Last Day in Austin, TX

Dear Blog

Wow! I can't believe I get to see New Orleans tomorrow. I know I kind of copped out on writing my blog yesterday, so I figure I might take a little more time today to describe what I've done.

Well, first I guess I'll talk a little bit about our trip yesterday. Wow, it's much harder trying to get back from a country then going to a country. The anticipation of going to a new country eases you. But the anticipation of getting back home, well that makes me anxious and makes the trip seem extra long. But, I was till able to smile and keep my face on in D.C. But was customs bad getting into the country! The picture below shows maybe about 30% of the people in line for customs. It was hectic!

Today I woke up early (like 7:00 AM, I guess due to Sweden time). My mom had some car trouble, so my bro came and saved the day. But it ended up my moms car had lots of things wrong with it, and some maintenance that had to be done to keep her 10 year warranty (Hyundai).

I mostly did some facebooking, and iPhone coding for a game that I want to create. But my brother told me later that day that it might be a good idea to use game maker to make the game first just to get a feel for how the game might work. I completely agree! Oh, and I also made some granola bars that I was supposed to give to my family, but didn't yet.

Once everyone was off of work, we all went to eat at AppleBee's (the kids eat for .99, cool!). After that, my brother and I watched Transformers 2 at Cinemark Cedar Park. Cool movie, with tons of shots of Megan Fox. So if you like robots and boobs, yeah, this may be the movie for you. Anyway, great night, but I need to get my head in the game (yeah, literally, a game!). But as of now, I'll goto sleep, and have a great night!

- ET

Panoramic Pictures - Back in the States!

Dear Blog

I have had a long day in planes, and lay overs. I don't really have the energy to write a blog entry today. However, I do want to place all the autostitched pictures I have, AKA panoramic pictures of my trip! Check them out! I know some of them may have a ghosty effect, but too lazy to fix it!

- ET

PS - I wish I could upload better quality panoramic photos (because I had to scale them 1/10th the size), but hopefully this is good enough.

Final Day in Sweden

Dear Blog

It's unbelievable that today is the last day here in Sweden. I've taken it one day at a time here, and even then, the time passes sooo fast. I'm looking forward to seeing my routine life back in the States, but I love Sweden very much. It's such a beautiful place, peaceful and quiet.

Well, we had some good ol' fajita wraps for lunch, it was delicious. I ate it with meat, chicken, and shrimp... so a big mix of protein there! But then we went to the grocery store afterwards, where we brought two bags filled with empty cans and bottles. I thought there was a recycle bin or something, but to my surprise, there was an automated machine! You put cans in one machine, and bottles in another. Once you are finished, you hit a button, and a receipt prints out with money that you can use at the grocery store. Wow, we need something like that in the States where recycling bins are not available in every home.

Afterwards, we waited for Jerry to come home from work. I had some extra cash that I will not be using, so I decided to treat the family to dinner. We first wanted to eat at a place with shrimp. We knew of a restaurant in Gebbestab that would let us eat many shrimps, but there was one problem. Andres does not eat anything from the sea. So I bought him a small pizza. But when we tried to bring the pizza in, the workers at the restaurant said no outside food allowed. We went to 2 or 3 other places and no outside food allowed! Eesh, so we made Andres scarf down the whole pizza, and by the time he did, luck would have it, every restaurant closed. Every single one of them. The clock hit 10 PM, and no restaurant would stay open. Except for one, at the end of town we found this nice little pub/restaurant. They served food very elegantly, and it was a very nice time! I think it was probably much better than any of the time we would of had in any other restaurant in the area. We had steak cooked on wood, my mom had salmon that she's been craving, and Andres... well he already had a whole pizza (but he ate some french fries). It was great. We even had desert. I had dime cake (or pie). It had this caramelly chocolate coating and nuts, and it was simply delicious. Not too sweet, but definitely had sugar!

I had a great time in Sweden, and I hope that the Arayas, Friis, Viteri, and kids will come visit us in New Orleans, LA or Austin, TX (in the United States of America). I would be honored to have them here. Well good night Sweden for the last time this trip... I hope I can come again someday.

- Eternally Thankful

Day 12 - Sweden

Dear Blog

This has been an interesting day. We first went to Happy Price, a store that is kind of like a dollar store on one half, and a big lots on the other half. Very interesting. I bought some souvenirs here, but could not find exactly what I wanted.

