Last night was trivia night at Bitter's! We fought our way to a table, named our lovely (but as it was soon discovered, not fully prepared) team "The Parrots/Papegojorna/Papousci" and put on our game faces! But when categories as "Name the Bill", "8-Bit Movie Posters", "Meat" and "Scientific shortenings" was presented, we faltered and after two hours we waved ur wite flag to surrender. But oh how much fun we had despite our lacking knowledge! It's such a nice bundle of people I've gotten to know here, and they make my day!

 

Another run, another view! While most of my days consist of school, lectures and assignments, I have time to go running. Today I took a turn to Quidi Vidi lake, which lies about 15-20 minutes of jogg down the road. I know there is a beer brand called "Iceberg" which is made from this lake, so it was nice to see it in person. On the way back I discovered a little river path back, which was just adorable! Seeing a river in the middle of the suburb, with all the cute houses and garden around. 

Sunday was the second hike, along Cobbler's Path, which also is a part of the east coast trail, which begins at Cape Spear (the hike we did on Saturday). The nature was more forest-like here, rather than wind-worn. Don't get me wrong, this entire island is constantly windy, so you still have to be careful while walking. This hike was also longer, and my legs were pretty worn out from the Saturday hike, but nonetheless it was so beatiful to walk along the coast! Afterwards everyone went to eat pepperoni pizza, before going homw to rest our legs. On the way home it started to rain like crazy (läs: slagregn/ösregn), and by the time I got back I could without any problems squeeze water out of my jeans. But all in all, a really fun first weekend and week here in Canada!

 

This weekend GradFest (the kick-off week) arranged two hikes, and since I'm struggeling getting out of town on my own due to lack of vehicle, I bought the tickets. First out was the Saturday hike, two hours long. It started and and ended at Cape Spear, the most east point of North America. It was super-sunny (got a little tan going!), super-windy (it is not unusual that people actually fall down the cliff and into the Atlantic due to the strong winds), and gorgeous. The wind made the hike endurable, otherwise it'd have been nearly too hot for such a walk. The most North American thing about it all though was the pick-up by a proper, yellow, school bus. 

(By the way - if you click on the small pictures they enlarge, in case you've missed this..)

 

  

This Friday morning Eva had made me agree to go to the 8 AM Yoga class, and against all odds I actually managed to roll out of bed and be there! First class I tried in the free gym, called "The works", and it was surprisingly nice to start the weekend in such a manner. This might become a good habit if things go well. 

 

 

The same day we had the mandatory Business Administration welcome meeting, which mostly contained basic information. It was nice to meet all other business exchange students though, and during the evening a group got together to go to the student pub called "Bitter's". It turned out to be this tiny little pub, the company was just awesome and we ended up staying 'til closing. Also turned out Okey, a guy we met during the concert on monday, worked there, and he joined in as well when he had a few minuted off. 

 

The way around campus has now gone from being a total maze to something managable, and I have started to figure out things like when to leave the house to be in time, how to avoid the most heavy traffic on the way to my classrooms and how the bridges work. But even so, there are sometimes little surprises on the way to school. The other day a big black plastic bag drifted by along the road, quite big and clumpsy. Then it got stuck to the fence and ripped open - and in seconds blue balloons where everywhere! The cars could of course not avoid them, so for several minutes the entire street was filled with balloon-popping-noises. Not sure why anyone would bother filling garbage bags with balloons, but it sure made my walk a little happier!

Today the sun was the most intense since I got here, so I went on a little run. Or so I though, but in the end it was nearly 8 km and took about 90 minutes, with constant up-and-downhills. But I got to see a lot of the city: the downtown, the harbour, the church, the art center and the second-highest top of signal hill, which lies of a really high hill at the port of the St. John's little protected harbour. The atlantic looks just stunning from up there, sadly my pictures does not give the view any justice.

The second day of orientation was far less exciting. Since this part was exclusive to graduate students, more focus on proper faculty welcomes were present, as well as the imtimidating promises of huge workloads. Not the best spent hours of my time here so far.

 

 

When I got back home Eva invited me to join her for a Zumba class the Uni offers at the gym (the gym is free of charge for all students - awesomeness.), and I said yes. And then I accicentily locked myself out of my room, due to a key mix-up when the landlady got them made. So I got help from Caitlyn to contact the landlady, and the door were soon opened, and by now I have a new, very canadian key. But I missed the Zumba of course, so instead I was invited to join Caitlyn for her Yoga class, which was really good compare to the few I've been to back in Jönköping. Seriously, how sweet aren't the housemates of mine? <3 On Wednesday evening we also did a little tour to Walmart, which are about as American a food store gets in Canada, and Dominion, which also is a food store but with better fresh products. The three of us squeeze into Caitlyn's car, to the so called "Box-store" area (Kanadensiskt ord för citygross/ICA Maxi/ÖB-områden), shop 'til we drop and drives back with a full car, and with an unmotivated proudness of ourselves (or, at least that was my feeling). I know I keep saying that my housemates are awesome, but it just keeps surprising me how quickly and easily the strangers-to-friends adjustment has gone by! 

 

The concert and BBQ turned out to be two different, I think, local bands who were pretty good. Additionally, before, between and after the bands the area turned into some kind of outdoor disco with house music, light sticks, dancing, silly string shooting and balloons. All non-alcoholic, and all really fun! All these little activities makes it so easy to interact and get to know different people, which is perfect for newly arrived students like myself. It is so many canadians though - normally you only meet exchange students while on exchange, but the integration of exchange and program students is pretty seamless here, which is really nice.

  

Today was first day of Orientation, which corresponds to Jönköping/Sweden's "Kick-off". But less partying (which is called GradFest and occurs simutaneously). So this morning my housemate Eva and I went to orientation, where I met her Czech friend Monica (and during the day heaps of other people with equally many names).

It started off with some speaches from the faculty, where the most importent info seemed to be that Memorial University is named this way as a memorial of the soldiers that served during the first world war. Since it's been 100 years on the dot since then, they are having a kind of jubilee for the next 4 years, which for us meant free memorial scarfs to wear. Yay, free stuff!

 

 

After the speaches, one drum group, two dance groups and a cheerleader performance (so North American!), we were sorted into groups. I got to be a Caribou, a word I had to google before realising it was simply a North American reindeer..