My trip to Norway was really cool! (As I mentioned earlier.) I got to stay for with Tilly (my friend from Norway, who I met when she stayed with our family for an exchange program)and her family on their farm in Sveio, which is about half an hour from Haugesund, the nearest larger town.
I got to see baby lambs being born (two sets of triplets! And one of them was named after me!), take Tilly's sister's dog, Tinka out for walks (I am dog-starved), and play this funny card game called Munchkin (it's American; anyone heard of it?). I also got to meet the entire awesome Rossehaug family, and eat delicious home-cooked meals for the first time since Christmas. What more could I ask for?

Unfortunately, I cannot post pics of Norway for the time being, since my digital camera is broken and I had to use a stupid disposable one. So once I use up the roll of film and get it developed...you will see some pics! And yes Tilly, I will definitely find a way to share them with you. Is over the internet good?

Pics from the earlier Eurotrip will be posted soon, I swear! (I actually posted most of the good ones on Facebook already, but I'll still post some up here for the fam.)

It is sunny and warm-ish outside, and I have so many productive things I could be doing, such as planning my schedule for next semester, which starts in exactly a week, or getting exercise...but no. It is 2pm, I am still in my pajamas, and I am looking at pictures on Facebook as well as reading my friends' blogs.
WHY, internet? Sometimes I think I'd get about 5x as much stuff done if i had no internet connection in my room.

But I am back from a great trip to Norway! And I will post more info and other random news/pictures when I am feeling less lazy!

Ah, my sister, the born entertainer. Or strange child, depending on how you look at it.



(Video shot by her best friend, Danielle.)

And I triumphantly return to blogger yet again, after three weeks of harrowing adventure.
Do I have to sum up the trip? Ok, I'll try in a very lazy, brief way:
[Later note: Ok, maybe it's not so brief.]

Cammy arrives March 10: Woo hoo! Haven't seen her for 8 months!! Show her around Goettingen for a few days, despite the huge snow fall that is perfectly timed for the day before we leave.

Berlin: Lug our suitcases through the snow all the way to the train station, get to Berlin in the afternoon (it's only 2 hours away). Cold, cold weather and snow. First evening, visit the aquarium with big fish! And crocodiles! Second day, really depressing but interesting self-guided tour along the old Berlin wall. (Thanks for the guidebook, Dylan, we used it like crazy on this trip!) Met the most OBNOXIOUS Canadian girls in our hostel room--Cammy and I were definitely proud to be Americans in comparison.

Prague: Still really cold, crappy weather. Took a bus and walking tour, which was pretty cool, but full of old people who walked really slow, so we basically froze during the walking part, since we had to go so slooowwwly! Found an awesome all-vegetarian restaurant that night, then went out to a bar afterwards that had great live jazz (traditional stuff).

Bratislava: Decided to go to this city at the last minute, since it's between Prague and Budapest, in the country of Slovakia. A very tiny city in comparison to Prague and Berlin; you can walk everywhere. But a very cozy, friendly feeling. The sun came out for the first time, even though it was still chilly! We went to lots of random little museums to pass the time: a clock museum, a really tiny art museum, a weaponry museum with a lookout area (that was the best part). On St. Patrick's day, we went to the Irish Pub in Bratislava and ran into a group of about 30 Irish guys having a stag party for one of their friends. It was fun until they wouldn't let us leave...luckily they were the typical skinny, harmless Irish guys. No match for us!

Budapest: My favorite city on our solo trip (before we joined the tour). Sunny, warm, SO MUCH TO DO! We ended up staying 4 nights, since we had so much we wanted to fit in. Tours of caves, thermal baths, Communist museum, wine tasting...it was definitely a great city. Found another awesome vegetarian restaurant on our last night there. Badly-translated English was also fun to look for. Our favorite item on a menu was "poppyseed dumps."

Turkey: Too much to describe! We stayed in Izmir by ourselves, then travelled to Kusadasi where we met the tour that Cammy's dad was on, then traveled to Antalya and finally Istanbul, all within nine days. SUCH an awesome place. If you stay near the coast the weather feels like Hawaii, but obviously with a totally different culture, with Mosques everywhere and bazaars and men yelling at you all the time, since it's obvious anywhere you go that you're a tourist. Cammy's dad got married to his fiancee, Kathy, at the Temple of Artemis, which is one of the seven wonders of the world! A very pretty and small ceremony. And we saw a total solar eclipse! It was SO COOL! But pretty much one of those things that you don't understand how cool it is until you see one yourself. I definitely have to see another one before I die!

