Candy Heaven

For those of you not IN THE KNOW, 4-Gott is my favorite candy store in all of Gothenburg. I stumbled upon it one sunny day (must have been September) when Anna (amazingly fun friend from Uppsala days who now studies a JIB) and I were out shopping (or perhaps in search of lunch, eating and shopping being our activities of choice during daytime hours).

Well, when out for a stroll with my good friends Kadri and Sebastian this past Monday. (killing time between breakfast and lunch... wow my life revolves around food) I discovered that a new location opened right by apartment!!! Conveniently located next door to my grocery store and the EVIL EVIL gym!

Yes upon this discovery I was more excited than any kid has ever been in a candy store. Rushed inside and filled a bag with sugary goodness.

Flash forward to today:

Feeling slightly exhausted from a two hour nap this afternoon, I decided to brave the gym, which would be followed by a quick stop at the grocery store to pick up yogurt for breakfast tomorrow. Midway through my 3.25 minute walk to the gym I decided I was not in the mood for sweating relentlessly next to human cyborgs and headed right to the grocery store. Picked up some yogurt, yalla drinking yogurt, and Echinacea. (for those of you who don't know I am shunning modern medicine aka the flu vaccine in favor of natural immune system fortification... I am currently drinking about a gallon of orange juice a day, consuming 1 carrot stick, followed by two clementines, fortified with cottage cheese for lean protein... yea I read about it on the web) Well, not eager to return home just yet I decide to stop by the good ol' candy store for some dessert, which would follow my immune fortifying dinner. Less than ten seconds out of the shop and the bag was already opened and my sugar fest commenced.

Needless to say, my immune fortifying dinner never really happened, I was too full from the 5 kg of candy I felt inclined to consume?

Ahh the perks of being a grown up and being allowed to make your own poor life decisions!

My Swedish Gym

As many of you are probably aware... about a month ago I broke down and joined a gym. Unwilling to be inconvenienced in any way, I joined a gym that is exactly a 3.25 minute walk from my apartment.

The Gym is called "World Class Fitness" and has destroyed every last miniscule molecule of my self confidence.

You see, a normal gym is a place where people go to work on their physique. The word "work" implies there are still areas that can be improved. My gym on the other hand is a place where cyborg robots go to flaunt their .09% body fat and rippling biceps.

The other gym goers are petrifying! Their brute strength being contained by nothing more than shiny spandex lurex blend body suits. I've seen grandmas come hobbling in on walkers, rip of their jackets and then run on the treadmill for an hour! A paraplegic lifting 150 kgs!! A deaf blind person complete a kick boxing class!!! These people simply aren't human!!!

Today for the first time in a month there was an exception and I almost wept for joy. Out of the sea of physical perfection stood a slightly overweight but kind looking man of around 25. Soo eager to finally find someone on my level, I went out of my way to smile at him at every opportunity. Crunches...look up smile... dumb bells...look up smile... and so on in this pattern for 20 minutes. My tubby chubby friend unfortunately, could not be bothered to look at his fellow physically challenged compatriot, because his attention had been caught by the Giselle Bundchen look alike on the recumbent bike.

And so it goes...

Quarter Life Crisis

I came to a realization last night that I am indeed going through a quarter life crisis... 3 years earlier than my intended quarter life. ( I neeeed to live to be 100!!) The crisis is brought on by three main problems in my life:

1) After 22 years I am bored with my face... my god it just never changes, everyday I look in the mirror and its still the same!!! Solution: when I go home for Christmas I am getting bangs. Even if bangs make me look worse than Stephanie Tanner during her pre-meth days... at least it will be something new to look at!

2) I need to stop eating a pound of chocolate a day. For those who experienced the "Post Uppsala Kirsten"... You know the detrimental effects of my last stay in Sweden... triple chin whaaaat? This problem luckily is rectifying itself. I am patiently waiting for money to be put in my bank account so I can survive through November, December and pay January rent. So far it's been a week and the money has yet to go through... meaning I literally have 30 kronors to my name. Making grocery shopping impossible and cutting off my food supply.

