Emmasofie

Hanging out of a plane at 10 000 feet

2006-05-08T08:45:00.000+09:30

Imagine hanging out of a small rusty plane at 10 000 feet with only a few straps attached to a person behind you keeping you from falling out. Picture the beautiful Australian coastline that distracted you on the way up now almost hidden under white clouds. It’s cold and extremely windy, like when you open the front door in the middle of winter and a window is also open. You’re trying to focus on the instructions that have been given to you 10 times in the past hour - was it “bend your back like a banana” he told us to do? You can’t hear a thing, but suddenly the person attached to those straps quickly counts to three by leaning forward three times. You fall…

I went skydiving the other week. Hadn’t planned it but as a few of the people I was travelling with wanted to do it I thought; why not?

It was an amazing feeling. The reason it’s hard to describe is that it’s so unreal! In one way it would be scarier to jump from a 20 floor building, at 10 000 feet it’s too far up for you to realize that it’s the ground you’re seeing down there. There were really three stages of the whole thing:

First, the second I fell out of the plane made my stomach move a few inches up! (And yes, as you can see from the picture I did scream).Then there were the 45 seconds of free fall – which felt like a few minutes! It was still a thrilling feeling but nothing close to when I fell out. After that, when the parachute was released it was just beautiful! It was less cold and windy; I could take the goggles of and really enjoy the view. I felt as relaxed as after a spa massage and just enjoyed, probably because my body compared this feeling with the thrill I had just experienced. The instructor let me steer the parachute which was awesome, you can make it turned around in circles with just pulling one of the strings! The landing went well and for a good half-hour afterwards my body was just hyper alert with adrenaline!

Amazing feeling!

Finally I meet a kangaroo!

2006-05-07T10:03:00.000+09:30

Each time I’ve been out in the countryside I’ve been disappointed at not seeing any kangaroos, or at least any alive ones. People have told me it’s usually hard to avoid them! But on my last trip to the Blue Mountains I really made up for what I’ve missed. We found a very friendly kangaroo
who even let me pat him!

Playing Holi in Sydney

2006-04-13T15:38:00.000+09:30

I played Holi the other day. Holi, or Holikotsava, the Hindi festival of colors, was celebrated in a park in Sydney. In our group only I and my Czech friend Alenka had enough courage (or disposable clothes) to enter the fenced square in which the game was played. For those who don’t know, and can’t tell form the picture playing Holi consist of throwing colored powder at each other! But the real fun began when walking back through the city and several people couldn’t help but ask what was going on. Well, at least we managed to enlighten a few Sydney-siders who might join the festival next year.

Happy Easter!

2006-04-05T16:04:00.000+09:30

It’s been a while… but as my first thesis is handed in and am handing over to my successor at work – I thought I’d update my blog!

Summer is getting to an end in Sydney and at home I hear the longest winter ever (at least according to my grandmother) is about to end. So what better way to celebrate these changes of season, and my birthday, than with a visit to the -5 experience Ice Bar! It was a strange feeling to breathe the fresh air and pull your fingers to the centre of the gloves to keep them from freezing. And yes, they did give us gloves – and coats and boots! The experience was also preceded with rigorous security measures and instructions. To avoid not freezing to death in the extreme temperature of minus 5, we were also given a timer to hang around our neck. It beeped after 30 minutes and you had to get out!

As I was about to stop feeling my hands I put down my made-of-ice glass with the sweet complimentary vodka drink on an ice sculpture of the Opera House (see picture). From there I could look out the window at the busy Circular Quay with people still drinking beer in shorts and sandals. I realized then that 30 minutes of winter every now and then is just enough to keep me from missing the Swedish winter too much.

Take Care!