And that's the trip in a nutshell! Got up at 5am to fly out of Istanbul into Frankfurt yesterday morning, and now here I am! School starts on the 18th (I LOVE vacation time in Europe), so I will actually be heading to Norway for five days pretty soon! But if it makes people feel any better, I won't really have any money left when I get back!

I will try to post pics--but I have so many, it's gonna be hard to narrow them down!

Ok, quick update: Cammy is here!! Since yesterday, when she got in at the crack of 8:30 am. It's been great seeing her, as usual. But tomorrow we are off for quite a trip: Berlin, Prague, Budapest, perhaps Croatia, and then Turkey!

Wish us luck! Hopefully no lost wallets, tickets, or broken bones! Should be fun!!!!

Things seem to be going a bit slow in Chile....
A conversation with Dylan:

BuckoGal (10:24 PM): so have you heard any new music recently?
BuckoGal (10:24 PM): or any news in general?
Macho Man110973 (10:25 PM): nothing significant
Macho Man110973 (10:25 PM): but I found this cool looking nut on the street today and I was just trying to open it by cracking it underneath the leg of my chair
Macho Man110973 (10:26 PM): but instead of opening it, the pressure flung it across the room and under my bed somewhere
Macho Man110973 (10:26 PM): it was kinda cool

Just wanted to share! Who knew that back in the day Brad Pitt could have easily passed for a woman? I think it's mostly because of the shirt.

Good times last night. Biked in really heavy snow with my friend Keinst to Cartoon, a restaurant that has 3-euro pasta dishes on Sunday nights. We met up with Eileen there, and by coincidence also met up with friends Steven and Tim. We sat at the restaurant until about 10:30, and then went outside to see a pretty good layer of fresh snow covering everything. Steven made a little snowman (which a drunk guy later knocked over, lol), and Tim and Eileen made a big snowman, except it ended up being a snow-monkey, due to the simian facial features.
We then played a rousing game of snow dodgeball, and then walked up into the pretty park behind us, attempting to throw snowballs into the lake below.
I think this is the first time I've actually "played" in the snow since coming to Germany--it was a lot of fun! The only part that sucked was biking back with wet gloves...I seriously started wondering how long it took for frostbite to set in because my fingers hurt so much!

Four jobs I've had
1. intern at Epson
2. karate instructor
3. pet-sitter
4. Epson intern...again!

Four movies I can watch over and over
1. Strictly Ballroom
2. Moulin Rouge
3. The Best of Will Ferrell
4. Conan's 10th Anniversary Special (yeah, the last two aren't tech. movies)

Four places I've lived
1. Monrovia
2. Davis
3. Germany
4. Japan

Four TV shows I love(d)
1. Buffy
2. Six Feet Under
3. Inspector Gadget
4. Looney Tunes

Four highly regarded and recommended TV shows that I've never watched a single minute of
1. Lost
2. West Wing
3. I don't know what else is highly regarded! I don't think the O.C. or Laguna Beach is....

Four places I've vacationed
1. Hawaii
2. Montana
3. Thailand
4. Vancouver

Four of my favorite dishes
1. pad thai
2. anything Indian
3. bean and cheese burrito from Food Time (I really miss cheap Mexican food)
4. Artichokes!

Four sites I visit daily
1. My blog (what a narcissist)
2. facebook
3. most of my friends' blogs
4. Candy Cane children (woo White Stripes!)

Four places I'd rather be right now
1. Southern Italy
2. Turkey with Cammy
3. Hawaii
4. Monrovia (But just to see my fambly)

So it was fun twice. Three times. Maybe even a fourth time. But now, I have to admit it, I am getting a little sick of this snow! It's predicted all this week for Göttingen. And it sucks, because it's enough to make me want to stay inside, but not enough to be exciting anymore. It's usually just enough to be slushy and slippery for a few days.

It looked like this at about 2pm:


Then I look out the window again at 3pm:


Pretty, yes. But a pain in the butt, haha. The Russian guy on my floor asked me if I thought I'd ever like to come back to Germany after I finish school. Bad time to ask. I just don't think I could handle these winters EVERY YEAR! But I might change my mind after a year back in CA. Who knows?

I am SO bored. All I do is eat, sleep, and watch movies or Six Feet Under. And I'm almost done with season 3, and they don't have season 4 or 5 at the video store here! What will I do?!

