Author Archives: Alexandra

Weekend

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This weekend of mine was over so quickly.  But I feel rested and did a lot of fun things.

On Sunday I had my last day of work, only 6 hours and the day was over so fast.

Yesterday I finished my room, took all the boxes to the basement and now my room is done. It feels great. I still have tons of stuff I want to do, like go through all my clothes and give away stuff I don’t use anymore. I also want to order canvases with pictures from the Caribbean trip. And more smaller things.  At 5pm I went downtown to meet up with Jesper after he got off work. He is a guy I’ve kinda been seeing since I came home. I know it’s early to mention him here, but it feels right with him and I haven’t had this feeling in a very long time. I know he feels the same, so we will see where this goes. Anyway, we went to his place where we cooked dinner together, feta/bellpepper filled minute steak (is that what it’s called? A very thin beef) with potato wedges and rosépepper sauce. It was delicious.

Today was a fun day as well. I left bed at 12:30, went to 4-Gott to buy a bag of candy (it is my weekend, and I needed to refill my energy before 6 days of work which is ahead of me). Then I played some The Sims 4. Didn’t have time to do more than just one family.

At 5:30pm I went downtown to go to the movies with Axel, we saw Minions in 3D. Super fun movie! Grabbed a beer before the movie too. He came with me to my place after where we looked into where we should go in August. We had talked about going to Florence, Italy, but it was kinda expensive. So we found flight tickets for half that price with RyanAir to Marseille so we took that instead. Then we booked an apartment right next to the ocean with Airbnb and it all ended at 3,200 SEK per person in total for four days. Not bad at all! Yesterday I also booked my flight to Paris in September with mom. I am going to France twice in just a month, that will be fun!

Now that that is all booked and done I think I should probably go to bed. It will be nice with a long night of sleep before this new week at work. I hope my body and especially feet and legs are used to this hard work now.

Evening swim

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Two very very long day at work are over and I can’t put words on how tired I am. 9.5h of work both days and now in the beginning those days completely killed my feet. They hurt so bad the last hour today I couldn’t stand up more than I really really had to. Today I also only had two breaks (usually during long days there are three) so I had one three-hour long period of just working without breaks. That was rough and also the longest we can work without breaks. I’m glad I only work 6 hours tomorrow.

Snapchat--2190016857145699440The weather has been amazing the past few days. That means sweaty at work, but it also means breaks out in the sun (while working at Balderado).

Yesterday I was at Balderado. I wasn’t too happy since it was a really long day. I have three attractions there so I spent a total of 4.5 hours on Spinnrock. Sure, it is a pretty nice one, but 4.5 hours is way way too long.

After work today Axel and Leo picked me up and we went to Rådasjön for a late night swim. We jumped in the water at 10 pm then went for a walk and got eaten by mosquitos. It was a fun evening, and now I am ridiculously tired and should probably go to bed so I am rested and prepared for my “Friday” tomorrow. Can’t wait for two days off!

Snapchat-9186518937329934293 10pm where we jumped in. Okay, I was the only one who jumped, the other two “badkrukor” slowly slowly walked in, haha.PANO_20150704_230400This panorama would have been better if I didn’t move the phone… This photo was taken at 11pm.

First day back at Liseberg

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First day at work was easy, but I am very tired anyway. Good thing I only had a 6-hour day with two hours of self-education on the attractions. I started at 4pm, spent the whole day before then on the balcony in the sun. The sky was spotless today, not a single cloud and it was warm and awesome. That’s how the Swedish summer should be!

First at work I had 90 minutes of self-education, which means that I walked around to the different  attractions up on Berget and try to remember how to operate them. It was so chill and everything came back very fast. Then an hour lunch and another 30 minutes of relearning. Then my day started for real. One hour at Lisebergshjulet, where there were no people and with the sun it was awesome. Then half an hour break, and then only two more hours on the day. One hour at Höjdskräcken, and the last one at Helix. I don’t understand why there weren’t any people in the park today. But it was nice. At Höjdskräcken were periods of time when no one was there so I just sat there and rolled my thumbs. Not as boring as it sounds, haha.

