Happy Thanksgiving!

You'd be surprised by how many people have asked me how my Thanksgiving in Sweden went (Daniele Beauman). I thought it was a pretty AMERICAN holiday considering it was based from the story of Pilgrims and Indians. I guess it's not that obvious. Even though it is not a holiday here, it doesn't mean that it can't be celebrated. Give Sweden Americans and you'll get Thanksgiving in Sweden for sure. Mainly because we NEED it and will do whatever it takes to have it (order a turkey from the grocery store a week in advance). My roommate Deb and her friend are hosting a Thanksgiving feast tomorrow at my place. A total of 14 people will be attending. I am in charge of making the mashed potatoes. It can't be that hard right? I have my doubts considering my kitchen retardation. I am sad I am not enjoying Thanksgiving at home. Yeah, the food is all similar where ever you are but the tastes of your Mom's cooking can't be replicated. I'm used to not being home since I only was home for Thanksgiving once (last year) since I left Idaho for New York when I was 14. Last year teased me. Anyway, tomorrow night should be fun to share the joys of Thanksgiving with some Swedes. And as if one Thanksgiving isn't enough, Mandy and I are going to have Thanksgiving with 3 teammates on Sunday. LEFTOVERS GALOR! I can't wait. We went shopping tonight for it. The 4.3 kg turkey was $45, it took us a half hour in the spice section to figure out what Swedish spices were what in English, and there is no such thing as chicken stock. Overall, it was a successful trip. I am going to make the amazing french silk pie. I am also skeptical about its turnout. Wish me luck. A lot.

So I've been working at my sports manager's golf course. It's a good time. A couple of my teammates also work there so it is fun. Summer houses are being constructed so we spend Monday taking the waste from the site and burning it in a huge bonfire. It was awesome. I love Sweden and their "fika" breaks. No more than two hours can go by without taking a break to drink some tea/coffee and sit around and chat for twenty minutes. The golf course used to be a castle with farmland. An old barn is being turned into the club house so a lot needs to be done to it. Mandy, Cilla and I spent today sweeping the upstairs of the barn to prepare it to be sprayed for termites tomorrow. The wood boards are very old and some have gotten really weak due to age and termites. Earlier in the day a guy said to be careful because his leg went through the floor. The whole morning was fine. We swept and bagged the dirt and made a fire to burn all the bags. We went back after lunch to finish up the last part of the barn.  I was carrying the last bag to be put in the truck and...yup, my foot went through the floor. A plank of wood snapped right under me and my whole leg fell through the hole. Not gonna lie, I thought I was going to die. Aside from a bruised knee I am fine. It was scary as shit though. The bottom concrete floor was at least 30 feet below. You know you'e fat when...

We had our first home game on Sunday. We won 6-0. It was another frustrating game because they were so bad that all they did was trip, hit, hook you. It felt like the second I got the puck I was being rocked from some direction. So different from American hockey. The refs let so much go here. It was just hard to stay level-headed when you're getting smoked and penalties aren't getting called. Makes the game unenjoyable and everyone gets frustrated and the game goes to shit.

The red solo cups my mom sent me have been broken in. Last friday me, my roommates, and Cilla and her roommate had a fun night playing beer pong, LSD, and flip cup.  It was the first time for the Swedes to play drinking games like these. They loved them. And were like this really is what it's like in the movies. I tried to explain to them that parties aren't parties in America unless drinking games are involved. They understood why because of how much fun they are. I can't wait for the American theme party next weekend. I am cooking Kraft Mac n' Cheese for them that came in my care package. They are in for a treat.

Happy Thanksgiving all. I am thankful for having such amazing parents. They've provided me with everything I've ever needed which has allowed me to fullfil so many experiences. I am fueled by their support and couldn't be more grateful for the love and encouragement they give me.

My 1st Swedish Birthday

I had a nice birthday. I had class, baked a cake (Swedish tradition is you bake a cake and bring it to the function and in this case the function was hockey practice), practice, and then I got home and my roommate deb and her boyfriend Bjorn were in the kitchen waiting with balloons, candles, cake, champagne, and decorations and we had a nice hangout. All around good birthday. 

These are the coolest glasses in the world.

There have been so many beautiful sunsets here. Yellow, orange, pink, red, turquoise, purple, dark blue.

