This is the Most Poorly Written Post I’ve Ever Made

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.

St. Eriks Gymnasium

Here’s my new schedule!

Monday:

8:30-11:00 ~ Art

11:10-12:25 ~ Svenska 2

13:25 – 14:40 ~ History

Tuesday:

9:55 – 11:10 ~ Svenska 2

11:20 – 12:35 ~ Natural Science

13:35 – 14:50 ~ English

Wednesday:

9:40 – 12:10 ~ Art

13:00 – 15:30 ~ Photography

Thursday:

9:55 – 11:10 ~ Physics (help?)

11:55 – 13:10 ~ History

13:20 – 14:35 ~ Mentor’s hour

Friday:

8:30 – 9:45 ~ Digital Art

9:55 – 11:10 ~ Natural Science

11:20 – 12:35 – English

Beautiful. 

Living the dream right here. Look at all that art! And the man who helped me to get this schedule, Jonas, said he could probably get me into the choir too! I’m dying of happiness. No offense to all the other days I’ve had so far this year, but this one has probably been one of the best.

List of my favorite days:

1. Arrival
2. Photography days at Dorren
3. My weekend with Hannah
4. Imagine Dragons
5. That One Time We All Went Ice Skating
6. New Years
7. That Day We Went Sledding 
8. TODAY

These aren’t in any particular order.

I’ll update the cast page tonight with all of the Newbies because I get to meet them in an hour or so! God. I can’t believe I’m an Oldie. I should probably invest in a map so that I don’t lead them to the red light district or something on accident.

I’m dying and I hate everything whymeeeeeeI

I made the post and then I tried to add the pictures and the computer froze and lost the whole post. So. I quit. I’m not rewriting it all, because now I’m in a terrible mood. You get the abridged version.

Friday.

no. nothing happened. I ate pizza. Here are those pictures I promised earlier.

I was so close.

this is ridiculous

Here are some more to tide you over.

secret agent man

tell me who you are

so mysterious

species please

what kind?

bird

this reminded me of the IKEA monkey

IKEA monkey

Saturday:

Cafe Dox exchange student gift exchange.

I didn’t participate because I suck at giving gifts.

It was nice

We went ice skating afterwards. I was wearing tights because all my pants were in the wash. I was super super cold (but also super super cute.)

Lots of kids had never seen snow or ice skated.

I was helpful. Made me proud to see them going off on their own. And sometimes they fell, But they got up without help, and that’s what counts.

We went to McDonalds to warm up and ate ice cream because we like to be ironic.

I got home at midnight because I was sitting with Narain and Tanner at Central Station for a few hours after they missed their train home. Had a little heart to heart. It was grand.

Sunday:

Went to see Catching Fire with Hannah, Emily, and Oliver.

The movie theater candy

Hannah is like the best friend I had in a past life, Emily is like the friend on the internet I never met in Real Life, and Olver is like the big brother who never came to stockholm with me.

If you guys ever run into these three, you’ll need to step up your wit-game. Clever sarcasm abounds.

Oliver and Narain

Emily and Tanner

Afterwards we looked at the NK display and had our minds blown.

Then we went to a trendy cafe.

Hannah’s bus home was coming, so we left really soon after getting there.

We ran to Emily’s host family’s apartment to get Hannah’s bag, and then ran all the way to the pendltag platform.

My lungs still sting from the cold air.

I think that’s it.

OH!

I might be moving to where Hannah lives at the end of the christmas break. So there’s that. No more living in Stockholm. It’s alright. Hannah’s the best. Also, music program at school. I miss singing.

OH!

Also, I’ve been staring at dogs when they walk past me, and then they stare at me and they stop sometimes and their owners are like ‘whatchyou doin m8?’ and I keep looking over my shoulders and I can tell the dogs want to be with me. This is my power. I can control the minds of dogs. My YA novel character power has been achieved, not a moment too late either, seeing as it should be at it’s full force around my 18th birthday.

Dr. Livingston, I Presume?

