Day 25

Today was a Monday and a rather special Monday, because due to scheduling and cancellations, I only had 40 minutes of class today, but it somehow turned into 4 hours... Read more to find out... (this sounds like the summary on the back of some crappy elementary school novel...)

Anyway... I was very excited about today, because this one, lonely class (Biology) happened to be scheduled for 11:55, meaning that I would be able to sleep in, right?? WRONG!!!! I had forgotten that I was going to the Rotary Club today because Katarina was making a presentation about her job, so instead of sleeping in all day, I had to get up at 6:45 and go into town. Luckily we drove there so I didn't have to bike or take the bus. The presentation was interesting, even though I only understood about 26.385% of it. Everybody was really happy to see me and they all want to take me to do things like fishing and outdoorsy-things. And it's always nice to eat free food at a hotel. After the meeting, I rode my bike home (we took it on the back of the car, they have this magical rack that attaches to the tow-hitch on the back of the car)
--I need to just add a little interjection here about another thing I've noticed about Sweden. Firstly, almost every car that isn't a sub-compact (ex: smart cars and other itty-bitty ones) is a station wagon, (aka hatchback) to make a guestimation (that's right I just said guestimation) I would say it must be about 82.4% hatchbacks and there's practically no suvs or "big" cars here. My Honda Civic, which is considered a "compact" in the US of A, would be considered a normal/full sized car here. Also, there are a ton of Volvos (not a surprise) and a lot of Peugots, Renaults and Skodas. (in case you don't follow, those are types of cars)--
Getting back to the main story... I rode my bike home and then tried to go to sleep, but that didn't work, so I wound up watching American cartoons on the internet, because I got this sudden urge, and they brought pangs of nostalgia. (but not homesickness)
I then caught the 11:06 bus into the city, because it takes a little under thirty minutes, because it goes the ultra-long way around Gottsunda and Södra Gottsunda instead of taking Dag Hammarskjölds vag like I do when I take the bike. It also takes just under 10 minutes to walk from Slottsbacken (the bus stop) to school.
During Biology we mainly discussed the field trip we would be taking the next day to Erken. We were going to stay one night and conduct various experiments with the water. So after that I thought I was free for the day and I wanted to just go back home and sleep, so I figured I would go do that, right? WRONG!! AGAIN!! I found out that we were taking school pictures today (a little early don't you think?) and I figured I must have just missed the memo, but everybody else was surprised too. So I was thinking "Oh isn't that nice, it's just like SURPISE!!! pictures today!!" What really sucked, however, was that the pictures weren't until 16:00, aka 4:00 (that reminds me of something else, here they write times as 16:00 but they don't say "sixteen o'clock, they still say 4, well actually they would say klockan fyra...) So then I realized that I would have to wait three and a half hours just to take stupid pictures. But it wasn't all bad, because I was set to meet with my Rotary counselor Ulrica Ståhl for a visit to a local Biology museum. Upon arriving at the museum, however, we found out, much to her dismay, that the museum is closed on Mondays, despite the conflicting information presented on the website. So instead we took a little walking tour of Uppsala, and visited several University buildings. (anybody notice how I keep switching tenses throughout? That's because in some cases, tense shifts are necessary to make the sentences sound right, but also it partly because I am writing this two days after it actually happened, so it's confusing every time I write "today..." because it was not today. Also, anybody notice how I constantly keep changing from spelling out numbers and just typing the digits? No? I didn't think so, that's why I decided to point it out myself! ^_^) Here, the university, Uppsala University, (UU) is not on one central campus, but the buildings are split up and strewn (I always liked that word) across the city. So after walked all around, we got some ice cream and then I when back to school at about halv tre (2:30). Just as I was walking up to school, Anna (from Australia) came walking out and so we decided to go get ice cream (again!) because she wanted it and I had nothing to do. So we went and got ice cream and while we were eating, Iliyas (from France) called and wanted to come join us. So after having a little trouble finding us, he came and we got even more ice cream (so I had three that day... but I did miss lunch so...) and then Anna headed home and Iliyas and I headed back to school because we were both waiting to take pictures.

So I guess your getting tired of hearing about these people, but I promise that tomorrow and the next day will have many other new people in them. How do I know this? Well if you were paying attention and read my note about tense shifts in my story, then you would already know that I'm writing "today's" events on Wednesday evening.

So after a while longer, we finally took our pictures and then I took the bus home and then packed up all my things for Erken and then went to sleep pretty early (for me at least) at klockan halv elva. (10:30)
Tomorrow the fun starts (and the really funny pictures!)