Theadamlife

Dear blog,

Here I am now, sitting in Taiwan. No Christmas feelings really, only an empty hole that is longing to be filled with family, Christmas presents Swedish food and snow. I did know this about me but I really miss my traditional Christmas at home. Today is my day at home in Sweden which means if you look in the calendar it is my name on this day, the day before Christmas. I usually get a present or a little something in advance from all the gifts lying under the Christmas tree but no, this is not an ordinary Christmas. I still cannot get into my head that it is the day that everyone is waiting for is already tomorrow! This is what we usually do at home in my family on this very evening and what we do on Christmas eve:

-tonight my family will eat the first piece of the homemade Christmas ham, all the decorations are up including Christmas tree, outdoors lights, red curtains, Christmas cards, Santa Claus and Lucia’s, presents under the tree

- tomorrow is Christmas eve, it starts with waking up around 8 o’clock, going down to eat a big breakfast with the family, my brothers and my mom and dad. On the table is of course all the Christmas traditional must-haves. After that it’s time to open the presents, everyone has bought a present to everyone and in a second the whole living room is overwhelmed with present wrappings. After this the family gets ready to leave to dads parents where that side of the family is gathered. More food and presents. Around 13:00 my family goes home to get ready to watch Donald Duck’s Christmas on TV (a Swedish TV phenomenon since the fifties I think). During this we eat chocolate and other traditional candy. In the evening we go to meet my relatives on my mom’s side where we eat more food and more candy. Late in the evening we drive home through the cold Swedish winter discussing the day and just looking forward to the next day when we will have time to use our Christmas presents. Before bed we usually eat something more, just because it’s Christmas ;)

This is after all not an ordinary Christmas for me. Maybe I should be glad to experience something totally different from what I usually do but I don’t know… Maybe I’m just too stuck in my old patterns or it’s because I’m getting homesick but I just can’t get into my head to enjoy this moment and try something new. So tomorrow the plan is to exchange some presents with my new temporary roomies and then start fixing for the evening when we will have some more friends over for a French/Taiwanese/Westernized Christmas dinner. I don’t know what to expect but one thing that I can say is that it will be interesting… I did at least force Philippe to come with me to IKEA for a Christmas lunch, meatballs here we come! IKEA is the closest to home I can get right now. It will be fun im sure but there is something I will have in mind during the whole day, something moiling in the back of my head…

that Christmas eve, in Sweden, is the day of the year when you are supposed to be with your family. And here I am on the other side of the earth, nothing Swedish, nothing family related,

yes I do feel a bit sad.

now im sitting at home at philippe's, mattea's and caroline's apartment, on philippe's computer. And he is forcing me to leave the computer soon because he wants to watch a movie, BITCH ;)

Im happy to be here with them but i do of course miss my place. And what is really tiring is that i will now be without a place that i can call my own until i am beck home in sweden... that is something that really scares me since i dont like being like in the way in someone else's home.

This is my package that i sent home anyway, 19.9 kilos it was!! It was so hard to send it home since i love my clothes!! I said i wanted to have it in sweden within two months so i hope i will have it then! otherwise i will cry since i have a lot of thick winter clothes that i bought in china in there.




   

The most sadest thing was to leave my fellow roomies Dan and Ulrika!

It has been so nice during the whoe semester to always have someone at home to speak swedish to and discuss things with and even though we where not always together there were always someone there as a backup. Im so grateful to have shared this semester with them and that they came and "saved" me from the dorms and instead we shared the most amazing apartment for four fantastic months!

Dan och Ulrika, ni är alltid välkomna till mig var än i världen jag befinner mig!

Yesterday was not only a day for party but also a day for shopping! Since im going to ship home most of my stuff here from Taiwan next week i will have to do my last shopping this weekend so i more or less forced Philippe to come with me for a long day of walking around in the stores of Kaohsiung.

This city actually has Dream mall which is the biggest mall here in Taiwan but it is actually also the fifth biggest one in the world! Just imagine, 400 000 square meters of surface dedicated to shopping! It's unbelievably big and i cant really say that i could grasp its vastness...

But i did get one feeling, i got scared because i got lost!





After a few hours we got enough and we left the mall a bit dissapointed that i did not find anything that i wanted to buy... We went of to a brand outlet, bought a t-shirt and then we went to the most popular mall here in Kaohsiung, the Hanshin, but i didnt find anything there either... The clothes here is either too expensive or simply not nice enough that i would want to buy it.

We did go to ikea though, where i bought some swedish ginger bread cakes, they didnt have blossa glögg which was a big loss... I was so looking forward to it!

Well i still have a lot of stuff that i have to ship home, i just dont want to start packing, its so comfortable to just stay :(

this is... Taiwan! Where madness is an everyday thing! No just kidding but yesterday night turned out really fun and crazy after all. First we sat here at home, just us roomies + Philippe, we discussed france, languages, cultures, gossip and sweden. Listened to my favourite playlist on spotify and drank some wine and alcohol. In other words, a perfect preparty!