Today our english teacher asked us if we had any news about Africa. Va? Really? No one answered him because that’s such and obtuse question, and he got all upset that “none of us had done any research”. He went on to tell us about how some Swedish missionary just died ‘over there’ and if we knew who he was. I don’t think Swedish missionaries are exactly “news about Africa,” but okay? None of us did and then he asked us if we knew about Dr. Livingston. No one was talking, so he told us about how this dudebro got lost in the wilderness (still not sure where exactly, but I guess that’s not important to the story.) and when someone found him, they said something famous… what could those words be? hmmmmm I wonder…? No one was raising their hand so I did, and the teacher was like “THANK GOD” and I was like, um, these kids didn’t know who Livingston was, and they speak English as a second language? Why would they know those magical words?

Anyway, we went to the library to “Research Africa” and I read some short African horror stories about kids getting tricked into terrorist plots and some boy getting tangled up in and exsanguinating to death in some barbed wire. I think I’ll probably write about Rwanda or something. It’s not due until October, and it’s only a two page long paper, so I’m not too worried.

I took a nap on a bench. Probably drooled a little, but I was face down and my hood was up, so it’s all good. We had a two hour wait before going on a surprise field trip during E-Block to the King Christina exhibit, so I made the most of it and got some rest. The exhibit was alright, and probably pretty informative if you spoke Swedish and could understand the tour guide. I felt like any minute I was going to time travel back to the 1650s and that would be my YA character power, but no. So because that didn’t happen, I guess my favorite part was when we got to wander off on our own and I found the dress up section. There will be pictures, but I’m to tired to upload anything right now. Check back later.

Alright. So that was my day. I made pancakes for dinner and it was only Hugo and I eating tonight, so we ate all the bacon and got two giant pancakes each and it was heaven.

Summer in the City

Today was my first day of SFF. I got into class and there were almost thirty kids in there (I thought there were only going to be three, so imagine my surprise) and the room capacity was probably twelve, so we kept all of the window and doors open. The teacher spoke completely in Swedish which sucked. I mean, she spoke slowly and enunciated, but I still could only understand every five words, so I didn’t know what was going on. Then she wrote something Swedish on the board and I understood 4 of the fifteen words and everyone was pulling out their notebooks, so I did too.

I raised my hand and was all, “I’ve only been here two weeks. I don’t know what’s going on, can you please explain this to me?” and then she was all “Just try your best.” and I was like “I don’t know what the board says well enough to try my best. Are we writing essays? What does it say?” and then she was all “Just write an introduction about yourself instead of doing what the board says.”

So, I still don’t know what all of the other kids wrote, but I wrote a paragraph about myself and Wisconsin and I drew a picture of a cow in a blizzard that made her and the girls sitting next to me laugh. I turned in my essay and started talking to this Italian boy with an Italian name that I can’t pronounce or spell. He seemed pretty cool though. After the teacher scanned all of our essays, she gave the non-international section kids (me and a few other students) some reading material that was completely in Swedish and then told me and the Italian boy that we should go to beginners Swedish. No kidding. He wrote two sentences and I wrote six. Everyone else had a whole page front and back. She gave me the email address of the beginner SFF teacher and I’m supposed to email her to find out when and where her classes are. ??? Okay, then.

Then I went to lunch (which was rice and some suspicious looking chicken.) didn’t eat anything, and hung out with Jonatan and Aida until Farida got out of her class so that we could go see THE CITY.

It was pretty cool. We hung out for five or six hours, walking around and looking at things. They’re all super awesome and amazingly like all of the things that I like and all have tumblogs (besides Aida) and we fangirled over tv series and movies that we’ve seen, and Jonatan loaned me Miss Peregrines Home for Peculiar Children in English and they showed me around Gamla Stan and now I know how to get there by walking from my school and I want to spend lots of time there!!! (everything is so cute, you don’t understand. I feel like I’m in a coffee shop AU)

Pictures from yesterday’s science class:

FOR SCIENCE!

I am not a murderer, I am a SCIENTIST.