After Happy Price, we went to a beach in Stebbegrad. It was nice, but there were lots of jelly fishes. Some blue and some red. The red ones can sting very badly, if you touch the tentacles. Jerry was grabbing them by the "head" and showing us the bottom. He is pretty brave about that. A lot braver than I was. I didn't even want to touch one.

At the end of the beach trip, Jerry offered me some tobacco in a mesh bag (like tea). I guess it's also chewing tobacco without the mess of making a ball of it for yourself. He offered many times, I guess as a joke. This time, I said yes this one time, and essh... it was not a very pleasurable experience. At first, there was this spicy feeling at the back of my throat. Then some tobacco flavor started filling my taste buds. I did not like that one bit.... but then the tobacco feeling started hitting me. I started getting dizzy, but then I got really dizzy, and mellow (yeah, more mellow than usual!) I survived the rest of the beach trip, and the drive home. But when I grabbed a cup of water back home, it was time to run outside. Yeah, I had to let it all out in the grass. I couldn't quite make it to the bushes, so I vomitted right in the middle of the grass. I didn't want to show anyone, so I dug a hole, and buried it. Yeah, it was really gross!

Anyway, we had a nice evening afterwards. We played some Playstation 2. San Andreas and Pro Evolution Socce 2008. Both were fun, and Andres kicked butt in every game. Then afterwards, it's late, and it's time to go to sleep. I'll write more tomorrow.

- ETdoFresh

4th of July in Sweden

Dear Blog

Happy Independence Day to all those in the United States. This year, I'm in Sweden celebrating in a nice, unique style. We started off by BBQing. Made some Hamburgers, Chicken on sticks, Hotdogs, and Andres made the hunk o' pork. Delicious foods, and good times.

It was most of the family and even Jerry's sister and kid came by to have some food and celebratation. I aplogize if there are bad pictures, it's just that I didn't take that many pictures today (for once!).

After a great lunch, we went out to a lake which was great. There was a little dock, and it gradually declined into the water. I took a swim, a few dives, and basically had more water fun! I think about the lake, and how usually we go into these control pools with tons of chlorine. But on the other hand, swimming in a nice big lake feels great and natural. But the rocks sometimes hurt the feet and the algae just feels weird sometimes. These are things we should be used to.

Then we went to watch Jerry's son Linux play some Futbal (or Soccer to us). It was fun to watch a game, even if it was younger kids. You can see the mistakes, funny goal keepers, and star players.

In the nighttime, we had some leftovers from the BBQ, and had lots of candies. Good times. However, I'm soo exhausted right now, so I must sleep. I'll blog more later! Bye!

- ET

Day 10 - Surviving the trip back

Dear Blog

I woke up in a hot hotel room this morning. We were in need of taking a shower, packing up, and getting out of there! We left our bag in the hotel "at our own risk". Well, as you can see, I still have my laptop, which let's me blog!

I am starting to have a collection of many different kinds of money. Well with this collection of money, we went off, and had an excellent brunch. We had a plate with croissant, pancake, eggs, bacon, sausage, pineapple slide, melon slice, brie cheese, and a yogurt, and also a mozzerela sandwhich with tomamtoe and herbs. Yum!

Then we walked the city of Copenhagen, Denmark. Found interesting places, people, and things. I found my name on metal plates all over construction sites, so it only made sense for me to take a picture with it. One of the stores we found served mint lemonade... but it was basically mint leaves with lemon juice... too strong for me. So I loaded it with brown sugar that was on the table, after about a cup of sugar, it tasted just right to me!

We were really tired after yesterday (OK, I was really tired after yesterday), so I suggested we go back to the hotel lobby and relax. So we did until the bus came, and we finally were headed home.

Once we made it to our first stop, I thought we had about an hour to spare. So we ate a Subway. It was good, I had the 15cm (6-inch) meatball sandwhich. Not really too different on how the food was served (but all in a different language of course). But as we finished up, we looked at the bus ticket, and the bus left at 8:10PM, and it was already 8:25PM! We were screwed. That was the last bus out of Gothenburg, Sweden. We were running around, panicked to say the least! We finally ran into a ticket stand, where we asked how can we get to Tatumshede, Sweden from here. The ticket lady said, we could probably take our tickets to the train station, and catch the last bus from the final train stop. So, with no other options, we jumped on the train.