The day was over very quickly, and not even dark when I got out of work at 11pm. Not cold either. I love Sweden!

Aboard the Volvo boats

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Sunday was the last day of the week-long event down in Frihamnen. Once again I went there with mom and we met up with Solveig, mom’s friend. We started with standing in line for going aboard the racing boats. The line was long, but I don’t think it took more than an hour. We were assigned a boat (otherwise everyone would probably have wanted to go aboard the Swedish boat. But we got Abu Dhabi, the race winner. Not too bad either. I was surprised at both how big it seemd and also small. The inside was mostly black (and I think they all looked the same) and it didn’t look very comfortable. The toilet was in the middle of it all, only one thing to cook on, and the beds didn’t look nice at all. It must have been really tough being out there for twenty days for some of the legs.

IMG_20150628_135910 IMG_20150628_143535 Abu Dhabi from United Arab Emirates.IMG_20150628_141754 Alvimedica from USA/Turkey.IMG_20150628_141656 SCA from Sweden.IMG_20150628_143133 First room in the boat with the sinks and one cooking place.IMG_20150628_143058 Two of four beds in the first room.

IMG_20150628_142841The open bathroom in the second room, in the front. There were only beds there (from what I could see)IMG_20150628_143118 The room in the back with some beds.IMG_20150628_143124 Third room, in the back.IMG_20150628_143324 Control panel or something in the back.IMG_20150628_143356 The desk in the back room where the reporter worked.IMG_20150628_143454

When we were done we wanted to go aboard the big ship Götheborg, but no more people could get in line, so I will just have to do that another day.

The last couple of days I have written a ton of emails. This scholarship thing takes a lot of work. And today I found out that I won’t get my proof of graduation until October… hmm. I emailed the foundation and asked if it was possible to apply anyway, but their office is closed until August. This sucks, but I mean, how fun would life be if everything went one’s way? I’m sure it will work out. Like every time I have really wanted something.

Volvo Ocean Race In-Port Race

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Sorry blog for being a bit inactive this week but it has been a very weird week. I have had a very annoying cold, still have. And I have been busy with trying to find scholarships, unpacking and just doing stuff. I don’t even know, but I’ve been busy.

On Wednesday I went downtown and met up with Axel for the first time since November when I briefly saw him in LA. We went for a fika and it was so nice to see him again!

Thursday, hmm, nothing I think? Friday evening was movie night with Axel and two of his cool friends. We had dinner at Danilo first, the restaurant inside the movie theatre. And then we saw Mad Max. It was an okay movie, but it was kinda long. But it was a fun evening and I liked his friends.

I couldn’t fall asleep last night because my heels were itching from the blisters after diving and Stuff went crazy in my boxes in my room. I don’t know what she did but she made hella lot of noise and I couldn’t fall asleep until like 4am. I closed the door, I thought, but they opened it and I found them in my room when I woke up. Next time I will have to make sure that it is 100% closed if I want it closed, haha. Sneaky cats… Not always nice and cuddly.

This morning I had to set an alarm. Mom, Axel and I were going to Långedrag to watch the In-Port Race in Volvo Ocean Race. Oscar II’s Fort was only open to SCA employees and their family. So we got really good seats and could see the whole race from the cliffs. I have never been out there so it was the start on my #TouristInGöteborg summer. It was also nice to see part of the Gothenburg archipelago again.

IMG_20150627_121955 IMG_20150627_120913 IMG_20150627_120929 IMG_20150627_121354 IMG_20150627_121301 PANO_20150627_121614

It was a grey day, but not too cold, and it only drizzled a little bit so we didn’t even get wet. It was actually a nice day. The SCA boat came in second in the race today and third in the whole In-Port Race part of Volvo Ocean Race (6/7 in the big competition). Not too bad. The Crown Princess of Sweden was on the SCA boat today, pretty cool.