Pictures from today’s outing:

We passed this bridge that was covered in locks. Lovers write their names on here, hook them on and throw the key into the river. Apparently sometimes people come with wire cutters to chop theirs off when their relationships fail.

Jonatan, Farida, Aida, and I in a cafe underneath a concert hall

The acoustics in this library are so amazing! When you whisper, it echos! It took all my self control not to start singing!

zzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Golly, I’m tired. School starts at 9:50 usually though, so that’s a blessing I guess.

I made Mexican Wedding Cakes, but idk if people are eating them. I’m okay with that. I’ll eat them all. No problem. Farida wanted to know what MWC are, so I’m bringing some to school tomorrow.

Swedish people don’t have personal boundaries. I thought that because it’s a sin to make eye contact on the train that we all had a four foot bubble around us as well, the way it is in America, but no. My bubble has been invaded too many times today. All of the teachers were standing like six inches away from me and ever time I shifted away they would shift closer and ohmYGOD KNOCK IT OFF!!!!

I had English 7 first hour and we did one of those games where you take the role of a person who is stranded with a bunch of other people and for some reason you need to kill one of the others and you need to make an argument as for why you shouldn’t die and why someone else should. Our class killed the vicar, but we were only one vote away from killing the politician. My job as the psychologist got zero votes because I’m amazing.

The teacher came around and he asked me what I wanted to get out of the class as I’m overqualified to be there. I said I wanted to pass because I needed to graduate school and go to college. He didn’t like that answer. I don’t really know what he wanted me to say. That’s what I want to get out of all of my classes.

Next we had lunch even though it was only eleven in the morning and I took one look at the school lunch and went straight to the water. It’s a good thing it was so early in the day because I wasn’t even hungry yet. I sat with Farida and Aida outside the lunchroom and eventually we went to the ICA down the road and bought juice boxes and granola bars. I didn’t get anything because I left my wallet at home and wasn’t hungry.

We went to Humanities and the teacher tried to explain to me what we were doing in the class for our projects, but I didn’t really get it. We sat and talked all hour and didn’t do anything that I’m aware of. The teacher told me I wasn’t going to Rome with the rest of my class. Frowny face. Ah well. Jonatan asked me if I wanted him and Farida and Aida to show me around the city after school on Friday. (school ends at 11 in the morning so it’s not that big of a deal to do stuff afterwards.) I asked my host parents and they said I could go. So yay! Maybe I’ll make some friends and learn the layout of Stockholm!

I went home and finished my third book in three days and fell asleep. Tomorrow I start Jane Eyre. I read Ender’s Game, Divergent, and Insurgent in the last three days. On the fifth day I’ll reread Looking for Alaska and on the sixth maybe I’ll read The Alchemist and on the seventh I’ll do Airborn. I have a lot of free time that I don’t know what to do with yet, so I read to use it up. My swedish homework is mostly reading assignments, but every time I try to to translate it I end up with one page finished after three hours and I don’t really want to do that anymore because it’s hard and boring and I don’t think it’s going to really get me anywhere in class because I can’t understand what they’re saying when they teach us, so what’s the point of doing the extra handouts??

Tonight we had spaghetti, but the sauce was pureed mushrooms with bits of chicken throughout, so I just had plain noodles. Life. I’m so interesting. Please stop reading my blog. It’s a waste of time.

this is me waiting hanging out in the library yesterday when none of my teachers showed up.

Swedish fashion

Fashoon bb

the view from my Humanities classroom window. there aren’t screens on windows here. Apparently, sometimes people jump.

I think I might be going to Rome

School was superrrrr boring today. I’m sure it was interesting if you knew Swedish, but I don’t so I sat there bored out of my mind most of the day. Sometimes I make up conversations in my head like that Whose Line Is It Anyway? game where they sit in front of the black and white television and do voice overs. My favorite game to play is when I pretend that the teachers are mobsters and when the whisper together they’re talking about who’s next on the hit list and where to put the bodies. Anyway. I won’t bore you with all of my daydreaming and just get down to what you’ll all probably find interesting.

