. from the Eiffel Tower. We ate for a while, eating takes a long time in Paris apparently. By the time we left, the Tower was lit up, and we waited for it to start sparkling. Once the sparkling happened, on the hour, we listened to Journey on Emily's phone, while dancing, it was quite the experience. It was then time to go back to the Hostel, check in, and go to sleep.

On Wednesday, we started off with going to see the Moulin Rouge. We decided to go during the day before it wasn't necessarily the best place to be at night. There was a crepe stand on the corner next to the Moulin Rouge, so I got a chocolate and banana crepe, however, I also seemed to order coconut, but it wasn't that bad. Next stop was the Louvre. It is an amazing building and we had a fun time just looking at it. When we finally made our way into the building, we were pleased to know that we could get in for free since we are E.U residents for at least 6 months! I saved 9.90 Euros! We were on a mission to find the Mona Lisa, which we did by getting a lost a few times. It was bigger than I imaged since people kept saying how small it was, I guess I would say I was pleasantly surprised. We also saw the Venus statue. Next was shopping on the Rue de Rivoli, another main street, but first, it was so nice outside, there was a lawn on the way out, so we laid down for a while, with the Eiffel Tower in the background, it was a cool experience. On the Rue de Rivoli is where I did my tourist shopping. I did buy coasters with classic art on them, I know it's a weird purchase, but they will go nicely in my apartment next semester :). After lunch at, again, McDonald's, we headed to Notre Dame. It is an imposing structure, however I've seen a lot of cathedrals in this short period of time, that I was a little underwhelmed. When we left, we tried to see if we could make it to Verssailles, however it closed at 6, and it was about 5 and it took 30 minutes to get there, so that was a no. We ended up getting directions to the main shopping mall, and we did a lot of shopping, being mostly disappointed. I was determined to buy something in Paris, and I eventually did. We ended up eating at another Restaurant, based just on the price, so we didn't know how good it was going to be, but it ended up being fine. It was then time to go back and sleep.

In the morning, we had our free breakfast at the Hostel, and went on our merry way to the airport. We got there in plenty of time, however, the security line took FOREVER! It's the longest I've ever waited to go through security, and they had to delay the flight since there were still some people going through it. I got through and went straight on the plane. The problem is that they only had one metal detector and people apparently have no clue how to go through security, so that took up a lot of time. I was a prepared flyer though, and once I got to the station, it took me all of 3 minutes to get through and on the plane. And again, once I got back, I had class at 4.

That night Jackie and I bought plane tickets to Milan and Genoa, Italy for the Easter weekend. I am looking very forward to this trip, and I hope the weather is warm. It's getting better here, however it's getting very slippery with the snow melting and then it freezing over night. I even slipped today on my way to get my laundry, my hand landed in the snow, and half of my body was soaked. I hope the snow goes away faster.

For 2 weeks, home will only be 6 hours behind me thanks to Daylight Savings Time. We don't change our clocks until the 28th, since there isn't much daylight to begin with.

Well, that's all for now. Again, I'm sorry for the lack of updates, but as you can tell, I've been pretty busy.

Hope you all are enjoying the warming!

Happy Spring!!

Lindsay

Update...

Hej Hej Everyone!

Sorry I haven't blogged in a while, but I find there really isn't anything to blog about.

I'm starting to feel better now, thank goodness, but I'm still having a problem with my ear, but I just bought ear drops to see if they help.

I'm leaving for London this Saturday and I'm pretty excited, it's just Emily, Kristen, and I, and we're going to plan out our trip sometime Thursday, either before or after my Basic Swedish class.

Speaking of which, that class is going well, I don't think I'll pick up the Swedish accent like I did the German accent, but what can I do, it's a little hard actually. It's similar enough to German that I think I will be good at it. Let's see..... Jag bor pa Sernanders vag nio i Flogsta... That means (without the proper accentage above the letters) I reside at Sernandres vag 9 in Flogsta.. Jag heter Lindsay (my name is Lindsay), Jag studerar Anthrpologie (I'm studying Anthropology)....uh...Jag kommer fran Amerika/USA (I come from america/usa). I think I'm picking it up rather well, and the grammar doesn't seem too hard, which is good.

Tomorrow is Emily's 20th birthday and I'm pretty excited. We're going to get manicures and peduicures in the afternoon, then shopping around a little bit, we're going to look for rain coats since it's rainy in the U.K.. And then everyone is going out with us to dinner, then we're buying a cake at ICA and then we're either going out or watching a movie, depending on what Emily decides to do.

