My Trip to America!!!!!

     I found out that I would have some time off where I could travel back to America. My choice of destination was Champaign (naturally). I called my parents to inform them, but sadly they told me that they would not be able to make it. I arrived in Champaign and went straight to Huff Hall. There was going to be a volleyball game there that night. I immediately headed straight to the gym because I knew my friends would already be there to make sure they got the good seats. But as I entered the gym, I found it empty. My next idea was to look outside that they would probably be standing in line to get in. I was filled with joy as I walked out the doors to discover that the first people standing in line were my parents and a group of people all from Immanuel. I was so happy and surprised that they all came. I knew that I didn’t have long to stay in America before I had to return to Sweden, but I couldn’t remember when my flight back was. I knew that I needed to get food though before I returned to the airport. There was no doubt in my mind what I was going to have for dinner. Chipotle! I couldn’t wait to tell Meghan that I ate Chipotle because I knew that she would be so jealous. I was starting to panic though if I was going to miss my flight or not since I didn’t know when it was. I was really starting to freak out when all of a sudden…

     I woke up in panic thinking that I overslept and had missed volleyball practice! I wonder when/if my dreams will change from in America to in Sweden…

The long awaited...

APARTMENT VIDEO!!!

We moved into our apartment on September 9th, but it has taken awhile for us to get it all set up and ready to view. So I hope you like it! Everything we have is an accumulation of things from our teammates and other people in Ljungby. It is really starting to turn into our home now.

Best Practice Ever

     I do not think I could have imagined a better practice tonight! All weekend my lower back had been hurting and was super tight. This has been an issue for me in the past especially during high school and club days when I would play multiple matches a day and standing a lot. So for me today’s practice started out with… wait for it… MASSAGE! I got a 15-20 minute massage just on my lower back. It was so painful; she had to remind me multiple times to keep breathing. But just like John Cougar Mellencamp says, it hurt so good! She worked out a lot the tightness. It was seriously exactly what I needed. After that, I just rode a bike for a little while before it was team aerobics time. We rolled out a big long gymnastic mat. We did different kicks, somersaults, cartwheels, and jumps all down the mat! For those of you who don’t know, I cannot do a somersault so naturally I cannot even come close to doing a cartwheel. After I finished my embarrassing attempt at cartwheels, I ran and grabbed my camera to get the rest of the girls on video! At least I wasn't the only one who can't do a cartwheel. :)

     After that, we all changed into our swimming suits. We had to swim 5 down and backs. Another fun fact about me is that I don’t know how to swim. Many people have tried to teach me, and I just cannot do it. So I doggy paddled the whole way (and just walked some times when my feet could touch the bottom haha). Needless to say, I was the last one done. We finished off ‘practice’ with sitting in the sauna for a bit before showering and heading home. Like I said at the beginning, best practice ever!

Borås Tournament

     I woke up early Saturday morning to get in the van to go to Borås, Sweden, for our first tournament. We had two red 8-passenger vans that we took on our two-hour ride. Lena drove our van with Malin in the passenger seat. Meghan, Selma, and I were in the middle row, and Nata and Linn were in the back row. We had some very interesting conversations courtesy of Selma! There were a couple times where I literally had tears in my eyes. Not sure how many of you know this next fun fact, but while I was at Illinois, I kept a Kevin Hambly quote sheet. There were many times when Kevin said something funny or inappropriate, and I had the joy of keeping track of them all. Well, I have a new person now take Kevin’s place, and her name is Selma! For instance, the whole van ride Selma was drinking my water bottle because she thought she left hers in the fridge at home. All of a sudden, she turns to me with a completely straight face and says “I think I am stupid” after figuring out that her water bottle was right next to her the whole time! Shortly after this incident, she points out the window to a group of cows and says “Look Jo! There is my family!” I am always anxiously waiting to hear what she has to say next!

     Our first match on Saturday was against ____ (I don't remember who we played...). We played like we were still asleep, and lost in two to a team that I believe we should have beaten in two. This match though was a good wake up call to us, as we played way better in our next match. We played Lindesberg, which is a team that is in the Elit division so we will be playing them again in league play. We won the first set! Meghan told me later that she felt like she could set anyone that game and she would get a kill. That’s exactly how that set it; I think it was the best and most consistent game that our team has played so far. The next game was not like that. In fact, it was almost the opposite. The third set, we came back out strong. The score was tight the whole set. At 14-14, our middle back hit a back row attack that Lindesberg’s middle blocker CLEARLY touched. To our dismay, the refs did not call it. We ended up losing 14-16 in the 3^rd. This brings up another interesting difference between here and the United States. There are no line judges at any matches until you are in the playoffs. Could you imagine the final point of the September 24, 2010, Illinois victory over Penn State without line judges?! If the ref had called it out (which it was), Penn State would have gone crazy. But if the ref would have called it in, we would have gone crazy yelling at the ref too!

