super article!

C sent me this article and when I read it I felt like it truly put words to how it feels to move to another country and not have the language. read it, it's really super! Thanks C! Sorry, only in Swedish...

http://www.00tal.com/arkiv/art9_10.html

happy times

Helloo,

I seem to be fading a bit in my updating of this blog, don't know if this indicates a good or a bad thing. I guess I have more things to do now than before that doesn't include a computer. Well, not that my life has taken such a drastic change, even though I now can officially stay in Canada and find a work, but I have a better feeling inside that came with these new possibilities. I'm happier, more out going and less likely to burst into tears for nothing. And that is an amazing change inside! And this makes me less motivated to spend my time in front of the computer and therefor less time spent on the blog. Sorry! I guess I'm happy! :)

Je parle un peu français

Häpp! So, today at French-class I for the first time didn't feel sooooo lost any more! yes, still a lot, A LOT of struggling, especially to remember how to say stuff, but I feel like I'm really starting to get the hang of it, I understand so much more, it starting to make sense to me and I have fun learning again. Now I just have to get one of those French big pointy noises and talk about women and wine, then I'll be ready for anything!
YEIIIPPIIII!!!

Oscar

The Oscars are beeing shown on a big screen in a big movie complex in town. I think I should go, just for the laugh! 250 people in the same room watching celebrities cry and thank God for creating them. Hey - can it be better, and it's for free.

update

So, time for up-date from me to you:

My passport is out traveling on its own, taking flights cross the big ocean. I've sent it to London to get my visa for permanent resident glued in, gulp! A bit weird to put you passport into a little envelope and send it away for a journey through countries and flights, all by it self. I really hope it will find its way back to me. Don't wanna have another "plu-plu-person" living in Canada carrying my passport and name.

I had my 3:rd meeting with my new found friend K. She's really nice and we have fun chatting! Went for coffee and some shopping actually, I haven't been shopping since I got here in September so it was nice. Actually, to meet a new person like this is probably the closest thing to blind-dating as I will ever come. It's fun and a bit strange, but nice. I like it! And it's such an blessing to have someone to talk to that are going through the same thing as I am, and who understands the roller coaster emotions it gives you.

I'm trying to write my thieses, (C-uppsatsen), and it's actually fun. Still in the process of reading and trying to figure out what the real subject will be, but right now I'm into documentary films and environmental discourse. You know, Al Gore and stuff. Reading course books at the moment and it feels good to get back into the thughts and theories again. I'm ready for it, I think. I have some idéa back in my head to finish my masters here in Montreal within journalism, but hey, well see about that. Cause here you have to pay loads of money for your studies, in lovely Sweden it's for free.... Hmmmm... what to do..

My French is moving, just can't say in what direction. I'll keep you posted. :)

I'm applying for a job at Ericsson! Hoppala! Well, you know, I need a job... And it might be funfun too, who knows. I'll keep you posted on this. And M got a job too, super fast! He literally applied and had the interview within the same week. Now that's something! Congrats M!! :)

Tonight I'm having my 4:th meeting with friend K, we're going for a nice locally brewed beer to celebrate my visa!

Salut!

Happy happy joy joy - visa is here!

TJOHOOOOOO!!!

I've got my permanent residency visa today!!!!! This is what we've been waiting for all this time! It went faster than we thought it would, so it's super duper! Wow! This means I'm aloud to stay here as long as I would like to, I can work, study, get access to doctors, apply for courses, get grants for film making if I wanted that. Basically I'm a Canadian now, just not able to vote and have a Canadian passport (I can apply for Canadian citizenship after 2 years, if I want to).

So, that's my great news! I feel happy and confused at the same time, but mostly just happy happy joy joy!

I miss you all my friends! Tell me what you're up to?

Love/pluplu

"...a decision has been made..."???

PS.... I might, and I say it again - MIGHT - have got my immigration application for a visa for Canada approved...! We'll know for sure in some days I believe. But the web page where I can follow my application says that "a decision has been made" and office will contact me. Please say it's the decision I've been waiting for... PLEEEASE!!!

HO-HO-HO-HOOOOCKYFRILLA!

Yesterday I went to my first hockey game - ever! It was quite something! I have no idea what the scores were at the end (5-3 to the Chiefs?), but HELLOOOOOO!!! What were they doing fighting all the time?? I mean, there were suddenly a fight and BOOOM! - loud music crashing down on us like a heavy metal band on disco-speed and the two muscle hunks on skates started circling around, and around, and... gääääsp... aaaaroooouuuunnnnd, sometimes a little bonk! on the nose and no blood, no cool black eye - no nothing. Disapointing! It were some sort of a dance I believe. And they didn't stop it, it was kinda aloud in some weird way, never seen anything like it, thought sport was all about health and good old spirit in tight clothes with bad smell, guess I was wrong. And during this "fight" event, that took place more than often, the drunk part of the hunk-wanna-be audience were doing their hunk-hunk-hunk-sound, cheering for the poor dancing gentlemen on the ice and the a bit left out players in each team had to stand back on the side and wait it all out, looking a bit bored. Then they were done, after about a minute or two, and the game could go on. Strange, I must say. Learned later that these guys fighting are actually meant to be fighting for real. They kinda have a guy in the opposite team to go for with a fist if the guy are playing too too good or beeing too hard on their guys or something. Just to put some tension into it, like skating fast, pushing each other into the walls so it sings and shooting the rock hard piece of plastic as hard as possible were it hurts the most, like this all wouldn't be enough - let's fight! : )
And of course there were also all-dressed-up-for-pleasure 18 year old girlie-girls doing their sexy bon-bon dances to BAD music (Ace of Base came twice) in white mini-skirts (with white G-strings under, I saw them, more than once!) - YES, welcome to the American continent! Felt like being in a highschool movie - but live. One old and frogstyle-looking dude were checking out the poor, willingly dancing grandchild-aged girl next to him with a look that leaves out absolutely nothing. Brrrr.... I felt colder than the ice just by beeing in the same room as him.
Well, so, don't get me wrong now, I enjoyed the game a lot, the players were good and the tempo high, but I must say that I had my best entertainment on the side with my new found friend chatting with me. Thanks K for bringing me there, it was quite a ride! :)

kiddo

Tjo! Today I went sledging down a snowy hill! Feel like a kiddo again. Funfunfun!

On the roadmap to friends 2

So, of course the girl I met for coffee was super nice and we had fun talking for 2 hours! Finally someone to share Montreal-beginner-stories with, if you know what I mean. I believe we have quite the same experience of the adjusting problems and roller coaster emotions. So, we will meet again, for sure! Haaaaaappy me! :)

Fat Tuesday!

In USA they have Super Tuesday.
In Sweden we have FetTisdag.
Could it be the same?

On the road-map to friends

I'm looking for friends, I'm feeling very lonely in this town. You know, I do have M, we're together a lot and having a blast. But sometimes it's nice to have others around you, someone to share life stories with, gossip, have coffee, talk over the phone (just to get a phone call would be amazing), or just to share different points of views. You know, simple life things, friends in its own essence. So, I joined this network for friend-seekers in Montreal (and around the world) called MEETin.org
I'm new so far, but the whole idea around it is to get people together and have fun and hopefully meet new friends during. So, I signed in and looked around, and there was some nice people there. I got in contact with a girl from USA, who lives here under kinda the same circumstances as I do, and we found out we live actually very close to each other too, and we're getting together tomorrow morning for a coffee! Hey! That's something, huh?! Hopefully we'll have a good time, she seems like a fun girl to me! On the road-map to friends...
Watch out Montreal - here comes "Super-Friendly Jessie"! Ta-da-ta-taaaaaa!!

T-TV

Thanks to P we are now hooked on The Sarah Connor Chronicles! Watched the first pilot episode yesterday, nice stuff, of course can't be compared with the Terminator films, but that's the thing with spinn-off TV-series. I can live with that. The only thing I find a bit hard to melt is the over sexy new Sarah, just too much lips in one frame for me. But if we know her character right she will probably get them smashed and punched at least 10 times before this story is over, so they might change a bit.

Quebec name and vikings 2

hmm... M said he was doubting this thing I found about the name Quebec came from Sweden via the Vikings... (see earlier input two steps down). I looked it up and Canadian officials claim it's from the indian culture and their name Kebec, wish means narrow creek or something, pointing at the river St Laurent and the narrowing parts around the city of Quebec. Well, this all makes a lot of sence, probably the one who claimed the Swedish point of view was just a bit jelous - cause in fact he himself is a Swedish scientist/author.
Well, as the story goes about my hometown of Arvika (wish is not a fact coming from this Swedish scientist), the name means something like the battlefield of the vikings (ar = battle, vika = rowing men in shift (vikings) ). How about that! :)

Bläääsch!

