good morning stockholm!

smooth flight from bkk to stocks! slept almost the entire journey, save for the pillow thief in the next seat. i'm appalled that she'd the gall to blatantly steal my pillow. her modus operandi was, rather unimaginatively, to sit on it and hug her own. and her impeccable toilet timing had her poking me awake the moment i had entered deep sleep and after my second valiant attempt to achieve REM, she did the exact same thing. hazily remember glaring and growling at her. maybe.

hit the ground running at 0635h (!) and made my way to the hotel. so much for being an intrepid explorer and checking myself into a 10bed mixed dorm, which i did book initially but ended up cancelling, although that is a story in itself. i take for granted the ready availability of free luggage trolleys back home and spent a better part of my awake time on the plane hoping for a free trolley. thank god for trolleys and elevators for without them there is no way i could have lugged my weight in baggage from airport to central station to suburb station then 1km to hotel. and the hotel receptionist lied! she claimed it was a 5-10minute walk from the station and maybe it is, for regular pedestrains. it did not take lone asian female lugging her aforementioned weight in baggage 5-10minutes. multiply by 10 to figure out actual time. and my trolley bag had cranky wheels so we were quite the sight, my bag and i, rolling sideways like a crab along the pavement. and the pavements! why why why are they tiled??? the joints in the cement kept impeding the wheels. again, thank god i did not stay in the hostel which happened to be in the heart of old town. because old town is charming and, like many other old towns, filled with equally charming cobblestones that make rolling a trolley bag the size of a baby elephant a most unpleasant task. anyhoos, i'm spending five nights here and then moving into the university accommodation on monday. am not looking forward to the commute and carry.

had an eventful first day. soon after checking in and freshening up i headed to the city centre to meet a family friend for lunch. overestimated the time it'd take to get there (hotel is central! yay!) and had time to buy a stockholm simcard that only speaks swedish. but i am undaunted because i have googletranslate! and a brain :) lovely lunch at the zink grill where the restaurant is built around a zinc bar that the proprietos fell in love with in paris and brought back to stockholm. it serves a mean grilled selection and i had a curious duck fillet cooked in a vacuum. didnt take a photo, unfortunately, but it is definitely one of my (few) stocks must-gos if i have visitors. visitors who don't mind buying me lunch, that is. but back to the duck! it was moist and tender and because it was fresh, as opposed to duck margaret it wasn't too salty. yummy stuff! met Z for the first time and he strikes me as a grandfatherly type but oh myy he is so well-read and open-minded in a way i wouldn't expect someone of his generation to be. he shed some light on swedish culture and gave me a much welcomed insight into their psyche. it was good to hear a local's perspective and see how it matched up with my own preconceived notions. i left lunch enlightened haha.

wandered around after lunch visiting the same haunts i saw when i was last in stockholm, about three summers ago. it is as if time stood still and whatever stuck in memory was still there when i returned. i saw the galleria that S and i shopped for belts at, the coffeeplace i lazed around at with my family and the familiar shops with their familiar facades. it felt like a homecoming of sorts and it is good to be back, and for so much longer this time. bought some fruit and back at the hotel to rest up before heading out tonight. can't believe the sun sets at 10! it's surreal to suddenly have such long days. summer makes everything look nicer :)

off to stocks!

it's been a crazy past few days, filled with family, friends and food. eventually realised that i didn't have all that much stuff to bring with me and packing wasn't as painful as anticipated. in fact, i even had space for a slow cooker (!) which i decided to hand carry on second thoughts for fear of breaking it.

so i'm hand carrying a slow cooker to stockholm. one would think the swedes have no native means to make soup.

blogging from a coffee place at the bangkok airport. thank god for wireless the price of coffee. then again, i think i might've just paid sgd5 for an americano. eep!

looking forward to sleeping all the way to stocks. busied myself with the reading material i brought for the sin-bkk leg and i've fnished reading 1) LP stockholm 2) travel journal 3) digital camera manual, albeit 3 years late 4) slow cooker manual.