Great Ocean Road

2006-02-02T10:08:00.000+10:30

Started of from Melbourne early in the morning in our rental car. We were told that one day was too little but insisted we’d be back in Melbourne that same night. We were all amazed by the view from the famous road and took pictures of road signs, trees, waives and surfers. If we had known what was waiting for us ‘at the end of the great ocean road’ we would definitely have saved the photos. Had fish for lunch in a very beautiful fishing village, went inland to a rainforest (took two pictures and went on) and went to the lighthouse at the most southern point of mainland Australia. The view of the 12 Apostles, which are the main attraction, was beautiful! I have to say thought that less famous sights like the Loch Ard Gorge, the London Bridge and the Arch were more impressive than the 12 apostles (you have to use your imagination to find 12 by the way). We made it to the London bridge (part of it appropriately collapsed in 1990) on time to see it during sunset which was amazing!

It was a truly overwhelming day but of all the things I saw I have to say the Loch Ard Gorge was the best!
It’s a 100x100 hole between the orange cliffs with a beach in it. The only entrance of water is a few meters only and still the waves were extremely high and smashing against the cliffs. It really looks like a beach from ‘the beach. The Gorge got its name from a ship (the Loch Ard) that cashed into the cliffs in 1879. Only 2 people survived by escaped into the Gorge. Of course, by the time we reached there both our cameras were out of battery…

Melbourne & Australian Open

2006-02-01T15:56:00.000+10:30

I finally went to Melbourne last weekend. Beautiful! Coming from Sydney it felt a bit like Milan compared to Rome, more stylish and innovative but with some of Rome’s atmosphere. Definitely very different from Sydney.

Got tickets for the Australian Open Women’s Final after a dodgy bidding session on e-bay. We were unlucky, in a double sense. First, none of the interesting players (that I know) made it to the final (Williams, Hingis, Sharapova). Then the final was cut short by Henin-Hardenne’s walkover. Luckily we could stay and watch the men’s double final witch turned out to be a good game with Leander Paes stealing the show from the Bryan brothers, even though they won the game. Between the games I was keeping busy getting as much free sponsor stuff as possible, highlight was a free facial and a bag full of goodies from Garnier!

Take care!

Me and my body board

2006-01-25T10:53:00.000+10:30

This weekend, while celebrating my 6 month in Sydney (actually I didn’t remember it was 6 months at the time, but now it makes sense) I realized I’m missing out on a huge thing about life in Australia. I haven’t really got into the surf and beach culture and taken full advantage of living close to a few of the most famous beaches in the world!

So this Sunday, on my way to one of them – Bondi Beach - I decided to buy a body board. It could be described as half a surfing board, some claim it gives you half the experience as well, I thought; it must be twice as easy to learn! When I had picked a nice blue and while one with a shark on it, I went down to try it out. I decided to observe someone who knew how to do it and was astonished by a guy on a purple board who caught waves 150 m out and rode the diagonally all the way to the shore – looked easy enough!

My difficulties started when I tried to get on the board. After several attempts all I had accomplished was scrubs on my knee and stomach from getting thrown against the shore. I finally managed to master peddling my way out from the shore and ‘getting past by’ a few waves - I couldn't say I was close to 'catching them'.

But as the Swedes say: ‘Shame to the one who gives up’. We will be out there next weekend again, me and my body board!

Cheers

New Job!

2006-01-06T08:39:00.000+10:30

I started a new job with Ingram Micro the week before Christmas. I was initially supposed to temporarily support their understaffed team managing the Cisco Systems account. However, it seems the last guy doing my job, who they had to fire, really didn’t leave much for me to live up to so they have offered me to stay for the 6 months I’m in Australia.

So far it has been great! My first week I was taken to a restaurant on the beach for a 3 hour lunch (still having a hard time adjusting to drinking beer during office hours). Friday the same week, we had beer in the office and all decided to leave early. But people are very nice and it’s a good, not to exhausting job to have while I write my thesis.

Cheers

Christmas on the beach!

2005-12-28T15:41:00.000+10:30

This was my first Christmas away from home. The very thought of celebrating it in the middle of summer was bad at first but turned out to be great! Instead of trying to make it as much as home as possible I accepted the fact that I wouldn't even be able to complain about too little snow or even rain and instead decided to celebrate it on the beach!