I have to pay my rent for the month of March by the end of the week.

I'm enjoying myself and that's pretty much all there is to talk about, hahaha.

There will be another blog about London within a day or so of when I get back, and I expect it to be a long one.

Hope everyone is doing well in the good ol' USA. I'm looking forward to the food when I get back ;)

Hej da

Lindsay

Berlin...

Hello Everyone!

First off, I'm sorry that this took so long for me to post, but I'm sick and haven't really felt like writing it all down, but now it's here!

I had a great time in Berlin.

I really tried to use my German skills, but I was extremely intimidated so I didn't use it as frequently as I would've hoped.

So our trip starts off good. We met at about 9am to get to the airport early for our 12:50 plane. Getting there was very easy, take bus#2 downtown, walk 2 blocks to the train station, buy the tickets, get on the train and get off at Arlanda Airport. We got our tickets very easily though we had to wait a half hour before there were people at the counter to actually check us in, we were there terribly early. We made it through security easily, we don't have to take off our shoes here thank goodness. Our flight was delayed until 2:30 due to heavy snow fall in Berlin. While waiting, we kind of just hung out and played cards. I, being the graceful person that I am, found myself on the ground at one point. I went to get up and get a bottle of water when I slipped on my purse and toppled to the ground, but I got up quickly and laughed it off, it all happened so fast.