3) My life has become mundane and I need to inject some excitement. The clear answer to this problem is that I need to develop a crush! It needs to be someone so out of reach and unattainable that it literally causes pain every time I see him. I have to get so flustered during our encounters that I utter the most embarrassing stories ever about my grandma's out of control hemorrhoids, and then beat myself up about the encounter for the next week. Currently on the look out!

In other news Christian had a really fun party last night!! A few of us headed to ParkLane after (love that place!!!!!), then traversed to McDonald's. Not sure why I eat fast food here... I never do at home... but it was delicious!! Then wound up at an efterfest, with Sarah, in the nicest old apartment in all of Sweden (based on my very limited experience of being in two) and walked home around 7 am.

Now I am super le tired... and going through the toys'r'us christmas toys catalogue that came in the mail today... I don't get a paper, just the adds that are normally inserted. Did you know they still make polly pockets and the littlest pet shop... totally different design now. I also totally would have been asking for the Pony Slott (My little pony castle) if this was 15 years ago and Santa was still heeding my beck and call! Maybe he can find me a crush....

Mourning

Erica left this morning after a ten day visit and I am officially in mourning. I have spent my evening with the lights dimmed, candles lit, eating chocolate and listening to Celine Dion (Ok so her departure hasn't affected my usual nightly habits in the least bit... but I am sad!!) No more visitors for me... it was fun while it lasted!!!

A lot has happened since I have last written, but I'm not sure stories about illegally smuggling Pronghorn Antelopes into Finland is an appropriate topic for a blog... so I will start with something a little more savory... My Halloween PARTY!!!

On Friday, I hosted a small gathering in my apartment. The evening included food (I devoured an entire meat pie), a few drinking games of the Amerikansk variety, and a whole lot of debauchery. Now for the full rundown.

The evening started calmly enough with a flapper, 2 pirates, Axl Rose, a mexican, a swede in a towel, and a gypsy playing f*ck the dealer, followed by Kings. Things quickly spiraled out of control. With 20 people in attendance I expected the evening to remain a quite calm affair. (When have I ever thrown a calm affair??) Things really took off during the "pin the nose on jack-o-latern" game. Sebastian's friend from Stockholm, who we will call "the one who dropped me." Picked people up spun them around vigorously and then smacked my friend Jessica's head into a pole.

It was then time for beer pong... erica and I dominated... literally never, lost but had to give up because I couldn't drink anymore... so naturally it was time for flip cup!! Things continued on in this fashion for a quite a while. One party guest may have even needed a two hour nap (haha).

As for "the one who dropped me," he ended his evening picking me up, sprinting towards my bedroom (or the kitchen but that would be just weird), slipping and landing on top of me. Yes, I know what you are thinking "Kirsten fell again, shocking..." but it honestly wasn't my fault!!!!!

We ended the evening in my crazy hippie neighbors garage/home. I talked to the dog (not wearing a diaper this time) lola, while jessica banged the bongo.

The next day Erica and I awoke to the most horrific site of my life...the mess made the mods look spotless!!!! But it was nothing a mop, broom, vacuum, dish soap, hydrogen peroxide, three loads of laundry, and a smoke bomb couldn't handle!!! 4.5 hours later we were done and it was time to watch Crash. My response to the movie --Dear Residents of L.A. you are all horribly racist, and I had no idea that Ludicrus called asian people "Chinamen," shame on you Luda!! But seriously who let Luda be in a movie??? Oh and Ryan Phillipe... why do you talk like you are missing chromosomes?

That night (saturday) we went to dinner with Sebastian and "the one who dropped me." Erica and I were very overtired and couldn't stop laughing the whole night. I ate a delicious dead cow and then refused to share my ice cream for dessert. Erica shared hers with "the one who dropped me" (ice cream is not a sharing food OK!!!) The whole table may have had an intense discussion about the complexity of the bathroom in the restaurant, followed by multiple trips to said bathroom to investigate.