IMG_20150627_131617 IMG_8729 IMG_8582 Älfsborgs fästning. I’m going there one day this summer :).IMG_8589 Ostindiefararen Götheborg.IMG_8626 IMG_8686 IMG_8706

After the competition I was super tired, but I had stuff to do today again. So no nap for me. I got my transcript from Cal Poly today so I emailed Chalmers, but the guy who is supposed to put my grades in the system is on vacation until August 10. That’s not good because I need my proof of graduation as soon as possible so I can apply for scholarships, and it can also be problematic with CSN (financial aid) if all my classes are not there soon. So I emailed another person and I hope she can help me with this.

Then I also sent in my grades to the university application website and I hope I will get accepted to the German class. It can also be problematic since I don’t have any grades from previous German studies here in Sweden. But I’m sure that will work out too.

Lastly, what I’ve done today is finish the travel report Johanna and I had to write about this year at Cal Poly. It turned out good I think. And when that one is approved we will get the last piece of our grant from Chalmers, 2500 SEK will be nice in September.

And now I will install The Sims 4, cross my fingers that it works, and play some before going to bed. Tomorrow mom and I are going down to the harbor again to get onboard the sailing boats, that will be fun.

One Direction @ Ullevi

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Only a few hours after I landed on Sunday I got a phone call from my uncle. He put my youngest cousin on and we talked for a bit, then she asked me if I wanted to join her and her dad to go to the One Direction concert in Gothenburg two days later. They are not my favorite band, but concerts are always fun, they have some good songs, and it would have been great to see Malin again. So I didn’t hesitate, I said yes right away! The plan was for her dad to come too, but then they found a friend of Malin, but she decided she didn’t want to the same day, and her dad didn’t have the plans in Borås today that he thought, so he didn’t go either. Just me and Malin.

I met up with her downtown, went to Åhlens where I bought nail polish remover and three nail polishes so I can finally try and do the gradient sunset polish that I’ve been wanting to do for a while now. We then went back to my place, ordered pizza for dinner and hung out for a bit to rest our feet. Mom drove us to Ullevi. We missed the first warm-up The Foo. But we weren’t too sad about it. The second band was McBusted, they were okay.

By that time the clouds were gone, and the promise of rain had gone away. When One Direction came on stage at 9pm the sun was shining, almost a complete blue sky. It made the evening so much better! They played for an hour and a half and I recognized most songs, but there were still lots of them I had never heard before. They played my two favorites, Stockholm Syndrome and Night Changes. They ended the whole thing with Best Song Ever. It was a great concert, and I have to admit that I now have an even bigger crush on Louis. I can only say wow!

During the show they kept saying they loved Sweden and I don’t know why. But I am pretty sure that I have heard them say that before, that Sweden’s their favorite place to perform. They have been here pretty often lately. Harry kept saying he loved köttbullar (meatballs, with a very good accent). They were cute :).

IMG_20150623_194200 IMG_20150623_183459 The Foo.IMG_20150623_205301 IMG_20150623_205412 IMG_20150623_205504 Haha, this girl is too funny. Malin and I called her Antenna Girl!IMG_20150623_210050 Harry is actually not too shabby either now when he let his hair grow out.IMG_20150623_210629 I think 80% of my pictures was of him (Louis)…IMG_20150623_211222 IMG_20150623_211946 IMG_20150623_213545 IMG_20150623_213935 IMG_20150623_214109 IMG_20150623_215058 IMG_20150623_221906 Waterfight between Louis and Liam.IMG_20150623_223547 IMG_20150623_223554 IMG_20150623_230141
Malin and I :).IMG_20150623_223605

After the concert, mom picked us up and I drove Malin and her friend to Kungshamn where they were on a camp for the week. It took 1.5 hours, we got there at 1am, and then I got back home at 2:45am. To keep myself awake while still being jetjlagged and having a cold (I’ve decided that it is a cold since I have a little bit of fever aswell), I listened to music, sang a long, and ate my whole bag of candy I bought yesterday. I do feel a little bit bad, but now on the other hand I got that out of the way and can get start being healthy. I don’t have that urge to eat sweets anymore like I did in California. That is great because I have 10 more pounds to lose.