The flight was uneventful and went really fast, it only took us an hour and half to get there. When we arrived, we weren't connected to the airport, so we had to use the stairs to get off and then they shuttled us to the airport, it was actually pretty cool. After people used the bathroom, we proceeded to try and figure out how to get to our hostel, Hostel Schlafmeile. We weren't getting anywhere by asking people, so we gave in and got into a taxi to take us there. Since I could speak some German, I was instructed to sit in the front of the taxi van. A half hour later, we made it to our hostel. After checking in, we asked the people who run it, one of them is from New Zealand :), where we could find a pub. We didn't really use their instructions since we kinda got lost, but we found this pub called "Bariton." I had to help people figure out what they were ordering, and my first meal in Germany was a Quesadilla. We were there for a long time, about 3 or 4 hours, and there was this awesome Irish Folk band there, and apparently we were being really loud since they came and asked us where we were from in between sets or whatnot. On our way out, we found this park across the street so we obviously went and played there, a few of them were a little impaired which didn't help with walking on ice, a lot of people fell on their behinds. We made our way back to our room, which was like a store front, which was weird. We found out that we had 2 roommates with us, but they weren't there at the moment. We all got ready for bed, and Kristen, Stefan, and I played go fish for a while, and as it turns out, I am very good at go fish. Our roommates eventually showed up and as it turns out they're from Melbourne, Australia. They are living in London at the moment doing Rugby or something like that, they're names were Billy and Chris. In the morning, everyone was really tired, but the girls took over the bathroom for a while. Mary Beth and Matthew, first nicknames "The Boy" and since nicknamed "Tomcat" due to his cat-like dance, went to breakfast with the Australians at the hostel owned restaurant while the rest of us finished getting ready, and eventually met up with them. Since Emily, Mary Beth, and Tomcat didn't want to go a Concentration camp, they left with the Australians and took a free tour of Berlin, while Stefan, Kristen, Jackie, and I went to Sachsenhausen Concentration camp. It took us about 45 minutes to get to the camp and it was probably the right way to see one, when it's dreary and cold outside. We were there for a good 3 hours and decided to take the train to Potsdam. We walked in the wrong direction at first,and by the time we turned around, Stefan's hip was hurting him (he hurt it playing hockey), so we had a late lunch. Afterward which ended up being another 2 hours on the train. The train ride back was interesting. Stefan was wearing his Canada jacket, so the guy we were sitting next to asked if the US and Canada were in a Union, when he said no, he went on this racist tirade about America and the Turks. I was really angry, so I pretended that I didn't know what was going on, and Kristen was laughing by herself on the other side of the train. It was interesting, and now I can laugh about it, but it was bad at the time, my American Pride came out during that time. Anyway, it was dark when we got there and we went the wrong way, so we ended up eating in the train station and then heading back to the hostel. After another long train ride, Jackie took a nap while Stefan, Kristin, and I played go fish again. The other group left for a bar crawl when we left for a late dinner, where I had kangaroo and a glass of wine! Our next stop was place called The Matrix, and I can honestly and legitimately say that I am not a club person and I have no urge to go to another one the rest of my life. It was about one in the morning when we got back, but while I was trying to sleep, the others were trying to open our door and failing, so I listened to them for about 5 minutes fiddle with the lock until I just decided to open it up for them. The next day went more smoothly, since the other group had seen what we were going to see today, they stayed in bed and went to the zoo while we went on our own tour of Berlin. We were about a ten minute walk to the East Side Gallery of the Berlin Wall, so we walked along the wall until we got the the East Train Station. The Wall is interesting and very colorful, and something I think everyone should see once in their life. I actually stood in both sides at once, which was pretty cool. After we found our way to the S-bahn, we went to see Brandenburg Gate. Unfortunately, the gate is getting a face lift, so there were things covering one side of it, or something. Fun fact, the hotel that's right in front of it is the hotel where Michael Jackson dangled his baby from the balcony, Kristen took a picture of it. We strolled our way to the Reichstag where I thought I could get warm, but after waiting in the line for an hour, we went to the top and it was not indoors. I would've appreciated it more, I think, if it had been warmer. We were so cold that we decided to go to lunch after we got out, we ate at a car dealership or something, I don't remember what kind of car it was, but it was German, hahaha. The food was delicious, and thankfully the waitress explained what the menu said, because I really had no clue. We then made our way to Museuminsel, an island with a lot of museums and the Berlin Dome. We didn't get into any museums because we turned a corner and saw the Berlin Dome, and spent a good 2 hours in there. It was beautiful and huge, and I loved it. I'm still awestruck when I see pictures of it. For reference, it's the inset picture. I remember thinking that however beautiful it is, there isn't a real need for anything that extravagant except for tourists. But there isn't anything I can really do about that, I would've given the money to something that needed it. We could've stayed for the 6 o'clock service but we decided to leave and meet up with everyone else, and get our luggage that thankfully the Australians let us leave in there since we were kicked out. When we finally got back to our Hostel, they weren't there yet, so we sat in a place called "Schmitz" where I had the most delicious hot chocolate. Eventually the other group got there and we figured out how to get to the airport. We ended up taking the train to Alexanderplatz and then jumped on a bus that took us to the airport. We were getting there pretty early thinking that things would be open there, but we were very very wrong. We got to Tegel airport at approximately 10pm. and there was NOTHING OPEN, and a few of us were starving. We found the place where we were supposed to get our tickets, but they were closed too, so we settled down. My group was getting hungry, so we made up our minds to see if we could go find food, and if all else failed, we were going to take the bus back into the city and get something there. We left our bags with the others, Mary Beth, Tomcat, and Emily, while we tried to find food. Outside, we thankfully found someone with Burger King, and Kristen asked where they got that, and not speaking very much English, the lady said go over a bridge and walk and walk and walk. We took her directions, and after a while I found the sign that pointed to Burger King. It was in the middle of no where, and it felt as though it took forever to get there, however it was only about 1o minutes. When we got back to the others, about an hour later, they were being kicked out of that terminal since it was being closed, so we were instructed to go to a different smaller terminal. We ended up sleeping on the floor of the airport. I didn't get much sleep, I was too uncomfortable. At about 5:30 am, we got up and went to get our tickets. We were all exhausted, and a little testy. The flight seemed to fly by, pun intended, since I fell asleep as soon as I got on the flight, however I missed free muffins and I was starving. Arriving back at Arlanda, we got back on the train to Uppsala and then the bus back to Flogsta. I slept for a long time, however I could've slept for another day and a half.

Since then:

Saturday was a lazy day. Sunday I went to church with Emily and free pancakes. Then at night, Emily, Jackie, and I had a Valentines Day dinner and movie. Jackie cooked, and we had fajitas. I started feeling sick then. We watched Finding Nemo, such a great movie, and I made my way back to my room. I had a bad headache by the time I went to sleep, so I took medicine. The whole night was bad. I kept waking up with that pounding in my head, and I was dizzy and lightheaded, and I almost fell over when I went to the bathroom in the morning. I barely made it to class that night, but I did, I'm such a good student.

Today, I had a full blown cold, but Emily and I went into town anyways and had fika. We were told by our interpreter at church that we had to eat a certain pastry before Ash Wednesday, so we had that. I had to go to my first Swedish Language class at 4:15, and it went well. I think I will sleep a lot tomorrow to help this cold along. I hate being sick, and being in a foreign country doesn't help.

Well, that's it, I will try to write more frequently, but I can't promise anything. Sorry for such a delay.

Lindsay

Super Bowl 44...

So I lied. Sorry about that, I said that I would write again on Saturday, but I didn't.

