• It’s just, like, memories.

    Apparently we’re cruising at an altitude of 40 000ft right now. We’re even running a little early. Thanks for the heads up, pilot. Now any chance someone could throw me a box of tissues, or a brown paper bag, because have a look at me. Yeah, that’s me, the pathetic mess in 26F. We just flew out of Sweden, and for the millionth time this week, waterworks. Well instead of replaying every happy memory from the last year in my head, maybe I could get on to part 2 of the Uppsala nostalgia blog. Or maybe I can use my tears to clean my filthy laptop.

    Anyway, my second semester’s “classic” moments, in vaaaaaguely chronological order. Let’s do this.

    • Watching movies til 4 or 5am most nights of the summer, rarely missing the sunrise.
    • Lying around on the grass at the lake with Steve and Lloyd, watching the (stupid, sexy) Swedes. We were the only ones in the shade, the only ones applying sunscreen. Also, the water was fresh. Weeeeeird.
    • Playing classic/obscure tunes out of Lloyd’s window ‘til 4am, then having eggs thrown at us. Highlights included the Imperial March, the Round the Twist theme and the song from the banana ad.
    • Drinking death buckets in Uplands’ beer garden. Trying to ride home afterwards. Failing. Leaning over my bike to vomit on my shoes.
    • Going on a cruise to Tallinn. Watching the kids in the ball pit for far too long. Realising we now feature in the background of a number of parents’ photos of their children, us staring on creepily.
    • Trying to walk up my corridor without slipping over after a gratuitous number of water bombs had been thrown around at Jesper’s birthday.
    • Waking up at 3pm, being incredibly bored, going back to bed at 4pm.
    • Chilling out at the viking mound, in glorious sun. Then spending half an hour walking up and down the aisles of ÖoB. Then coming outside to find the sky was black with clouds and it was pissing down.
    • Going to Julia’s birthday at her house in Tierp. Being incredibly amused at how beautiful, blonde and Swedish everyone, and everything, was.
    • Lloyd’s 21st: drinking the rainbow. Trying to kick in the door of Johannes Grill when I found it was closed. Never being entirely sure if I made it to Snerikes. Rolling around in the grass at Ekonomikum. Worshiping at the porcelain altar until quite late the next day.
    • Realising if I positioned my laptop correctly, I could watch stuff on my laptop from the toilet.
    • Kräftskiva: smashing crayfish, being mistaken for a Swede and watching shooting stars on the roof of building 1.
    • Sitting alone in a park in Gothenburg, drinking cider, enjoying the sun, and resolving to never travel alone again. My god, I’m boring company.
    • Being completely frustrated by the new exchange students. Forcing myself to not be an arsehole.
    • Dancing around in a swimming pool, in glorious sunshine, in the middle of a music festival.
    • Witnessing some of the most incredible sunsets from the roof of my building.
    • Walking out of my first medial anthropology class after half an hour and never coming back.
    • Drunkenly sending Anna an email to say I’d be interested in becoming a club worker.
    • Walking the streets of Uppsala and randomly feeling incredibly content and home.
    • Having the most terrible, tasteless, mind-bogglingly awful, hilarious conversations at Norrlands on Monday nights. These conversations usually featuring Ben.
    • Watching the trees around the field I can see from my room turn red as the days got shorter.
    • Biking into the wind out to Stenhagen and wanting to give up and die because it was so much effort.
    • Screaming so hard during one Flogsta scream I lost my voice for the next two days.
    • My first shift in the bar, pouring beers terribly and being an overall terrible bartender. This hardly changing at all for the duration of the semester.
    • Screaming at the chillblaster, the oven, the veggie burgers and the grill any time I had to run the kitchen.
    • Being hungover at nearly every staff meeting.
    • Yelling “double rainbow” at Alex.
    • Playing Circle of Death at Kalmar sexas at least once a week. Finding out far too much about the club workers. Sharing far too much with the other club workers.
    • Getting awkwardly felt up by Rasmus and Tina. Constantly.
    • Being so bored working Saturday night shifts in the bar I think I set some sort of record for inane texts sent.
    • “Hi! This is Marita from Kalmar Nation calling! I was wondering if you’d be interested in working this week?!”
    • That night we went to Ben’s for dinner, which ended up at Palermo and us talking to some old guy with a dog. Working in the bar the next night and continually having to sprint to the staff toilet to puke every internal organ up. Then staying up all that night so I could be back at Ben’s at 6am for the Grand Final.
    • Getting a random facebook message from some lady to tell me she’d found my wallet next to the forest. Not realising I’d lost my wallet until then.
    • Jorge making me food whenever I was in the Cockholm kitchen, drunk at ungodly hours.
    • Working at the Höstgasque and collectively hating the people who organised it. Drinking ourselves into oblivion immediately afterwards to forget about what a godawful experience it had been. The night ending weirdly.
    • Screaming that I would not stay in Uppsala for another weekend. Boarding a flight to Munich 10 hours later with Cafran and KESLEY.
    • Having at least 10 assignments on the go for many weeks, at least 70% of them overdue.
    • Dancing on stage with Kelsey at Plattenbau.
    • Dropping in to Kalmar pub for a quick drink. Not leaving ‘til after sexa. Rinse, lather, repeat.
    • The 8:5 Corridor Crawl, featuring beer pong and flip cup by strobe light, musical chairs, a light-up fountain and Super Mario on NES.
    • Working the Ostkakegille and having ostkaka rammed into my face and up my nose by everyone’s favourite sexmaster, Alex.
    • Shamelessly singing Runke Ball. Yes, I know what it means.
    • Laying eyes upon the most amazing, Kath & Kim-style tracksuit in an op-shop. Wearing it out for a pub crawl. Being absolutely devastated when I couldn’t fit it in to bring it home.

    Nick modelling The Tracksuit

    • Catching z’s on the couch outside of Anna’s office.
    • The pure, unadulterated joy of making 13 nations on a pub crawl.
    • Being super excited when the Christmas lights went up around town.
    • Screaming underwater in frustration whilst being stuck behind hopeless swimming Swedes at Centralbadet.
    • Drinks at Nick and Anneli’s crazy awesome apartment. Feeling like a proper adult. Sorta.
    • Skipping the line at Stockens with my KK card. Feeling incredibly smug. Not remembering much after that.
    • Tällberg. A weekend best encapsulated by this photo:  
    • Getting super excited when the snow came, then being totally devastated when it melted. Again and again and again.
    • Predrinks using Anneli’s amazing wine glasses (2 glasses = 1 bottle of champagne).
    • 10 minute intense party at Värmlands
    • Hank’s magic.
    • Screaming the words to Helan whenever given the opportunity.
    • Drinking bubbly out of the bottle at Luciagasque.
    • Lloyd and I ending up the only people at Kalmar, unattended and unsupervised in the bar. Our absolute incredulity that this had come to pass. Further shock when this happened again.
    • Total elation whenever I counted the money and had a diff of zero.
    • Dancing to the trashiest music at Stockens and Värmlands and being unable to wipe the idiotic grin off my face.
    • Sleeping through my final presentation for Utopias and Dystopias. Daniel being totally cool with it, and actually dismissing another assignment I had overdue.
    • Hating Sandeep, the worst resource I ever had the misfortune of working with.
    • Standing on my chair at the end of the dinner at the staff party, singing Gamla Klang, and sobbing like a little bitch.
    • One night of bar hopping in real-world Uppsala. Never finding out how much I spent. Never actually wanting to know.
    • Buying fireworks out of the back of a truck.
    • Dragging my couch in front of my desk for the week between Christmas and New Year and spending the whole week incredibly bored and watching movies. 
    • Randomly bursting into tears with increasing frequency as my date of departure drew nearer.
    • Going to a family birthday celebration at Julia’s. So much blonde. So much food. So much lovely.
    • Lying on the bottom of a pile of clubworkers on the Kalmar pub floor, suffocating, but happy. Then travelling around in circles for aaaaages on a scooter.
    • Doing the “WHERE’S THE CHOIR?” dance with Catherine in the changerooms at Weekdays.
    • Trying to convince myself to actually do my assignments for In-between Cultures. Giving up and, instead, opting to attend a bunch of farewell events. Not regretting it. Yet.
    • My mad dash to clean out and leave my room. Heimstaden walking in whilst I was still in the shower. Realising I had no vacuum cleaner or mop. Giving up. Fuck Heimstaden.
    • Walking through Uppsala and being hit by memories at every intersection, every bridge, every major building. Laughing and crying at the same time.

    So I guess I’ll leave it there. As long-winded as it’s been, it’s by no means comprehensive. I wish I could talk about more people, remember more stuff, convey everything better, but I have things to do. Haha, not really, but I have to stop somewhere. It was the most incredible year of my life. I wish I had a dollar for every time I’ve said that since I’ve been back. Shit, I’ve been back a month and I haven’t shut up about it. I’m trying, but I obviously I miss it. I still cry. I still talk about the nations as if everyone should know what I’m talking about. I still act like a 13 year old boy. I’ll be back, Uppsala, but until then, I’ll be over there. By the pool. Quoting Simpsons and texting inanities. 

    2011. Yeah, I guess this sums it up.

    3 months ago