A few of us rented a cottage in Jervis Bay on the South Coast of Sydney. The day we left it was 38 degrees and there was for sure no danger of icy roads! We ended up having a great BBQ on Christmas Day and spent the weekend on what according to the tourist brochures is the beach with the whitest sand in the world! I thought I'd bring some Swedish Christmas food along but in the company of vegetarians and non-pork eaters our christmas cuisine offers little more than Glögg and Pepparkakor (Glüwine and Gingerbread), which was what I brought (thank you IKEA).

Allthough I missed my family a lot and ended up spending a fortune calling them just to hear the traditional Christmas Eve TV show etc., I had a beautiful Christmas with some of my closest friends!

God Jul!

From student to Holiday-maker/temp!

2005-12-01T14:40:00.000+10:30

Finally my exams are over!

Studying in Australia has been quite different from my time in Uppsala with 4 exams in 5 days and assignment deadlines in between. Somehow it all worked out though. Now, when I've had my according to me well deserved day in track pants watching TV series and the appropriate 4 days of partying, I kind of miss it. I miss going to the international strategy class and listen to the eccentric lecturer give his opinions and view on all world events something unacceptable of in a Swedish university. I miss bitching to my friends about my sometimes-dysfunctionall study groups. It's been amazing though to do projects with students from China, Indonesia, Colombia, Malaysia, India, Germany, Australia, Hong Kong, Finland, France and Turkey. Trying to deliver on assignments and do presentations in groups with people with 10 years of experience in corporate finance to recent graduates has been more challenging than I thought and also much more fun!
After having been away from University studies for almost 2 years I expected studying at Masters level would be difficult. I have to say though I found myself quite at home with it. I loved the cases anassignments and the fact that people had more to contribute with! I really felt I could relate to what I was studying. I knew the past couple of years would prove useful but not that it would give me such an advantage.
On top of that I've had Chinese sweets, been to a real Aussie suburb home and got a private lesson in chopstick-eating! But now I'm a happy holiday-maker/temp in Sydney with summer officially starting today - life could be worse!

Kram
Emma

PS: Also, can you imagine, the lecturer in my management class was
Hugo Weaving aka Agent Smith!!!('s brother Simon Weaving). Cool huh?

Moths and flipchart boards in Warwick!

2005-10-10T15:40:00.000+09:30

A few months ago I was asked to be the chairman of an AIESEC Conference here in Australia. I was happy to accept since it was during my mid-term break and I had nothing to do (read no money to travel). I also felt it would be nice to get back into an AIESEC environment after having been away from it since June.

I travelled to Brisbane with part of the National Team, 3 days before the conference was to start. Had the pre-meeting in Mei's parents' house, which was great. Imagine having wonderful food every day, sleeping in proper beds and going for swims in the pool in the middle of session run-through. It was the most relaxed pre-meeting I've ever had and I was actually rested when the conference started! Travelled to the site the night before with a few people. I realised we were in the middle of nowhere when my mobile reception disappeared! We reached the site, a family owned lodge outside Warwick with cows and other animals around it. The cows were fine, but it took a while to get used to the insects and having moths flying around your bed and joining you in the washroom. Spent the rest of the conference looking for Kangaroos around the property, everyone else (who didn't really care) seemed to spot them but I was very disappointed to go home without having met one.

My objectives with going were to have fun, get to know the country and contribute with my experience.
The fun was for sure a tick! Had some good parties and great conversations with cool people. Introduced Nordic Circle which immediately became a hit a soon people were doing it with beer bottles :). The Swedish Little Frogs' dance also went down well allthough the I'm not sure what the owner who happened to walk by in the middle of the flog moves thought. I understood so much more about the country, like the culture in Queensland, why Canberra is located where it is, that beer is cheap in South Australia and how Australian's have fun and how they work (not necessarily separated). The best thing about the conference was the chance I was given to contribute. I guess I knew quite a lot about AIESEC Australia from having Lauren on my team (thanks looser) and I was happy to see open and eager to learn the new Local Presidents were. I had great discussion about how to develop a Local Committee from scratch, how to build an LC culture for success and TN marketing - I think I told the Uppsala story 5 times! It was wonderful to see the incoming LCPs fears, hear their expectations and maybe be able to help them out in some way! I felt like I could do more for these LCPs in 5 days than I could in a year as MCP!

