I need help

Alternatively a new wardrobe. I couldn't pack a suitcase well with a gun pointed to my head. I'm going to my old college town Örebro tomorrow, for a weekend of fun with the girls, some of whom I haven't seen in 2,5 years. I've been very much looking forward to this for weeks, and and I'm still thrilled to go, but I'm less than thrilled about my fruitless attempts to pack a suitcase that will provide me with clothes, makeup, accessories, and whatever else I may need for two days. Two days doesn't sound like a lot, but regardless of the time spent away from your home, the makeup bag, the toiletries, the hairdryer and straightener still take up just as much space. And you obviously need two daytime outfits and an additional one for the mandatory Saturday night out. And shoes to go with everything. As well as purses.

Thank heavens the boots I had to take to the shoe repair today, as the sole fell off the heel, will be ready to collect tomorrow already. My tan boots are just too worn out and curling boots just feel too January to wear in March. And they really are more for emergencies, such as heavy snowfall or sleet covered streets. This weekend, I hope, will contain none of that.

Either way, I'm going to spend the weekend with some of my best friends, in a town which was my home for many years, where I had some of the best times of my life, and some of the worst. But definitely a place where I met some of the most important people in my life. And I doubt that I'll be able to get much sleep tonight, the prospect of being reunited with more or less every single one of my college friends is just too exhilarating!

Some of us back in the day, perhaps 4 or 5 years ago. I would like to think that some improvement has been made, at least on my part.

Blonde bimbo

I'm watching a show on Swedish TV called Lyxfällan (Luxury Trap) about people who are spending more money that they're making and sometimes they're so deep in dept they have little chance of ever getting out of it.

Tonight it's about a 23-year-old girl, super blonde and clearly with one thing or another pumped into her lips. And she's not even in debt, she's just extremely spoiled. Her (American) dad is also on the show, and he seems to be the one who pays for her to have the lifestyle that she has. I'm not saying that it's wrong for parents to help their children, I know my mom helps me out a lot, but I certainly don't life a life in luxury.

This girl had her own company and got 2000 euros net every month. For a 23-year-old, that's quite a lot here in Sweden. The thing is that she doesn't seem very bright. How can someone so stupid have a job that pays that well? I'm clearly far more intelligent than her, yet I don't make anywhere near as much money as she does. And how can you be irresponsible enough to spend 1200 euros more than you make every month and still be able to manage your own company?

And how in the world can you spend 15 euros on a cab ride that would take five minutes to walk? I guess I'll never understand that overly excessive lifestyle. I too like clothes, bars and restaurants, but surely life can't be all about surface?

A hazard to myself?

I don't think I'm actually literally a hazard to myself physically, I mean I don't think I'm going to get myself killed any time soon. Hurt, yes, I'm the clumsiest and most accident prone person I've ever met and I tend to break things one wouldn't have thought breakable.

But I also have no self control. For the past 6 weeks or so, I've been working out regularly and I'm trying to eat healthily, hoping to lose a few kilos by easter, and another few by summer. But altough I have no problem sticking to my exercise routine, keeping myself from the chocolate and cookies has proved to be a lot more difficult.

At work, someone always insists on putting a bowl of chocolate in my room. It's dark chocolate, but nonetheless having too many pieces even of healthy chocolate can't be good. And when I get home at night, after starting off on the right track with a nutritious salad, it doesn't take long before I reach for something less healthy. Today actually hasn't been that bad, only had a couple of digestives and I guess I can live with that.

I'm just going to have to learn never to have anything unhealthy in close proximity to myself. I think that's the only way to keep my sweet tooth at bay.

Me and my milky tea

When I first moved to London seven years ago (a painfully long time, am I really that old?) I couldn't stand having milk in my tea. I didn't even know that this was how most every Brit drank it, so when I was first asked if I wanted a cup of tea I just agreed, not knowing what I was signing up for. And the first time you meet someone and they're making you tea in their house, you're not really going to ask them to make you a new cup when you realize that they put milk in it.

A couple of moves back and forth to England, however, have made me unable to drink my tea without milk in it. There's nothing more relaxing than a big cup of hot, steaming English breakfast tea with a drop of milk in it.

And tonight the tea tastes better than ever, as I made a little trip to the English shop here in Stockholm, http://www.englishshop.se/, and bought myself som PG Tips, the bestest tea in the world. I love the English shop, I'm quite a frequent customer, but mostly I just go there to browse the aisles. Food is such a big part of a country and certain foods just really remind you certain people, situations or places.

When you love tea just as much as the next English person, is that when you have become one of them?

Loyal to my company?

Or should I say embassy... Before I was offered this job, during my second interview when I met the Ambassador for the first time, he said that he was slightly hesitant to hire someone as young as me, because young people don't tend to stay very long and they needed someone to stay for at least one year. I said that this was no problem, and it was true. I had no intentions of leaving anytime soon, after all I'd been waiting for a job for five months and wasn't going to give it up that quickly.

