Inauguration of my Dutch friends

Hey guys,

I am in the bus now, on the way back to home, Jönköping home. I just had an exciting weekend at Goteborg and instead of sleeping I decided giving an update on my life.

During the kick-off 8 months ago, I met David (Swedish) and we pinky-sweared that I would come to his place in Goteborg to visit him. The last 8 months that didn’t work out very well, but I guess I was waiting till the right moment. Celebrating Easter with a Swedish family, the Swedish way, what more is there to learn about the Swedish culture? On Saturday he picked me up from the station and we ended up 77 metres high in a luxurious restaurant eating probably the most expensive salad I have ever had in my life. The view was stunning but also jealous making because we had sight to another tower which facilitated an infinity swimming pool on the 23th floor. After the sightseeing we went to his house, met his mother and went together to another family to have an Easter dinner. This resulted in once again explaining the difference between The Netherlands, Holland and Dutch, but overall this was a really good experience. As being in a new city comes included with a night out, we went to the city afterwards for some drinks. Unfortunately we didn’t realize the change of time to summertime so at the end we missed out on the last nightclub that was on our list. This morning, we woke up fresh with some Easter eggs and went sightseeing in the city. Instead of Copenhagen’s mermaid, Goteborg has a red stone. Just so you know.

Let me also give you a flashback to last week. Two Dutch friends (Boi & Niels) came to visit me. After a tiring trip, right Boi? I picked them up on Friday and the first activity was the Dutch Culture Day. After this we went to the Systembolaget to get their first 7,2% beers, prepared ourselves for the night by drinking the beers and had a small house party at my place. Unfortunately, this weekend was in the middle of the exam period. On Saturday we went to IKEA to mind blow my friends with the fact that if you order free water, you can still take coke sneakily. On Sunday we went to the city to see PSV – Ajax. At the end we ended up watching this in Sockertoppen, because the bar owners thought that ice hockey was more interesting. After the match we went to the weekly Bishop’s arms where we got great burgers, right Niels? The rest of the night started with FIFA shots and ended up at Carl’s birthday. What happened in between is better not to be described here. Trying to prank my roommates and Niels being the one pranked is completely explaining the saying “Wie een gat graaft voor een ander valt er zelf in.” On Monday we went to the stadsparken before we ended up playing Black Jack at O’Leary’s. Or better said sponsoring the casino. The idea was to have one more cosy dinner, which ended up with 3 hamburgers at McDonald’s each. One hour later we were sitting at Bada Bing, eating more hamburgers. On Tuesday we cleaned all the mess, my friends left and it was time for getting my life back on track. My liver really deserved a good holiday. The FREEDOM we had the last 5 days was really good and I am glad to have spent some time with my friends again.

Besides these 2 memorisable experiences, there was another buddy activity called “The Prison Island” which I joined. This ended up in teams of 4 running around 2 hallways with doors on each side. Each of these doors could be opened and within the doors there was an activity, which was either physical, tactical or empirical. The goal was doing these activities as good as possible and beat the other teams. My expectations of this day were already really high, but it definitely reached the expectations. At the end we didn’t win unfortunately, but we definitely won in having a good time.

These last couple of weeks I met many cool people and for the last 2 months I have some really awesome activities marked on my schedule. So I am definitely looking forward to making the most of this experience before I am heading home again.

Ciao!