What was different from the chairing experiences I had while I was active and why I am really happy I went, was that I realize again how great it feels to be able to contribute!

...My final revelation; like construction workers can fall, police officers get shot, I personally experiences what I think could be the occupational hazard of AIESECers when I had the flipchart board fall on me during a line dance!

Emma

First second impressions...

2005-09-22T14:49:00.000+09:30

It was the second time I visited India and I was wondering if my impressions would be different this time. There were a few immediate differences from when I last visited in February 2004; the heat and humidity! Lets just say that I won't be visiting the steam sauna in my gym again until I get really miss Delhi. I went by car to Agra and I wastravelingg with an Indian and British guy. I was happy that I wasn't the onlyfreak-showw in the car and that the truck drivers we passed starred as much at Adam as at me. But I starred back. When the sun rose it was just beautiful! I should have been tired after the flight but there was so much to look at! From truck drivers sleeping on top of their moving trucks to the cafes along the highway to a man to my great disappointment had caught bear Baloo from The Jungle Book and was leading him around to show him to the passing cars.
It was strange being at IC. It hasn't been long since I left AIESEC and although I thought I was still in the "ccatching up on sleep face" and haven't really started reflecting on the past few years, it felt surprisingly distant. But the people were the same and it was great seeing many old friends! Emma and the rest of the Swedish delegating had all taken terms being siexceptxept Amit I guess who could handle the water etc. I got "the disease" it was generally referred to that same night. Great sharing a bottle of Aussie wine with you guys while trying to dress Maria, Joanna and Em in Saris :)
The day after Rajat and I left on a 15 hbus rideride to Manali in the Himalayas to visit his sister. It was a very comfortable bus though, referred to as "the Volvo buss". Aftravelingling the whole night and stopping several times along the road I had amazed myself by my ability to find and use very different facilities when really in need! I woke up at around 6am just to see nothing but a hundredered meters of void outside the buss window and then an amazing canyon filled with green water! It was amazingly beautiful and I again couldn't stop looking at it! Manali is a small town at about 2000m where many backpackers end up. The villages around it are filled with apple trees and happy looking people and when I asked it was confirmed that the 2 main sources of income up here were apples and marijuana, whapparentlyntly have won prices for it's quality in Amsterdam! We spend three days walking around in the mountains, buyhempampa shoes and eating great food! Rajat's sister even tried to teach me how to cook Indian! On bus rideride backstomachache problems deterioratedaded and without revealing too much, the stops seemed even further apart this time...
Back in Delhi we spent the rest of the week meeting friends, shopping (I must say I was much better at bargaining and saying no than last time) and chilling out in cafes. I was very happy I managed to meet my friend Blah who did a traineeship in Stockholm a few years back! (See, I am updating by Blog!).
On our way back we had a 12 hour stopover in Singapore which pretty much cured me for any shopping crave I had left in my body! It really felt weird going from one vforeigneign country to another in just a few hours and at the end of the trip coming back "home" to Sydney!

Going to India!

2005-09-22T14:41:00.000+09:30

My friends here in Sydney probably thought the worse was over after I had changed my mind the 7th time and finally decided to go to India. But that was just the start of it. First it was the visa. For some reason one of the ladies in the Indian consulate in Sydney didn’t like me much, not that embassy and consulate people are supposed to like you but this lady really didn’t want to grant me the visa, which they are supposed to do. I got my first culture shook even before I left Sydney when I was trying to deal with her. I was told that I should be very persistent, cry if necessary but make sure I didn’t offend her. I wasn’t very successful and I left the consulate crying twice. That hasn’t happened since my fights with Italian bureaucracy in Rome. I realized I have a great disadvantage having grown up in Sweden, I’m not used to fighting with officials and playing by their rules to get things done. We really need to toughen up! At the end I had to play it their way and got people from left to right to write letters of urgency and even found a friend of a friend who knew the consular. So I was on my way – I though! But just to make things a bit more exciting my visa card stopped working when I was supposed to pay for the ticket! Somehow that was all sorted out and I could finally enjoy the Singapore Airlines personal entertainment system on my way to Delhi! When the baggage belt at the airport in Delhi had stopped moving and my backpack was still nowhere in sight I can’t say I was surprised. A friendly girl helped me locate though and I WAS IN INDIA!

