Year-In-Review Chronicle 2010

It’s back! For like the seventh year in a row or something like that, here is the year chronicle, so it's cool to do this again. As always, I make two parts, one for myself and one for the news years. Since I'm going to have Cecily over from the US over New Year’s this year I will leave it a few days before the year is over.

Contents:

• My 2010
• News Year 2010
• Sports and entertainment year 2010
• My guesses for 2010
• My guesses for 2011

My 2010
Wow, so much I've been through this year. Been a background dancer on American television, a parachute jump, celebrating Spring Break in Mexico, been to a Catholic wedding in Brazil, lived in a ghost ship, bought my first car, was on cheerleading competitions, gambled away money in Vegas, has written cover stories, seen New York Rangers play in Madison Square Garden and so much more.
But we start well chronologically.

After a cold Christmas in Sweden, I went to New York a few days by myself. Though I did not get there directly. A hell journey like no other took place during the chaotic days. During the whole time I wrote down my thoughts about everything that happened. It is probably the most entertaining blog post I've ever written. One can see how I go from positive to more and more desperate and sad. Here is the post.
But I finally came to New York and could have some wonderful days to myself where I went around town, taking pictures, shopped, watched hockey in the Garden and was featured on television. It was totally sick. I went to a recording of a talk show to have something to do, and it ended with me standing and dancing on stage behind Ke$ha to her song Tik Tok. Really fun, and it has amused my friends this year too, when they have watched the clip on YouTube.

Hockey in the Garden

Views of the Big Apple

After NY, I took a weekend to visit Daniel in Washington DC. Glad to see the city for the second time, and to meet Daniel again.

Spring in Santa Barbara has meant a lot of cheerleading. Since Cecily and Lauren have been all around and competed, I've been with them and cheered and took pictures. It was originally thought that I would come along to their first competition, which was in Anaheim, and take pictures and write about it for the school newspaper, where I had started that semester. I went on to accompany the team more than that time, and finally I had been involved in all their competitions in the spring, in Anaheim, Long Beach and Irvine. I became friends with many members of the team, and they appreciated that I was with and took pictures of them.

The team before the first competition, in Anaheim

I also got to be into cheer, in Irvine

For Cecily's birthday was the competition in Long Beach, and then we were a gang that went and lived there all weekend, and stayed at the old WWII-ship Queen Mary. Old cool boat that is said to be haunted. Very cool anyway, and a fun weekend.

Outside Queen Mary in Long Beach

Has fulfilled a lifelong dream of ours. I did a skydive! Me, Jocke and Sahar did it as a ploy to Sahara's birthday, and it was so amazingly friggin awesome. Unfortunately I have no pictures of it.

The next big, really cool thing in the spring was spring break. 12 of us came from SB down to Cancun in Mexico for sunbathing, swimming and partying around the clock. Awesome fun all the time, and really party 24-7.

Was also at a journalist conference, JACC, with people from the school newspaper. A long weekend with a lot of fun stuff journalist and you got to know several classmates much better.

Me, Paige and Maria A at JACC

My parents would come and visit in April. But because the volcano Eyafjallajökull in Iceland erupted and formed a large ash cloud over Europe and all flights were stopped in a few weeks. Mom and dad did not come, but, however, could go a bit later. They went to visit in May, and we were around in both Santa Barbara and Los Angeles and Hollywood.

In the spring I was feeling worse and worse to think that I would go back to Sweden after the spring semester. Therefore, I began slowly to plan for not going back, and finally I decided: I stayed for another year. It was a really good decision, and I have not regretted it one second that I made that decision. Therefore, it was quite fun to be on school graduation, which otherwise is for those who do not come back. But I came back to the fall =)

When I got home I found out that my grandmother had just died. Very sad, but not entirely unexpected since she had been ill for some time.

Otherwise in the summer, I worked almost all the time. From the first day to the very last, literally. I quit as page editor of Hallandsposten just a few hours before my plane went from Copenhagen.

Other stuff I've done this summer is to go on my first wedding. Emma proudly married in Kvibille with her girlfriend from Norway.

Emma and Peggy's wedding

Was also down in Malmö for a reunion with people from Santa Barbara.