But little did I know then how incredibly bored and under stimulated I would be. I got this job in competition with many others for reasons unknown to me. Some of the people were fluent in both Swedish and Slovene and probably would have been better suited for the job, but I guess they didn't have my good command of the English language. I'm not saying that my English is amazingly, unbelievably good, but I do think that my translating skills are at least half decent. Or at least so I've been told.

Unfortunately, there are only so many articles, annotated agendas and Globalization Council reports to translate, and it normally only takes up a few hours of my time every day. So when I've gone through the papers, translated what I found important, and printed out a couple of papers that get sent to us every day, I'm pretty much done for the day. Ok, sometimes I have to update the agenda, confirm or regret a couple of inviatations, make a few phone calls to different ministries and embassies, and write a summary of what the Swedish ministers have been up to during the week, but this still isn't enough to fill up a whole week.

I know many people probably think that I'm lucky, that being able to just kick back at work and do more or less nothing is a luxury that most people can only dream about. Well let me tell you something. It's not that great. I like to be busy, to be challenged, to be kicked out of my comfort zone and find myself in situations that I don't quite know how to get out of.

More importantly I want to grow, to learn and develop at work. I want to be able to take my career further, but obviously I won't be able to be promoted at work as I work at an embassy and to hold the higher positions you obviously have to be from the country which the embassy represents. And I'm not learning enough or gaining enough knowledge that I'll be able to bring with me to my next job for it to be worth staying here for an entire year.

If something better comes along, then I'm out of here. Tomorrow if possible. Because although I did promise to stay for a year, I feel like I was given the job under false pretenses. Had I known then that this job would provide no challenges whatsoever, I don't know if I would have taken it.

Then again, my original plan was to apply to the Diplomat Program at the MFA, and as they won't be recruiting this year as I thought they would, there's not much point in me wasting my time here.

Instead I'll be looking into finding a job in the publishing industry in London. Or here for that matter, but I do think that jobs like that are a lot harder to find in Sweden. Plus, the English weather is just so much better than the Swedish!

give up life for love?

Tonight after work I was supposed to have a French class but after waiting for half an hour for the teacher to show up, we all decided to give up and leave. As we were walking towards the metro station a couple of girls that I hadn't talked to before decided to grab a glass of wine and invited me to come with them. I happily did as I had just realized that communist alcohol store had closed and I wouldn't be able to get the wine I'd been planning on buying.

Said and done, we found a bar called Tranan, just next to the metro station. It was a pretty nice place, and the wine was decently priced for once. And the girls were very nice, a few years older than me and far more grown up. One had even bought a house with her boyfriend, something that I can perhaps see in a far distant future, but certainly not in the next couple of years. That didn't bother me though, but what did was that she told me that when she was 26, she'd been accepted to some school in New York, a place where she had always dreamed of moving to. But as she had just met her (now ex) boyfriend and was so in love she decided not to go.

I was having a very hard time understanding this. How can you give up your life long dream because of a guy? When you're 26? If he's the one he'll still be there in a year. Right? If not, he definitely wouldn't have been worth staying for.

I want no regrets in my life, especially not regrets of not doing what I dreamed of doing when given the opportunity. Of course I regret doing certain things, but at least I've tried, and sometimes failed. I've never not done anything because of fear, or because of someone else.

Perhaps I'm selfish, although I don't think that I am. But I would never give up on a dream because of another person. Because in the end, the only thing that's constant in my life is me, and I'm the one who's going to have to live with the decisions that I've made. And I would never be able to look myself in the eyes knowing that I've disappointed myself.

Just an ordinary citizen?

After work on Friday, I went to pick up my mom at the train station. As people were getting off and I was trying to spot her face in the crowd I spotted a face that I definitely wasn't expecting to see. Prince Carl Philip. I know he's studying some sort of farming down in Skåne, and he was probably just going home for the weekend to see his family and girlfriend. But still, he's a prince! And he was just walking there like a normal person, bag slung over his sholder and baseball hat on his head. He was definitely more attractive in real life than when he's on the cover of old ladies' gossip magazines. This was actually the second time I saw him, the first I was maybe 10 or so and we were taking a tour of their summer house premises at Öland, and he came by in the back of a car. Perhaps we're meant to be together?

I do admire him for wanting to be normal. People sometimes complain that they're given too much money for doing nothing, but seriously, I would not want to trade places for all the money in the world. Those kids did not choose a life in the spotlight, they're not like the other celebs out there who even if they're in the business just because of their passion for acting or music or whatever it may be, actually made an active choice to be in the public eye. And other celebs can make mistakes and they will be forgiven for them. Royalties are just scrutinized, their every move is closely monitored and they'd best behave or they'll be in a whole lot of trouble. The people that they've finally ended up with, their significant others, are very brave indeed in my eyes, for being willing to put up with the whole media frenzy, for accepting that they have to give up their life as they know it to become part of the most famous family in Sweden, a family that people either love or hate, but always have an opinion on.

It's a good thing that they do, though. Imagine if royalty would only marry royalty. The royalties of the world would be very messed up by now, perhaps even extinct. And even if I can't say that I'm the biggest royalist in the world, I wouldn't wish upon anyone to be forced to marry their cousin.