The rain in Sweden...

Update: David has gotten more awkward, and unfortunately I have had to see him three times again already, and especially unfortunately more him, the phone he gave me is no good so the road to redeeming himself might be a long one for him. 

Update: Still no uncontrollable crying! I got all welled up from a frustrating course of events yesterday, but took a walk, came back, had something overly positive happen to me, and was back to normal. That has been the pattern here...it's been down down down then up up up every day it seems, getting less extreme every day. Most often, the down down down comes from a combination of frustrations topped off with one tiny annoyance to push it over the edge. An example of an ongoing frustration: This school is beautiful. The campus is so easy to navigate, all the rooms are state-of-the art. They are fully wireless. It's great. But I constantly get the feeling that, despite all their redeeming qualities, Mid Sweden University is utterly shocked that there are exchange students here. Every meeting has been somewhat sloppy, the directors rarely have enough copies for all of us, none of them has given me a straight answer about when I can actually register as a student, etc. Example: There weren't enough computers for all of us to use to get logged in to the student portal. Another example: This is an actual conversation that occurred in front of the whole class yesterday:

"I will be teaching your Swedish language course here, and also at Campus Harnosand, a few hundred kilometers south of here. This is the book you will need to get for this class. It is impossible to pass without it: "........" "

"Where can we buy that book?"

"I don't know...I'm not from here."

That's where I just put my head down. College in Europe, I have learned, blows America's definition of "independent" out of the water. Students rely more on each other than the professors, it turns out. I think I will like it this way eventually, but yesterday, it was just a weight that was bearing on me so much I felt like I couldn't walk upright.

So back to the down down down. In between sessions, I hurried over to the phone store to activate the phone David had given me. A combination of only getting five hours of sleep the night before (a bunch of us from the exchange program went to the most frequented student pub in town...it was fun!...but sooo expensive.) and of feeling like a completely neglected exchange student already had me irritable. I walked into the store, and in my entire ten minutes of waiting in line, this other woman in line did not stop staring at me. At the time, I was still toting around this unrelenting paranoia that everyone here automatically hates all Americans, so this staring really really bothered me. (Side note: This morning I promised myself I would let the paranoia go. Yes I'm outgoing and have a big smile with a personality to match. So do people who aren't Americans.) Anyway, I waited and waited, just standing there, the store got more and more crowded, and then the cashiers called out the next number. The next number. I hadn't grabbed a number. I looked directly into the hand of the woman who had beens taring at me the whole time, and she had a number. She knew! She knew I was waiting and that I hadn't grabbed a number, and she didn't tell me! I was so pissed off I grabbed a number and walked out, tears welling up in my eyes. There was my down down down.

After walking around for twenty minutes or so, cooling off, I returned to the store to find that it was my turn. (AND the lady had thankfully left.) Nice. I presented my phone to the Karl phone guy (with the FREE sim card given to me by the school! Guess they didn't completely forget about us...!), and it was a dud. Not nice. But Karl and I had sort of discussed where I was from and what I was doing here and where the phone came from, so he must have felt comfortable enough to just offer me his old one! Very nice! I just had to come back the next day (today) and get it from him...for free! I left feeling much lighter and refreshed. And...the up up up :) 

Alright I didn't intend to spend that much time on that story, but the library's closing soon so I gotta wrap this up. I think I actually took my time on that one, though, because like I said that has sort of been my life here so far. Crappiness has been washed away by outstanding kindness every time. And now it doesn't even take kindness to wash it away...I saw an amazing view of the mountains yesterday once...GASP...the RAIN STOPPED! And I felt like a million bucks.

Alright...sorry so inconclusive! More later! Miss you all!

kt