Arrival at Orrefors! (wrote this Monday around lunch)

Sunday around 12:00 I arrived in Orrefors to move into my room and sign my contract and etc.  I am on the first floor of a small apartment building.  I have my own room in an apt with 4 other girls.  We have 2 showers, 2 toilets, a kitchen and a living room to share.  My room is nice and luckily it is on the sunny side of the house.  Not very big, but I don’t need much room (only brought 1 suitcase).  I have a twin size bed, desk, desk chair, sitting chair, bedside table with a little lamp and 4 built in closets!   Three of the girls I live with are Swedish and going to gymnasium here and Nybro, it is like high school but they get to specialize in glassblowing, I think they are all around 16.  The fourth girl is 25 like me and is from Finland, where she has studied glass for 3 years already!   There is another small 2 bedroom apt on the first floor, a Bulgarian couple lives there and a half Danish/half American boy, and then the same layout upstairs.  My mom, Aunt and I went to lunch and the grocery store to get the necessities like cheese, bread, ice-cream, coffee, chocolate, yogurt, toilet paper and chocolate balls! Then we went to the Orrefors glass shop where they both bought me something to have nice in my room and for some inspiration:

The candle holder is an Orrefors design, the cup is Kosta and the flowers are local wild flowers. 

Then we had some coffee and I got to serve coffee to my first guests! 

 We had these wonderful icecream cones with Diam (chocolate bar with toffee inside) pieces in them and wonderful chocolate around the outside... one my grandmother's favorites!

After that they left me (for foooooorever!)  Haha, no, they will be back Friday afternoon to check on me on their way back to Norköpping from Helsingborg.  I went on a walk around town to explore a little and get some exercise.  Also, I didn’t know if I was brave enough to meet all the people in the building just yet! I found there are some people who have horses (häst) just down the road, but I didn’t see anyone to talk to.  Also, I went to pick some purple flowers and this little girl, maybe 4-5, started yelling at me while she was riding her bike in her yard.  I tried to tell her I was picking violett blomma (purple flower) but then she started going on and on about something and was not very nice… lots of pointing and making serious/mean faces… then her little friend/partner in crime came out and started with the yelling and running around laughing at me.  Finally I just laughed, shrugged and said bye.  But then I saw these guys:

  

These were the inspiration of one of the few sentences in Swedish I can say “Jag såg många bruna sniglar i Sverige.” If only I had seen them before I saw the little girls I could have told them that too! Haha. 

Then I found my Swedish Boudreax (Sam’s crazy ass cat) .  He even clawed me when I was trying to pet him! Such a nice reminder of home!

In the evening we went a party upstairs where the 5 room apt is full of boys, 3 gymnasium guys and 2 American guys who are 20 yrs old and doing the same program as me I think.   The party was fun, small and mostly with the younger people but they all tried to speak English so I would be included.  There is a young girl who is kind of goth from Stockholm who was the life of the party.  I was really proud of myself, I was funny, talkative and actually had a good time.  I only drank like 3 beers so it wasn’t just because I was drunk! I remembered how successful I was at pretending to be super outgoing and talkative and not shy when I first started my job at Amherst that I didn’t have to spend a few awkward weeks of getting to know everyone… So I applied that same practice here and now I already know a lot of people.  One of the guys from America is half Swedish and speaks Swedish very well.  He doesn’t talk much and gives off the feeling that he thinks he is better than everyone else… maybe b/c most of the people where teenagers, but still kind of lame and boring.  The other American that the goth girl thinks looks like the lead singer from Green Day.  I don’t know if agree, but he seemed nice, but didn’t hang out at the party much.  He doesn’t speak any Swedish, so luckily I am not the only person who won’t know what is going on!

Monday, none of us knew what time to go to class, apparently Orrefors is really bad at organization… so I went to the building at 8:30 when I saw some cars arrive with the Finnish girl and we met one teacher who found a paper that looked like me and the boys start at 1pm Monday and the Finnish girl maybe 10 on Wednesday (luckily she is in a different class since she is so experienced!).  She is really shy also, maybe b/c she doesn’t think her English is very good, or maybe just always shy… I am not sure, but she stank up the apt after burning some oat bran on the stove (it smelled so bad and looked like gruel!).  So, then I went back to sleep (the party upstairs went on until 3AM and we could hear them very clearly in our rooms) and I had absurd dreams so didn’t sleep well.  Then I went on a really nice walk through some woods.  The area around here is so beautiful, amazing forests, cute houses and all sorts of nice places to walk. 

Now it is time for class… Epp! I will write about my experience later!  Here is what I am wearing (traveling pants, sweet briar shirt, orange and blue socks and my red sneakers):

Sorry the picture is kind of weird, I am using a new editor format and it is being a real wanker.