I went straight to bed, didn’t wake up until noon and spent some time in bed with the cats. And now I am about to head downtown to meet up with Axel, haven’t seen him since November, I am excited! And I will check off another Swedish thing on my list, fika :).

Volvo Ocean Race in Gothenburg

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This post used to contain pictures, but due to new storage limitations from WordPress, I had to fix the problem and decided to create a new blog that works as an archive for all the posts from my two years in California. This full post can be found here.

Before I write about what happened today, on my first real day in Sweden, I will rewrite about my long way back home. I wasn’t aware of anything I wrote last night and I am not sure I want to read it. I was completely out of it and I’m sure it was the worst post I have had so far in this blog. So here goes again.

On Saturday June 20th I was supposed to wake up at 4am so I would have time to remove the sheets from the bed and soon. But I accidently turned off my alarm and didn’t wake up until 4:30am when my ride texted me that he was outside the house. Shit! I got stressed, and I hate being stressed. But 15 minutes later we were on our way, and there were surprisingly many people on the freeway, not enough to slow us down, but still more than you would think at 5am on a Saturday. We got to the airport at 5:20 am, I thanked Andrew and then hurried in. I was surprised at how many people there were. I stood in line for the kiosks to check in. But once I got there, twenty minutes later, it said I couldn’t do anything so I had to stand in another line. When it was 50 minutes left until my flight left it was finally my turn, so I put my suitcases on the scale, and of course one of them was overweight. I am stressed out of my mind, but right there on the floor, I open up my bags and repack them. I was lucky enough that the security line was short, usually that can take time. I got to the gate with two minutes to spare before boarding, so I bought a little breakfast and then boarded.

The first flight was 4 hours to Chicago. Those flights always seem to be overpacked, so I could check in my carry-on for free all the way to my final destination. Pretty awesome! I got an aisle seat, I was tired, but normally I can’t fall asleep on planes because it is so uncomfortable. I almost manage to fall asleep this time, an 18h long day followed by 4h of sleep makes one tired. But right when I am about to fall asleep, the lady in the middle needs to take her 6-year old daughter to the bathroom. And after that I couldn’t fall asleep again so I read for the rest of the flight.

The second flight was 8.5h long and was all the way to Berlin. Over the Atlantic Ocean, through the night. That is the worst type of flight really. We left Chicago at 3:25pm, flew against time, skipped the night and landed early the next morning. We only got a few dark hours and I couldn’t sleep more than 1.5h, if you can even call that sleep.  That flight was actually okay, not as good as the last time I flew over the Atlantic when I had three seats all to myself in the back of the plane, but almost. I got a window seat at row 50 of 50. There were only two seats and the girl next to me was nice, although she took up some of my seat once she fell asleep which was annoying. We got a blanket and a pillow like always on those long flights, but we also got a carebag with socks, earplugs, a blindfold, and a toothbrush and toothpaste. The socks were perfect since I was flying with flipflops. I watched two movies on that flight, first the third Hobbit movie (finally!!) and then American Sniper. Both were really good. Then I tried to sleep some, but was pretty unsuccessful. I “woke” up 1.5h later because a guy on the other side opened up the window and the rising sun blinded me. And that was that sleep… I started watching Jumper, saw about half of it before we landed.

The third flight was from Berlin and only 1h and 20 min. I had a window seat again. I just wanted to be home so I just sat there listening to music the whole time. I got sad to when I realized that that was it. California was behind me and Sweden ahead.

I was excited when we descended and I saw the green forests of the outskirts of Gothenburg. All those trees, and lakes, and red houses with white corners. It was nice to see.

We landed on time, I went to baggage claim, just to wait there for a long while. And one of my three checked bags didn’t even come. I talked to the baggage service lady and she told me it got stuck in San Diego already. It was gonna get flown in that same evening, but too late for driving out. So I got it today instead.

