For breakfast, we had the usual (bread & butter, yogurt with berries, HOT tea) but with FRESH orange juice. I don't do any kind of juice so I was nervous about having to drink it. It was
surprisingly really, really good! We visited our first of 3 schools then. We went to several classes. In my first class, I learned that nearly every student (roughly around age 13-14 years old) had been out of the country. Orebro is a very well off community is what the teacher told us. Traveling outside the country for them though would be like me traveling to California or New York. School is soo much different there; some for the better and some much worse. Another unfortunate even happens now. I'm quite embarrassed by this!! I went to the toalett, as they call them, (which are not separated by gender) but can't get out of the stall. They are full doors, so no climbing out. I do have my cell phone, but who would I call! I am really scared that I may be stuck in here for quite a while. I have no better choice than to just knock on the door hoping someone will help. Keep in mind they all know English, but speak Swedish of course so I can't understand anything! Finally a boy says in English "are you lost"; I respond "just open the door". He then says "oh you speak English" because he had probably been talking to me in Swedish but I couldn't understand. I kind of chuckle and thank the boy, but walk out quickly totally embarrassed. It is quite funny now, but was a little scary to me then. After school. I went directly to the store and got my card back! We had leisure time to walk around town and shop. Later that afternoon I met with Helga to do an interview. Part of the classwork I had to do was write a paper on someone with a different culture than me. (Apparently my paper was really good because my teacher wants to share it with the chair of the department, the international office person, and others that will take the class!) Then we went to the mall on the outside of town. That was fun! We went with a couple guys from one of the schools, so they were able to tell us what everything said.WEDNESDAY
We went back to the same school as yesterday. We got to visit different classes from yesterday. It was quite interesting. That afternoon we had a silly meeting at city hall. It was very pointless. Afterwards, we went to IKEA and some other places outside of town by the mall. That was quite an experience. We had to walk on the highway (they drive crazy fast) and jump a huge snow drift to get to a sidewalk. When I got 'home' I had a sweet cake I think she called it (basically like a gingerbread cookie). They were good, although I don't usually like gingerbread. I think it was just a taste of home when things weren't going as good as we expected, I guess.
THURSDAY
Spent the day at Ralph's school. We learned about their special education program. It was very interesting how that works. Ralph showed us the museum in his school.
Some are wanting to take it out to use the space, but they are fortunate to have something like that in their school. That night, I went bowling with a couple girls from my group and Helga and a couple of her friends. I bowled a 161!! Pretty sure that is a personal record! That night at 'home' we had some amazing cake type thing. It was the best thing ever! The consistency was like uncooked brownie with powdered sugar on top.
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