School?! Whoops.

Today was rather uneventful except for ah! SCHOOL. Yes I was finally beginning my new university with new people in a new country and yes, with a whole new language to make things even more difficult. To say I was nervous would be an understatement.

But first, I will start with my new nation - Gästrike-Hälsinge (yest-ree-keh hell-sing-eh), or GH for short. I finally got to register there and upon asking about why no one was there to help me Saturday, the girl assisting me told me they no longer did registration on Saturdays and those signs were old. After I said some people on Friday told me to come back Saturday, she said that they were mistaken but I could still sign up now. Whatever then! I paid my dues for the term (390kr or $55) and she told me about the events coming up. Tomorrow night they have a special dinner for all the newcomers so that should be fun! Manda will be on her own for food then. By the way, in case I hadn’t mentioned before, these are required by the university to join.

I hurried to class right after this and got there right as the professors, Tomas and Berit (first name basis here in Sweden!), began talking. It’s safe to say I have a long way to go on my journey of understanding my class fully, especially when it comes to spoken Swedish. Reading is never a problem…I guess I understand bigger concepts rather than individual sentences. I know they mentioned bringing ID and my test card when I take my exam in October. I know I must sign up for a group starting tonight and that I must sign up for the exam at the latest 12 days prior to the date of the test. Someone asked a question about calculators and I think he said just a standard one would be fine, but I’ll need to check about that later. He also went on about some paperwork at the front of the class but I was more than confused about what it was for and if I had already filled it out. Suddenly, everyone was getting out of their seats and heading out the door. It was only 1:40pm and class was supposed to go on until 4. What? About 1/4 of the class went down front to talk to the prof and to fill out papers, so I avoided talking to them for the time being. Everyone else filed into the halls and out doors so I figured class must be over. It wasn’t until I was biking that maybe it had been a break…but I didn’t see anyone staying seated. Huh. Guess I’ll never know. I could always e-mail my professor about it, but I don’t want to be silly and it’s not like much is missed on the first day but technical/informational stuff about the university’s policies and the like.

Nothing else really happened because Amanda didn’t want to go anywhere and the guy who she e-mailed about renting a bike never replied. Plus, my phone is still busted (sim card issue) and I can’t make calls instead. Oh well. Manda and I made hot dogs with fries for dinner and it was delicious. I’m hoping to make chicken and mashed potatoes sometime later this week…