     Our last match of the day was a big match for me personally. From January to August, I did not have many opportunities to play volleyball. I have felt like my blocking has been terrible (at least in my own terms) every time I play. I wasn’t closing blocks like I normally do, and I wasn’t making moves with my hands like I normally do. I felt like I was just trying to get out to the ball and throwing my arms up wherever they would go. This match was the pivotal changing point where I finally felt like I was blocking like me! I was able to actually feel when I was reaching high on the block and when I was staying low and reaching far over the net. I blocked their huge outside sitter twice with my left hand (volleyball people know what I’m talking about here). There was a streak of points where I think I got 6 blocks out of 7 points! It was just such a confidence boost for me to finally be back to the point that I am happy with my blocking. I forgot to mention who we even played!? We beat Halmstad in two sets. They are also in the Elit division so we will be playing during league play as well.

     After that we still had a few hours before we would be going to dinner, so we went to the salad bar at the grocery store. It was soooo good! I had pasta with corn, green olives, avocados, mozzarella balls, and crawfish! It was just so yummy that I had to take a picture.

I should have taken another picture at the salad bar at dinner Saturday night too. I had green olives with garlic inside, garlic cloves in a marinade, pickled onions, cherry peppers, marinated mushrooms, corn nuts, sundried tomatoes, and more! I am in love with salad bars here. The dinner that Meghan and I both got though was a chicken breast that came with the salad bar. So this is what the plate looked like that they brought out to us…

     I learned a valuable lesson on this trip also about the sleeping situation. There were three of us each in a room so I thought there were beds. But when I was the first person to walk into the room, I was surprised to only see two beds! I was in mid-sentence asking Nata and Mia what we were going to do when they both jumped on to the two beds claiming them!!! I have learned my lesson now, and I do not plan on sleeping on the pullout couch again.

     Our first match on Sunday was against Vordingborg, Denmark. This just so happens to be my friend Tara’s team! We played much better in our first match today than we did in our first match the day before. We won in two sets! There were three matches before we had our next match. It was nice in the beginning to just sit around and talk more with Tara. I can’t say enough how nice it was to see her! I also took a little nap on the bleachers during the break. Even though all of this was nice, we were all completely cold before our next match. We had to totally warm up again. I thought this was apparent in our last match, which we played Halmstad again. We came out flat and with not a lot of energy. We ended up losing in two this time.

     After this weekend, it was obvious that we need to spend a lot more time working on serve receive. This was probably our biggest problem. Our other main issue still is just consistency. We had moments where we were playing really well and moments where we were playing really bad. The good thing about all of this is that it is still only like pre-season matches. Our first real league is not until October 15^th. We have a lot of potential, and we still have time to work hard in practice to get there before our start the matches that ‘really count’.

      We ate dinner in Borås before heading back to Ljungby. Where did we eat dinner you ask? Burger King!!! I walked into the restaurant, and the very first thing I said was “It smells like America!” I had a Whopper with cheese (med ost) with french fries and a Coca-Cola. It all tasted exactly like it does in America. It was a nice taste of home, no pun intended! Now if only I could find a Chipotle…

København

     This adventure was the first of soon to be many adventures for Meghan, MoMo (Meghan’s creepy doll), Simba, and me! Our adventure began Tuesday night after practice when we went to Växjö to stay at Jaz’s apartment. On the drive there, we were talking about different wild animals in our area. Jaz was talking about a ‘grävling’, but she couldn’t remember what it was in English. She described the creature as being black and white which my immediate response was skunk. Meghan’s immediate response was zebra! We later discovered that it is a badger, so I guess Meghan was the closest?! When we got to Växjö, Jaz made us a fantastic dinner, and we all passed out pretty quick afterwards.

     We woke up in the morning and headed to the train station. Sidenote: Meghan and I were both wearing our newly purchased skinny jeans so we were looking very Swedish! 

Jaz was our mom at the train station making sure we had our tickets and making sure I had another warmer jacket. :) Of course, we were giving her trouble for this, but we appreciated it all. This is how everyone on the team is. They are always looking out for us and making sure that we are happy and have everything we need. We boarded the train at 9:06 on our way to Copenhagen! We even successfully switched trains at 9:19. Our adventure was starting so smoothly. (Jaz told us a story about 2 other American girls that we taking a trip to Copenhagen, but they never actually made it out of Sweden!) Our first stop in Copenhagen was 7 Eleven for doughnuts and coffee. Meghan and I had both been craving American doughnuts.

We sat on a bench at the train station waiting for my friend, Tara. I met Tara when I came to Europe on the trip this past January, and we became instant friends! As soon as we saw each other, we both started running towards each other and shared a big hug. It was just like a scene you see in the movies!

     We then headed out to the streets of Copenhagen. There were a couple places/things that we knew we definitely wanted to see, but we decided to just wander instead of searching. We walked past Tivoli Gardens, but decided not to pay to go inside. 

Multiple people have instructed me that I need to go there at Christmas time so we decided to hold off for this trip. We continued to wander, and we found ourselves on a shopping street. We looked in some stores, but none of us made any purchases. Of course, we continued to talk about the European style and our individual progressions towards having style. We soon found Nyhavn, which is a famous canal street, lined with different brightly painted buildings.