Well, Saturday was a fun day. I bought some University apparel so I can be all decked out when I get back home. I also bought a pair of cheap leather walking flat boots. So far they are awesome and I wear them everyday. The funny thing is that in the beginning of the day, we ended up hanging out in MAX again, Emily and I had met up with others and they just so happened to be there. It's becoming our hang out place. Later that night, Emily, Stefan, Jackie, and I, had another card game night. We ordered pizza which was a little strange, but good none the less. After a while, Emily and I made our way to ICA to get something sweet to eat and brought it back up for the 4 of us to eat. We played games until midnight when we were all getting sleepy.

On Sunday, Emily and I met to go to church in Building one. The previous Sunday, we had gone to get free Swedish Pancakes an found out that it was provided by a church group and they invited us for the next week. The whole thing was in Swedish, but we had an interpreter for us, but everyone was really nice about filling us in what was going on. We met yet ANOTHER Canadian, Heather, who is from Vancouver, who is studying Neuro-Science. At the end, we were chatting with the locals and they are all very nice. At one, Jackie and Stefan came to get pancakes. We were supposed to go to a pub to watch the Super Bowl, but we ended up going to Stefan's corridor to watch it. Before though, we went to ICA to get some snacks and we ended up getting ingredients for Taco/Bean dip, and it was delicious. Anyway, watching the Super Bowl in Sweden was weird. It started at midnight and it ended at about 3:45am. The commercials were a weird experience. Sweden doesn't have as many commercials as the US, so I saw the same 5 commercials every time. They also don't show them as often, so when the US was watching the cool new commercials, we saw the stadium from afar with no sound, it was strange, but what are you going to do.

I leave for Berlin on Wednesday and I am excited! So I probably won't post until I get back on Saturday.

If you want to see all the pictures of me that are on Facebook, my dad made a website so everyone can see them: lafrey.shutterfly.com

Enjoy and Talk to you all later!

Lindsay

Copenhagen...

The Arrival:

Getting there was interesting. It started out good, I woke up at around 7 o'clock to meet everyone at 8:15 to make the 8:20 bus to the train station. It was all going well, we transfered trains in Stockholm and we were on our way. The train was going really slow because it was snowing, so we ended up being about 75 minutes behind schedule. We were stopped in Malmo for about an hour before they finally said in English that this train wasn't going to Copenhagen. So we get off the train with others who were also stranded. We found some people to follow that were also going to Copenhagen. It turned out that due to the Blizzard that they were experiencing, no trains were going or coming from Copenhagen. We were a little tiffed, but they said that they were having buses come to come and finish the last 45 minutes. We waited outside for about 30 minutes in the blizzard with a whole mob of other people. We were proactive in figuring out if the buses that were coming were going to Copenhagen, and we were eventually one of the first people on the first bus, however, when the others found out too, there was a whole lot of pushing and shoving to get on, it was definitely an experience. We were under the impression that the bus was taking us to the Central station, however, we were brought to the airport. So we were confused. Someone told us that we could just hop onto the metro and that would get us there. So we bought tickets for the metro but we apparently went to the wrong place. We almost got on a train that would take us back to Malmo, which would not be appreciated. We eventually found where it was and we bumped into the people we met at the Malmo train station again, and they gratefully helped us the rest of the way, on two metro trains. At about 8:30, we arrived at Copenhagen Central Station, we were expected to be there at 3:30. We were starving, so we ate McDonald's for the first time since arriving in Europe. While eating, we figured out how to get to our Hostel. We had to call them a few times during the day so they knew us well. Our hostel was only about 5 blocks away, so we made our way, in the slush, to our hostel and we were very happy to finally be there. We had our own room for 5 people and it wasn't that bad. We went to sleep early since we were exhausted. We woke up to check out of there by 10. We then had all day until we had to leave. We first thought it would be a good idea to figure out where we would be getting on our bus home. After a few failed attempts, we finally found it. Our first stop in our quest in Copenhagen was to find a place called Christiania, a place sovereign from Danish law, and only has a few rules, basically a hippie colony in the middle of Copenhagen. We of course got lost on the way there, but finally found it. The experience was weird, I felt very uncomfortable there and wanted to get out fast. You can't take any pictures in there, so I don't have many. We were only in there for about 10 minutes, and that was enough. The sign to get out says, "You are now entering the E.U". We were taking pictures of that sign when a car almost hit us. I had a bad reaction time, but I got out of the way quickly enough. It all happened really fast, but all was well. We then went to meet one of Jackie's friends, who is studying there, for lunch. She took us to the picture above to find a place to eat. We ended up eating at a wonderful place with a fireplace, which was nice since we were all freezing. We had a delicious meal and went on our way. We walked further along and ended up at the Palace. 4 houses, one belongs to the queen, one her son, her other son, and a guest mansion. After spending time with the marching guards, we made our way to The Little Mermaid. She's very small, but worth the walk. After an hour or so, we made our way back to the train station, walking along the main shopping street. A few blocks away from our Hostel, we found an Organ donation party happening in a square and they were serving free hot chocolate. There were DJ's playing music, and it was all really cool and fun. After spending some time, we made our way back to the train station to wait for our bus. We all had our own window seat, comfortable for sleeping. The trip home went well. At the border of Sweden, we had to go through customs and such. Then in Stockholm, we had to transfer buses. When we arrived at Uppsala Central Station, we ended up running to catch the #2 bus back to Flogsta. I immediately fell asleep and had a relaxing day yesterday.

