< ok so I was really curious about all of these fountains that they have around here? I mean, where does the water come from and where is it going and why is it here? Cotton eyed joe? Anyway, so I drank some because it look really nice and I was really thirsty and it tasted like bottled water and it was so cold and I hope I don’t die, but dang that was good water.
Mary and Joseph carrying the bb jesus on a donkey.
Mary in the stable with Jesus
Jesus picking up peter when he realizes he’s walking on water
I think they’re all pulling in the fish from when Jesus was like “cast your nets on the other side!”
?
The description says Death of Saint Vierge, but idk who that is cause no one ever taught me anything about saints.
John baptising Jesus
Kid!Jesus working with Joseph to make a table
idk about you, but this looks like witch symbols
I saw many dogs today, but I couldn’t touch any of them because they were attached to humans
That middle one was in the Mortal Instruments movie I think
Daily-Kate-O-Gram, it is cold and I am as white as the snow
It’s a really good idea to have one of these in a ski village, I think
ok, now that I’ve got that out of the way. I’m in France, you guys. Like FRANCE, France. Not some French city like Fond du Lac or Eau Claire. Like, the real deal where people kiss with their tongue and fry their potatoes and grill their toast with eggs and cinnamon. Okay?
I know it’s dumb, but every French book I’ve ever had was published in the mid 1980’s, and I guess I had some delusions that French people were very 1980’s-ish and they’re not. I’m a little put-off, and I’m not entirely sure that I’m ACTUALLY in France because of it.
we stopped at Karin’s parent’s house on the first night and they were really cute and it was so nice to sleep. After that car trip with Nick to Florida, I swore I would never ever ever go on another road trip that lasted longer than 8 hours, but this whole experience has renewed my hope in Road Trips. It made me miss driving dearly though 😦 On the bright side, if I ever have a family of my own, I’ll always get shotgun or driver’s seat since I’m the mumma and I’m in charge! 😀
Look familiar?
Foggy morning in the mountains. Good time for a walk?
It wasn’t even cold.
I had my coat open the entire time!
Honestly, I was pretty sweaty because everything was uphill and I was really regretting the longjohns.
Heck, it was so warm, I decided to take all my winter wear off and sit in the middle of the hiking trail to read. I HIGHLY RECOMMEND GOOD OMENS. IT’S A VERY FUNNY BOOK. But then maybe 20 pages later the trees I was sitting under were heavy with snow and they dumped it all on my head and I had so much snow down the back of my shirt. Such is my life.
and then the fog cleared a bit
so I started walking into the village
and then I started running because walking is slow and I am impatient.
I stopped to show you guys this river though. I forget what it’s called. It’s on a map I was looking at earlier somewhere downstairs, but I’m too comfy to look it up again for you. surry 😦
This is for YOU, dear reader! If you have this blog url, then chances are I like you a lot! Or you’re a huge creep and stalked me on facebook to find it! If you put that much effort in though to read my silly little blog, you probably like me though, and if you like me, then I like you because people who like me are the type of people I like.
I was sweaty again when I got to the village and decided to stop running because there were people around and idk about you, but I always stare at runners to shame them into not running and that’s what they were doing to me. I mean, where are you going in such a hurry? Is there a fire? Has someone fallen into a well? I don’t think so. Slow down there, Speedy Gonzalez. You’re making the rest of us Slowpo Rodriguezes uncomfortable and anxious.
idk which one is Mont Blanc. They all look the same to me. Is it this piece of elevated land? Probably not. I should never be so lucky as to locate it on the first try. They’re all pretty nonetheless.
French architecture reminds me of these fake houses that I saw in a documentary about North Korea one time. There was this really nice city in South Korea near the border of North Korea and the North Koreans built a city across from it even grander with taller buildings in an attempt to get the South Koreans to defect or something, only no one lived in the grand city because all of the buildings were fake and only had one side to them like buildings in stage productions.
there were lots of windows with bars on them???
awkward selfies are the only kind of selfies I’m allowed to do. Mama once told me I should only take photos if there are people in them. Here ya go. Sorry for the lack of people. Like most humans, I’m alone for the majority of my life and I can’t exactly photograph myself in front of things I want to show you. So. Here’s your Daily-Kate-O-Gram. I’m healthy, still totally alive, and kinda cold.