Sporty Emma - part cricket!

2005-09-17T18:25:00.000+09:30

I once saw my British cousin return from a cricket match and remember two things: how funny he looked in those white clothes and the fact that I couldn’t understand anything about this game! I admit I have made fun of the game and teased my friends from cricket playing countries with remarks like “it’s not really a sport right” and through comparing cricket with a backyard social game.

I guess I’m not the only one they have heard this from and as true cricket crusaders a few friends from India and Australia decided to make an attempt to convert a few of us infidels – we were going to learn how to play cricket in the park!

A happy group of youngsters from Australia, India, Denmark, Turkey, South Africa and Sweden headed out for the Domain, a park in central Sydney. After overcoming small challenges like the guy bringing the cricket bat not showing up and some of us ending up in the wrong park, we finally got started with the game. We had two sets of rules; “the people who know how to play” i.e. the Indians and Australians had to throw the ball the correct way with a stretched arm while the rest of us, “the people who don’t how to play” could throw it any way we liked, and so on.

It was a beautiful day and we had so much fun! We played for a good 2 hours, with beers at stake! We took a break for the loosing team to buy beer for the others and then played another game! “The people who didn’t know how to play” were ecstatic whenever we managed to hit a ball and “The people who knew how to play” did their best to encourage us!

The biggest surprise came the day after though. All of us, first time players as well as the cricket crusaders, who hadn’t played in years, had trouble getting out of bed! While we complained about our sore muscles and hurting backs one thing was clear: we would never call cricket a backyard social game again!

Sporty Emma part 1

2005-08-30T14:55:00.000+09:30

As they say; When in Rome...
And when in Australia - do sports! Or at least talk about it! (Which is what I'm just about to do)

The other week I ran my first official, (i.e. not school) race! It was the annual City2surf race when approximately 70 000 gather in the streets of Sydney! It's a 15km long race from the centre of Sydney to the famous Bondi beach!

I was supposed to run with Selim from Turkey but after weeks of preparations on the morning of the race he was nowhere to be found. I instead hooked up with 4 Scandinavian Girls. 2 of the them had done triathlon and run races like this before so I decided to try to keep up with them.

It was a beautiful day, about 20 degrees and sunny, the scenary from the road we took was absolutely amazing! The most amazing thing with the whole day was the atmosphere though. It was so Aussie! Bands were playing in the parking lots and in some of the back yeards we passed the families had taken out the water hose and watered the hot runners passing by. 2 men in their 50s (!) had brought water pistols and stood on their balcony aiming at slow runners - hilarious!

Had been running quite a bit before the race and felt in good shape. Competitive as I am and with Rajat's comment of "if you don't run under 90 min, don't bother coming home :) ) in the back of my mind, I wanted to finish the race in less than 100 min. That way you are guaranteed not to be put in the "back of the pack" group next year! When we passed the 12 km sign we decided to go for it and sprinted the last 3 km! We made it on 85 minutes!!! Which officially was 96 since we didn't want to count the 10 minutes in the start it was too crowded to move!

We had a great time and aer now thinking about the Harbor Bridge Marathon (half-marathon to start with)

Emma

Making friends

2005-08-15T10:53:00.000+09:30

Apart from the obligatory childhood situations in kindergarten and school when forced to make new friends I have only found myself in that scary position twice. The first time when I at 19 went to Rome without knowing anyone or the language for that matter, the second time when starting university in Uppsala. Both times it worked out well somehow and I ended up with life-long friends! Still I was far from confident when I first went to University here in Sydney.