I will write again tomorrow :)

Lindsay

Leaving...

Hej Everyone!

Yesterday was a relaxed day. I woke up and had free Swedish Pancakes with Emily at one. They were delicious and the people who make them have church before, and they invited us, and we're going next Sunday. The rest of the day was leisurely. I was planning on staying up until 2 am to watch the Grammy red carpet, but at one am, the power in either our corridor or building or whatnot went out, so I figured that was my cue to go to sleep.

Today I woke up and met Emily, Stefan, and Jackie at MAX. Emily and I went then to try and buy sweatshirts, but the place isn't open on Mondays, just my luck. We then decided to see if we could buy sneakers, and I found a pair I liked, but they didn't have my size :'(. Anyway, we came back and I had a few hours until I had to leave for class, so I watched the Grammys (I taped it). Class was good, if a little boring, but we had to get into groups and I met two more Canadians and two Australians. After class, I sped walked to the bus stop because I didn't want to hang around at the bus stop for another 20 minutes. I made it just in time! Thank goodness! When I got back, we were meeting at Emily's to buy tickets to Berlin for next week since Dog Sledding failed. Emily, Jackie, Mary Beth, Matt, Kristen (also from ISU), me, and maybe Stefan are leaving next Wednesday at noon and getting back early Saturday afternoon. I am really excited because I will be able to practice my German!

Tomorrow Kylee, Jenny, Jackie, Emily, and I are meeting up at 8:15 to leave for Copenhagen. We're getting back early Thursday morning. I won't be able to watch Lost until I get back, so please, please, don't post anything about it!

I'm off to bed now :)

(Picture: Emily, Me, Jenny, Kylee)

Stockholm...

Yesterday we went to Stockholm. We met at 8:45 at the bus stop, and since it was so cold, we took the bus. The train was 15 minutes late and when we finally got on the train, we apparently went to the wrong section....we were in first class, and the train was crowded, so when we got up to move, we ended up having to stand in the stairway for the duration of the trip. We arrived at Stockholm's Central Station at about 11ish. We then had to figure out our Copenhagen trip for next week. We ended up getting a train ticket for the way there and then a bus ride home. Anyways we split up after that, Jackie, Stefan, and Matt went to Parliament, and Jenny, Kylee, Mary Beth, Caroline, Emily, and I went to try and find the shopping area. I need to reiterate the fact that is was COLD! About 9 degrees and we were very very chilled. Out strategy was to get into shops as frequently as possible. What surprised me is that there are 3 H&Ms within 5 feet from one another. We walked briskly along the touristy road. We found an underground mall where a demonstration ( I think) was taking place, but we left the area soon enough. We were hungry and wanted to eat, so we decided to eat in Old Stockholm. It took us a few minutes, but we finally found an awesome little restaurant in Old Stockholm. I had a tuna sandwich, which was amazing! And I also ended up getting a hot chocolate which warmed me up. After we begruginly left into the cold, we tried to find the center, which we eventually did. We went into the Nobel Museum, but didn't feel like spending money to go in, so we went towards the water front. Stockholm is a beautiful city which I think I would've enjoyed more if I were able to feel my body. Anyways, we continued our shopping warmage scheme and ended up hanging out at, guess where, MAX! It's becoming our hang out place. We sat there for a long time warming up and what not. We eventually made our way down a block to Central Station and were able to sit in a seat on the way back. We took the bus from the train station to Flogsta, and a few of us went to ICA to get some food. When I got home, I ended up having a nice chat via Skype with my parents, and I am happy to say that they have their plane tickets! So I will be picking them up from the train station at 8:30 on June 5th!