Pictures from Rome! (In very un-chronological order!)

The Colosseum at night

Me and Viv in our hostel--it actually looks kind of cozy in this picture!

A "gladiator" talking to a policeman

Pompei: weak attempt to climb the ruins

Pompei: We thought the holes were toilets. We later figured out they were cooking areas.

A park in the area.

The Fontana di Trevi--the first day of (warm!) sunshine made it look really pretty

Hope ya'll like!

I am back from Rome! It was a good trip, barring a few small problems (super-crappy hostel, my friend Jen's wallet getting stolen on the last night we were there).
We were there for seven days, so we basically had enough time to see everything we wanted to, as well as make a day trip down to Napoli and see Pompei, which is about 2 hours away from Rome. Before I left, I really only had heard about the Colosseum and the Fontana di Trevi (the big famous fountain--didn't know what it was called until I got there). So it was really cool to find out about all of these other famous, amazing things! Like Vatican City! Totally forgot that was in Rome. . . oops. I guess it's ok since I'm not Catholic, right?
Photos will be posted soon!

In other news, I watched TWO movies yesterday (already making great use of my time back): Cry Baby and When Harry Met Sally. Let's just say that I understand why I'd never heard of Cry Baby, despite the fact that Johnny Depp is in it--it's a really lame, low-budget spoof of Grease. But When Harry Met Sally was great--it's one of those rare examples of films that are so famous and hyped up, yet still really funny and well-done! Glad I finally saw it, and I recommend it to anyone who hasn't seen it yet.

Note: If you want to see some pics from Amsterdam, check out my photo album on Facebook!
I'm off to Rome--catch ya later!

I am in love with Mutts, so here's a pic for the day:

Happy Valentine's Day to everyone!

ps-I just wanted to thank everyone for the birthday wishes! I got so many on facebook, it was overwhelming! I mean, it's facebook, but it still makes me feel special, what can I say? I went out to dinner with a small group of people for my actual birthday, which was delicious, and then Janelle and Vivian made even more tasty brownies for me.

I have great friends!

I am a new fan of the author Tom Robbins. I just finished my first book by him, Jitterbug Perfume, and I really liked it. He writes in a very descriptive, yet totally unromantic, un-cheesy style, and I often feel the need to underline random sentences in his book. The opening lines, for example:

"The beet is the most intense of vegetables. The radish, admittedly, is more feverish, but the fire of the radish is a cold fire, the fire of discontent not of passion. Tomatoes are lusty enough, yet there runs through tomatoes an undercurrent of frivolity. Beets are deadly serious. "

As you can tell, Robbins has a very random, unique writing style. I highly recommend his book!

ps-I'm 21 today! But it's not such a big deal, since the drinking age in Germany is basically 10 years old.

I'm back from Amsterdam! It was a lot of fun--the city is gorgeous, the people all speak perfect English and are very personable, they have bikes EVERYWHERE (go Davis!), beautiful old buildings, and canals! The canals were the best part--very European!

We saw the Van Gogh Museum, the Rijksmuseum (prounounced somewhat like "Rykes" museum--it's the national museum of the Netherlands), Anne Frank's house (a really good museum, btw), the Heineken "Experience" (basically a huge ad for the company, but quite entertaining), and on the last day we fed CRAZY seagulls at Vondelpark, a big park on the outskirts of the city!

The only bad thing about the trip? I got really used to speaking English for some reason...so even though it was only 4 days long, I came back and today said "Thank you" to someone working at a store! Of course I wanted to hit myself--I don't think I've ever done that yet, since "danke" is freakin' the easiest word ever to remember, and you use it all the time! But whatever--I'm going to Rome in a couple days, so the German's gonna be pushed even further back in my brain!

I'll post some pics from amsterdam soon!

Random stuff

I have found an actual use for the beer "stein" stolen from Oktobefest!

Glorius, no?

And then I got a birthday card from my family today (they're on the ball!), a card they apparently bought while visiting me in Germany. I had to laugh at my dad's usual pseudo-German. This is probably funny to anyone who knows even a little German!

MY FINALS ARE DONE!!!

Party tonight to say goodbye to all the "Ami" kids who are going back home, and to celebrate the end of the semester! Yay!
Monday: Amsterdam!

Is this cool or what? I can totally see my cousin Mason growing up into someone who looks like (or is as talented and cool as) Beck! I noticed the resemblance between them today: