the trip is booked and paid for. the adventure awaits.

the train towards Kastrup leaves at 4.22 a.m. on August 18 with me and T on it (can’t say I’m too pleased with such an early morning, but hey it means that we’ll reach our destination before noon)

Theo's Village (our hotel)

it’s been awhile since my last trip and then I went alone. Kastrup was just a huge lonely place with tons of strangers walking around. this time will be different. a whole new experience. going abroad with one of my best friends.

Kato Daratso (where our hotel is located)

we decided we wanted to go somewhere warm with lots of sun, culture, nice food and cute boys (last bit applies to me since T is taken these days) and the natural choice was Greece. T opted for Crete and I obliged even though I’ve been there once before. we’re even staying near the same city, Chaina, but I expect it to be quite different this time seeing as last time was about 10 years ago.

so the next few weeks I’ll be working and checking off the list I wrote with things to do before we leave. among other tings; packing and are three pairs of shoes, apart from the pair I’ll be travelling in, enough for one week?

sometimes I get weird impulses. an idea pops into my head and it sounds fantastic in the moment. but later: not so much. usually when I get one of these impulses I find it hard to let go until I’ve tried it out. the “incident” which took place last week was a direct result of this.

I was meeting T in Malmö and it was a nice day, the sun was shining, the birds were singing and I’d just bought a new pair of shoes. as we were walking from the Triangle I said “it’s a nice day, why don’t we rent a paddleboat?” (something I've wanted to do for quite some time) with no clue what’s in store for her T says yes and we make our way to the canal and rent a boat for an hour and a half. we then decide to paddle towards the library. as we float along we spot cute guys, even cuter ducklings and, after passing a bridge in the making, a bike. a bike which is half way down in the water. naturally (did you really expect anything else?) I want to check it out and we do. next thing you know we’ve decided to save the poor bike from the horrible fate of drowning. T jumps over to land and pulls it up while I try to hold the boat steady ashore. not the easiest thing to do when you’re laughing and photographing at the same time.


voila. she succeeds and climbs back into the boat where we decide to ask the police what we should do with our new friend. but first is first and we have about an hour left of paddling to do. so we paddle along enjoying the weather and the calmness that floating on water creates. we return the boat to the renters and start to think about what to do next. eat or go to the police? I voted for the police/bike combo. so that’s what we do.
when we arrive at the bike we realise that where we successfully pulled the bike up, was actually a construction site. which creates a new problem. are we allowed to go in there to get the bike? after spending about 30 minutes on the phone we’re told to take the bike to the station at Davidshall. so we did. to bad the station wasn’t open. T spends another 40 minutes on the phone, trying to find someone who will take the bike from us.
at last the station on Drottninggatan agrees to take the bike mainly because no one else will. so we walk and walk and walk (you see where I’m going with this, right?) and walk some more. hungry and tired we arrive and finally the bike is gone. and we completed our mission: doing what we can to return the bike to it’s rightful owner.

what started out as an adventure, with an act of humanity in the middle, ended with a question. is it worth trying to be a good citizen when it’s obviously not encouraged by the community we live in? should it be this hard and time consuming, about 2hrs, to drop of a found, possibly stolen, object to the police? I don't know. I just hope that if my bike gets stolen (again) and someone finds it that they will take the time to turn it over to the police (again).

btw I was accepted to the Creative Writing course in the fall. mah here I come. again =)

I’m going to take a wild guess and assume that no one living in Skåne or in Sweden has missed the constant raining this week. it’s been so bad that the basement at my job got flooded. at one point the water was over one meter high and our boss was talking about possibly evacuating the old folks living at the home. she also sent someone to buy flashlights in case the power went out.

the basement is, when it’s not filled with water, where we have our locker room, the storage room and the tanning bed (which I’ve never used btw). when I went down to check on it the first time, the water was still clean and even if it was a bit strange to wade around in 20 cm high water to get my clothes, lucky I did since no one was allowed down there later because of the risk of getting electrocuted , it was kinda neat. a new experience. naturally I managed to get wet despite the rubber boots I was wearing.
the second time I went down there the water was all dirty and funky looking and, I know this will make me sound like a total dork, but it felt a bit like a scene from a catastrophe-type-of-movie, water coming in everywhere, no one really knowing what was going on, the boss freaking out and calling pretty much everyone who could help (the firemen, a few plumbing companies, her boss) and of course the pump outside trying to remove the water.

I know I shouldn’t make a big deal or complain about all the things which got ruined (quite a few people got their things destroyed in the lockers and what if we run out of diapers) since it’s so much worse on other places. but I tend to be somewhat self absorbed and this is the first time something like this has affected me personally, guess I can’t ever say that again, so it’s a milestone. a weird one but still a milestone.
I can’t wait to get to work tomorrow to see how it looks.