jazz concert

 

Tuesday January 19th, I played in a jazz concert with my class at school. We had been at school until 9pm the day before, practicing and setting up. We played three concerts that day and it was a lot of fun. I was the only wind instrument because everyone else in my class plays electric instruments or sings. I had a solo in Watermelon Man, and the melody in The Man With The Cucumber. We also played It Don't Mean a Thing, The Lady is a Tramp, Honeysuckle Rose and others. Everyone was impressed with our concert and liked the trumpet parts because it was unique! It was a lot of fun but now my jazz class at school is finished for the year. But I'm still playing jazz outside of school with a group called Let's Play!

Good Bye Jarryd!

 

Saturday January 16th, at 6am, Jarryd and all the other Australian Rotary exchange students in Sweden, went home. So I spent the night in Arlanda, Stockholm's airport to say good bye to them. Friday evening, I got on the train with Jarryd and Rachael, the girl who lived in Sunsvall. we got to Arlanda at 10pm and there was not much to do but the time passed fairly quickly by talking, goofing around and disturbing anyone else in the airport who might have been trying to get some sleep! Early in the morning, we met up with more exchange students who were either leaving or saying good bye. Right before checking through, Jarryd needed some help closing his suitcase. I helped him part with some of his stuff by filling a plastic bag of 4 kilos of stuff. That made some room, but it was still over weight! After 8 hours of hanging around in the airport it was time to say good bye which wasn't as hard as I thought it was going to be because he and Rachael were both looking forward to getting out of the snow and into a nice hot Australian summer! When they all had gone through security, I met up with my friend Claire, an exchange student from New York who had dropped of her Ausie friends too. We caught a bus to her house where we could get some sleep before noon. When we woke up, we spent the rest of the Saturday walking around Stockholm, looking for a place to donate Jarryd's stuff to and shopping. I caught a train home in the evening and understandably spent most of Sunday sleeping!

birthday

 

I had a Swedish birthday on Friday January 8th. It was still the Christmas break so I didn't have tho get up early to go to school, but my family had a different idea! They woke me up at 8 in the morning by all coming in to my room singing 'Ja må hon leva'! I didn't have time to be grumpy at the sudden awakening because they gave me presents and breakfast in bed! I like this Swedish tradition! Later that day I invited some friends over for a birthday fika, Lennea, Maja and Jarryd. I was showing them some things on my computer when my family skyped me. It was 8 in the morning for them because my brothers wanted to with me a happy birthday before they went to school. they had received my Christmas package and I fetched my birthday package that I had gotten from them a month ago in the mail, so we could open them together! My package had lots of balloons, party hats, candy, glo sticks and whistles that I shared them with my friends and we had a real party fika! Their Christmas package had Swedish candy, chocolate, tea, clothes, model airplane and a tea cozy. Then we had cake, a princess cake which is half white cake, half cream all held together by icing. I had a one and a nine candle but instead of setting it up as 19 Anna switched it around to 91 to make me look old but I'm born in '91 so it works. It was a great birthday and in the evening we went out to a fancy dinner as a family. I'm really enjoying my last year as a teenager!!  

the rest of my Christmas break

The rest of my Christmas break I spent moving into my second host family and being sick. the day after my birthday I was throwing up so much they figured I had the winter's vomiting disease, is what it's called literally translated from Swedish and isn't uncommon here. So I spent the weekend on the couch. On Sunday, I moved in to my new home. I had 3 suitcases, a backpack and a couple plastic bags full of stuff and it was a couple blocks away, I don't know how I'm going to get all this stuff home!! Ingela, my new mom, is a nurse at the hospital that's just down the street. Johan, my new dad is sort of like a handy man and seems to be good at everything. Johanna, my new sister is my age and went to Halifax last year on exchange. The family is vegetarian but Ingela is an excellent cook so I don't miss meat. They are very active and Ingela leads aerobics sessions. I have been able to borrow a pair of Johan's skis and use the cross country track that are in a little wood just across the street from where we live. We have 2 cats and 2 dogs. the dogs are schnowders, Asta is 10 years old and Marta is a new puppy. I'm getting along great with my new family. This is were Stefano the Brazilian boy stayed so I'm just slipping into his place. **********Monday January the 11th was the first day back to school after the Christmas break but I didn't go to school; I was still working on eating solid food so I used that day to settle into my new room. It's the guest bedroom and very nicely designed with 2 big windows and a balcony. I'm going to enjoy living here!!