Tomorrow I plan and observe people for my ethnology class then meet up with Emily and others to go and get Uppsala University sweatshirts! Then I have class at night. Then I will be leaving for Copenhagen early Tuesday morning.

Right Now we are trying to figure out Dog Sledding for next week because the place we were going to go to is fully booked. So we'll see if we can even do that. And I think I may be going to Ireland and Scotland in April. I am thinking of not traveling much in May since I will have my "papers" and test then.

Well, check in with y'all later :)

Lindsay

2 weeks in...

Hej Everyone!

First, thank you all for commenting! It's always nice to read :).

The pub crawl was pretty lame. We left at about 5:30 and waited in line to get on the bus (there was a lot of people waiting to go to the same thing). When the second bus came, it actually stopped right in front of us, which was awesome. We didn't know where the first stop was so we wandered and we luckily found it although we had to wait outside for another 20 minutes. When we got inside, we HAD to check our coats which I didn't like. We sat around and chatted, although once we got in it was time to go to the next stop. We decided that we would go to the third one and just wait. However, we didn't find it any fun so we decided to leave. It was really cold out so by the time we got to the town square, we decided we wanted to eat at MAX, it's becoming our place and will be one of the things I will miss when I leave. After about an hour there, we decided to head back to Flogsta. I was completely okay with this, although every time we try and go out, we end up getting too cold and leaving.

Today was a very relaxing day. I woke up at around noon and I felt amazing. I then rearranged my room and now there isn't as much empty space and it feels more cosy, however it still needs color. For dinner I went over to Emily's and we made Quesadillas. YES I ACTUALLY "COOKED"! We had those with some salsa and some apple sauce and chocolate milk (we had to, her milk was expiring). Once we finished cooking however, Jackie and Stefan came in and they actually cooked, and it looked quite delicious. After we cleaned up, we found a french deck of cards, so we played card games for a long time. I lost at pretty much everything, but oh well. I'm going to sleep early tonight because we're leaving for Stockholm tomorrow morning, leaving the bus stop at approx. 8:45. I will take lots of pictures and let you all know what we did.

And I am pleased to have been right about something: before I left I said that I would probably be comfortable after 2 weeks being here. Well, I was absolutely correct! I am doing great, and can fathom being sad to leave in June. Talk to you guys soon!

BYE!!!

Getting Better...

Hej!!!

So that last time I reported I said I was feeling homesick, and now I am happy to report that that is no longer the case. I think I had to get through that phase to get to this new accepting one. I don't know why I'm fine now, but I am. Today it was blizzarding and I had to go out. Emily and I went at about 1 to pay her rent at the same convenience store. Then we trudged against the wind and snow, up the hill, to English Park to turn in my Basic Swedish application. People's opening hours are ludicrous over here. The International Office is only open Monday through Friday from 9:30 to Noon. Anyways, the lady wasn't there so I slipped it through her door and emailed her to see if she got it, and yes, she did, thank goodness. We did everything in an hour which is amazing. I got back and watched Regis and Kelly and The View, I know, but I like those shows and they make me happy. I helped empty the corridor's garbage, or as my neighbor, Sophie, likes to say "rubbish." She's from England. Anyways, at 6 we went over to Emily's to try and buy train tickets for our trip to Copenhagen next week. We failed in the end to which someone said was probably due to our American credit cards. So we decided to go to the Central Station tomorrow and work it out. We then started to plan out our trips for real, researching prices and such. We also changed a few things.
These are the dates and places I will be going up until April:

Jan. 30th- Day trip to Stockholm

Feb. 2-4th Copenhagen

Feb. 11 (or 12th)- 14- Dog Sledding

Feb. 26th- Mar. 6th- Berlin, Prague, and Auschwitz (Poland)

Mar. 9-11- Paris

Mar. 26th-Apr. 3rd- Spain with a trip to Morocco

I am so incredibly excited about all of this! I think this is what made me not be homesick anymore, but I was feeling better before.

I ended up not going to that International Bible Study only for the reason of the fact that it was a blizzard outside. I have another skype date with my mother tonight.

I skyped my brother Tom today and he says its almost good that he's coming here. He also convinced me to go back to IKEA to spruce up my room and make it look un-cell-blocky, arguing that I would want to get back from my trips to a cosy room, not one that's prisony. I am going to be a very good person to the next person who lives here. I am considering writing a note to them as well.

