living a swede life

Hey all,

I know that is have been a long time since I last updated and so much has happened since my last post. Our routine has changed a lot lately because we are now in such high demand. All the teachers who teach English classes want us in their classes and some teachers even want us to come to their class more than once during the week. So it's been crazy trying to get use to all the schedule changes that are being made. A normal day for us goes something like this.... get up at 7:00, get ready, leave around 8-8:15 and spend the rest of the day at school in various English classes and then return home around 3:30.
On a different note the kids are really starting to warm up to us. We barely make it into the school before we get mobbed by random students who want to say Hej and give us hugs as if we have been gone for years. They invite us to go with them to random classes all the time, which is a huge step for us. At first they would just talk to us and then scurry to class when it was time, now they want us to occpany them. We also get invited to join people at tables during lunch. At first we would just sit there as a team and the kids would walk by, say Hej and keep right on going. Now we get asked to sith with people or if they can sit with us, which gives us a warm fuzzy feeling inside.
On Monday on Friday we attend Swedish class. It's been going okay, but it's not my favorite way to start off the day. It's a little bit frustrating. We try so hard, but it feels like we aren't making any progress. We feel that the teachers are talking at us and not with us. During class they will only speak Swedish with us, and I know that it's going to help us in the long wrong, but when we have no idea what is going on or what being said, it becomes frustrating. The teachers will say something to us in Swedish or ask us a question and because we only know a few words, we get lost very easily. So we give them the ''deer in the head lights'' look and they proceed to repeat what they said, but a little bit slower. To me it makes no difference how fast or slow it's being said if I don't understand the language at all and it makes me feel really stupid. I think the reason I feel this way is because I'm angry at myself for not being able to pick up the language quickly, but I guess all of these feeling come with learning a new language.
Earlier I mentioned that all the kids are starting to warm up to us... well I lied. We seem to be having some problems with the 9th graders. They were gone the first week we were here and then the second week was fall break, so we didn't meet them until a few weeks ago. We had heard rumors that they were all jerks and thought that they were better than everyone else, but we thought they were just rumors. Turns out the rumors were true for the most part. There are a few who I really enjoy, but the rest I can't stand, especially the boys. There is one group of boys in particular that I just can't stand at this point. They cuss and yell all the time and have no respect for anyone. As if this wasn't reason enough to dislike them, Sam and I had a run in with them that caused me dislike for them to grow. One day Sam and I were watching ping pong and the boys were yelling and cussing as usual, when all of the sudden things got quiet and they started speaking in Swedish, because up until this point they had been ''speaking'' English. We had a pretty good idea that we were the topic of their hushed discussion. Sam and I finally got sick of not being able to understand what was going on, so we decided to make up our own translations and whisper them to each other. We were laughing and having a good time when out of the blue one of the boys points at me and starts yelling at me in Swedish. One of my new friends told me that he was telling me to shut up and to quit laughing. So I looked at him and sweetly said Nej. He proceeds to yell at me again in Swedish and again I said Nej. He continued to yell the Swedish version of shut up at me every few seconds and I just ignored him. This seemed to anger him even more, so he switched to English. Finally I snapped. He had just finished telling me to shut up for about the 100th time, when I glared at him, pointed at him and said in a stern voice ''No you shut up! I'm sick of hearing you''. He looked at me in shock and aww. He had never had a teacher figure tell him to shut up and mean it. Later he came up and apologized to me, I was very shocked and impressed that he did that. While that was going on with me, Sam was having problems of his own. The other boys in the group kept telling him he sucked and called him other various names. Finally we got sick of it and left.
Later on of our new friends told us what the boys had been talking about and we were correct, they were talking about us, saying that we were stupid because we didn't know Swedish. This just added to our frustration. We are trying really hard. We've only been here for a month. Do they honestly think that we could become fluent in a month. And to top it off, everytime we try to speak Swedish with them, they laugh at us, which makes us very self conscious. I am hoping and praying that thing will start to get better with the 9th grade boys, because at this point I just want to smack them all. I know that we shouldn't let the opinions of 15 year old boys affect us, but being foreign and not knowing the language and having them point that out to us makes us even more self conscious. So I truely hope things get better with them and the teachers insist that it will.
Anywho, next week is English camp with the 7th graders and I can't wait. I am really excited to see what it's all about. I've heard rumors, but I can't wait to see what it's like for myself. Tom told us that we travel to the mountains about 2hrs. north of us and stay at a camp for a week and the whole point of this camp is to speak English. It will be great to finally be immersed in English all the time and not just in class.
Grottan is still going good. I enjoy it a lot. It's a great place to meet new people and just sit and chill. I really enjoy talking to the youth of the town that come.
On a different note, I am starting to feel more and more at home here. I have made lots of new friends and they come over almost every night. We just sit, have fika, talk and occasionally watch a movie. I know I have said this before, but I will say it again. Everyone is really nice. We get invited for dinner frequently, which is very nice. We also have people who check up on us all the time and tell us to let them know if we need anything. It's the people like that who make me feel so at home. It makes me feel so great to know that the people here really do care about us and only want what's best for us. I think I am falling in love with this town. :)

Well that's all for now. Many blessing!

-alyssa

random fact: the sun sets here at 3:00 everyday and the moon never goes down during the day