I explained our situation to the ticket checker on the train, and he looked at our tickets, looked at me, kinda smiled, but then back to neutral, looked at the ticket and me once more, and pulled out his hole puncher. He said, alright, make sure you catch the bus once you get to the final stop. And we did! We caught all the right buses, and made it home to Tanumshede tonight without too much despair.

I love coming to Menena and Jerry house, but I was especially happy to see it tonight. I had an adventure today, and it was a mild one from an outside perspective at best. But to me, it blew me away. I'm usually in such control of my life, and when things don't go according to plan, I usually can fix or avoid the problem right away. Today, things didn't go as planned, and I wasn't sure how it was possible to fix the problem. Maybe I need to learn to let go of controlling my life so much, and learn to go with the flow and ask for help when I need it. I don't ever ask for help! I'm too proud/independent that way. Maybe I needed so much help growing up, that when I finally did grow up, I never wanted help from anyone anymore. I don't know if that makes sense, but it does to me. But sometimes it's good to control all the aspects in your life, but sometimes you need to release yourself from that control too, otherwise when things get out of your control, your life may go into a deadly tailspin. I may be babbling, but I try to see things from every possible perspective, it helps me see things more clearly. Maybe some sleep right now will help me blog more clearly. Haha. Alright, God Natt!

- E.T.

9th day - I never thought I'd be in Denmark

Dear Blog

We had a nice start this morning! We woke up at 4:20 AM, and we started the day. We had a nice typical cheese, salami, and bread breakfast with either tea, coffee, or milk (tea for me). Then we hopped on the bus not too far from Menena's house.

On the bus trip, we saw some nice sites, and I really couldn't decide what pictures I wanted to post. So I chose two at random. Much of the Scandinavian area is powered by windmills (wholly). So, I thought a nice cluster of windmills were appropriate. After figuring out what and where we had to go, we were there! Kobenhavn (Copenhagen), Danmark (Denmark)! I liked this place soo much more than Oslo, Norway. The people, the diversity, the spirit. Just great!

Our first mission after settling into Cab-inn Hotel (another story later), we wanted to see the most popular site. The Little Mermaid. Yeah, this is where the story began centuries (or a century) ago. It was good luck to touch the feet of the mermaid, so you know I had too! But it was really hot due to the sun, so it burned my hand, and I tripped into the water as I was leaving... so I'm not exactly sure when that good luck kicks in, but I'm ready for it! :)

Another key worthy point about Copenhagen is the bike trail. Check it out! It's like Sidewalk, Bike Path, and then street... all on different altitude levels. I think it's cool! Oh, and with the extra money I had left over, I bought a palace. See it right behind me? Ok, not really, but it was a big building that was photo worthy.

Andres saw the Guinness Book of World Records Museum, so we stopped by. I stood by the tallest man, and ate with the heaviest man. How luck am I?

As I said earlier, Copenhagen is a really cool place, with interesting architecture and very touristy at least this time of year. Even some of the grafitti is pretty cool. Check this one out, Nice colors, stands out, but without being an eye sore.

We were walking for about 5 hours before we decided, "we need a break!" So we went back to the hotel, took a rest, and headed back out. This time instead of towards the touristy side, we saw lots of people on the otherside of the river. I didn't know what awaited us there, but we were on a mission for pizza. We walked to that side of the river, and we walked a few blocks. I noticed in the corner of my eye, there was the word pizza on one of the doors. Wow, it was amazing that we found pizza (@ 9:30PM, everything seems to close early around here, even though still daylight). So we walk in, and only one of three guys spoke english, and they almost didn't take our Euros (they didn't take our credit cards). But it was a nice little local pizza place where one slice was two thin crust pizza sandwiched together. Andres had pepperoni, my mom had just cheese (couldn't explain vegetables to them), and I had random meat (I said "different" meat, and they must've given me lamb meat). It was delicious. But it was definitely a poorer side of town, and much more local side of Copenhagen. I like to take adventures, but without someone to push me, like my mom, in this instance, I usually don't. But then how would I get to experience great things like this?

We walked back when the sun started to set, around 10:30 or 11 PM. We came back, and this hotel room is cramped! Not only that it is like boiling hot in here without A/C. But even though I have complaints about this hotel room, this one day trip to Copenhagen has been a much better success than I would have imagined. Maybe it was the timing, maybe it was the people, maybe it was nothing, but I enjoyed myself today, and that's that!

- ETdoFresh