ok! time to call home ;) will update when i get to stockholm.

to quote j, ikea nows!

more phood

thursday 060809 dessert

monday 100809 lunch

wednedsday 050809 lunch

will miss

these two.

chinese food fix

dinner with the family and it was good to spend the last night with them.

crispy pork and jellyfish

deep fried whitebait

corn soup with chicken

home-made tofu

steamed groupa

apple jelly with chrysenthemum

lazarus island

at the top of my hitlist is the archipelago, which i can't wait to visit soon after arriving in stockholm. however, it'd be vaguely unpatriotic to have explored the islands off the coast of sweden before i peer into my own backyard. so on my last evening here, we hopped over to lazarus island and sat in contemplative silence on the beach. the water was crystal clear (most unusual!) and it was surreal to remain in singapore territory but feel like we were on holiday at an exotic beach destination.

seafood dinner on national day

one last fix at my favourite seaside restaurant before i go! my gracious hosts ordered the usual and the usual never disappoints.

prawn with mayo

fish paste dough fritters

barbequed squid and seasoned jellyfish

beef on hot plate

seafood roll

the piece de resistance - salt baked crab

am probably doing myself a disservice by posting the mouth-watering photos because i foresee many cold and hungry nights ahead :(

patrioticism

yesterday was national day and while i'm far from hyper-patriotic, most times, i'm proud to be singaporean. there are times, however, when hearing 'waaaahhhhhhh!!! so cheeeeeeeep!!! better hurry buy!!!' sends shivers down my spine and make me wish i wasn't associated with the country.

but yesterday, there was atypical graciousness in the air and despite being caught in a traffic standstill, there was no horning at all! even when some impatient drivers exacerbated the situation by making illegal u-turns, none of the inconvenienced motorists beeped their displeasure! it's sad that i'm unaccustomed to gracious behaviour on the road but better annually than never. caught a little of the parade at home and felt an upsurge of pride as i watched the nation flex her considerable muscle.

more than fleeting emotion, however, i was reminded of how it's a place i'm very blessed to be in. i've benefited from the stability our island's enjoyed and am cat-content with what i have. with my impending departure on the back of my mind, it was an apt reminder of how rooted i am to my home and how i look forward to returning in half a year. when i return, the ever-changing landscape would have sprouted more buildings, there will be new malls and old haunts might have vanished but that's part of the beauty of being on the cutting edge of everything. plus the food's amazing and where else does one find the very best of each cuisine?

have spent the past few days eating my way to remembrance and have very safely eaten enough local food to satisfy me till january :) photos of that to come!

steamboat

steamboat is usually a chinese new year dish but one of my favourite adults very kindly planned an elaborate steamboat dinner for before i leave. i didn't realise how much effort 1 x steamboat would require but the lovely lady went to the market thrice on three consecutive days to ensure the ingredients were at their freshest. but the great lengths she went to make it a steamboat to remember were well worth it and i enjoyed every drop

a foodie friend once told me that food cooked with love is immeasurably better than food cooked without and i never really believed her until tonight.

welcome

hello friends,

most, if not all, of you who're reading this probably received my farewell text. looking forward to the national day long weekend before i leave and won't be updating much until i reach stockholm.

thought it'd be fun to post about my exchange experience, albeit a year later than my peers. if inquiring minds wish to know why i'm going on exchange in my final year, it's because i was holding out for something that wasn't to be and forfeited my exchange place in year 3. when what i was hoping to get into fell through after a year of uncertainty, the faculty was extremely supportive and understanding. the powers-that-be i.e. the vice dean, could've said that i couldn't have my cake and eat it. he could also have said 'too bad. deal.' but i'm grateful that he instead broke protocol and exceptionally allowed me to go on exchange in my final year. the regulations are that i need to spend my final semester back at my home university though so i can only go for a semester, which works for me because i'm quite happy to come home after half a year, or so i say now :)

that said, it does feel vaguely unusual to be embarking on something my peers have just returned from. just as everyone is re-adjusting to life back home and settling down for final year, i'm packing my bags and readying myself for some fun in the sun. not like i'm going to see much sun during the nordic winter. however, i do have the pyschological benefit of going on exchange after securing a training contract. i know where i'll be starting work at! it's such a bonus to leave for a semester without a care in the world and i'm almost delirious that there's so much to look forward to in the months ahead.

how does this sound:

august '09 - january '10 6months exchange (pass / fail)

january '10 - april '10 4months final semester

may '10 - july '10 2months graduation trip

july '10 - december '10 6month post-graduate course (pass / fail)

january '11 start work!

techincally there's nothing exceeding stressful or demanding for the next 18months. what a luxury :) and then i start work! which i'm excited about but not in any hurry to begin. so yay to anticipation and yay to having what looks like a glorious 18months ahead.

so if you want to keep tabs on me (oh how i flatter myself), return to this page as and when you wish to indulge me.

best,

T-7days

a week to go pre-departure and i'm nowhere near as ready to leave as i'd imagined myself to be.

there are people to meet, places to go and packing to be done, although i must say it's harder physically (refer to previous post) than emotionally to ready myself. having anticipated going on exchange for close to six months now and i'm besides myself with excitement at the prospect of soon being immersed in a different way of life.

it's been a fruitful holiday thus far. spent the first month in south america, the second learning french and the third catching up with the nearest and dearest. south america was amazing and i can't wait to backpack around europe, practice my extremely basic french in france and maintain my support network while i'm away.

i do recognise that six months is both a very long and a very short time and as i stand on the cusp of departure, i hope that the time won't fly by because this could very well be my final fling :)

baggage

not unsurprisingly, i'm limited by the weight limit.

if i'd my way, i'd gleefully cart my few worldly possessions to stocks with me. i'd painstakingly pack my entire wardrobe, the few pairs of footwear i use and all my books into my spanking new trunk and arrive in sweden looking a little like a snail with its home on its back. i'd bring oodles and oodles of clothes and not have to repeat an outfit or wear the same article twice. i'd also have an endless supply of home food comforts because it turns out that each box of prima mix that i've been so kindly gifted with weighs a ton.

BUT i was too cheap to spring for a student ticket back in january when i booked the flight and the ticket i bought only allows me 20kg check-in luggage.

this 20kg is, however, grossly insufficient. to my horror, once i put in the library of lonely planet books (europe on a shoestring, sweden, stockholm) and the hodge podge of other guidebooks i've managed to amass pre-departure (paris, anyone?), my suitcase was pushing 12kg.

so in an attempt to score myself some extra baggage allowance, i've been advised by people in the know to make my way down to the airline office and lay on the charm.

wish me luck!

edit: YES! 10kg MORE!!!

procrastination

after the initial excitement of receiving notice from the embassy that my visa was ready for sticking (as opposed to collection because i need to leave my passport with them overnight for their special glue to dry), i completely forgot to submit my passport for sticking!

well, not exactly forgot but because the embassy is only open 11am-1pm and i've french class 9am-12pm monday to friday, it leaves me with a tiny time window to get it done. it's been awhile since the embassy emailed and i sure hope they haven't revoked the visa in the interim!

in other departure-related news, it turns out that something's cropped up on the homefront and i'm likely to delay my outward bound flight. so much for doing the lone female asian backpacker thing for a fortnight prior to orientation!

edit: turns out i remembered wrongly and the embassy is open 9am-12pm. learnt the hard way when i stood outside the reinforced door and patiently rang the bell at polite intervals for 10minutes, before reading operating hours sign. bummer.

