Sweden and Beyond

This is only one of many entries about my month long winter trip. There are only afew pictures here so if you want to see more then check out http://picasaweb.google.com/mikerwallace

And on with the blog...

School was done for the next month. I had spent nearly 4 months in the same country...boring! It was time to get back into the travelling groove, see the world and really mix things up...Norway! (That should be funny b/c Norway is very similar to Sweden..get it...fine, I suck)

I took a bus to Norway. The intention was to see a Big Bang concert (Great band thats super popular in Norway. They sing in english and are moving to LA soon. Check them out!). When we got to the Norway border the bus was stopped and a drug sniffing dog was put on the bus. Guess who the dog liked...ME! You know me, I always carry tons of drugs They questioned me and searched me and everyone thought I was some American drug addict or something.

When I finally got to Oslo (Capital City) I met up with a Swedish guy I know there (Thanks Tobias!!!). He had a sweet place with a spare couch that I crashed on for 3 nights. I walked around Oslo during the day and we hung out at night. Here are some shots I took while wandering around:

Trees after sunset

There is an awsome park in Oslo that has tons of gates and statues done by one artist over 100 years ago. Here is one of the gates.

I have been to Oslo 3 times and I always go to this park. This time it was misty. Very cool...below freezing actually.

Then I walked down to the waterfront and saw this sunset:

The next morning it was off to the airport and on to Ireland...

Some f#%&er stole my bike. All 240 dollars of it. I was careful, used my big heavy expensive lock and even locked it to something solid, I thought. When I locked my bike to a steel fence I didn't notice the fence was bolted together and not welded. The thief dismantled the fence to steel my bike. He even put the fence back together so he could rob someone else.

Now I have a new bike, or at least new to me. I decided not to buy another bike and instead build a bike. There are always mangled bike carcasses in the bushes around my apartment so I pieced afew of them together and made a mutant hunk of junk. It doesn't really stop or shift or operate quietly but it gets me around. Maybe its for the better because now I can't ride full speed in the street with the cars like I used to.

Speaking of bikes, check out this all platic one (it's not mine).

On a happier note I went to a great cocktail party put on by some Swedish friends. Here is a picture of one of the many weird drinks they came up with.

If you look closely you can see the champagne flowing down a big drill bit. Yes, they are engineers and yes it was clean.

Thanksgiving is just another day in the rest of the world. Fortunately I got invited to a catered thanksgiving dinner by the woman who started the exchange program with Cal Poly. She is a memeber of an American club in Sweden who get together on American holidays. Here is a picture of her and the other students from Cal Poly.

My friend Sara moved into a new place. Check out the dinner she prepared!!

It took me like 2 hours to get all the meat out of that thing. Thanks for being patient Sara!

My friend from Cal Poly (and PG&E) who is studying in Spain came to visit me along with three other American friends of hers. I took them out to the islands and we had a blast.

Megan is second from the right.

Göteborg is all lit up for the holidays. They converted a fountain to an ice skating rink.

Next to the rink was a singing Christmas tree!

Here is me messing around in a grocery store. I like these product names.

I don't like FUN light. Who would? I need full strength fun!

Christmas plans:

12/20-12/22 Oslo, Norway staying with a Swedish friend and seeing aBig Bang concert.

12/22-1/4 Ireland with my old roommate from last time, Ciaran

1/4-1/13 Portugal. Lisbon with a friend from there. Rest of country solo

1/13-1/16 London to visit a friend and then back to Sweden to start building a race car!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. The cards are in the mail.

Ciao

Fall was fun. Yeah, I remember that WEEK! Winter is on like donkey kong now!

Can you find the white dog?

Brrrrrrrrrrrr

To escape the snow I went to Copenhagen, Denmark for the weekend. I stayed with the sister of one of my old roommates. Meet Heather:

Heather is a CalPoly architecture student who is studying in Copenhagen. There are actually more than a dozen CalPoly students in Copenhagen so I hung out with a slice of home.

Copenhagen is a super bike friendly city. Check out this bike parking lot in the city center:

Bikes were EVERYWHERE. There were so many bike that they used hand signals to avoid accidents in the bike lanes. weird. Cool.

We spent most of the weekend wandering the city. Here is the ramp up to the top of a tower.

It wrapped up 7 times before you get to the top! Here is the view:

Another interesting building:

If you look closely, the tower is made from the tails of beasts.

I went out to the bars with a group of CalPoly kids. We were in luck because that night and that night only Carlsberg Christmas beer was FREE! Thats right, FREE BEER! The only drawback was that they had jingle bells cranked. We couldnt take it so we left early, or just in time if you ask some. Here is the party crew:

OK. Some people are asking me if I am actually going to school because I rarely talk about it in the blogs. Yes, I go to school. I am currently working on two different things: my masters thesis and the formula student team. These things combined are a full time commitment. The thesis is not very exciting right now because I spend my time reading technical papers. The hard part is next: Taking all this material bouncing around in my head and forming my own insightful thoughts on the subject. Unguided independent thought is hard. Ug!

The formula student team is, of course, becoming an even larger commitment than I planned. I am not only a member of the technical communication team, I am also an advisor to the suspension and unsprung mass teams. Since I have done most of this stuff before I am also meeting with the faculty advisor to help plan things. Its fun but time consuming. It will all be worth it when we win!

Heydå från Sverige,

Mike

The most expensive jacket ever has been found in Sweden. I went to a local sporting goods store to look for a jacket and found this:

I almost choked! Do you know how much that is in US Dollars? $957.61!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

That's right. Nearly $1000! What the hell is it made of? Baby seals!? Actually it was just a big down parka with a gore-tex shell and a fluffy fur collar. I did'nt try it on. I did'nt even touch it after that for fear I might mess it up and have to buy it. I did'nt buy any jacket at all. The cheapest one I like was over $250 so I went online and saw it for $150 in the US. I think I'll become an illegal importer to make some money on the side.

A couple days ago the sun actually came out. The trees are turning colors and losing thier leaves fast. The fall colors are quite nice. Here is a picture from the roof of my apartment building:

Check the weather forecast that I saw when I logged online the other day:

I miss the sun! That report was a few days ago. right now it is almost freezing outside. It's hovering at 33 degrees! I am looking forward to the snow. It could start anyday now with these temps.

Last week I went to a soccer game. The local team was playing a home game and we got free tickets. The cheap seats are'nt even seats, you have to stand! Here is a picture of Jay (England), Me, and Erica (CalPoly) at the game.

They really know how to cheer here. There is one section where all the hardcore fans sit and scream their heads off. They have dozens of songs and chants with different dancing/jumping routines. To keep them in sync, they have a conductor who starts and stops all the songs so its quite organized. Then there are the guys with drums....

I met Juleitte Lewis on Saturday night, backstage at her concert. I knew she was an actress but she actually has a rock band too, Juliette and the Licks. An American guy I know here is friends with the guitarist so after the show we went backstage. Backstage the beer is free but in front of the stage a bottle is $7!! I told her the show was good and really high energy. She says it was bad because she was singing flat. We chatted for another minute while she did a funny iceskating thing on a towel to clean her feet. She was cool. Then we hung out with the band while they complained about their European tour. Getting paid to ride around Europe in a posh bus and rocking out everynight must be horrible! They were really nice and kept telling us to drink their beer. We hung out for about an hour and then they went to bed early, mostly sober, and without any of the Swedish groupies. Sorry but I did'nt take any pictures of them, or the groupies http://www.julietteandthelicks.com/

I went on a boat tour through the city canals last week. We waited and waited as more and more people piled on the boat. The tour guide even put folding chairs in the isles so more people could fit. I kept thinking that this was weird since boats leave every half an hour. Why pack them sooooo full......this is why:

One of the many bridges the boat has to go under is suuuuuuuper low! They call it the cheese grater. We cleared by less than 2 inches! You should have seen the look on everyones face when the tour guide said we are going under and you have to lay on the floor. Awesome!

Later on the boat tour we went out into the main shipping lanes. Göteborg has the largest port in Scandinavia. Check out this monster ship under repair in the dry docks:

I felt bad for the tour guide. She had to say everything three times. Once in Swedish, then English, then German. She was quite talented.

Last Sunday I went to the botanical gardens. The place was packed. Swedish people take every opportunity they can to enjoy the outdoors while the weather is nice. On request of my mother, here is another shot of me:

I finally used the flower mode on my camera:

This weekend was great. I saw two friends I have not seen since the last time I was in Sweden. One guy was an old roommate of mine here in 2004 and he never left Sweden! When he first moved to Sweden I showed him around, taught him some Swedish, and introduced him to Swedish people. This weekend he showed me around town, introduced me to his Swedish roommates and proved that he is fluent in Swedish. The tables have turned!

Ok I need to go to the gym before it closes.

Hejdå