Post-exam sunshine in Sweden

It’s the strangest sensation, to realise that 12 hours ago I was struggling to wake up in my bed in Durham... and now I am sitting in my familiar spot at Stockholm Airport. (And I swear the smoothie guy knows who I am now.)

It was sooo close – everything had to be perfect, or I’d miss my flight. Fortunately the taxi was 5 minutes early, the train only 3 minutes delayed, and the bus not impossible to find – though I did get soaked in the 5 minutes that I was lost in Edinburgh. The train ride provided a view of the amazing (and always wet) Scottish landscape, and then the bus ride was straight through the centre of Edinburgh. In fact, it almost precisely traced the way Hilary and I walked when we went on that Rag Raid at the start of the year (I cannot believe how far we walked!). Although I was entirely exhausted by that point, I really appreciated the ride. (That’s what you get for watching a movie with everyone until 2 AM, ah well.)

I still haven’t figured out how to get (free) internet at the airport, but I’ve at least found a place to plug in my laptop – my battery wouldn’t survive the whole 6 hour stay (I can’t believe I just wasted 6 hours watching movies; holiday is amazing). All the places were taken though so I settled on the floor... which made it impossible to do any work. Oh no! Haha.

I was already considering memorising something – maybe the Hebrew alphabet. I resisted though! My ears still hurt (oh the turbulence... ow) so I am taking that as a strong sign to take it easy for a week. I’m sooo glad I have the luxury of 4 months of holiday. I’m obviously not one of those people who will spend 4 months at the beach, but I love being able to decide what I want to do, see, and study. I feel very privileged. I don’t think I’d ever go through the school-that-must-not-be-named again for this – it’s not thanks to that place that I got in to Durham after all - but I do feel like I am being rewarded for surviving it now.

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Ten days later.

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Ah, there was no internet at Jona’s apartment. Ever heard of a game designer without internet? Hahahahaha... it was a disaster. More for me than for him though, because I couldn’t be bothered to drag my laptop to the office every day. This is what I did instead of dealing with university registration and my job:

Wednesday I went for a long walk along the city wall. I planned to go to the museum (finally, after four years) but didn’t. I walked around the botanical garden (but didn’t go in), and I tried to track down some of the hundred church ruins Gotland has (and discovered most of them are now occupied by annoying, small, expensive cafes).

Next I spent a day playing Final Fantasy Tactics on the DS. When I was finally allowed lunch around 4 PM (rules of Sweden: always expect everything to take three hours longer than you assumed, and always bring cookies in case you're not fed) there was a sudden meeting, so I let the gamers to off to play, and got some traditional bread-and-cheese (Swedish style) to eat in the sunshine.

Perfection.

Jona doesn't randomly abandon me though (to the disappointment of his friends) and we had some wonderful coffee the next morning, in the sunshine. (In one of the stupid cafes ruining the beautiful ruins.)

... and we went for walks together too.

Then GGA began of course. I could've gone to the museum then, but then I'd have missed out on all the fun. I remember handing out bookmarks at these fairs since forever, so I just really enjoy being there. The exams must have really taken out more of me than I thought though because by the end of the second day I honestly barely made it home - I couldn't stand up straight any more. It was completely worth it! The cuddly 7-week-old not-really-a-game won TWO awards. It's very, very cute and would almost make me start trying Facebook games.

(Famous boyfriend? Hell yeah.)

(Swedish fireworks fail: it doesn't get dark early enough.)

(Very pretty though!)

One of the best parts of the week (and worst about coming back to Durham): the food. Sweden is regrettably low on fruit and vegetables, but a massive improvement over college. I feel much better now.

Some final random things: apparently for high school graduation students on Gotland ride around on trucks all day and play very loud music? Beats my stupid cafeteria graduation for sure!

Then naturally on the way back... the travelling went wrong. Though there should have been no timetable problems this time, of course the air plane was delayed. It was rushing down the runway to go up... and then went back down, breaked, and reported 'ah we got a warning, we'll, err, try this again in a bit, thanks'. So in Edinburgh I RAN to the bus, which then took 10 minutes to leave, RAN to the train - the most vital bit since a new ticket would've been 40 pounds - and caught it with 2 minutes to go, and then... only had 1.50 pounds in my wallet (+ 6.70 euros + about 200 Swedish crowns) so I couldn't get a taxi, but walked back by the flooded river bank. Fortunately I had masterfully packed only 8.7 kilos so I succeeded without being killed by the mountains (or 'hills', as the foreigners say).

Now I can look forward to a stressful couple of days of miss-communication with the Classics v.s. Archaeology department, and moving all my stuff over to the new house (how did I end up with all that stuff?)

Lets' hope the water is hot and that the sun will shine!