warmth

met with j for tea. he's just come out of self-imposed home quarantine (because he's civic-minded that way) and i needed to get the oracle(s) from him, as well as d's address, the nice boy who is guarding my (soon-to-be) stuff in the interim. thank god i can move into j's stockholm life, if only possessions-wise, and am very fortunately inheriting, among other things, a heater, kettle, textbooks and notes.

but the take-home from tea that really really excited me was the prospect of my very own sauna. well, 'very own' is a bit of a stretch but apparently everyone and their mother has a sauna in sweden, and where i'm staying is no exception. this personal sauna is now an integral part of my body heat conservation plan come winter! in fact, i might just hibernate in the sauna and emerge in spring.

equally importantly, i now have the names of and directions to the asian grocers (absolutely crucial) and am relieved to find out that there are communal washers and driers, albeit of the non-human kind, in the building. things are shaping up! now i just need to decide if it's practical to go to stockholm armed only with a dutch oven and the set of clothes on my back. because the 20kg weight limit is forcing me to choose between being warm and being full. while i'm certain i can buy clothes there and not a dutch oven, i'm equally certain that i can cook with another pot.

and so the p(l)ot thickens...

all systems go

just a quick one to say

and it's T-3 weekends!

swedish midsummer

in singapore!

when i was visiting my canadian cousin in dublin last summer, it so happened that she'd a friend she knew from college, T, in town at the same time. this summer, T came to singapore to work at the womens' and children hospital for a month (he's a paediatrician) and we managed to catch up! incidentally, T is swedish-canadian. he was born in stockholm but emigrated to canada as a kid. as a sort of farewell to the friends he's made in singapore, he threw a swedish midsummer party, albeit a week late. it was my first introduction to swedish food and T really went to town with herring in mustard, herring in dill, dry bread, smoked salmon with gravalax, swedish meatballs with lingonberry sauce, liver pate, caviar from a tube and swedish sweets. we blasted abba (swedish music!) and bopped around decked out in yellow and blue.

totally psyched :)

self-discovery

or not.

i've the terrible tendency to look for an epiphany in everything. most times, there is no epiphany to be found! hence, the self-imposed steep learning curve isn't much of a curve. and it's gotten particularly obvious when i start to whinge about stockholm.

don't get me wrong. i'm thrilled to be going on exchange. but having decided not to go on exchange once, it's a challenge to muster up the suitable amount of excitement at the prospect of spending a semester away, grateful as i am to the powers-that-be that miraculously wrangled me an exchange place.

i'm, thankfully, not so self-obsessed as to see exchange as a means of finding myself or establishing an identity independent of my family and friends. i know drama queens who make a big deal out of going away and attempt to establish some form of pseudo-independence. if that works for them, great, but i'm not at a stage where i feel the need to prove anything to myself, or anyone else for that matter.

a mad eurotrip isn't on the agenda either, because i've had the benefit of visiting friends while they were on exchange in europe. been there, done that, have the obligatory facebook albums to show for it. been "independent" for 14 weeks (over winter'07 and summer'08) - bought groceries, survived on my own cooking, learnt basic survival skills like vaccuming, laundrying, planned trips, carried a backpack (maybe twice) and realised that while i can survive on my own, i just don't particularly enjoy it. so it's semi-silly to voluntarily spend 5 months away. because i already know i can take care of myself. because i don't have identity issues. plus it's grossly overrated to make a big deal out of exchange when other college kids spend years away from home.

so to buck the exchange-is-my-key-to-independence trend, i welcome any help that comes my way (especially if this help relieves me of manual labour) and am gratefully accepting trip itineraries from friends who've been there done that. yes, i mock myself for being a dependent lump of lard. but independence is overrated. as is self-discovery. i guess i know i can do all that, have done all that and will be the first to admit that it wasn't particularly pleasant and i can do without.

oh, and my conclusion is that there is no epiphany to be found. i'm merely going to experience the wonders of swedish life for 5 months and then come home. hohum.