Ulf picked me up around 3:00 and we went up to the skiing area via scary gondola thing? I can’t remember what they’re called. All I know is that it was slightly terrifying because woWEE WERE WE HIGH UP and also on the way back it was verrrry full of people. Look at that view though. Guys. Look at. that. view. These kinds of views are the sort that make you believe a god. Like, wow. I don’t know. If my life were a movie, I think this is where the trumpets would have kicked in.
The ride down
so many mountains
And then today I went for a little walk, but forgot my camera. This is the first time in weeks I’ve had so much sun, and my body went into shock halfway through the walk so I had to come home and lay down to get rid of my stupid sun headache. Tips From Kate: BRING YOUR SUNGLASSES IF YOU GO OUTSIDE, YOU GOOSE!
Later I felt guilty about not going skiing or being outside for long because everyone else is getting fit and I’ve kinda been skipping on the EuroTour fitness thing I promised Hannah I would do, so I did sit ups until I wanted to throw up and then I did some lunges. Probably none of you care about this, but I just wanted to go on record saying that I DID DO SOMETHING WITH MY DAY, OKAY? I DIDN’T SPEND THE ENTIRE TIME WATCHING CHRISTMAS ROM-COMS. OKAY? OKAAAAY? I’ll do more tomorrow. I’ll build a giant snowman or something.
Hamish, Andrew, and Emily. I think I joined a gang. I’m not sure. I don’t know if I like it.
Andrew
We took this escalator up to a library and then when the library closed we tried to leave, but there was only this escalator and it only went up, so we had to use the handicap elevator???? I feel like this architect could have just planned it so much better
group hug! awww
Pablo and Jorge DJ-ing like bosses
yoooooo Pabloooooooo
Martin is an amazing dancer omg
Oh Narain
Aakanksha!
Martin wearing Andrew’s glasses
wow my lense is dirty
we woke up at 7 in the morning to walk Aakanksha to the bus stop
THIS IS THE BEST SCHOOL LUNCH I’VE EVER HAD!!!! ILY ST. ERIK’S GYMNASIUM! First time I’ve had curry too!
This is my ID. I’m lookin fresh to death, but my name isn’t Aaron??????? Or is there something my parents aren’t telling me?
Okay so I hung out with the losers (I say losers lovingly. That probably sounded mean if you don’t know me.) in the first picture all night and it was great and Muna from Kungsholmen came along which was super cool of her and I hope she didn’t hate us.
The next day I went to the train station to meet Andrew so that we could go to Södertälje together and he was late. Andrew, if you’re reading this, I haven’t forgiven you yet. He told me to meet him at 12:30, and he came at 1:13.
Moving on.
We walked around Södertälje a bit before meeting up with Breno and then later Narain, and then even later Hannah, Alejandra, and Jorge. We sat in this super amazing McDonalds for a long while before the DJ event started. (Jorge and Pablo take DJ-ing lessons and their club put on a charity event for kids with cancer. We all signed up to work it, but in the end only the 18-year-olds were allowed to work. Martin gave me his Crew shirt though, so it was all good on my end.) We got there and Pablo did some mixing and then we all stood around and talked/danced*.
That night we went home around midnight and because it was a sleepover we talked until 3. I then layed in the bed Hannah generously offered me (btw, if you’re reading this Hannah, you need to stop being so nice because it makes my stomach hurt and I feel awful taking things from you.) staring at the wall wondering how sleep happens. A little after four I think I fell asleep. The alarm went off at seven and that was the start of the day. Who needs eight hours of sleep? Certainly not me!**
We walked Aakanksha to the bus station and then went home. Narain called and he and Pablo met us outside the house, where from we walked to ICA to get some doughnuts for Hannah. Pablo is really generous and bought everyone doughnuts*** and wow, what a cutie. He stuffed a chocolate bar in my pocket and I ended up really needing it when I got to the train station to go back home because I hadn’t eaten anything all day. ily Pablo!! ❤
Idk what else to say? I hung out with Narain and Hannah all day because Pablo had to go to his host mom’s birthday. I love Hannah and Narain so much and it’s not like I can tell you our conversations? I seem to run into this problem a lot. We just sat around and made bad jokes for a few hours . <I hope that works for you.