I really love these kind of parties when its just a small amount of people, where everyone is interacting. They always turns out to be the best! And this time i had almost drank no alcohol at all and still i had fun as crazy. Here its usually only about getting wasted so i had forgotten how fun one can have without too big amounts of alcohol. Just silly to drink too much alcohol, you only end up with a big hangover and bad things in the memory from the last night (if you even can remember!).

So we stayed at home here until midnight or something and then we decided to move to KTV that is just beside our building. The closest one was full so we went to the next one because apparently we have 4 of them in 5 minutes walking distance! tzz, taiwan and their KTV's! ;)

We all had a blast though and sang loud as hell even though we were not drunk (except Philippe) and there was only the four of us.

After two hours we had to leave and then we moved to the Lamp nightclub instead which was a big disapointment. Music that sucked and we had to pay fullprice even though we were only in there for one hour before they closed, that would never happen in Sweden...

I ended up in my bed around 6 i think, fully satisfied with my awesome night here in Kaohsiung.


The whole room for just the four of us!!


We are all happy to sing out loud and as you can see, Britney is in the background :) It was cameras inside the room as well, i think the staff that is monitoring the cameras each night has the funniest job ever! KTV was a blast, and i will try to make more preparties there. I only wish they had newer songs...


And Philippe is in his own world dancing :)

Soon its time for another party here in crazy Kaohsiung. Sure the parties here are crazy but not far as crazy as in Austria or Växjö last semester...






GOOD TIMES AND FIRENDS I MISS!!

Så nu har jag suttit i fyra timmar och jobbat med kineskiska läxan. Det går framåt bara inte så snabbt som jag ahde hoppats... Det är så frukansvärt tidskrävande eftersom jag inte kan tecknen så måste jag gå igenom alla tidigare anteckningar, skolbok och power point slides som vi haft på lektionerna.

Jag kan inte alla tecken utan det som jag har pluggat mest är hur man uttalar tecknen, alltså pinyin. Jag sitter först och letar reda på hur alla tecken uttalas i pinyin och sen måste jag hitta vad själva ordet betyder, jag sitter med andra ord och gör dubbelt arbete.


Så här bekymmrat har jag nu sett ut de senaste timmarna...

Men det finns något positivt också, jag lär mig så mycket och jag lär mig känna igen tecknen och hur man bygger upp meningar för kinesisk grammatik liknar inget jag sett innan. Det liksom för lätt på något sätt... I europeiska språk måste man alltid ta hänsyn till grammatik och massa undantagsregler och annat jag vet inte vad. I kinesiska lägger man bara till ett tecken om man undrar något eller om man letar efter vägbeskrivning.


Jag lär mig!! :D

Apropå grammatiken så underlättar det inte növändigtvis just att det är så lätt grammatik, oftast tvärtom... Här är ett exempel:

Ni xing qi tian qu gong si zuo shen mo?

Direktöversättning: Du imorgon färdas offentlig buss till "fråga" (shen mo lägger man till när man skriver en fråga)?
Svenska: Kommer du ta bussen imorgon?

Detta blir en lång kväll...

I cant believe it, i slept for eleven hours tonight! I think its a new record... Usually i always wake up in a good time like around 9 because my brain tells me that i have to get to work and do something with my day. But today my brain was shut off and so i slept, not even the loud traffic outside my window could wake me up! Twelve hour on a scooter is apparently really tiring.

I have now had my breakfast anyway, a banana. Since i woke up so late i will just wait a few hours and then go down to subway and have a lunch instead.

I really hope that im not turning the clock now and destroying my sleeping habits, i like being up early to get stuff moving. Now i've just too much time really so there will no tanning on the beach today and no gym. Or maybe i can go there tonight... hmm.

Now i will do my enormous chinese homework and then start to finish my "taiwan government and polits" class' paper.

come on adam,
YOU CAN DO IT!

Late yesterday some friends told me that they were going to make a trip on scooter to Maolin national scenic area. The name implies that there is a place with a great view. and yes it was really beautiful. Maolin is a area (i think it can be called an area or maybe village...) in the mountains about 70 kilometers outside Kaohsiung.







Sure it was beautiful but i've never felt my ass growing so much :P I have been sitting on a scooter for 12 hours today (yes people, twelve!!) I went up 6 after 4 hours of sleep which means that i am totally worn out right now, cant belive it can be so exhausting just sitting all day :P

I just love the mountains though and seeing the mountain tops again reminded me of Austria. What is it with me and my love to tall stuff? Skyscrapers and mountains are the most beautiful things i know...



I love my scooter!
;)

Jag har nu laddat upp alla de bästa bilderna från min resa i Kina, för er som inte har facebook så kan ni titta på bilderna från den här länken:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=137205&id=719350177&l=83cf90af3f

Tror det ska funka i alla fall...

Is back home now from the party in Tainan yesterday, oh my god, i had so much fun!!

And also as i just said, I just came home (the clock is 13:00) Then you know it was a good party! ;)

pictures will arrive shortly, first shower! They smoke way to much here in Taiwan... blah