The fall in Santa Barbara has been very chill. Just the right amount to do in school. I've had a lot of responsibility on the school newspaper as well. Have been dealing with a lot of elections that have been in school when the new or old school board would be elected. Many scandals and other things happened during the election campaign, and it finally turned out that everyone who was incumbent had to go.
I have also had many other great things to write about in the fall, and had many stuff on the front page. It feels good, I have to say.

Moved into a new place for this semester, which is so much better than the others I have stayed at. Lives with Ola, whom I've known from before. During the fall also lived Christoffer and Lidia who later moved to Brazil to get married. In moved Nima that I lived with in Victoria this spring.

Christoffer, Lidia, me and Ola, we who lived together most of the fall

The most eventful month of this year was October. Several trips and many fun events. Among other things, I bought a car for the first time in my life. It was Veronica who would go back to Sweden after the semester and when we talked about that I wanted a car and she needed to get rid of her so it was a perfect opportunity. So now I am the proud owner of Bruce, a Buick LeSabre from 1992, gold and just überawesome.

Bruce!

Later in October it was time for one of fall’s first big journeys. Together with Christoffer and Lidia, I went to Las Vegas! They lived there previously and had a complaint so we got a suite for free. We stayed at the Tropicana, which is located on The Strip, and we partied and gabled and went sightseeing over the weekend.

On the top of Stratosphere

Before a party in Vegas

On Sunday we did something really cool. We flew to the Grand Canyon. It was probably the coolest thing I've ever seen in my entire life. That kind of incredible gorges and mountains and just absolutely breathtaking. It is impossible to describe, it must be experienced.

By Grand Canyon

Then at the end of the month it was time for Halloween, which I for the third consecutive year, celebrated in the United States. Where it should be celebrated, because it's really cool to be there then. Lots of things from Thursday to Sunday. Celebrations and costumes, though on Friday I went with Cecily, Lauren and Vaios to the Six Flags amusement park that has some of the world’s coolest roller coasters, and to honor the day there was a Halloween theme and ghosts and zombies walked around in Park and frightened people.

My two outfits this year were Zorro and Playboy photographer

In November I for the first time got to celebrate a real American Thanksgiving. I went up north to Cecily's mother and experience this family holiday for real, and eat all the good that belongs to, and see the area where Cecily grew up.

Vaios, Virginia, Cecily and me

I left SB very early this year, in order to go to Brazil. Christoffer and Lidia were supposed to get married, and I was at the wedding. We were a total of nine friends and family from his side, and we had a really fun week with the wedding party, sun, swimming, party, water park, dining and a lot of fun. An amazing experience to be part of a Brazilian wedding, although the country is not as cool.

Lidia and Christoffer

Ola and Krsitian partying at the wedding

The year ended with a lot of snow, cold and travel problems in Sweden. A nice Christmas with family, and then a visit from Cecily at the conclusion of 2010. A good year again, where I have done so sick a lot of fun, visited a lot of places and spent time with my friends. An incredible 2009 was followed by an equally amazing in 2010, so now I have high hopes but low expectations about what 2011 will bring.


Chronicle of the news year 2010

Natural disasters and princess wedding
There are two things which it was brought up the most of the year. In Sweden, the wedding of Crown Princess Victoria and (now) Prince Daniel. It was a perfect wedding with beautiful weather and a lot of guests from Europe's royal families and celebrities.
However, Princess Madeleine broke her engagement when her clueless boyfriend Jonas who cheated in the mountains.
There have been several major earthquakes in 2010. Worst was the beginning of the year in Haiti, where about 200 000 people died and the large share of the capital was destroyed.
Even in Chile, it was a great earthquake. Later in the year it was the collapse of a mine and about 30 miners were trapped. They sat there for a couple months, but were later rescued and all were safe and sound.
Turkey had an earthquake, like Mexico.
In Iceland, the volcano Eyafjallajökul had an outbreak in April, and covered all of Europe under an ash cloud. In doing so, no airplanes could lift for several weeks and all of Europe, and then the whole world, became paralyzed.