Sunday night Erica and I went to the movies, we saw couples retreat... I decided I needed an extra large coke. The movie was terrible (minus a few funny moments here and there) but the caffeine high that kept me awake all night was even more horrific.

So far this week has been all about schoolwork... but that's boring, so from now on instead of saying school work I will say "viking ships."

So far this week has been all about viking ships... gosh my life is cool!!!

Addendum (sp?)

Oslo:

After a four hour bus ride we arrive. Take a taxi three blocks which costs approx 30.00 and head to our "hostel"

There was a girl at our "hostel." She was on heroin. She was supposed to work behind the counter but instead stood there saying "yaa yaa yaa yaa yaa" on her cell phone over and over and over again. Her eyes were vacant, her spirit clearly destroyed, and she may have been missing several fingers. She was basically the most useless person on the face of the earth. In fact a damp wash cloth covered in elephant feces would contribute more to the earth's greater well being.

To make matters worse, it wasn't even our hostel, erica had once again messed up and we were in fact staying at the hotel next door. It was then time to find lunch and the obligatory city castle. It took us about twenty tries, and 35 run ins with more heroin addicts, to finally end up on the same street our hostel/hotel was located.

For the next 24 hours I walked around thinking everyone was on heroin, every house was the one charlotte used to live in, and the foliage is soo beautiful this time of year (bahaha that last one was erica, she couldn't stop talking about it).

Things I learned in Norway:

1) Everyone looks dead, in fact I had to ask erica multiple times if she saw people we walked by because I was completely convinced I was seeing ghosts.

2) 7 dollar beers from a hostel refrigerator are the best deal in town.

3) When a boy comes up to talk to you at a club repeatedly saying "Nej" will not impress him, and he will shoot you dirty looks with his sullen heroin eyes for the rest of the night.

4) There is a park with short squat people in compromising positions, in the middle is a penis of people in even more compromising positions, this turns erica on in all the right ways.

5) I love viking ships, and everything viking, I would live in the viking boat museum if given the opportunity.

6) People in norway love US... The United States. Or at least the boy we met in a club did... he was a pastry chef and therefore his opinion is held in my highest esteem.

7) Boys in Oslo are the best dancers I have ever seen in my life! To describe it as angelic would be an understatement of epic proportion.

8) I want to live in Oslo one day, I could happily become a sunken eyed living dead person with an affection for Norwegian Sweaters!!

MISS WHOOPIE ARRIVES

Sooo as most of you already know, whoopie is currently staying with me and we are off to an adventurous beginning!

On friday erica arrived at 6 pm. By 6:30 she had taken over the laundry room of my building and was either washing or drying every article of clothing she had taken with her on her journey. She also arrived with three bottles of wine and a 12 pack of beer so all was forgiven. It was then time for Erica to experiance "the man in the window" a small asian man and his wife who have a small window on the street level of my apartment building and can create either thai, chinese or italian dishes for your consumption. Everything invariably tastes the same... delicious.

All was going smoothly until it was time to head out. After consuming copious amounts of alcohol, Erica was feeling quite loose in the head and mistakenly left home without the tram pass we had purchased just hours earlier. This would have been fine except for the fact that a tram worker, we will name her St. Peter (Erica and I aren't sure but we think he judges you when you get to heaven) took it upon herself to make sure that Erica and I were not wronging the Swedish tram system. St. Peter heard me talking to Erica informing her to get out her ticket, Erica too drunk to comprehend what is going on just looks up laughing saying she forgot her ticket. St. Peter hears the exchange and turns to me and asks me in Swedish where my friend's ticket is. I try to explain in English the situation. St. Peter becomes angry and once again starts talking to me in Swedish. I once again try to explain that I only speak English. St. Peter informs me I am wrong. I inform her this cannot be so. I then tell St. Peter that I will buy Erica a ticket with my phone. St. Peter sees that my phone is in Swedish and once again starts yelling at me in Swedish. I explain to St. Peter that in fact the reason my phone is in Swedish is because I bought it here and can't figure out how to switch it to English... on account of it being in Swedish. St. Peter is still angry and takes Erica's drivers license to call the police, because she no longer believes me about anything. Not sure what happens during that conversation on account of it being Swedish. But St. Peter once again turns to me and tells me I am lying. Sebastian informs St. Peter that I infact am telling the truth, but it is to no avail. She says she is going to check something up front, our stop comes we get off.