Anyways, that's it for now. Tomorrow we're buying train tickets and there's an international pub crawl that goes to all the nations. I'm going but not participating, just want to see all the nations. See? I'm getting out :) hahaha. Friday I think I'm going to clean and re-arrange my room.

Once Again, leave comments, they make me happy!!!

Hej da!

Homesickness...

Yesterday was a bad day for me. I woke up and was feeling a little homesick. I had to meet everyone at the bus stop at noon and we were going to see if we could pay rent. That didn't go as planned. For the first time paying rent we had to use cash, and all of us could only take out so much in one day, so we said we'd come back and do it later. Anyways, we came back and I hung in my room for a while, which was really boring, but I had class at 6:15 so I was happy to get out. I left at about 5:30 and took the bus to a close stop and walked the rest of the way there. When I got there, the door was closed, so I sat and waited. I met a girl named Sarah who is a little strange. She's been here since the fall and she's from California. She sat next to me in class and when we had to break into groups of 3 with the others you were sitting next to her weirdness came out more. She reminds me of a Luna Lovegood (Harry Potter reference), but with more Californiaishness. I really like the class, it's basically what love. I get to observe people and write down my observations about what they're doing. If we do these observations, that's basically the final "paper", so it should be fine. I decided to take the bus back since it was so cold out and I couldn't remember the last part of the walk. We were going to do laundry at 9:30 so I waited in my room. At 9:30 I went to Emily's building, but all the machines were taken, so a few of us had to split up. Thank goodness these things are free because they pretty much suck. I did laundry until like 11:45, and I was not happy. I don't know why but I got more homesick during this and I started tearing up on my walk home, maybe because I was tired and my clothes were still a little damp, who knows. Anyways, I got to my room and wanted to talk to my mom, and thankfully she was actually on, so I called her. It made me feel a lot better seeing and talking to her. I didn't want to hang up, but she had to leave. I immediately went to sleep and was zonked out until my alarm woke me up at 10:45. I was still exhausted and I don't know why. Today was better than yesterday. We paid our rent, which was at a small convenience store in the center of town, I'm not sure why that's where we pay, but we did. We then went shopping and it was really fun. My mom told me to shop to fell a little better, and you know what? It worked. I bought a shirt and a dress from H&M, I love that store, and I bought leg warmers since it's so cold at another store. We continued to window shop for a long time, and I am happy to say that I controlled myself. We took the bus home at about 5:00 because we were so cold. I have been in my room ever since, but feeling better than yesterday. In a minute we're hanging out at Kylee's kitchen. I'm not going to stay long, but long enough so that I get my nightly dose of social interaction. Plus I have a skype date with my mom at midnight. I don't know what's planned for tomorrow, but I hope tomorrow, Thursday and Friday go as fast as today went. I think as soon as I start traveling I will start feeling better, and time will start flying by, which at this point, I want it to. I think I'm going to try and go to an international bible study, but we'll see.

Please leave comments because they make me happy and gives me something to read!

Love you all.

Lindsay

More Pictures...

Planning...

Hej!

We've planned out or travels for February. since many don't know when they have class after February, that's as far as we could plan. This Saturday we're visiting Stockholm for a day, we're taking the train there and just doing a day trip, we can always go back. The following week we're taking the train to Copenhagen for a few days. The, I think, the next week after that we're taking the ferry to Helsinki for the weekend and then flying home. Then the week after THAT, for Emily's Birthday, we're going to Norway, again, by train. I will definitely take pictures while I'm there, don't worry. I am excited to travel because it will make the month of February pass faster. And I think the last week of March I am going to Spain and a brief trip to Morocco with as many people who can go.

I finally know my schedule! I have Swedish Society and Everyday Life on Mondays from 6:15 to 8 every Monday until Easter, then two weeks off and then every other Monday up until May 31st. I am wishing to have Basic Swedish on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 4-6. It starts on Feb. 16th and goes until mid May, I'm not sure when I have weeks off yet. My Dinosaur class only meets this past weekend, Saturday and Sunday, from 9:15 to 4, then we don't meet again until March 6th and 7th, same time. The last time we will meet is Saturday April 24th. It's good that we don't meet often because it is the most boring class that I have ever attended, and it doesn't help that it lasts 7 hours. It also doesn't help that I already know about what was taught and we haven't really talked about Dinosaurs yet. It's also good because it means I will be able to travel more!

