Ville 29

His birthday is actually on the 23rd (same as Karen actually, hehe) but we can't really celebrate on a weekday, so for just the weekend the whole family, with cousins, grandma and even Ville's girlfriend's sister we gathered up in the summer house to have a wonderfully grilled dinner and too much wine. I think this was actually the drunkest I have gotten with my family so far, it's not much though and I think it was mostly because I was so very very tired.

After dinner we went down to the lake, just for a stroll, it's was simply too cold for swimming and the mosquitoes were crazy, both in amount and aggression. Once down at the lake I could see the result of all the rains this summer, it was crazy; when I was young the water level of the lake was so that we had to skip on small stones to get out on the big one, but over the years the level has sunk so now it is a small grassy path out, even in autumn when it is normally raining a lot, but now after all the summer rains the level is higher than I ever saw it before, not even with rubber boots could we get to the stone.

Two cousins and a sister.

All the cousins' butts!

I had to get a picture of me for once, I think cousin Anna did a quite good job taking this.

The stone as it is now, barely showing itself above the water.

The view was great in the shading light of a setting sun, so I braved the mosquitoes and sat a while to take a few pictures.

Bad news

I was a bit unsober when I got the news, it didn't dull the impact much though. Kyla, one of the Singaporean girls that came to visit me with Karen a few months ago, has cancer, and a bad one to that. She was the only one of Karen friends that I really connected with, and I'd like to think that we are friends now. We have kept in touch on MSN but the last few weeks I haven't heard from either Karen or her, I didn't think much of it since I have been so busy but when I got the news from Karen today I knew why.

Harry Potter

It's been about a year and a half since I saw the last Harry Potter, Harry Potter and the flaming cup, with Nancy sometime in winter 2005, and I have built my expectations quite high since then. I guess watching with Nancy, the Harry Potter super fan, was a quite good way to get the most if it that time. Going with high expectations is always a bad idea, but what can you do about it? In the end I got disappointed anyway, it was an OK movie, I think not as good as any of the others, even though the girl is kinda cute.

It was fun to see Hellen again though, it's been a while, she has changed her hair, seems like everybody does that now, and nice to see Weina too.

Progress update:

Summer job is going well; I have found more to do and I have learng enough to actually do something, I'm also working on my personal customization for the T650i that I have borrowed and that dad has (so maybe I can get it from before I leave). My mentor has gone on holiday now, so I have no one to support me as closely anymore, hopefully I can handle myself and use the other co-workers instead, I think next week will be quite empty though, more and more people are going on holiday, the Chinese girl, Qian, is still there though, I talk to her from time to time. I haven't gotten enough hours though, I think I have around 38-39 hours per week now as it is, I hope I can catch up with that before I'm done, otherwise there will be less money, I'm just too tired to stay later than 5.30pm every day and I always oversleep in the morning so I don't get there until just before 9am.

The TEFL course is going quite slow, I managed to finish nearly two full modules last weekend, but I'm always too tired in the weekdays to do anything. The job in Chengdu says they have sent me the invitation and the contract now, and I have already bought the flight ticket to Hong Kong but not yet any tickets from Hong Kong to Chengdu, I plan to stay in Hong Kong between the 9th of August until the 13th. I really hope I can get a VISA now, I'm actually a bit worried about that; they say that I need a diploma to get a work visa (I think the Z-VISA) and I don't have that, instead they want me to get a 6 months visitors visa, I have heard that it might be OK to work with that though, but I'm not sure.

Training is going bad, I haven't had time to train at all since I started working, or rather I didn't have energy, at least most of the time. I have lost weight though, I'm not sure but I think I'm under 100kg now at least, I think it's because I changed my eating habits, both eating more regularly and that I don't eat bread in the mornings anymore, I just don't have time to eat anything but müsli. It's good anyway, Nana said I look slimmer when I saw her after she came back from China.

Swimming

When I fetched my laptop the other day I stopped by at my cousins place it was just after dinner so it was too late that day but Gordana (my Aunt) invited me to dinner with them for yesterday. So yesterday I went there again, the food was really nice, some burgers and pasta. After dinner me and Gordana went swimming in their pool, Sandra and Anna (my two little cousins) were too chicken to swim, they both think the water should be over 25 degrees to swim, which is crazy. The water did feel a bit cold at first, despite the 23 degrees it held, but once I had gotten used to it it was really nice.


After the swimming I was about to go home, but we all started to watch a movie, Apocalypto, and I got stuck watching. I have been quite skeptic about that movie before, but it was actually a very positive surprise; the movie was really well done, especially graphically, it was a bit violent though.

A laptop

I finally got my laptop! So much problems with ordering; when I finally had decided which laptop I wanted, a HP 6715b, I found a relatively cheap place from pricerunner, a place called itservice.se, with good reviews and low price, but for some reason, probably because of vacations, they were unable to deliver the computer and it took us over a week to realise that. We finally cancelled the order from there and I ordered a new one from dustinhome in my own name instead, it took about 24 hours for it to arrive and now I have it!

Surprising meeting.

Nothing special this week, I guess I have made more friends at work and so, and I got more to do at work too. I still didn't get enough hours, but my mentor claims that I will get too much to do sooner or later so I'm not worried. I finally managed to understand that I actually got a tax reduction that I had applied for, the decision was kinda hard to get. And I sent in some innovation ideas at work, if they come through I will get some money, but it will probably take a few years.

