Exploring Änggårdsbergen

This has nothing to do with my trip to Nicaragua, but I wanna share this with you all anyway. Änggårdsbergen is a big nature reserve area and also a part of Botaniska Trädgården, which is a famous botany park in Göteborg. Since this park is just across the road from where I live, I decided to take a look around. So today I walked around for about 1-2 hours there. It was sooooo nice, as you can see at my collage above.

If you live in Göteborg or will come here to visit, I strongly recommend you to take a walk in that area!

And since the lovely Swedish summer finally has arrived, I bought some very tasty, sweetish strawberries! Mmmmmmm delicious!

Vaccination

Now I'm back in Gothenburg and I should really start preparing for my trip now. So today I visited City Akuten, to take my first vaccine injection. It was for Typhoid fever.

Later this week I'll go to the doctor to discuss whether or not to have a shot for/agings tuberculosis. I'll also consider Yellow fever, since I might wanna visit Venezuela on my holiday this winter.



This is what I need for the trip:
-Hepatitis A & B (done)
-Typhoid fever (done)
-Cholera (bought it)
-Yellow fever (done)
-Malaria (on prescription)
-Tuberculosis?

Maybe there is more, but I'll now more on Thursday.

Mission accomplished

Yippie hurray! Now I have now accomplished my goal to be a member of the team that will be sent to Nicaragua 2009.

Now what?! yes, off course I need to start preparing myself for the trip. But since it's 6 months left until we'll fly there. I have a lot of time to practice my Spanish ;)

I have also applied for some summer courses at the University. Both in Gothenburg and Halmstad. In Halmstad, they have several courses regarding renewable energy. So I hope it'll be one of them.

The call...

After the interview on the 4th of April, I continued my trip in Stockholm by visiting another one of my cousins. It was a looong long time ago since I made them a visit. So it was great fun to see them all again.

On Monday afternoon, just as I was about to hit the sofa to see some meaningless TV show my phone rang. I didn't recognise the number but took the call anyway. Lucky me!

It was Erik, from VFSN. As soon as he had presented himself my thoughts were all over the place;

"-why is he allready calling me?" -"please don't tell me that I didn't pass..." and so on...

But no, Erik had only good new to deliver. They had picked me, to be a part of the team that they would send to Nicaragua this autumn. Yay yay yay and double yay! My hart stopped and I had to ask him if he was joking. He wasn't...

Just when he asked me if I needed some time to think about this and decided whether I wanted to go or not, my phone lost the connection and the call was disconnected!

Oh shit! Now he might think that I didn't wanna go?! please please please phone, find the connection again!

And it did and Erik called me back. I shouted: "I don't need any time to think this over. I'd love to go!"

Some pics from the trip:

This is my cousin Maries oldest boy Kevin. He really love buses, trains and trams. As you maybe can see from the look in his face =)


And here is Kevins younger brother Linus. I assure you, he was happy to have me arround as well. He didn't wana show of in front of the camera ;)



This is Jacob. My cousin Emmas boy who is a very cool and hipp boy!



This is Emmas and Jacobs cat Lillebror, who joined me on the sofa when I stayed at there home.



This is my grandparents house. A upgraded summer cottage in the archipelago of Stockholm.

The very moment, the interview

It was now time for me to convince the people in the VFSN organisation that I would be a perfect candidate to send to Nicaragua!!!

I had been thinking about this day, this interview and this moment ever since I got the notice. I spent some time with my cousins and their kids the days prior to this day and also during the hours before. This helped me to relax and not to be so stressed and nervous about it. Those feelings showed up anyway, while I was waiting for my turn...


I was interviewed by Erik and Karin for about 20-30 minutes. It felt a lot longer I can say... And the interview was quite tricky and I didn't feel so good about it when I left. Actually I was pretty sure that I had screwed it up, when I weren't able to answer all questions and some of my answers was also very diffuse and messed up.

Anyway, that was my opinion. Erik told me that they would give me an answer within the next 2 week.

How was I suppose to be able to wait that long??? 2 weeks?? I would be crazy!

But, what to do? It was only to wait....

Called for interview...

When I hadn't received a mail from VFSN within the time limit (which was the 15th of march) I had given up all hope for this opportunity. It was probably to good to be true...

But then, in the early hours on 16th of march I received a mail telling me that they were interested in meeting me and that I should come to Stockholm the 4th of April. I had to read this mail 10 times, over and over again. TO be sure that I had understood it right.

Wow, I made it! I am now one of 11 people who has been called to a interview the 4th of April in Stocholm.

I could barley sleep that week. I was soooo excited. But then I also needed to prepare myself for the interview. But, how will a interview for these kind of "jobs" go along? I had a hard time figuring out all the different questions there might be on this one...

Grab the oppertunity!

In the end of 2008 I was still working as a consultant (project coordinator) within the automotive industry in Gothenburg. But then the crisis hit us and I, as several hundreds of other people, lost my job. Just before Christmas actually...

But since I'm a strong opportunists, I only saw this as a chance to figure out what I really wanted to do with my life...

When I was scanning the market for other jobs and trying to figure out what to do, I found a add about 7 months youth practice within renewable energy in Nicaragua.

How about that!! My eyes almost popped out and my ecological and environmental antennas were about to catch fire. This was exactly what I was looking for!!! A chance, not only to get some hands on experience within the renewable energy area, but also a splendid opportunity to really live, sleep and eat the life of another culture. And also to learn another language!

I found the add via www.ams.se and VFSN homepage

And the only criteria was:
-You have to be within the age 20-30 years old
-Have experience or a big interest in renewable energy, electricity and/or gender equality
-Basic Spanish
-Be able to work physical and sometimes quite heavy

Just hours before deadline, I applied!