Uärk... Just saw the movie La Grande Bouffe - I'm feeling sick!

Ha! I knew it! Sweden is loosing words to Quebec.

Looki what I found on the web. This might make people here more interested in Sweden, and stop complaining when I claim the stole our Swedish words!
(I borrow this text from http://www.nordicway.com/search/Quebec.htm)

" QUEBEC IS SWEDISH!
The Normand Samuel Champlain and his friends sailed from the harbour of Honfleur in Normandy, France to North America in 1608 with the intention of founding a colony there. They landed in eastern Canada and named the land they claimed Quebec. They brought the name from their home in Normandy, just like other emigrants had done before them, and have done since then. What the settlers probably did not know was that the name Quebec has Scandinavian origins, having been brought to France by the Vikings in the tenth century.
(The very interesting book "The Frenchmen from the North" by Clas Brunius has a detailed account of the existence of many Nordic names in Normandy, stemming from the time when Vikings from Denmark, Norway and Sweden took possession of this province. Language analysts like the Dane Jakob Jakobsen have also uncovered some fascinating information about this).
The Viking chief Rollo rewarded his men by giving them land in Normandy. At the same time he started imposing a tax on the farms and the estates. They therefore had to be registered and this was done by French clerks knowledgeable in Latin and in writing. They tried to transcript the unfamiliar Nordic names in Latin. The "Kallebäck" from the western part of Sweden was then written down in Latin as "Calidusbeccus", later transformed into French as "Caudebec". Skånish Ivetofta eventually became Yvetot.
Similarly "Kvillebäck" (the Kville creek) became Quebec. And there we are! Quebec is Swedish, more precisely the name comes from Bohuslän, the western-most province of Sweden situated to the north of Gothenburg. The Vikings emigrating from the place called "The Kville Creek" took the name to Normandy when they settled down there 1 000 years ago. The community and parish Kville still exists in Bohusldn, Sweden."

naked illegal alien 2

hmm... I discovered something suspicious at the swimming pool the other day, I now know the trick the girls have to be able to change clothes without being seen naked. For those who doesn't think it's enough to shower with swimsuit on and then after get dressed facing the corner of the room all wrapped up in towels (usually two) and zig-zag themselves like worms to get swimsuit of and underwear on without showing skin, they change in the tiny toilet rooms. (no, not IN the toilet, they have already been swimming. All you see is feet under the door, bags being zipped open and closed and schwuuuuungz - out comes a properly covered female body, dressed and maked-up and hair in place, ready to meet the gaze of the world again, and my amused eyes. Way to go girls! (BRÄNN BH:n!)

First contact with the aliens

So, I got spoken to by a stranger from Montreal yesterday, the very first in over 6 months that tries to make contact with me just like that. It was in a coffee shop in the English speaking area of NDG (west of the city), where I had an afternoon of boring exploration. (yes, I said boooooring, only beautiful houses and no kicking energy at all.) So, there I was sitting with my coffee and an English newspaper, The Gazette, when suddenly this qute guy came up to me with a pen and a piece of paper and very awkwardly asks if he can do a goofy thing and ask for my telephonenumber. Man, of course very flattering, even in it's own fumbling goofyness, but why in the world was this my first contact with this new people? Typical! I have never, EVER in my whole life been asked for my number before by a stranger I haven't even said a word to before. But the most amazing feeling in the whole situation was to not feel anything but flattered and not interested AT ALL, and to tell him, "Sorry, I'm married." and really feel super happy in that!
I'm so in love with my man, that no little guy can charm me with a smile and a piece of paper. Take a hike dude.

Frodo - my best friend

So, now I have finished the whole book of Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings! Together me and Frodo have been fighting monsters in dark places and man! that freaky, super-scary spider she-monster! Uuuuuuhhhhh! I was sooooo scared that I was jumping up and down in the bed, waking up M all the time and kept having scary nightmares about super-sized monster spiders crawling up the walls around the bed, waking up sweating and shaking and had M to check if it was for real. Yes, I have fobia for spiders! And the worst thing is that this appartment of ours seems to be the super-nest of disgusting pale yellow-white BIG spiders who keep crawling in and scare me. poor M, who hate hurting any one or anything, has to terminate them for me. I'm a serious spider-hating woman!

Talking about terminator, we also have watched all three the Terminator movies again! The first one is a masterpiece, the second super, the third is pointless. But hey, for sure, it WILL be back! Maybe Arnold could do something about that slaughter-machine of Mr Bush too...?