Yesterday was Mary Beth's Birthday. During out class, those who weren't in it went to Malin's apartment where she made her a homemade Swedish cake. I didn't get to have any, but it looked delicious! After we were done with class, we went out to dinner at our Nation's Pub (V-Dala). It was quite nice there. I once again had a hamburger. My mom says that it seems that that's all I eat here, but it's pretty much the only source of meat I'm eating here, plus they're delicious! They have this sauce that's mayo and dressing mixed together, and it is magical! We hung out until 9 when the club opened, Jenny and I decided to go home because we were tired and had class in the morning. Apparently we didn't miss anything, so that's good.

I skyped with my parents when I got home and I'm looking forward to showing them around, although you can see Uppsala in a day or two.

I'm going grocery shopping soon and then I have a corridor meeting at 8. I am actually looking forward to it because I haven't really met anyone and would like to know my way around the kitchen. After my metting the group is getting together to discuss our travels again and buying the train tickets for Copenhagen.

That's it for today!!

Lindsay

Getting Settled...

Good Morning Everyone!

Yesterday was a nice relaxing day. I got to sleep in a little bit, about 10:30 or so, and met up with most everyone at the bus stop at 12:30. We were planning on walking into town, but no one felt like it today, so we took the bus. Our destination was V-Dala Nation, the Nation that we joined. We looked at the map and seemed to know where the general vicinity was. Apparently we were wrong because it took us an hour to get there and was in the complete opposite direction than we thought, we found it thanks to the people we asked on the street. The fee to join a nation is expensive, SEK 450, but the upside is that they had free candy that was addicting, but I controlled myself. After we were done we wanted to go shopping. We entered a few stores only to realize how expensive everything was, but we eventually found something. We went into the mall where we saw that the shoe store was having a big sale, we were looking to buy boots since that seems to be a staple item here. I bought a pair of leather boots, they were originally SEK 1000, but they were 50% off, so they were SEK 500! They were worth it because they are very walkable in this town. We went to one last store and I bought a dress that makes me look Parisian, or at least I think so. We ended up taking the bus back because, again, we didn't feel like walking. We were to meet up again at 8:30 to go to a party at Stockholm Nation. I had a few hours on my hands so I watched Regis and Kelly and The View on my Slingbox, I LOVE THAT THING! I then saw that my mom was apparently on Skype so I tried calling her. She didn't answer so I called her cell phone. I told her where I was supposed to be going that night and she encouraged me to go, and thankfully Emily, another ISUer, is the same as me. We met up and took the bus into town once again. We ended up lost again, but eventually found it. There was a humongous line. We waited for about a half an hour until we gave up, we were freezing, and we decided to go back and just hang out. Our plan was to go to ICA, the grocery store, and buy some chocolate and to go hang out in Kylee's common room since no one is ever in there. I stayed until about 12:45 because I had a skype date with my mom. I called her as soon as I got into my room and talked to her for a good 2 hours, I was up until 3am. I was told to go to sleep, so I did. I didn't have to wake up at any certain time today, so I slept in until noon, and it felt amazing! We're having a relaxed day today and that makes me glad because I could use it. We're planning our trips today when everyone else wakes up, but only Emily and I are awake, so it's probably going to be a while. I will let you know where we are planning to go!

This weekend I finally have class! YAY!

Lindsay

Pictures...

Hey Everyone!

So the past few days have been pretty much walking around town and getting better acquainted with it. I think I am getting a lot better at knowing where I am now. I have walked back to Flogsta a few times now and see why I would want a bike, I'm just not sure how I would fare with riding it in the snow. We're joining a Nation tomorrow, a nation is kind of like a sorority or fraternity but not really, you join it and they have free stuff. I went shopping a little today, just a new scarf (since I lost mine on the flight here), and a hat.

Today we just went around taking pictures and being really touristy, but we didn't care. I didn't take a lot, but I will be working on it. I just got back with having dinner with everyone (we just brought our own food to Kylee's kitchen and hung out for a long time).

Tomorrow I am going to find one of my teachers so I can know my class schedule. One of my classes only meets Saturday and Sunday in January and March(just once), and once in April!

We aren't going anywhere this weekend, but we are planning on a trip to Stockholm for next weekend. Tonight when we were hanging out we discussed where we want to travel to and we pretty much all agreed that we'll go anywhere. It looks like we will be going to Finland, Norway, Germany, Poland, Ireland, Scotland, and maybe Russia and Itay. We can't decide anything until I know my schedule, but most likely these trips will be long weekends. We don't have much class time, so it should be ok.

I am adjusting rather well although I do look forward to coming home in June. I am also excited to show my family this beautiful city!

Lindsay