Here is my snapchat story from the trip:

00 Snapchat--4812541772281298543 01 Snapchat-6223498895822990226 02 Snapchat-1170670396550349917 03 Snapchat--8369422210148245011 04 Snapchat--3384652536501808550 05 Snapchat-1189796204483868459 06 Snapchat--5255627660992635926 07 Snapchat-9083590470613054292 IMG_20150621_093141 08 Snapchat--8353787428247180046 09 Snapchat--1349219900388136334 10 Snapchat-4046473758046674837 11 Snapchat--3284023470050709002 12 Snapchat--3864853555665185580

 

My day yesterday was super weird. I was so tired already from the beginning, but I did my best to stay awake. And I succeeded til 7pm when I just couldn’t keep my eyes open any more. During the day I hugged my cats all the time, I couldn’t keep my hands off them. I have missed them both sooo much. My two fluffy balls!

My mom prepared some Swedish midsummer food and I enjoyed that sooo much in the sun on the balcony. It was perfect. The pickled herring, the fresh potato, the meatballs. Yummy!

Then I tried unpacking but I was just so tired so it took forever and I only did a few things. Mom and I had picked up some of my boxes from the basement. Mostly clothes, can’t really put anything else anywhere. My room is kinda tiny, haha.

We went to the grocery store to try and wake me up at 4. I couldn’t go to bed just yet. There wasn’t really anything I needed, but we bought tea, some fruit and falukorv (a Swedish sausage that I have missed). It didn’t really help and I was still tired back home. I lasted until 7pm when I was about to fall asleep in front of the TV. My mom told me I coulnd’t, so I went to bed, fell asleep right away. I woke up at one point, it was light out and I thought that I had slept happily through the whole night. When I looked at my phone, it was only 10pm, haha! I have missed the light we get in the summer, it is amazing. Then I fell asleep again and woke up at 8:30am. 13h of sleep and I was still tired when I woke up, but I didn’t leave bed for a while, so it was nice. I fell asleep last night with Stuff right next to my face and when I moved around too much Chip took her place. He spent the whole night next to me or on my chest. That cuddly fluffball.

This morning I had breakfast, and unpacked some more. Went much faster today. I was still feeling a bit weird and that will take a few more days I think. As long as I sleep through the whole night I am happy :).

Soon after noon mom came home from work so we could take the public transit (wow, I missed that, haha) down to the harbor to watch the boats in Volvo Ocean Race sail over the finish line after 9 months of racing all around the world. The sun was out and it was amazing. T-shirt was no problem at all! We watched all the boats come in to the harbor. Alvimedica (the American/Turkish boat) won, and the Swedish came in last unfortunately. We stayed the whole time, even through the rain, which was cold… Ugh, I do not like rain! But it was a fun event to attend.

IMG_20150622_130510 #1IMG_20150622_132822 #2IMG_20150622_133154 #3 Dongfeng. This boat had a Swede onboard.PANO_20150622_135216 The big ship Götheborg! I don’t think I have ever seen it actually. It was a grand ship.IMG_20150622_143222 #4 Abu Dhabi.hdr_00023_0 It turned very quickly from sun to this…IMG_20150622_152943 #6 Vestas.IMG_20150622_155125 #7, the Swedish boat Team SCA, an all girls boat.IMG_20150622_161517All the ships being welcomed in the harbor.

On our way back home we stopped downtown where I could by more nosespray since my nose is very congested. All the rain here makes everything super green (which I live, and isn’t even comparable to California), but that also means a ton of pollen, and even if I am not allergic I definitely feel it. Maybe I am allergic now? I am gonna contact the health center tomorrow and ask for an appointment to take the tests and also find out my mysterious allergy. I have a lot of stuff I need to take care of, but I look forward to it.

Now I really have to go to bed. I have a long day ahead of me tomorrow. I will try to head to Liseberg to sign my contract for the summer, I am meeting up with my cousin Malin, hanging out for a bit maybe, will try to get some stuff before then, unpacking. And in the evening I will go to the One Direction concert here in town in the evening! Malin asked me yesterday if I wanted to come because one of her friends couldn’t go. Very unexpected, but I am actually excited. Not everyone can say that they have seen 1D live ;). And they do have a few good songs.

Goodnight!

IMG_20150619_144752This is a peacock that kept me company at the pool on Friday. Beautiful birds!

Back home in Sweden

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This weekend has been so long and really hard. I have stayed awake for a very long time and the only thing I can think about is going to sleep. But I have told myself that I can’t go to bed before 9pm because that will mess me up. I have been awake for 29 hours (6pm Swedish time) now, with only 90 minutes of half-sleep on the plane. And before that I only slept for 4 hours and the day before, Friday, was a very active day with scuba diving, and I was up for 18 hours. So far it’s been 47 hours with 5 hours of rest. Ugh. Not my favorite way to spend a weekend.

The flights went okay, On the second one, the long one from Chicago to Berlin, I got a window seat at the very back of the plane which was the best. I tried to sleep but couldn’t. So I tried and succeeded after watching two movies; The Hobbit 3 and American Sniper. Both really good. That flight was amazing in another way too. They gave each and every one of us a goodie bag with socks in I, a brush, toothbrush, earplugs, blindfold. Everything to make the trip better. Since I was traveling with flip flops the socks were especially welcome.

The food wasn’t good and I’ve felt it in my stomach all day, nauseous, ugh!

After the 18 hours I finally landed in Gothenburg. Lots of mixed feelings. When I get there I realize my third bag is nog here. So I went to the baggage lady and she helped me locate it. Apparently it got stuck in San Diego which is rather strange. But she said it would land in Gothenburg late tonight and they would taxi it out to me tomorrow sometime. Can’t wait for that bag, I have so many things in there.

I hugged my mom and we went home. It felt so weird to be back in Sweden. It kinda already feels like it was a dream again. I have tried to unpack, but with this sleep-depriveness it’s been really hard. I just managed to finish unpacking my one suitcase and carry-on. The boxes will have to wait until another day when I feel ready for it.

I apologize for the probably not very well-written post today. I am literally sitting here by my desk and can’t keep my eyes open and nod every now and then. I don’t think I have ever been this tired before. It has probably affected my speech today, I have mixed Swedish and English words everywhere and mom has laughed at me.

I feel like a zombie right now, so I think I will actually go to bed now, I can’t do this anymore. 29 hours of no real sleep is not very fun!

Dive #6 – La Jolla Cove Outer Reef

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This post used to contain pictures, but due to new storage limitations from WordPress, I had to fix the problem and decided to create a new blog that works as an archive for all the posts from my two years in California. This full post can be found here.

Last day in California with no sureness of when my return will be. That’s not good, and it makes this leaving harder than the last. Even if I look forward to go back home, I am still very sad to leave. Mixed feelings to say the least.

My last day started with a dive in the kelp forest. Today there was a third guy with us, he was from Germany. First we snorkeled for half an hour out to the forest, descended and started swimming to the more densely forested area. It was cold, and I was already shivering on the surface and it was even colder at the bottom. Bottom temperature today was only 53F (13C) and that made the whole dive not very enjoyable. But it was still cool to dive through the kelp. Total bottom time today was 59 minutes, but we were in the water for longer because of the snorkeling tour out. It took a long while before I could feel my feet again and even longer before I was warm.

We didn’t see any sharks today unfortunately. But we did see a banded ray, a giant black sea bass (only 40lbs though), lots of the orange fishes, the tuna crabs, and the other fish I can’t remember the names of, sea lions and I also saw a blue starfish. I am too tired to go through all the videos to try and find a good screenshot of the ray, sea bass and starfish. I will post them another day if I remember it.

I bought a chai latte on the way home, and once there I pretty much just took the poolcard and hung out at the pool for about four hours. I read some, I think I napped some, and then at 5pm Anna came. I haven’t seen her since I left a year and a half ago. We talked for an hour before we both had to leave.

Dinner with the family, then packing, all my suitcases are less than 23kgs, everything except my computer is packed and I am all ready to go. I looked through the pictures from today too, and all of them were okay today. I just didn’t look through the videos yet. Today the pictures got better, maybe I was trying to hold it more steadily while under water.

I am definitely going to bed now. 4 hours of sleep, awesome!

DCIM100GOPROGOPR0003. Lots of tuna crabs.DCIM100GOPROG0010017. A seagull from under the surface.DCIM100GOPROGOPR0004. Two freeloaders on the instructor, haha!DCIM100GOPROG0030108. Most of the pictures looked similar.DCIM100GOPROG0030135. DCIM100GOPROG0040228. DCIM100GOPROG0040233. DCIM100GOPROG0060437. DCIM100GOPROG0060464. It was a completely different dive today, and it was really cool!DCIM100GOPROG0060496. DCIM100GOPROG0060497. Snapshot - 100 Snapshot - 103 Snapshot - 106 Snapshot - 108 Snapshot - 109-112Sea lion playing in the seagrass when we were heading out of the water. The water in there were so much warmer.

Au pairing and guns

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This post used to contain pictures, but due to new storage limitations from WordPress, I had to fix the problem and decided to create a new blog that works as an archive for all the posts from my two years in California. This full post can be found here.

Today was exactly like a day two summers ago, when I was an au pair in this amazing family. It was like the past two years never happened and I just continued doing the au pair thing. I left bed at 11am after falling asleep at 3 last night. I started the day with playing Super Mario Bros on the Wii with the kids. My hostmom left to do errands for their upcoming Hawaii trip so I had the kids all to myself all day. It was a great day! First we played some Wii, and then soon thereafter it was lunchtime. And of course, they wanted Swedish pancakes, and it was like I have been doing that once a week the past two years as well. Turned out perfect.

Right after that we went out with the dog, Maya. The girl was on her bike and the boy had a friend with him and they were collecting sticks on the way. We were out there for about 45 minutes, and that was the only time they wanted to be outside today. I wish they would have wanted to go to the pool or something since it was the most beautiful day of the week and my second to last day in California. But well well.

Then the boys were out in the yard playing, and we were just hanging out for a bit before the neighbor had to go home and the boy and I played chess while the girl baked muffins. She then left for soccer practice and the boy and I played Battleship until my hostmom came home. And that’s when I left to go meet up with Andy, a guy from the Mission Beach volleyball gang. We had a very American evening together with first gunshooting at an indoor range, then In N Out for dinner (one last time) and then to Dave and Buster (Chuck E Cheese for adults) where we played arcade games until midnight when I had to go home so I would get some sleep before my early scuba dive tomorrow.

Shooting a gun is something I have always wanted to try, even if I don’t like guns and don’t agree with the constitution that everyone here has a right to own a gun. But it was still something I wanted to try so I could see what the fuss was all about. He brought four guns, two handguns and two rifles. I had him write down the names of them because there is no way that I would have remembered. The first one was a rifle .45 carbine, second was called AR 15, third HK .45 compact, and the last one was a .357 magnum revolver. My favorite was the .45 carbine, not too powerful, easy to aim with. The revolver was pretty fun too. The small and “normal-looking” gun was so powerful that it was scary to shoot with, haha!

After shooting about 2 rounds with each gun my arms were spaghetti and I was pretty much done, haha!

IMG_20150618_204323 AR 15.IMG_20150618_203955HK 45 compact, the very powerful but small gun.

We were planning on going to the County Fair, but we decided to go to In N Out and Dave and Buster instead. That was also fun! I’ve never really played arcade games like that before, and I have to say that I sucked at most of it, haha! I was pretty good at skeeball after a couple of tries, and of course I am pretty decent at Mario Kart.

It was a long and fun day, and tomorrow will be even longer. I am super stoked about the dive, and then I will babysit the kids for a bit, and pack. Last day in California tomorrow. It’s sad…