It’s time for another round of

HIGHLIGHTS:

1.  I got to school early to talk to the counselor. She wasn’t there. She’s going to be there tomorrow though. Probably. *sigh*
2. I went to Humanity class for 3 hours. I didn’t need to be there since I wasn’t registered, and I don’t think I’ll be going back. They made us write an essay about what it means to be human. I got really technical and politically correct and when I shared it with my group I found out that that’s what they did too. When the class started discussing the subject as a whole I think they got into an abortion debate. I heard the Swedish word for fetus a few times. I don’t know. Wouldn’t surprise me.                                                    When we got a ten minute break I asked the teachers (there were four of them in the room for some reason???) what the class was about and what we were going to be doing for the rest of the year, and they told me we were going to be focusing on what it means to be human and then we were going to be writing an academic paper about  for our final project. Yawn. The girls I was sitting with told me at the end of class that the highest grade that you can get on the final paper is an E. Well, åt helvete with that. I didn’t want to be in the stupid class anyway! I especially don’t want to fail it because it’s designed for you to fail. Why would I even try then?? Seriously! These people are insane.
3. Half of my class (H3) was in another classroom that focuses on architecture and is going to Rome in January for only 1,500 Crowns. That’s $230. They’ll be there for a week. WHAT A STEAL!! I’m going to see if it isn’t too late to join that class. It would be a good time to bond and see Rome again now that I’m older and cognitive. If they haven’t already booked the plane tickets and sleeping place that is.
4. We went to lunch. There were Pork Pancakes, Beef Wok, and Vegetarian Wok. I had some tortilla bread, a cup of milk and called it a lunch. All school food at every school ever sucks. This is the truth. These are the facts.
5. I went upstairs to find out if I made the choir or not. The results of my journey to the seventh floor are inconclusive. There was a list with six kids names on it and their vocal parts, but six kids a choir does not make. So. I don’t know if that was the chamber choir results or what. If it is, I don’t feel very disappointed because there were 30 or so kids trying out and that would mean 23 other kids didn’t make it. I don’t know. I’ll see what’s up tomorrow. Maybe I got the date wrong? The choir teacher wasn’t there to talk to me.
6. Today was Hugo and Saga’s birthday. There was cake and presents and I felt bad that I gave them their candy as soon as I arrived because I don’t know them that well and I don’t know what else I could have possibly given them on their birthday besides what I had given them a week ago.
7. I’ve had a headache for the past three days now. Ugh.
8. The Skarins won’t speak English with me anymore in an attempt to teach me Swedish. That’d be fine if they talked to me so that I could have some context. I have things I want to say, but dinner is just them talking really fast in Swedish to one another and I don’t know what the topic is in the first place, so how am I supposed to follow? Besides, no one has really talked to me in the last few days, so it’s hard for me to pay attention when I’m not involved in the conversation. I just kind of zone out all the time now. I should probably be using the time for productive thinking, but I’m so worn out by trying to follow along in class and keep up with all of my Swedish speaking classmates that by the time I get home I realllly bored of thinking so hard and not getting anywhere that I just want to sleep. I don’t know how to tell them that they need to speak slower or speak Svenglish when I’m around because whenever I’ve asked for that in the past they forget after two minutes. Whatever. SFF should be helpful.
9. I just started crotcheting Abby’s baby’s blanket. It’s going pretty well I guess. I need some sleep.

Engelska och MUSIC TRYOUTS

Sorry I’m so late posting! I’ve been really tired every time I had time to write. On Friday I only had English class. It started at 9:50 and ended at 10:50 or so and I was almost late to class because the train was late. Debbie was actually late, so I didn’t feel too bad about sitting in my seat 2 seconds before the teacher closed the door. I was going to sit next to Nick Baker (real name: Jonathan) but he only had one seat next to him and I thought maybe he was saving it for someone, so instead I sat by myself and it was awkward and THEN he turned and started talking to me and no one ended up sitting next to him and omg I should have just sat there instead of being nice to his imaginary friend. Debbie came in late and sat next to me though, so I didn’t look like a total freak.