I had the weirdest encounter this morning on the way to work. I got off the bus at the hospital station to change buses and when I sat down I saw a girl I thought I recognized, a cute Chinese girl sitting with a Chinese boy a bench away from me. I stopped listening to my audio book and tried to see if it was who I thought it was without staring too much, but I didn't really believe it could be her. I know she would be in Sweden now, but I didn't think she would be in Lund, and at that place at that time, and I wasn't too sure how happy she would be to see me.

After a short while I noticed that she was doing the exact same thing I was, half hiding behind her boyfriend she peeked at me, and from that I knew for certain that it was Serena. She is prettier than I remember her actually, and she seemed happy. Her boyfriend is apparently working at Ericsson, in the building just across from mine, but that wasn't why they were there, he didn't take the bus with me there.

It was a brief meeting, just a few minutes talking then I had to catch the bus to work, but I'm glad that I met her anyway. Maybe I should try to contact her on msn or something, Hellen will be back in Lund soon I guess and we used to have some nice dinners, the three of us and Manuel.

Chiayi, Taiwan or Chengdu, China?

Only two days ago I had made up my mind, I sent the email to my correspondent in Chengdu and I said I want the job if they will have me. I got the reply: "Thank you for your reply for our teaching job. I would like to say welcome to chengdu xindian school!". It's not really official yet, but close enough for me to get uncomfortable turning them down now. But today I got a reply from a school in Chiayi, Taiwan. I have been quite interested in going to Taiwan but had given up on the possibility; everybody seems to want to have native speakers with at least a BA and several years of experience.

Chiayi is a much smaller town than Chengdu, about the same size as the third largest city in Sweden, Malmö (that I live quite close to), with around 300 thousand inhabitants, where Chengdu has around 10 million people, quite a big difference. The salary in Chiayi will be higher, but so was the salary in Nanjing and I decided against that anyway.

I think the main issue for me is that I had already in my mind decided on Chengdu, and I have said I will go there. I don't want to risk my integrity either, I should stick to my word, even though its only an Email, shouldn't I?

Depression, and what it can lead to...

I first met her on a winter-afternoon in a Japanese guy's room in Vildanden, I remember it clearly because it was the same afternoon that I met Joyce for the first time, but this is not about Joyce. She was a funny girl, maybe a little bit odd but I couldn't help to like her, free spirited and open. She is the one who taught me my first dirty words in Cantonese, PK or pok guy, and some other things, it might even had been she who taught me to say I love you to Joyce.

I know she was depressed though, never really saw it myself but I have heard. I heard she was interested in someone in Lund, so I was a bit surprised to hear that when she came back to Sweden she went to northern Sweden instead, as far away from here as you can possibly come.

Last I saw of her was when she came back to Sweden, it was winter holiday and she came to Lund to say hi to friend before she went on north to continue her studies, I think it was Umeå she went to but I'm not sure. I remember that night mostly because she came while Kimmy was visiting, and it was even Kimmy that opened the door for her while I was still in bed, and maybe she thought it was something between me and Kimmy despite my relationship with Joyce (there was never anything between Kimmy and me). She wore bulky winter clothes, kinda looked like a tiny black Micheline man, it looked kinda funny. She seemed happy to be back and she gave me a something from Joyce.

I only heard from her once since that, she was coming down to Lund for a friend's wedding, just during the Lundakarneval, but I never had time to see her then, I guess both of us were too bust to meet, Lundakarnevalen is a busy time.

I don't really know why, I guess it had something to do with love, but she was depressed. So depressed that she didn't find any way out. I just hope, no I believe, that she is in a better place now. Lesley died, only a few days ago, suicide.

I'm not sure that it is OK for me to write about this, if anyone thinks so then tell me and I will remove it. But I just wanna say that she was a great girl, unfortunately she didn't agree.

Goodbye Lesley, may the afterlife be kinder to you than this life was, we mourn you and we miss you.

Transformers

Finally managed to get the computer up and running, it has taken a while since I'm only home in the evening and when I'm home I'm really tired after working all day, it's still quite fun though, despite that I've hardly had anything to do all week, mostly just sitting around trying to understand test reports and specifications, doesn't sound very fun but there are other things around it that is fun. I'm borrowing a T650i now, it's good looking and easy to type on, I kinda like it, and I'm doing my own private customisation on it, it least working on it. It might be that I can get dad's before I leave, he has one and doesn't like it that much.

Another reason that I didn't set everything up earlier is that we went to see transformers last night, and even though I was really sceptic, or maybe thanks to it, about it I really ended up liking it. The action was marvelous, and there was loads of fan treats, even the story managed to impress (probably thanks to really low expectations). The only thing I actually missed was the original intro theme, more original theme all together and a bigger Scorponoc and Devastator.


T650i
Transformers

Back in Bjärred

So, now I'm kinda starting to settle in here in my parents house again, I've got too much stuff and too little room though, but the room I have is bigger than my bedroom in Sparta at least. The worst part is that I'll have to get up before 7 (which is like 15-30 minutes before when I got up when I still lived in Sparta) and will still not be at work until 8.30, which I hope is ok. I'll probably stay here almost the whole week anyway, Mats is leaving Lund on Thursday and he offered me to borrow his room in Sparta so I can be somewhat lazy in the mornings, so probably stay there during most weekdays and stay here in Bjärred during the weekends, maybe going to the summer house for a weekend or so too, at least 28th and 29th of June when we will celebrate Ville's birthday (which is on the 23rd).