Crazy Swedish Day

Today was a really long crazy day.  It started out with being 4 hours early for my flight!  So I got to just sit around and relax for a while, but I couldn't get internet access at the airport without paying, so I got bored really fast.  The plane ride was lots of fun, though!  I enjoyed having a screen to myself so that I could watch the plane take off and watch movies and play tetris.  We also got a full dinner and breakfast, both of which were delicious. They gave us Greek yogurt for breakfast, it was sooooo good.  I probably didn't sleep much more than 2 hours on the plane, but that was ok because they gave us super strong coffee at breakfast and I was all hyped to be finally in Sweden!!  There were a couple of kids sitting in the row next to me, probably ages 2 and 5.  They were really good the whole flight, except that the 5 year old had to be woken up for landing, and he was not happy about it.  We got to hear multiple cries of, "I never want to go to Sweden ever again" and "I NEED WATER NOW I'M ILL!"  it was cute and funny though.

When we landed, we had to buy tickets in order to have unlimited access to public transit for the whole month. This is super handy because we took 2 buses, a train, and a subway to get to where we are staying.  We probably would have gotten lost, except that we met some Americans who had been to Stockholm many times (one of them is a professor who does research here) and they guided us practically all the way to where we needed to go.  We got separated from them at one point and started to get confused, and then they appeared again to show us where to go! it was a miracle.  We had to take a bus without their help though, and we weren't sure if we were going to get on it in the right direction.  One of the guys in my group saw an info button, and said, "oh this will help!"  Good thing it was all in Swedish, haha.  A Swedish man going to the same place helped us get to our rooms though.

My room has one bed, a desk, a desk chair, a lounging chair, a couch, a bed, shelves, a closet, and a bathroom. ALL TO MYSELF!  It's amazing, except kind of lonely.  I've only met one person on my floor so far.  The rooms are apartment style, with a shared kitchen on each floor.  The six of us that came today are all in different buildings, but we are along the same street, so we're really close.  The buildings are really secure too.  You have a magnetic scanner to get into your building, a code to get into your corridor, and then a key for your room. I thought I couldn't open my door, so I went 5 buildings down to the office and had a guy come up (I live on the 3rd floor, also the top floor) to fix it, but then turned out I just had been putting my key in the wrong way.  Yep, I'm an engineer.

I had my first meal in Stockholm today.  It was a pizza. I know, so Swedish haha, but we were hungry and it sounded so good.  We also went to the grocery store today and it was really confusing.  Instead of items being characterized by canned/boxed/crackers and such, it was italian/mexican/indian food sorted.  I wanted some granola bars to have for when I'm in Berlin, but I looked everywhere and found nothing. Then, I was going to get some soup, but it was different from soup here, so I opted not to get it because I couldn't read the directions.  I'm really glad I brought peanut butter because the jars at this store are teeny tiny

Since tomorrow is Saturday, and I am leaving for Berlin early, the trains don't run often enough, so I have to leave my room at 3 am, walk to the subway station, and then take the subway to where I can get on a Flygbussana (Airport Bus) to take me to the airport for my 6:30 am flight.  I can't wait to go to Berlin!