The English teacher’s name is Thomas. With and H. Which is weird because no one has and H in the middle of their name here. He told us it was a problem for him. He didn’t know I was an exchange student at first and when he couldn’t think of a word (tailor, draught, etc) I gave it to him and he was really impressed. Then he gave us these worksheets, and it was stupid because we had to match the English word to its Swedish meaning and obviously I can’t do that even though I’m fluent in English. So Debbie and I worked on it together, which was against the rules, but no one cared. I told her the English definition of the word and she told me which of the Swedish words that sounded like. I think I was helping her cheat as much as she was helping me to, but when the teacher came over, she said she was helping ME and the teacher was all “Why?? You’ve just got to read the text, it’s not that hard!” and I was all, “I only know conversational Swedish cause I’m American.” and then he was visibly less impressed with my earlier English feats. He flipped my paper over and read the answers I gave to some questions (which were all sarcastic because he SAID we weren’t turning it in and I didn’t think anyone was going to read it.) and pressured me to write better ones and I said “ok” and he left me alone.

I walked around town until 11:45 and ate McDonalds because I’m a fatty and then I went back to the school early because I the choir room is on the 7th floor and I didn’t want to be out of breath for tryouts.

Didn’t matter that I came early because as soon as I got out there, the teacher lady came out and said she could take me a half hour early. Seriously woman. I’m going to puke.

Lucky for me she talked for a while and I got my breath back. She tested my range and said I was definitely a soprano. This surprises me because I sound like Morgan Freeman when I talk. Whatever. Then I sang The Black Swan for her and she really liked it and asked me a bunch of questions about the composer and the opera it came from and I’m SO HAPPY I was curious about all of that Thursday night because I researched all of that and I knew the answers. 10 points for the nerd.

She had me sight read this Swedish song on the sound “nu” and I didn’t do so hot because I didn’t magically gain the ability to sight read over the summer, but I wasn’t absolutely wretched, and she said “It’s always hard in the beginning, but you’ll get better.”

So I think maybe she likes me. We find out on Monday.

I didn’t sign up for this

My class is H3, which means I’m in the highest grade level and all of the courses have to do with language. You can take German, French, Italian, Spanish, och/eller Latin. I can speak a little tiny bit of Espanol. All of the other classes I would have no hope to achieve anything in. There’s a few other classes that we’re required to take like Philosophy and Natural Science, but mostly it’s language courses with a math option thrown in their to spice things up. I’m not signed up for anything. I just go to the mandatory classes and lunch and then I go home. The guidance counselor told me that I should talk to her in a week and then we’ll see how everything is going.

??????????????????????????????????

She told me that in a week she would schedule me for Swedish For Foreigners. I’m in Swedish 3 right now, the hardest Swedish class there is. Why wasn’t this pre-arranged??? I’m missing a week of SFF! Whatever. And then she said she would see about getting me into an art or music class? In a week though. Because apparently it’s better for me to sit in on classes I won’t be in later and not understand what’s going on than sit in on classes that I’m going to be in the rest of the year and not understand what’s going on. If you can’t tell, I don’t like waiting. Mostly I want to have my SFF class so that I can start to understand what everyone is saying.

Highlights of the Day:

We had to go up to the sixth floor to get our Philosophy books, and everyone left that blind girl I mentioned earlier behind. I figured she would be fine because no one was worried about her, but then I thought maybe it was like when everyone left my wheelchair bound math teacher in the classroom when there was a fire drill and she actually needed help, but no one thought to give it. Turns out, she did need help, because she ran into the side of the staircase, no where near the stairs. I asked if she needed help (in english, because I’m really thoughtless. “Behöver du hjälp” is easy enough to say, but I didn’t think to say it because I’m slow.)  and she obviously didn’t understand me, but I took her hand anyway and lead her to the stairs, and THEN some kid from my class remembered that she had a blind classmate and came looking for the poor girl.

