Gotland, Latvia, and soon to be more

I have been travelling the world. We were supposed to have a game on December 11th but it got cancelled. I was supposed to go to Gotland on the following Monday with Cilla (teammate who lives on Gotland) but we decided to go the Saturday before instead. Gotland is an island in the Baltic sea. We took a ferry that was about 3 hours. It is such a quaint island. The biggest city, Visby, is the equivalent of a small town in America. The biggest road on the island is two lanes. It is not a big island at all. And it is very flat. It is known for sheeps. I did see a lot. Cilla, her friends, and I went out in Visby Saturday night. I brought my solo cups with me. They travel with me everywhere I go. I introduced American drinking games to more Swedes. They love it. My goal in life is to integrate American drinking games into everyday Swedish party life. It will change Sweden for the better. I would need to somehow change the alcohol sale laws though. Alcohol is sold in one place called System Bolaget. It doesn't have very good hours and isn't open on the weekends. Lame. Drinking games need access to large quantities of beer at all times for when the drinks run out during the night. But anyway Cilla took me to the south of the Island to see it. It is beautiful. 

There is a famous rock called Hoburgsgubben which looks like an old man and has a tale behind it.

Cilla made me homemade Swedish pancakes which were delicious. We had dinner at her moms. There is a wood board that is used as a plate for a special meal consisting of steak, mashed potatoes, roasted tomato, and asparagus wrapped in bacon. The mashed potatoes are spread out around the edges of the wood board. I didn't take a picture but this is sort of what it looked like. This dish didn't originate in Sweden but it has become a traditional meal through time. 

Cilla and I made our first gingerbread house from scratch by ourselves. It was huge. I am not artistic. It became very relevant after comparing my parts of the house to Cillas. I guess I didn't get my dad's architectural skills. Oh well. It was also hard not to snack on it since Cill and I are both not eating sweets at the moment. The temptation was killer.

Gotland was a great visit. I then headed to Latvia to visit Elina (teammate). I flew with ryanair into the capital Riga which was so cheap. Elina and I went to an awesome club that had 5 dance floors and 3 famous djs from Latvia, Estonia, and the UK. They were amazing. Riga is a really cool city. I feel like Stockholm is different from the rest of European cities. It is so clean and new looking. Riga was dirty and old but so awesome. Very busy. It reminded me of a less crazy NYC with shorter buildings and a bigger area. So I guess it is not that similar to NYC but I kind of felt like I was in NYC. Not sure why. There is this place that serves dumplings of all kinds. So awesome. Latvia is all about sour cream. They put it on everything. Elina's dad owns a restaurant that serves traditional Latvian food. SO good. Meat, potatoes, and different salads. 

She lives in Jurmala which is not too far from Riga right near the Baltic. We walked from her house to the beach and it was only 5 minutes away. We made gingerbread cookies and cheese cookies. We also decorated the Christmas tree which was nice because I won't be home to do that. Even though my Mom boycotts Christmas trees most years anyway. All in all it was a great 9 day vacation away from Linkoping. Being in Latvia made me realize how expensive Sweden is. Food and alcohol was like half the price. 5 days until my Eurotrip with Court. I am too excited. I will blog a couple times to keep you updated on my travels. I am almost done with the semester. I need to finish a review paper and revise a few reports. I have all week to get it done before I leave on Monday for Amsterdam. It has finally been steadily snowing here. Not much accumulation on the ground but it is enough for things to look white. I wanted a white Christmas and I think I'll get one. Deb and I will both be here for Christmas. The university puts on a Christmas potluck for international students that aren't going home for the holidays. We are supposed to bring a traditional dish. I'm going to bring Latkes. I have never made them on my own so it will be interesting. We all know I am a disaster in the kitchen. Thank god for Afton to save me in that department. I hope that you all have a great Christmas/Hanukkah/whatever you celebrate. Sending love from Sweden

SNOW SNOW SNOW!

It has finally snowed here. December 6th. I thought it was going to happen a lot sooner. It was just a little dusting but I'm still happy about it. I really want a white Christmas.

I have been really busy working and going to hockey so I apologize for taking so long to write. We've won our last two games. Still undefeated. We won 17-0 and 15-1. We play the toughest team this weekend. Our team is starting to play really well together. After this weekend we don't have a game until Jan 15th.

It is only 20 days until my Eurotrip begins with Court. I am pumped. We have everything planned and it should be so fun. Almost three weeks of traveling. Next week I am going to visit Cilla in Gotland where she lives for a couple days. It is an Island off of Sweden in the Baltic sea. I am then going to Latvia to visit Elina for a couple days. Ryanair has such cheap flights. I am excited to see the different places.

My American theme party was awesome. My team loved it. I cooked Kraft mac n cheese and American pancakes for them. I had red vines and mike n ikes also. I gave them a spoonful of Skippy creamy peanut butter because the Skippy creamy peanut butter is neither creamy nor as tasty. Everyone did a great job dressing up. Basketball players, a ganster, a prom queen, Minny Mouse, The Blues Brothers, the Statue of Liberty, a cowgirl, Miss Alabama, Marilyn Monroe, and Snookie. I was a lax bro. No one knew what I was so I had to explain it and I show "the ultimate lax bro" video on youtube. They loved the drinking games. It was a successful party. Cilla asked me to bring the red cups to Gotland with me so we can play. These red cups will be the most reused red cups in the history of the world. They have already been used twice. I have to make the most of them because it cost my mom a fortune to send them to me.

I went to Gamla Linkoping on Sunday to do some Christmas shopping. It is right near where I live. It is such a cute place. Stone walkways and old Swedish buildings. Take an old settlement back from the Oregon trail days and replace the dirt roads with stone and the wood buildings with red and white wood and there you have it. It was very crowded. Lots of tables up with people selling homemade things. On Friday Mandy and I are going to go shopping for some more gifts in Norrkoping and I can finish up my package to send home. We are also going to the movies to see Breaking Dawn. Woo woo! We are watching the 3 previous movies to get in the mood.

On Friday I worked a double. First and probably last time I will ever do that. I worked at the golf course from 8-4 then went back to Linkoping and worked from 7-1am at the concert hall downtown. It was the first time they had asked me to work so I said yes because it shows that I am available and willing to work and hopefully gets me in on more work in the future. If I had said no I would fall to the bottom of the call list and I didn't want that. So I cleaned for 6 hours. Lots of sweeping/mopping, changing trash cans, cleaning bathrooms, etc. There were a good amount of events going on so the place was pretty dirty. I got the luxury of cleaning puke out of a sink. Like why puke in the sink when a toilet is just as close? I don't get it. It wasn't too bad of a shift though. However I now respect janitors/cleaners. It only sucked because I had been up from 730 and been going non-stop to 1am. 14 hours of work. It is worth the money though. I just don't plan to do it ever again. My feet were hurting. I guess that's the real world. I have worked a ton since I haven't had scheduled class. But now I need to actually work on my review paper so I won't be working much anymore. I don't know my school schedule for next quarter in January yet so I don't know how much I will be working. Since I'm taking a week vacation to visit my friends I need to spend the rest of the days making a presentation due on Dec 20th and writing a review paper before I go off on my Eurotrip. So I will be miserable basically except for the week of fun in Gotland and Latvia.

Peace, Love, and if you are going to puke...puke in the toilet please.