The orientation day was my first test. I went there alone, on time and dressed as I would at Ekonomikum (the Business faculty) in Uppsala. First thing I realized; everyone else went there with their friends from their home university or other fellow dorm mates/ countrymen. Second, being on time, especially when you're alone makes the time you have to introduce yourself to groups of people longer. Third, if what students at Macquarie wear on campus is casual the Ekonomikum outfit would be good enough for a cocktail party! Anyways, I could always rely on my conversational skills and wit, right? Well, after 25 minutes of trying to find someone to sit with I entered the plenary and sat down next to two girls. I introduced myself as Emma from Sweden. They were Gina from Minnesota and L-something from Penny (Pennsylvania). I know if was bad but I just couldn't resist the comment "oh, that's in the US right?". That kind of was the end of our conversation. At lunch I made another attempt now with two great opening lines about the weather and food in my back pocket. I met a Swedish guy whom I could discuss both subjects with for a good 15 minutes (including a few for other nationalities sometimes awkward moment of silence). After that I made friends with some Danish and Finnish students as well, I couldn't help but wondering whether I had given people from different nationalities a chance. Although this orientation session was for Scandinavians and North Americans only there were probably people from close to 52 non-Scandinavian states there...

Since then I have made friends with a few more people, some students from Germany, 3 Danish girls, an Ecuadorian guy- even a few Australians! The person I have got closest to is a Swedish girl called Golala, originally from Iran. She's had a very unfortunate start of her experience though. The first people she stayed with were getting a divorce and fought all the time. Her second house she's sharing with three Asian girls who she is afraid will cook strange things while she's sleeping... She's a great girl though!

To conclude, it's great having making friends on my to-do list and actually having time for hanging out with them! I'm happy I feel that a group of western international exchange students are too homogeneous to be interesting and I'm having fun with my new friends!

Cheers!

Arriving in Sydney

2005-07-30T14:31:00.000+09:30

Blog * = experience :)

After 6 days in Barcelona with my team (not half as relaxing as we thought it would be), 8 days with my family in Floby (almost too relaxing) and a quick stop in Stockholm (crazy!), I was on my way to Sydney.

Had 2 interesting flights; Stockholm - Bangkok and Bangkok – Sydney. The first was full of Swedes going on holiday to Thailand and therefore the amount of alcohol consumed as well the number of children made me thank god I had brought my MP3 player. One the second flight one-third were Indians for some reason, I sat next to a scared 17-year-old boy who was not only flying for the first time but also embarking on a three year studying experience in Australia without ever having been away from his parents. I ended up playing checkers with him during start and landing as well as having some cultural preparations talks with him - both of which he needed desperately. Thought I might as well start of with a god deed!

Since I had been here before I don’t think I had any major surprises or revelations. Not until we got back to Rajat’s apartment where I’m going to stay. Let’s just say the "dust rats" (useful Swedish word) around the apartment were not close to as amusing as Rajat’s excuse for not cleaning being that it reminded him of me! Don’t know whether I should get offended… Since we've already been though fighting over very limited closetspace in Stockholm we could move on to more interesting topics of argument quite fast. The difference from our last apartment is that you can actually step into the kitchen here, we still don't have anywhere to sit but hey, details... It's a awesome place to live in though, very central!

Have to write a bit about the weather :). I was a bit sad that I was leaving a good Swedish summer for the Australian winter. However all days so far have been nicer than the whole of last year's "summer" in Sweden with about 20 degrees and sunny every day! My aim was to get over the jetlag during the weekend and the fact that it gets dark at 5 pm helped.

Well that was my arrival in Sydney although it's been a week now (allready doing great). I'm loving it so far and all is well!

Take care of yourself!

A new blog* - a new life?

2005-07-29T16:26:00.000+09:30

It is now 7 days since I arrived in Sydney for this new blog*. I am here to study but also to blog* a country, blog* a people and most importantly blog* myself in new situation. Already I feel an urge to write about things I see, impressions I have and my thoughts. For that, and for the fact that I'm known to be bad at "writing home" I have decided to challenge my technical inability and start a weblog.
But as they say: begining is easy; continuing is hard.

* see next posting