Classes are going well. I like population ecology. It's not too hard and pretty interesting to test predictions about extinction and stuff using computer models. I may do something with population ecology for my masters thesis. Don't know though yet. We had 4 weeks of class and starting this week coming up we stop having class and have 4 weeks to work on a review paper on a subject. I chose the effects of habitat fragmentation on ecosystems. We find papers and write a paper about the current research going on in that field. Doesn't seem to bad. I am pumped to have a month off a school. Since I've been here I've basically had class everyday with exception to a few Fridays here and there.  Obviously I'm not going to start the paper until the week before its due. I am hoping to work a ton while I am free from school. I don't work when I have class everyday which has been the case lately. So I looking forward to bringing in the cash. Or should I say Kronor. Court and I are all ready for our Eurotrip. Everything is booked. I am so excited. 19 days. 5 places. Lots of beer drinking on this trip. It's pretty cold here now and it gets dark at like 3:45pm (15:45). It hasn't snowed yet which is rare for Sweden at this time of year. It might be a short, weak winter. But who knows. I'm having Thanksgiving at my house with a group of like 12 of us. Roommates and friends. I'm excited. Then two days later, Mandy and I are hosting Thanksgiving for a few teammates. So I'm getting two Thanksgivings. That's more than I get in America and it's not even a holiday in Sweden. I'm throwing the American theme party in a couple weekends. It should be great. Lots of drinking will be taking place. I got red solo cups sent from my mom to complete the party. Everyone is supposed to dress up as an American stereotype. Pictures will be taken. Random things: there is no turning right on red lights here. When biking/walking towards someone they think it is the end of the world and don't know what side to chose so it becomes a really awkward shift left and right a bunch of times and close calls for bike collisions. I almost crashed big time because some idiot wasn't looking ahead and I was coming down a slope so I was going fast (on the right side like a normal person) and the dude went to his left trying to go around me that way and we had to both slam our brakes and I skidded and almost ended up in a ditch. Not good times. Cilla one day asked Mandy and I what it meant when someone says "bust a move" because she sees it on tv/in movies. We basically said well, if someone says bust a move, you bust a move. So now we randomly tell her to bust a move and she will do a crazy dance. It's great. An annoying thing: Swedes don't tie their hair back in their hockey helmets. UGH. If you're a hockey player you will understand what I mean. Proof that I am retarded: my mom sent me a recipe of a yummy chocolate cake. So I went to the store and bought all the ingredients. The recipe called for a box of chocolate cake, a box of instant chocolate pudding, eggs, water, etc. So I come home and prepare the pudding. Cook the mix with milk and put it in the fridge to solidify. So it's my birthday and decided to skype with my mom while I'm baking so she can skype me on my birthday. I tell her I'm in the process of baking the cake. She asks what step I'm at and I say I'm waiting for the pudding to set its in the fridge. She goes why? I said because I made the pudding to put in the cake...the recipe calls for 1 box of instant chocolate pudding. She starts hysterically laughing. I wasn't supposed to make the pudding I was supposed to add the powder to the chocolate cake powder. FML. Never have been a baker. Never will be. Anyway, we won our last game 7-1. I'd say they were out hardest competition yet...and still sucked. Got 2 goals and an apple. Leading the stats baby! We travel close to Gothenburg for our away games. It's about 3 hours away. We have our first home game this Sunday which is exciting. I want to check out Galma Linkoping (Old Linkoping) tomorrow. It is supposed to be cute and have lots of shops selling local handmade things. Hoping to find some Christmas presents there. Its a bike ride away which is nice. My mom asked me what I wanted in my next care package: funfetti cake, rainbow chip frosting, and cooler ranch doritos. Booyaa. 

No mercy rule in Sweden...

So Saturday I had a game against Rögle, which is about 4 hours south from me. Very close to Copenhagen. We won 23-0. It was a slaughter. Everyone on our team scored at least one goal haha. We only had 9 skaters. I got 4 goals and had 6 assists. First and probably last 10 point game. And they didn't even seem that bad. Like, yeah we controlled the puck the entire game and skated around them, but the reason we scored so much was because the goalie was brutal. The way ties are broken in the league is by goal differential so there is no mercy rule here. The other team had good attitudes though. I guess they get smoked like this all the time. It was way better playing them than the last team we played because not only did they suck but they were little betches. Afton, betch has made it into my blog. Appreciate. Anyway, we had to leave at 5:30am to get to the game on time and the battery of one of our vans decided to die on us while waiting in the parking lot to leave. Of course, Swedes don't keep jumper cables in their cars. No gas station was open that early on a Saturday so we ended up flagging someone down after waiting about 45 minutes who did have cables. Funny yet not funny. We still haven't had a home game yet. Not until Novemeber 20th. Speaking of November, it is my birthday in 8 days. Holla. My parent's bought me an awesome present. A Eurail pass for my Eurotrip with Court in January. Court and I have started planning the trip and booking flights/trains/hostels. It is so exciting. We are going to Amsterdam first to take care of some business and then heading to Berlin. A family that stayed with us in Boise a couple summers ago lives in Berlin and they have offered their guest room to us which is awesome. We are going to stay in Berlin for New Years. I can't wait. We then are going to Prague to drink beer and drink beer. Ending in Munich to drink more beer and eat weinerschnitzel. I will take lots of pictures and blog about the trip. Those of you who know my "suzi" dance, I have brought it to Sweden and they are obsessed. As you can see in my profile picture, they asked me to do it after a goal. I also did it in the club Saturday night. Emily Smith if you are reading this, I did the finger point dance as well. Epic. The club was really fun. I went with two teammates that I have become really good friends with. Cilla and Elina. We pregamed at Cilla's place before the club and played Catch Phrase. So funny to play with Swedes. We could only play the "food" category because all the others were too difficult and made it not fun because they either didn't know the word or didn't know how to explain it. But just playing on the "food" category was hysterical. Some funny things have happened the past week. My teammate Bohm gave me an extra stick to try out. I played with it and it was the game I didn't score. So I told her "Your stick is on the back burner." Yeah, she had no idea what I was talking about. The other day Mandy said that something didn't pan out and no one knew what she meant. Someone said to my Swedish teammate Larre, "take down her number" because someone had hit her and she was like "What? You want my number?" So funny. I said "didn't get the memo" and had to explain it. So many expressions Swedes don't know. I didn't realize how much I use expressions until I got here and no one had a clue what I meant. There had been construction on the way to practice for a while and the day it cleared we drove through what had been sectioned off and Larre started humming the wedding song...like what? I am waiting for these next two weeks of classes to end so I can start working more because we get a month off of classes to work on a paper. I am sad I won't be home for Thanksgiving. So to compensate, Mandy and I are going to celebrate Thanksgiving together. I'm excited. My mom has sent a box containing red solo cups for my American theme party I am throwing in a couple weeks. The team is so excited for it. I hope I can give them a good representation of American partying. Chugging, games, and more chugging. Should be great. 


