SWEDEN N STUFF

Okay so yeah. I am sorry for not writing sooner. But you know, things and reasons. I have no idea how to start a post of everything that's happened in the past five weeks, so I'm just gonna go with it and hope the narrative takes a shape on its own.

Week 1. On August 13^th I left for Paris. I cried a whole lot in the airport and the day before as well. I was sick and had a fever (why not!). The people doing security check always seem so jaded by crying people. They must see that shit every day. I got to Paris the next day, and I took the train from CDG to Jess' house in Bastille. I had to change trains twice and go up and down, no exaggeration, 7 billion flights of stairs. When I got to wifey's house, I have rarely felt so happy.

I spent 10 days in Paris with Jess, going to parks, taking pictures, and eating ice-cream. We went to many clubs and I met a lot of cool people. Paris is awesome in August; there's barely anyone there and you don't bump into dumb tourists in the streets. I met a couple of high school friends. Jess and I watched a lot of Buffy (duh duhd uhd).

The second day of my stay in Paris, Jess and I went to a friend's apartment and there was a girl there from Bolivia. This chick was strange, I thought. I said something to her in Spanish and she wouldn't answer me back. She asked me what I was doing in Paris about 5 times in 15 minutes, while relentlessly sipping on her white wine and littering the floor with cigarette ashes, much to the home owner's chagrin. Huh. The apartment had a nice mix of people from all over, 70% native English speakers, I would say. Bolivian girl, who I later found out was 34 or some shit, kept being loud and asking everybody the same questions, tuning out the answers, I guess. At one point, as we were all having the best time ever ever, she decides to start speaking (awful) French (two people there spoke no French at all) and insisting we all do the same because we were “in Paris to learn the culture.” Wow, I had no idea! I thought I was there to hang with my bros and smoke mad weed, but whatever. We tried to ignore her, but bitch was so insistent (to not say ANNOYING AS FUCK) that she actually drove everybody out. I can now honestly say that I have met the most annoying person on the planet. Then I decided that I will never again let anybody ruin my buzz ever again because life is short and buzzes are expensive.

Well, maybe not all of them.

Jess and I had many yummy foods and made fun of people. She gave me good advice and I cried when I left. After a ridiculously hard trip to the airport, I got in my plane to Stockholm.

I got here August 26^th, which was a Saturday. My friend Mattias picked me up from the bus station. With a car. Instant win. He took me to a rave in a park. I was in a rave within one and a half hours of my landing in Stockholm.

Week 2. We went home later and he told me all about Sweden. 1. Don't talk about drugs. 2. Swedes are hard to get to know. 3. Jobs are hard to find (no shit!). He drove me to school the next day and I moved into my dorm room. It's not quite a dorm, I have my own bathroom, but I do share a (gross) kitchen and (sad) living room area with like 11 other people. The kitchen always smells weird and the jury is out on my hall mates. Tonight there's a party in my building but I am lame and I have watched 9 episodes of Louie and ate old McDonald's.

The first week was orientation and that was nice. Didn't do anything. Went to a strange party with all international students in which the music legitimately sucked all the hairy balls. Euro-trashy-housy-Ibizaypop. UGGGGHHHH. I meet some cool people and stared at all the girls with green hair.

Week 3. I started one class which is sort of boring but okay. It's a lecture type, hardly any input from the class, and our professor kind of just reminisces about all the important people he's met in the film business. It's hard to keep awake (and by hard, I mean impossible, I have fallen asleep a couple of times). But it's cool because we get to watch old movies in an actual, comfortable, movie theatre most of the time. My classes are held in Filmhuset, which is this huge 70s'Architecture ugly-ass building that has its own cinemas, Sweden's only film-oriented library, classrooms, offices, and also the Swedish Film Institute is housed there. NBD.

Bam, motherfuckers. This is where I learn shit. (That entrance way is gonna be a problem in the winter. It's a 100-meter slope)

Week 4. Money is running low and I want to get a job. I have already applied for a few, but gotten no responses (this pattern continues until today). I actually don't remember many specifics. I went to a bunch of government offices just to be told I cannot get residency here without a health insurance card issued by Italy (because I am here with an Italian passport). I cannot get this card from the Italian embassy, so I am fucked. Until I get a job, I was told, I will not be able to declare residency, and, without this, I will not be able to open a bank account, obtain a cellphone contract, or any of that cool shit.

Week 5 or 6 or whatever. It was my birthday on Monday and it was actually quite shitty. I cried a lot because I have no money and no job. I have neglecting the SHIT out of my classes. I am supposed to read ALL OF THE ARTICLES EVER, but I haven't really. I feel a bit better now, although today was a waste of a day and I am a waste of a human being.

I got some presents though, for my birthday. My friends here (who are all German for some reason) gave me a tumbler coffee mug, a BIG cup for soup/coffee, a scented candle, a Kumbia Queers bag, and many kisses which I appreciate endlessly.

Okay, so my status right now is: useless, poor, and jobless. Hopefully this will change soon. But you know what won't change? My bad case of UGLY.

JK this is gorge

Coupled with the fact that I am apparently suffering from a late adolescence in my face, the women of Sweden are just incredibly fucking beautiful. Everyone says it, but it's actually stunning how ridiculous-looking everyone here is. Perfect skin, perfect hair, and, most of all, FLAWLESS FASHION SENSE. Ugh I feel like a deformed mutant who can only afford to shop in Salvation Army in some backwoods county 7 years ago. Also, I lost my iPod, so I have to suffer my self-deprecating thoughts super loudly when I'm in the subway looking at these superhuman models go to class in high-heeled ankle boots, tight black jeans, and the most expensive-looking sheer peach blouse ever, army green coat, with their iPhones, texting something insightful and funny to their perfect fucking friends. I cry in my head at least 3 times a day from lack of self-confidence.

Most of the people I have met or am friends with are foreigners. Swedes are strange and eccentric. I might be too weird for them. Or they are too individualistic for me. It's strange living in a country where everyone minds their own fucking business. I am involved in NO drama for the first time in my life, and it's legitimately weird and I have no idea how to behave or meet people.

Anyway, this post is weird, not funny, and mainly a mass update. I am scared, very very scared, that I might have to leave, because I can't find a job. I have almost no money left and I have to like, pay rent and eat food. I haven't been eating well, or regularly. It's like I trick my stomach for most of the day and then just have one big meal at dinner.

I miss you

But I like it here, a lot, even though it's fucking cold as fuck. The Internet is fast (I downloaded a movie in EIGHT SECONDS TODAY. EIGHT) and the people and buildings are nice to look at. Yup.