My philosophy teacher looks like irl Cecil Baldwin. He even has a mysterious tattoo on his arm. I couldn’t understand what was going on except for what he was writing on the board so I stared at his arm all of class and tried to figure it out. I let ya’ll know what it is when I see it in a few days.

I took the music class thing into my own hands and went to the seventh floor to talk to a choir teacher. I met this weird little man and he wasn’t very helpful and was totally scary and he told me about chamber choir and there were only two spots left to try out and I couldn’t decide if I was going to, but then at the end of the day I want back and there was a nice McVeigh-like choir teacher there and she said I should ask to join S3 instead of being in H3 because it’ll be more interesting classes, and also told me I could try out tomorrow at 12:30 and so I guess I will. There’s some sight-reading and some piano-voice response stuff and then I have to sing her a song that I know by heart. Which one??? I Carry Your Heart With Me?? Something from a musical?? Who knows. Ugh. This is hard. The other choir teacher said most kids sing Christmas songs. I can’t think of a single Christmas song besides Silent Night that would be good for this. I don’t really want to sing a Christmas song. Anyway. 12:30. I’m going to die.

Debbie and her friends let me eat lunch with them. I can’t tell if they like me or if they feel bad for me. Probably the latter. I think Debbie actually likes me, but it’s tough to know because I’ve never had to make friends in an environment where everyone is already friends with each other. Life’s hard.

In Nat Science, the teacher had everyone go into corners based off of what they thought about science (is it a belief, fact, always changing, or something else) and she had us do that like seven times, but she only told me what each corner meant the first time around, and then she went around the room and everyone had to say why they believed what they did. I would like to put several expletives here, but this blog is supposed to be classy. Eventually, I just staying in the same corner because I was comfortable in my spot against the wall and was tired of trying to figure out what was going on, and she just skipped over me for the last few questions THANK GOD.

So that’s been my day so far. woo.

Here I am falling asleep in my Svenska 3 class.

This says I, one. I prefer the title Everyday. It made sense.

Swedish Game of Thrones. This is my excuse for not reading them.

Here I am in my Svenska 3 class not understanding anything.

This is Miu-Miu. She sleeps in my bed a lot, but leaves when I get it. Jerk.

First day as the main character of a YA novel

^ that’s part of the train ride. Hooray for public transportation!

I met some of Hanna’s friends (Elsa and Anna) and we had coffee for about 45 minutes before going to school together and 2:30. They’re super cool and even invited me to a party and I felt like maybe I had the ability to make new friends. Then I got to school and the only person who sat next to me at first was this blind girl named Mikeala and she didn’t really talk and I didn’t know what to say because she might not have spoken English so well or understood it well and I didn’t want to be weird and then the the second half of the class came in and they all shook me hand?????? It was really weird because here in Sweden (at least so far as I’ve encountered) when people shake your hand, the hold on for another thirty seconds after while they talk and it’s really awkward and sweaty.

Then this girl named Debbie sat next to me (I was worried I smelled bad, but no. All of these kids have been with each other in almost every class for the last two years so they’re all really good friends and don’t want to talk to the new girl.) and another girl who’s name I didn’t catch and they were super cool and explained everything to me and we talked for forty minutes before looking for our lockers and then I was supposed to catch the train home because first days of school here only last for an hour or two I guess.

I didn’t go home though, I went to the guidance counselor’s office because I’m not signed up for any specific classes and I don’t know what to do. The counselor wasn’t in though, so I’m going to go to school midway through the first class at 8:40 so that I can talk with her and get things straightened out.

So, overall everything’s great (besides that stupid bird thing. God.). I’m glad I brought my converse because that is literally the only shoe the kids wear. The teachers dress the same as the students and we call them by their first names. So Coco and Doug would fit in in the Swedish world. I kind of feel like I’m at a really liberal college. My host parents say that at Hanna’s school there were bins of apples sitting in the hallway and that the kids had to take off their shoes in the entryway. People are only liberal here apparently.

Astrid says my Swedish is getting better. I think it’s because we watch American shows a lot with swedish subtitles.