Had fun at a club...

Next morning head to Norway. Ate a whopper for breakfast. Ate a ham sandwich as a snack. Ate fish soup for lunch. Ate either cod or cloud fish for dinner. Went out

Had fun at a Norweigan club...

Next day saw naked people in comprimising positions in a park. Saw three old viking ships. Had erica mess up our bus tickets home. Cried and ate a chocolate bar. Recovered, and ate a pizza buffet.

yo!

Alright people it's time to get serious!!! So I just read through Erica's blog and decided enough is enough... time to get crackin'!!! It's been two months and I have written essentially nothing. So to sum up my past two months in one long but hopefully enlightening post, I am going to make a list of all the things I have learned during my time in Sweden.

1) Going on exchange is completely different from studying in a foreign country for grad school. You will not drink 6 nights a week, instead you will partake in this novel concept of homework and group projects (this is the only serious thing I've learned don't worry!).

2) If you rent an apartment online, expect the walls to be puke orange and spend two days painting them!

3) If your landlord's name is Bjorn, your handyman's name is Hans, and your electricians name is Leif... this will make you very happy.

4) If your father cannot drive in your hometown, do not expect him to be able to navigate the streets of Gothenburg.

5) If your brother thinks every boy who looks at you is "creepy" going out together is going to be a long night.

6) Watching large boats go by in the harbor... is way better than any show on television.

7) I have a neighbor that lives in a garage, his dog wears a diaper, and one night Mandy (friend from highschool) and I jammed with him. I played the xylophone... it was rad. Learned that you never really do know what goes on behind closed doors!

8) If you don't water your plants they die... when you water them they come back to life... until they die again... and the cycle repeats

9) If you get black out drunk... you will meet a significantly greater amount of people than usual... they will all remember you.

10) I am still the worst communicator ever.

11) Late night drunk food still makes me quite nauseous.

12) Princess cake is still my favorite dessert!

13) Swedish gyms are full of cyborg robots... save your self esteem and never enter one ever!

14) I still love to ride my bicycle!

15) Group projects can actually be fun... four tigers rawr!

16) Shopping for home decor might be even more fun than shopping for clothes!

17) Living alone is amazing, you get to do whatever you want whenever you want, and you never have to wear pants!

18) When we go out, they play Abba, this is the highlight of my night everytime!!! ( I learned that this is awesome!)

19) Cocoballs taste like heaven.

20) I discovered the most amazing candy store in the entire world... the Chocolatemonster was very satisfied!

21) I realllllllly love vanilla yogurt with musli!

22) I want a pet.

23) There is a man in the window who cooks for me when I don't feel like it! (I've learned I want to marry him... even though he has a wife!)

24) I've learned I am surprisingly neurotically clean when I live alone.

25) I will always be a party girl at heart! I joined the events committee and now will plan parties for my university!!!

26) I still have a crush on Ola Svensson... Natalie just gets me everytime!

27) It is not appropriate to run around asking everyone if they are your mormor och morfar (grandmother and grandfather)

28) I now own ten pairs of black leggings in various design, if I throw in my jean leggings (now up to four pairs) I can go a whole two weeks without repeating!

29) Something about Sweden makes me lose earrings constantly... I've already lost 4 pair... while sober!

30) Oktoberfest was the greatest experience of my life. I never knew sitting in a smokey tent for 12 hours drinking beer could be sooo fun!

31) I still love it here!!! But I miss you all terribly! Visit?

Valkommen

Hello All!!!!!!

So I've been crazy busy with school work... Grad school is insane!!!! Plus I didn't get internet in my apartment until last week... But I intend to use this blog to share all the stories, incidents and crazy situations I manage to get myself into during the next two years!