Orientation

          Moving into my apartment: So on Tuesday I used the map to find the LU accommodations center to pick up my keys to where I'll be staying for the next month and a half. I found the place with no problem, and met some of the other girls in the program while I was at the office. I then headed back to my hotel to pick up my luggage (and yes, yet again..) hauled it across the cobblestone streets back to the train station so I could take the bus to Östra Torn (the name of the place where our student housing was located). At the train station, there was a place called Skånetraffiken where I bought my bus pass for the whole summer (a really cheap deal, takes me all over southern Sweden, and parts of Denmark by bus AND train)...not a surprise because public transportation in Sweden is excellent. There I met one of the girls, Sarah (who's from Cal Berkeley) and her and I took the bus together. Course it was only like a ten minute bus ride from the center of Lund, but once we got off, finding our dorms was a whole different story. The map they provided us was a joke, and we literally found ourselves hauling our luggage through residential neighborhoods and whatnot until like, the 3rd or 4th person we asked was able to direct us to the right place. Once we got there we discovered that each apartment had 2 people assigned to it; 2 bedrooms (one for each person), 1 bathroom, a kitchen (with utensils), a table, and a couch. It all looked great! (Ikea furniture...nuff said). I didn't meet my apartment-mate until later that day, (Sarah and I weren't in the same one) and learned that her name was Kelsy and she was from UCSB. She was super nice, and it was her first time traveling outside of the US so she was really excited for the program.

          The next day, I met some more of the people in our program: we are all kinda living together in the same cluster of apartments, and some of us went to town together for the afternoon before the orientation started at 4pm. There are about 15 or so of us, most of whom are girls, for the summer program which is a pretty large group...and all of us are from the UC's. We met our coordinator, Linus, at the orientation who just gave us an overview of the program/class which doesn't begin until monday. It makes sense, given that Midsommar is tomorrow (Friday) which is basically a Swedish holiday here. Anyways, the orientation was brief...he didn't cover much new information--most of it was stuff like "how to get a local phone" or "culture shock" or "how to buy a bus pass". I started laughing cuz all of this was pretty much old news; most of us had figured everything out ourselves by this point. After the session, we headed back, and Kelsy and I decided we needed groceries...

Grocery Shopping: The thing about eating here in Sweden is:

(#1) I forget to eat: Shocking I know, but I've been so busy that the past several days all I've had is yogurt, coffee, and maybe half a sandwhich here or there.
(#2) Food here is EXPENSIVE; whether you eat out, or buy groceries, it costs a ton.
(#3) We have no microwave. Crap
(#4) I can't cook. Neither can Kelsy. Double Crap.

To sum it up, we are about to get real skinny.

          Anyways, we decided that we were gonna attempt to add some things to our fridge so that our daily diet consisted more than just yogurt, cheese, and crackers. A guy that came buy the day before who worked for Lund University had mentioned to me that there was a supermarket down the street from our dorms, so Kelsy and I decided to walk there. Course as we kept walking, I realized I didn't want to get lost again so we saw an elderly gentleman get into his car up ahead of us and Kelsy decided she would ask where we could get food. HAHA it was hilarious: taking the whole "swedes come off as reserved but are quite nice when approached" stereotype she read in our orientation pamphlet literally, she runs up to the driver side of the car and blurts out (quite loudly and without slowing down), "HI! DO YOU KNOW WHERE WE CAN BUY FOOD??" The older man stopped and opened his door slightly, and just gave her this look of blank bewilderment and slight fear. Trying not to laugh, I quickly walked up and gently said, "Hej, kan du prata engelska?" (translation: hi, can you speak english?) to which he quickly shook his head no. Shoot. But then without even having to think i just said, "Ja, vi måste köpa....(thinking)...mat" shrugging my shoulders up and down to show uncertainty. [translation: we need to buy...food] and then stepped back, just as surprised as Kelsy that those words came out of my mouth. "Ja,.....dahdkajfdkaljdka...200meters" He said in his fast swedish, pointing and then the last word "ICA"...quickly I nodded smiling "YES! ICA!" (the Swedish equivalent of Ralph's, literally my new favorite 3 letter word). I thanked him and we proceeded to keep walking. We managed to buy 2 meals worth of food: swedish meatballs, frozen sliced potatoes, and pasta. It's a start. Of course I also decided that I needed cream cheese, nutella, and all these other great condiments---yum right?? Ya, except i forgot to buy bread to put it on.