hear the gears move

much to my disappointment, it turns out i can't move into my room any earlier than the stipulated date. bummer. that means i need to find alternative accommodation (read: cheap hostel) for a fortnight. while not a big fan of hostels, i recognise that they're a necessary, if not essential, part of budget travel. that said, i absolutely can't wait until i don't have to stay in a hostel any more. hostels are all well and good when you're in a six-bedder with your friends but i don't like having to sleep with strangers. gone are the days when i was certain that i'd wake up with one less kidney (this was just before the nakedlawyers' first foray into bangkok in the middle of freshman year!) but strangers still give me the heebiejeebies. and hostels in stockholm are crazy expensive. ok! enough ranting. was so psyched to see sweden before school started that i went a little overboard and booked myself onto the first flight out of singapore. HAHA.

the game plan looks like i'm going to check myself into a tiny 10bed mixed dorm (ugh.) for two weeks and take day trips out of stockholm. or might do slightly longer trips and not spend more nights than i need to at the stockholm hostel. it's relatively cheap, which also means that it's the most basic of holes in the wall and probably hardly a pleasant place to spend hours at end engaged in deep philosophical discussion. or not.

wikitravel's my new best friend and i'm working out some semblance of a plan for my free fortnight before moving into homeforfivemonths.

visa application

finally got down to applying for my resident visa. many thanks to M for doing the research and sending me an itemised list of documents that i needed to take with me. having had a tiresome experience at the brazillian embassy two months ago, which saw me making three frustrating trips down because the dude just didn't communicate and the website was useless, the swedish embassy was a breeze. am still somewhat puzzled as to why they need to see how much money i have in my bank account. it's such an invasion of privacy and a letter from the bank or most recent bank statement, is in no way indicative of anything. while i understand that they can't possibly grant visas to applicants who might potentially run out of money and require deportation with taxpayer's money, surely there's got to be some privacy law against having to reveal one's bank balance! plus if they were concerned about potential terrorists, if i were one, i wouldn't be so silly as to give them record of my real account, right? that kind of money be squirreled away in a swiss vault somewhere! they'd be better of running a global discovery for all possible bank accounts linked to my name that shows any sign of suspicious activity. oh well, conspiracy theories aside, i'm glad that the lady at the counter was so friendly. she even directed me to the nearest axs machine so i could pay my mobile bill.

back to the embassy to collect my visa in a fortnight!

in other news, i just found out where i'm going to be staying in stockholm. somewhat disappointed that it's not my first choice but it could be worse. at least i'm not assigned to the blooming construction site :)

thoughts on leaving

it's a little under two months before i leave for stockholm and having just gotten back from the great south american adventure, i'm faced with the inevitable question - so what're you doing this holiday?

and it's absolutely singaporean to instinctively wish i could come up with some impressive answer. "oh, i'm working on my phD, yes it's a little early, seeing how i only graduate next year, but no harm starting early." or "i'm off on a humanitarian mission to the middle of the atlantic to help find other parts of the doomed aeroplane", you know, something blithe like that. but the truth is, i'm not really doing anything till i leave in august, save intensive french classes at the alliance francais in july. i do need to get my swedish resident visa sorted out though and was appalled to find out that one needs an obscene bank balance before the visa application is approved. riddicks. what i sleep with my money under my pillow? then how?

but that's just me being difficult.

it's a little strange to be going away at this late stage, when most of my friends have returned from their year abroad. grateful for the opportunity nonetheless and having traveled the past few school holidays, i'm decidedly more selective about where i go this time. no more random european cities just for the heck of it. oh, maybe a few, but not as often as previously! looking forward to taking my time, to meandering aimlessly and to letting the pace of life slow to a crawl. semi-relieved that i'm not embarking on some epic self-discovery process. i'm not 'missing' so there's no need to 'find' myself if i'm right here. am certain that there will be things that i'm going to lose along the way, hopefully nothing of particular importance, but the search can be saved for that.