Peace, love, and send me birthday presents

Happy November

Hello everybody. How is America treating you? Sweden has been treating me very nicely. I love it. School is going well. Lots of computer models. It isn’t too difficult though because the instructions tell you everything you need to do. The workload is not bad at all. I haven’t been able to work because I’ve had class everyday. But after these three weeks classes stop for a month while we work on a paper so I’ll hopefully work a bunch. Hockey is so much fun. We won our 2^nd league game on Sunday against Trollhattens, which is about 4 hours away. 7-0. They were a lot worse than us so it was a frustrating game because they were more in the way than anything else. They had no skill so they reverted to being physical instead. It was really annoying. We should have beaten them by a lot more and our coaches weren’t very happy. My scoring streak halted. I got an assist, but I am not happy with how I played. Oh well. As my dad says, “You’re only as good as you next game.” Also, we only have 13 on our team so even if everyone shows up we still don’t have that many players. It is tiring at practices and hard to do drills when we don’t have a lot of skaters. We are trying to recruit more from around the area. Potentially steal some players from LHC (Linkoping team) that are on the junior team. LHC has like 20 players on their A team and then like 20 players on their B team which they sometimes pull players from to play with the A team. It would be nice to persuade some of them to come to us because they will get to play games as well as have fun because we are so much cooler. We have gotten into a consistent practice schedule for the most part. Practice Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and an off-ice practice on Tuesday. I went to the Vita Hasten guy’s game with a couple teammates which was fun. The hockey isn’t as good as the Union guys team but it is still good hockey. It was nice to get out and do something with people. I realize that I don’t hangout a lot with people because it feels amazing when I’m out of the house with people talking and laughing. I’m in class, working, playing hockey, or home. So I need to get some solid friends to hangout with. My roommates and I all have different schedules so we rarely find time to hangout outside the house. My main source of talking and laughing is in the car ride from Linkoping to Norrkoping with the Linkoping crew on the team. The conversations are hilarious. We have all gotten really close so it is a fun trip rather than a burden to have to travel to hockey. And my other source is with the hockey team. Good times. Halloween is Sweden is like any other day. It is weird not seeing pumpkins and Halloween decorations everywhere. And no one said Happy Halloween to me. However, Saturday night I went to a Halloween party my roommate threw and it was really fun. Deb’s boyfriend went into the forest and cut down a tree to put in his living room. I then covered it with spider web my mom provided me in a package. It looked awesome. My mom also sent candy corn, which Swedes don’t know about. People had great costumes. I was “Super Girl.” My favorite costume was someone dressed up as the boss from Office Space and he looked just like him and walked around all night saying, “Yeahhhh, so I’m going to have to ask you to come in on Saturday.” It was hilarious. Two Swedes dressed up as the World Trade Centers buildings.  I wasn’t sure whether to laugh at the creativity or feel weird about it. I mostly laughed…A custom in Sweden is that they hug you when you arrive if they know you. It definitely won’t happen if you’re new, but if you have hung out with them before they hug you when you come to their house. It’s weird. I don’t like when people touch me. Also, no matter how many people are in the room, if someone new shows up they go around to every person and shake their hand and introduce themselves. I feel like we just walk into a room and say hey, I’m so and so and then learn names as the night goes on. So I taught my team the U-G-L-Y song. They love it. U-G-L-Y you ain’t got no alibi, you ugly yeah yeah you ugly. M-A-M-A that’s the way you got that way, your mama yeah yeah your mama.  They tried to teach me a Swedish drinking song but it is a lot harder to learn a song when you don’t know the language. I’m throwing an American theme party for my team to show them how to actually party. Beer pong, flip cup, power hour, kings, asshole, LSD (the game not the drug), catch phrase, you got served, etc. Everyone has to dress up as an American using any type of stereotype they choose. I can’t wait to see what people come up with. There are no red solo cups here but I’ll manage to find something. I MISS BRODY. Oh and guys here roll their jeans at the bottom.