tick tock...

Exactly three weeks left today, I know I should not be counting down the weeks/days since only thing it will do is increase my anxiety but that should give you my answer on whether I am "excited" to go to sweden :) ... by the way, from my last count for today, six different people has asked me that godforsaken question (not counting Bezaire's sarcasm :) ).

Eh,... yeah, I'm starting to feel some urgency that I should be spending more time with my family and friends. As time approaches, the more time I wish I had spent with my friends in the past few months. I've been working too much, 50-60 hours.. few times I've even broken the 75 hours in a week barrier just because I need to save up for Sweden.

Earlier today, I was talking to someone who grew up in Milton all of her life until 20 years old or something then she moved out to midwest for almost 15 years, then she finally moved back to milton, she had to get to know who her friends (same ones from 15 years ago) all over again. I feel that it's hard to imagine but after reflecting back on my highschool glory days, almost all of my closest classmates are or will be in different countries (Cheryl in USA, Lisa and Leigh in Canada, Megan in Kenya, Tara in Italy and of course myself in Sweden) and sometimes I wonder if we ALL will ever actually be able to sit down in same room at the same time again? I know for a fact that it hasn't happened since 1998 and it won't happen for another year at least.
Will it actually take 15 years? I hope not.

It's interesting that you don't realize how valuable the people around you are, family and friends, until it hits you right in the head just before you are leaving them for a long time. To those Rotary exchange students, I don't know if you actually felt that way but if you people ever did then I can finally sympathize with you all. I know it's wishful thinking to assume that everything is going to be the way it is right now a year later but the reality won't permit that.

I think after this year, my priorities on life will change somehow but exactly how? I don't have the answer to that just yet. As I continue wondering, the time ruthlessly continue to tick and tock.

It's safe to say that 2005-2006 will be the biggest turning point of my life. Let's see what's gonna happen.

keep reading,
bg0ur3

24 days to go...

Some people have been asking me why I don't update this blog often... the reason is because I want to keep this blog's focus on my experience in Sweden. Sorry to everybody who wanted every single personal details of my life :)

Yup, only 24 more days to go now,... can you imagine how tiring it is to see everybody asking me the same question over and over, "Are you excited to go to Sweden?"... most of the time I just try to be nice and smile while nodding but what I am thinking is -- Seriously, is there someone out there who actually thinks that there is a slight remote chance that I could NOT be excited to go to Sweden for a whole damn year?... Is there someone out there who actually thinks I will say 'no' or 'not really' to that damn question? :) hehe... I'm typing this because there was someone (I prefer to keep this person's name anonymous) that asked me the exact words "Are you excited to go to Sweden?" on three different times, on three CONSECUTIVE days!!... *sigh* I guess that person is either more excited than I am or excited that I'm leaving for some reason :p naah, that person's just probably, for the lack of a better word, ignorant.

Yeah, I know what you all are thinking, I probably should as well wear a sign in front of me saying "Yes" and just point at it the next time.

After some research, Welfare (now called OntarioWorks) is out of the question, ODSP - forget it cuz the application process takes 90 days or so... and yeah, I only have 24 days left and they require an interview at the end of the application process so. Employment Insurance (EI) is still a possiblity but I cannot apply until I am actually not working which will be on August 12th (my last day working is on the 11th).

Hmm,... I just bought a pair of in-line skates.... Rollerblade's Aero 7 ... I was contemplating to bring a bicycle to Sweden but it would be a hassle thru airports and I figured it was time to brush up my skating skills :) The dorm will be few kilometers from the school so I hope to put those skates in good use :)

One last thing, I tried to mess around with the template but then one thing got screwed up, whenever I fixed one thing the other thing just got screwed up so I just decided to reset my template into its original state. I will be adding some links of friend's blogs and some links about Sweden for your viewing pleasure :)

later,
bg0ur3

things to do...

Tomorrow, it'll be exactly one month before I leave the Pearson for Heathrow... I feel that I've managed to finish lots of errands such as student visa and that bullshit. There's still few things I've got to do in the next few weeks such as -

• Sell my car (there will be an ad on autotrader.ca next friday for 2 weeks).
• Call State Farm Insurance and tell them I don't need their services anymore.
• Call Rogers Wireless and disconnect my pager services.
• Gethealth insurance (am thinking of getting STA Travel's health insurance, its like 320 dollars for 11 months with maximum of 5 million dollar worth of damages covered)
• Call British Airways (I bought two separate tickets, one from Toronto to London via STA travel and second ticket from London to Stockholm via travel.yahoo.ca, it was much cheaper that way, saving me like 500 dollars and only 5 hours wait time at the heathrow airport, I want to call them and see if I can get my bags delivered directly to Stockholm instead of me checking out and checking in again in London)
• Am gonna check out if I can get EI or Welfare for my duration in Sweden, I doubt that its possible but would be nice to have some extra cash around since I am hoping to not work for the whole year in Sweden.

If anybody has any comments or some insight of what I can or should do, please feel free to let me know :)

have fun,

bg0ur3

post #1

well, well... this is my first ever blog... I'm still trying to get the taste of what blogspot has to offer for now. Basically in this blog, I will be just updating everybody with my experience living in Sweden from this August to early July next year.

This template sucks, so did every other template blogspot.com had to offer, I'm gonna play around a bit later on to see if I can create some decent template myself :)

Aight... gonna go now, 'til then.

bg0ur3