Then I headed home. The bus and train ride home seemed to last years and I really appreciated riding to Södertälje with Andrew and being able to take the bus to Trossa to Hannah’s house with everyone because company makes the time go by so much faster and easier.
FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL!
I got up at seven (ughhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh seven) to go to school and I had a really hard time finding my first class. My room was A4107F, but the doors went G, D, C. No F. So I went to the room where F should have been (it didn’t have any number on it) and I asked the teacher and she was like “Go away, I need to start my lesson. I don’t know who you are, I can’t help you.” in Swedish and I was like “UM?!” and I’m desperately trying to explain my situation in bad Swedish and this other teacher guy comes up and he’s like “Who are you?” and he’s speaking English now, so I was able to explain myself completely and he still wanted to kick me out until I showed him my schedule. I think they made a few phone calls wherein Jonas explained who I was. It was all very stressful.
The kids in my class are super cool and super nice and I’ll take pictures of the school and classrooms soon.
In all, it was the best day of school ever and I can’t wait to go back.
*When I refer to all of us dancing, I’m excluding myself. Social situations with that kind of pressure give me a lot of anxiety and I know I may seem like a super cool person on the outside, but I’m almost always uncomfortable with everything and it takes a lot of effort for me to even talk to people I’m unsure around, much less dance in a dimly lit room with them. If I ever dance around you it’ll be impromptu and probably after several nights without sleep when I’ve lost all sense of boundary.
**That’s a lie. Today think I fell asleep in every single class. My eyes kept closing and when I tried to keep them open they were so heavy it hurt. I want to go to bed right now, but I need to make this post before I forget everything! 😦 I’ll do the ESA thing when I get home from school, Dad. I’m dying right now.
***I told him “NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO” because I can’t let people be nice to me and also three hours of sleep makes you want to lay down and die, not eat doughnuts.
Okay, so on Monday? Monday. Let’s say it was Monday. I left at noon to catch an SJ train to Hannah’s house. The ride was an hour or so long, and then I got off at Nykoping or however it’s spelled. I had to find the bus station from there. After a few attempts at asking for directions (which is really difficult when people use words you aren’t expecting. Mostly I just followed where they pointed.) I walked a kilometer to where I was supposed to be. LUCKILY I had 40 minutes to do it, which I clearly needed. UNLUCKILY it was raining the whole time. It has been raining ever since.
So, I got to Hannah’s house and she’s going this little dog named Willy, and he’s super cute and he total fulfilled my dog petting needs. We decided to go out that night, and when I say night, I mean afternoon except for it gets dark at 4pm, so I mean night. She took me to an old burned down castle and then we went to a coffee house so that we could dry off, as water was literally pooling on my shoulders.
I feel like I’m using a lot of comas, but I can’t help myself.
Anyway, we went back home and then we watched A Haunting in Connecticut and Insidious before going to bed.
TUESDAY:
We went back into the town (the bus ride is like 25 minutes, but there’s nothing to do where she lives as far as I’m aware) and we met up with some Australian girls. We ate at Mekka, which is this Exchange Student Mecca, and then we walked around for a while looking for a Halloween costume for Hannah. We stumbled into a few stores that we shouldn’t have, and if you want to hear about it ask me on Skype or in school, because it’s too inappropriate to post here.
yes, hello Future Kate. I’m sorry I didn’t write down this particular adventure. I’m sure you haven’t entirely forgotten the details though. Best Wishes, Past Kate.
That night I got Hannah hooked on American Horror Story, and now her life is all downhill from this point.
Wednesday:
We went to the castle again so that I could take pictures and then we went to the highest point in Nykoping and sat up there for an hour or so before going into a cafe and waiting for my bus to come. It was a very sad a tiring day. Hannah is lovely and her parents are lovely and her dog is lovely and I wanted to stay for another week because it was all so quaint. Like Fond du Lac on steroids.
The way home was tricky tricky tricky. I had like 3 buses and a train to locate, which really shouldn’t be so difficult, but I’m paranoid. I thought that I had missed my stop a million times, and it got dark so fast that I couldn’t be sure where we were.
THURSDAY:
I went to Farida’s house and had a Swedish dag with her, Jenny, and Josephine. I think I can steal some of the photos from facebook, but they haven’t been posted yet. We shall wait with baited breath.
We went to a pizza place (see photos) and then we watched a movie called Ego and then we played a board game about Africa and diamonds and I think our English teacher would love it. ALSO we (actually it was more Farida and Josephine, I just watched) made choklad bullar (chocolate balls) and they were out of this world, I love chocolate so much. My skin should be way worse than it is.
Friday:
I felt really ill. probably because I’ve been eating so poorly of late. Blame the chocolate and greasy pizza. I stayed in bed all day and slept. Then I woke up and we had fish sticks and I went back to bed because I was dying. I couldn’t really sleep because I’d already slept 18 hours so I watched Man Of Steel and I highly recommend it. I should update that list of mine.
I feel like I live in a Coffee Shop AU. I spend a lot of time writing and drawing and reading alone in coffee shops and I feel like at this point, I’m am definitely the main character of this YA novel. Today I ordered a Caramel Latte, and I definitely suggest y’all try one because they are THE BOMB. Also, all of these coffee shops have little pitchers of lemon water, and lemon water is good for your voice, so I’m probably a professional singer now with all of the free water I’ve drunk. (Keenan, I almost wrote dranken, and then I thought of you.)
The only problem is, whenever I enter a coffeehouse, I think of this post: i keep seeing the words coffee shop au without knowing what they mean. a coffee shop universe? alternate universe where there are coffee shops.friends, i have some good news for you about this universe that we live in.
And then I want to laugh. Living the dream right here.
Today I want to the Carl Milles Garden, and I’ve got some photos to share with you that about sums of the trip. Here they are, along with a video of how my morning went and part of the tour.
This reminds me of the sandman from that Episode of Sleep Hollow last week.
Um so. This weekend I went to the library and got some books that I probably won’t read. (I only want to read The Book Thief right now, but I can’t find it, so I guess I won’t read at all.) I walked around until I was a Kate-sicle and then I got on the train and went home. The rest of the night was spent skyping with my parents and that was nice.
On Monday I went to school at 13:00 for my only class of the day, but no one opened the door when I knocked, so I figured it got cancelled and hopped onto the train. I rode for like two hours because I didn’t feel like going home. I got off at the slutstation (it means last station, but I call it the slut station, which is definitely my stop 😉 jkjk ) and got some risifruitti which is basically my life. I only eat risifrutti and tea now. I think drowning in either one might be an okay way to go. The only time I stop thinking about how much I want some is when I have some. And even then, I’m thinking that I wish I had more. I will probably have to go to addict meetings when I get back to America.
On Tuesday I made vegetable soup for dinner, but no one really ate it, so it’s my duty to finish it off before friday. Thermoses of soup abound. I am always drinking it. It’s a little off putting when you get to the chunks, but I do my best.
Today I slept until 10:00 exactly which is when my English class starts. Somehow my alarm got turned off and I missed class. Amazing. This must be how it feels to go to college. Wake up late, school day is over already. So I spent all of today drinking tea and looking at scholarships and eating grapefruits.
I’m feeling like I’m going back to my middle school days because lately I’ve been listening to exclusively musicals. You just can’t stop the beat, my friends. Showtunes are where it’s at. I like how they don’t really repeat and how I can use a funny voice when I sing and it sounds right and how every musical has the same sort of sound in each song, so you can sing along even if you don’t know how it goes exactly.
Philosophy = I don’t know what happened, but I saw Cecil Baldwin’s full arm tattoo and was super disappointed. Jonatan said it might me a Satanic worshiper thing though, so I guess I can always pretend it’s something scary and cool. I don’t know, it was like a pitchfork in a circle?
Svenska 3= We read poetry about death and then I translated one of the poems and had to write a super detailed and disgusted essay on something that happens in my daily life. Mine was a really surreal piece about waiting for the train in the rain. I didn’t read it aloud because I was embarrassed by how freaky it was.