Eyafjallajökul

During the summer there were several large natural disasters, floods in Pakistan and China, and huge forest fires in Russia. The year ended with the extreme cold, which again forced the most of Europe's flights to stand still.
In the Gulf of Mexico, an oil rig blew up far offshore. It was leaking oil and became the largest environmental disaster in U.S. history. BP has since tried to rectify this, but they are very unpopular now.
There were elections in Sweden. The Alliance could continue to govern, but with the help of others, when they did not get a majority. But since the xenophobic Sweden Democrats came into the parliament has the other parties agreed to try to help each other so that the SD will not have too much power. The Moderates did well in elections, but so did not the Social Democrats. Mona Sahlin has said that she resigns, and work is now underway to find a successor.
There were also elections in Britain, and where the Tories won, and David Cameron became new prime minister.
Sweden abolished both the compulsory student union, 50 öre coins and general conscription for the military.
The last combat troops left Iraq, and now there are only peacekeeping troops. It has also been determined that the troops should leave Afghanistan by 2014.
North Korea attacked South Korea in November. Nothing more happened there, but people are worried that something is going on. North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il has begun to appear less and less in favor of his son, Kim Jong-un.
In Sweden, a suicide bomber blew himself and his car up on Drottninggatan in Stockholm in December. He killed no other, but injured a couple, but there was very little debate that we now have had terrorism in Sweden.
A major attack occurred in Moscow's subway in March, where 38 died.
A major tragedy was when a Polish airplane crashed in Russia. On board were the president, most of the government, almost all important people in Poland and many others. Some 90 high-ranking people were killed, but it is not certain yet if it was an accident or an attack.
During the year the website Wikileaks released various secret documents that reveal the different military sanctuaries and diplomatic relations. Site founder Julian Assange is hunted in Sweden for alleged sexual offenses.

Sports
Sweden did well with a lot of medals in the Olympics in Vancouver. Hockey team was not so good.
The World Cup was in South Africa, and the biggest topic of conversation was the instruments, the vuvuzelas, which the crowd blew in the whole time and created a sound that sounded something like an insect swarm throughout the games. Spain won, as the oracle Paul the Octopus guessed. He guessed right on all the games during the World Cup and became a celebrity.
An Original Six team won the Stanley Cup, the Chicago Blackhawks. The league's best player and winner of the NHL season was: Henrik Sedin. Very unexpected.
Togo's national football team was subjected to an attack and all the players except one were killed.

Entertainment:
Sweden sent an really crappy song for the Eurovision Song Contest, and missed the finals for the first time ever. The winner was Germany.
The Swedish Millennium films have been popular in the U.S.. The most popular television program was the reality show Jersey Shore, which I like. It was a Swedish version this summer, which sucked.

Some great songs:
Ke$ha: Tik Tok, Take It Off
Katy Perry: California Gurls
Salem Al Fakir: Keep on Walking
Ludacris: How Low
Robyn: Dancing on My Own
Key of Awesome: Tik Tok/Glitter Puke, Bad Romance, California Gurls (parodies)

Dead celebrities:
Leslie Nielsen, Martin Ljung, Octopus Paul, Michael Reuterswärd, Lech Kaczynski (Poland's president, along with some 90 others of Poland's top film), Tony Curtis.

Guesses about 2010 - how did it go?
Sweden fails in Olympic hockey, but good in many other branches
Kinda how it went really
I will get a great job this summer
No, I was the editor again. But if my bosses are reading this: it was a great job.
The Alliance wins the election, but must enlist the help of the Green Party to gain a majority.
Something like, but not directly stated that it comes from MP
During the World Cup in South Africa is an attack of any kind
It happened a little before, against Togo
I win a lot of money in Las Vegas
Ha, lost most, but had fun anyway
New York Rangers win the Stanley Cup!
Chicago became the winner
Anna Anka gets a talk show
She has received a lot of their own programs. Not just a talk show, but she talks a lot of the programs she has
Arnold Schwarzenegger says he wants to run for presidential elections 2012
Nope, not at all.

So-so I thought it went. So here are my guesses for 2011:

• I get a job in the U.S.
• I will travel around a lot in California
• Melody Club or Danny to win the Eurovision Song Contest
• Mikael Damberg will take over the Social Democrats
• The election campaign kicks off for presidential elections in the United States in 2012, and Sarah Palin becomes the Republican candidate large.

There you go, there you have it too. Now it's New Year a few days, and then another great year. On 12 I go back to the U.S., but we heard enough on the blog before then. For now, you can have a good time and a Happy New Year!