Joe and I have a drink with Gustav and a couple of his old school buddies before Gustav has to run to go on a dinner date. We will just plan to meet up with him later, as he thinks this will just be a quick dinner and then adios. In the meantime, we have plans to head over to meet up with the gang at Saltis before they all head out to a part of town called Sodermalm. This is an island a bit further south than our school. It is known for having a great night life, and is supposed to have a couple more down to earth, pub style places. However, we are going to split off and meet Oskar at what he has called a "pub" as well.
First off, it takes Oskar a while to direct us where exactly we are going. He claimed when he got to Chapel Hill that he was from Stockholm....not so sure now. Then again, when you are that pretty, you don't need to be smart. We finally get to the location he is talking about, and two things strike us. 1) The definition of "pub" in this country might not exactly translate. At least not in Oskar's eyes. This is very much a crowded dance club. 2) We are about 9.5 years older than most everybody in here.....time to leave
We walk down the street to Monk's where we eventually meet up with Oskar's. We have passed Monk's many times and there are two things awesome about it. You can get a beer in a quiet setting and just hangout, and the obvious.....the name rocks for those of you that are Seinfeld fans. Oskar's is with some of his friends from high school who begrundgingly taglong with us to the next pub, Dick's. They are not happy that we pulled them from the adolescent dance club scene. After a couple drinks with Oskar we head back home. Time slipped away from us a bit hanging out with Oskar, and it is now about 2:30 in the morning....nothing ever closes here. Oskar solidifies himself as one of the funniest people I have ever hungout with and easily makes up for lack of being able to help us navigate anywhere in the city.
We get up on Saturday and headout to meet Anna who has so graciously offered to show us around the city. This is a chance for me to actually take some nice photos of the city in the daylight and just get some of the tourist out of me. We set out from T-Centrallen and walk the scenic way along the big port, past the main financial district, and head towards our goal, Skansen. Skansen is a neat park that is setup with some old Swedish schoolhouses, farmhouses, and other buildings that were transported, as is, to setup here. It is very interesting, and the snow on the ground makes it beautiful. Also, it isn't too chilly this afternoon, so I am liking my choice to only wear a long sleeve tshirt and my new north face. Definitely the highlight of the Skansen trip are the animals. This park has wolverines, wolves, lynx, bears, reindeers, gigantic horses, otters, and seals. Some of the animals hide from us, but the wolves alone were worth the trip. Seeing these animals in the snowy surroundings trumps seeing them in the ATL zoo fighting heat exhaustion. It is definitely a fun trip. We decide to leave, as the sun has gone down and I now can't feel my chest. Turns out that my decision to wear this outfit.....yeah, retarded. I have been here long enough to not act shocked when the sun goes down at 4 pm, but sure enough on this day, not so much.
On the way back home, we stop at a burger joint called Max Burger. This is like MacDonalds on absolute Steroids. It is extremely tasty. At the fountain drink station, they make it very clear that refills cost 10 kr. We ask Anna about this as it is very crowded and obviously the effort it takes to enforce this rule is clearly not worth the couple times a day that they will collect 10 SEK. Anna just let's us know that it isn't a problem as nowhere in the country can you get free refills so nobody in Sweden has ever gotten one. This is odd as Joe and I have gone to get refills at places, and while we have gotten strange looks, we have not gotten scolded. This explains the looks......oh yeah, and there is apparently only ONE place in all of Stockholm where you will get free refills....TGIFridays. AMERICA!
We trot back home, and after about 15 minutes in my room, I get all the feeling back in my body. There is apparently a huge party at Lappis tonight, but Joe and I are pretty beat from a long day of walking around, braving the cold, fighting wolves, and taking pictures. I have attached the links below this paragraph to both Joe and myself's picasa albums from the day. I will also post my favorites onto the blog.
http://picasaweb.google.com/
http://picasaweb.google.com/
Sunday was a pretty low-key, get ready for school day. I spend the first part of my afternoon trying to sort the trash in my room. There are about 95 different categories you have to sort your trash into to throw it out. It takes me about 2 hours to learn the system and another hour to then sort it. I need to get good at it, as it is my week to be kitchen caretaker next week so I will be sorting trash more than your average UGA grad. I then spend some time studying Swedish, as I have to do my best to impress Frida Mol tomorrow. We make plans to meet up with the Canadian crew at Hard Rock Cafe to watch the AFC championship game at 9, but before that I manage to find a link to stream the GT-FSU basketball game. Being in Sweden and watching Tech BBall games on your computer is different in two ways. a) you curse in swedish and b) you dont have a remote to throw. It is similar in many ways a) Paul Hewitt still looks confused as to what a set play is b) He still calls timeouts at the crappiest times c) They still shoot 50% from the line......I dont know how you can win a close game if you can't shoot free throws and your coach isn't sure what timeouts are for. The best was down 1 with 10 seconds left Brian Oliver nails a wide open three....YES!! Wait, there was a whistle...offensive foul? travel?....nope, Hewitt called a timeout to make sure that instead of taking a wide open three, he draws up one of his "dribble and pass the ball around the three point line before taking a horrible, covered jump shot" Game over. Oh well, off to watch American Football
The Colts handled the Jets pretty easily, not too exciting. They shutdown at midnight, so we can't watch the NFC champ game, which turns out to be a much better game. I did manage to wake up to watch the OT period online. Pretty exciting game it seems. Group meeting and Swedish lessons tomorrow....oh yeah, and we have to pay tons of rent.
Drew In Sweden
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