Lunch = penne noodles and hamburger?
Natural Science = nap time because I couldn’t remember my password for the school computers
Music Class = I still suck at music, but Rickard was just as hopeless, so I don’t feel too terrible. They wanted me to stay after school and teach him how to harmonize though and I had a thing, so I recorded me singing the song with the piano so that he can figure it out on his own this weekend. I really hope he pushes the due date up to next thursday. We are soooo not ready.
Break = I went home and had a meltdown because the internet wasn’t working and I couldn’t figure out where to go to meet my rotary contact and I ended up getting there a half hour late and ughhhh.
Dorren = That’s with a swedish ‘O’, to be clear. I hung out with a girl named Hanna (Hannah?) and a guy named Oscar (Oskar?), and Hanna and I watched Oscar edit photos for an hour, and we talked and ate sandwiches and drank tea and it was a grand time. Then Christal picked me up and we went for vegetarian food and IT WAS THE BEST, OMG! I’m so tired of meat, this was a blessing! Then I forgot my phone charger so I went back and hung out with Hanna and Oscar some more and then we all went to the train station and here I am. What a day. I want to go back to Dorren because those kids were really cool and I like them a lot and they listen to good music and the photo editing was really interesting and yay!
I just really don’t know how to make friends? Like I don’t want to appear clingy? But I also don’t want to appear standoffish? And so today when we were walking to lunch, I was waiting for Farida and then she was waiting for someone else at one point, and I just kept walking and then I got in the lunch line before them, and I didn’t know where to sit, so I ended up sitting with kids I don’t usually talk to, which I suppose is fine, but it felt weird and then when we were on the bus they were all talking to each other and I didn’t know if I was a part of their conversation, so I just stayed quiet and ugghhh. I WANT TO BE YOUR FRIEND BUT I DON’T KNOW WHAT THAT ENTAILS. okay? I’m really into run on sentences if you hadn’t noticed.
Gucci has a cone on her head right now because she got in a cat fight and her leg got ripped open. She’s very sad and very noise and likes it when you scratch where the cone sits and I don’t know if I could handle Sneakers having a cone on his head because I feel bad enough for Gucci and I don’t even care that much about her in the first place.
That sounded cold. I care, but she’s not mine. I guess I have compassion for her. There. Compassion.
Cecil Baldwin saw one of his attackers on the subway so he took a few pictures of him, found a student who witnessed the crime, and they’re going to go to the police station together to make a report. HOORAY FOR JUSTICE! In other news, religion is interesting, but I can’t understand anything, only look at pictures. Astrid translated the pages about Ethics for me, so maybe I’ll learn something yet.
Question: when the college website says that I need to take at least five classes my senior year, do they mean that I need to pass five classes my senior year? I’m very stressed out about this.
I’ll have the music video ready for you guys next thursday. Wish me luck! (say: Lycka Till!)
Basically, I’ve been doing nothing. Friday was dull. Only one class that day and then I forgot to go to some carnival or something that was going on a few hours after class got out. Saturday I watched season one of Misfits, today I painted some feathers that I found so that I can use them as trendy bookmarks and I edited TMoNaD. I’m getting a cold. Saga and Astrid are sick too, and we don’t know who started it. It’s too hot to wear cute sweaters or drink lattes so I’ve just been making a million cups of chamomile tea and thinking about writing. No actual writing involved. Maybe another time.
I brought my camera to the city with me when I went to buy the paint for my feathers, but I forgot what I did with the memory chip (it was in my back pocket) so I don’t even have any fun photos to share. Sad day.
Please watch the TheAoJaneEyre. I started it when I was still in Murika, but it’s getting really interesting now. (This isn’t directed at you, dear parents. It’s not the kind of romance you like, mum, and I’m certain papa isn’t interested in gothic literature brought to life in the form of a vlog.)
< ok so I was really curious about all of these fountains that they have around here? I mean, where does the water come from and where is it going and why is it here? Cotton eyed joe? Anyway, so I drank some because it look really nice and I was really thirsty and it tasted like bottled water and it was so cold and I hope I don’t die, but dang that was good water.
we're never getting off this planet 