We continued to walk along the water until we found the statue of the Little Mermaid! This was very exciting, especially for Simba! It was his first encounter with another Disney character while in Europe (continue to read to hear about his second encounter).

We wandered back through town to found a place to eat lunch. On the way, we saw lots of beautiful buildings and churches. We didn’t always know what we were taking pictures of, but we still saw some amazing sites. We concluded that our decision to wander the city was perfect! We saw everything that we wanted to see plus so much more. It was just so great to walk around a new city with good friends!

    Carlsberg is a Danish brewing company whose headquarters are in Copenhagen. After lunch, we hopped on a bus to go to the Carlsberg brewery for a tour. As we stepped off the bus, another bus pulled up behind us, and Jessica, Tara’s friend that was meeting us, stepped off of that bus. Everything was still working out perfectly! The only downfall of the trip happened now. We made our way to the Carlsberg brewery (after a little bit of walking the wrong direction). The man at the desk informed us that we missed the last tour of the day by about 10 minutes! He gave us all a consolation prize though of a Carlsberg lanyard with a bottle opener on it. As we walked away disappointed, we decided that we would create our own tour! We stopped in the nearest bar for some Carlsberg suds. I asked for some kind of dark beer. As you can tell, the guy lied to me!

So naturally, I was not satisfied. I asked if he had anything darker. This time the bartender delivered!

The Carls Porter was absolutely what I wanted. Good company and good beer just can’t be beat!

     After a bus ride back to downtown, we found a little pizzeria for dinner. I honestly don’t think I will ever get tired of eating pizza here because it is all so good. We decided to walk around some more as the city was getting dark. This is when Simba ran into more Disney characters! They were on their way to a themed party.

We walked around Copenhagen a little more before taking a train to Tara’s teammate’s apartment to sleep.

     The next morning, Meghan, Tara, and I took a train back into Copenhagen. We sat at a coffee shop talking until Meghan and I had to catch our train back to Växjö. It was sad to say goodbye to Tara, but we will be seeing each other again this weekend as we play in the same tournament. We had a non-eventful train ride back. In Växjö, we got hotdogs, french fries, and Coca-Cola for lunch before getting on a bus back to Ljungby.

     The trip was absolutely great! It was so nice to see a great friend and experience a new city and country. And after all the trains and buses that we took the past day and a half, I think we will be able to travel anywhere!!!

Smålänningen Newspaper Article

     The lady interviewing us didn't know too much about volleyball so the only real volleyball comment is "'I like to block' says Bangert". The next part talks about me playing volleyball in front of large crowds. When I played at Nebraska last fall, there were over 11,000 people watching and cheering. In Ljungby, a good turn out will about 200 people. Although playing in front of a huge crowd is exciting, it is not what I am here for. I would still want to be here playing even if we did not have one fan all year long. Then it talks about how we have never been to Sweden before, and that we have the same agent that got us here. The article ends with Meghan saying how nice and helpful everyone here is and how well they speak English.
***DISCLAIMER***: This is my very loose translation of the article from the little Swedish that I know (and my remembrance of the interview).

First Match... well first scrimmage

     Today, we had our first scrimmage match as a full team. We played at Sunnerbohallen against Gislaved. Gislaved is also in the elite division and will be our first match when we start league play on October 15^th.  The start of the match was not so great. We played very tense and hesitant. There isn’t much more to say about the first game besides the score, 14-25. It was just bad. After that wake up call, we really stepped up our play. We were much more aggressive both offensively and defensively. With these changes, we reversed the score winning the second game, 25-14. We continued to roll through the third game winning, 25-16. We had the typical problem after beating a team handedly for two sets; we mentally let down. We stepped onto the court with a different mentality for that set, and it was not a good one. Even though we did not play our best that game, we stayed right with Gislaved and took the game and match winning, 25-23. We played a fifth game anyways, but still to 25 instead of 15. Some of the other girls played this set that had not played all match. It was good to see that we had different girls in the game, but that we could still pull off a win! We won the last game, 26-24. This match definitely showed us where our flaws are and that we still have a lot to work on before we play them again in October, but it was still fun and a good start to playing together as Ljungby Volleybollklubb!

Shopping!!!!! :)

     Before I get to the shopping part, here is quick apartment update. Friday after practice, we moved into our apartment! Everyone from the team came over to help unload the truck. The apartment is really big and nice. Right now, our bedrooms look kind of funny because they are huge, but they only have a bed in them (and I have a table). Once we have unpacked everything, then I will show everyone around the apartment with pictures or a video.

      Daniel invited Meghan and I to go to Växjö, a ‘big city’, with him and a friend on Saturday. Växjo is definitely much bigger than Ljungby, but it still would not be considered a big city in American terms. The city does have a lot of shopping though! Meghan and I went off on our own, but we were told to stay on this one street or we would get lost. We went into a lot of stores, but we were more just looking than really shopping. After walking the whole street, we decided to sit down and just people watch. We weren’t watching so much what people did or say, but simply what they wore. There we sat: me in my flared jeans and Meghan in her sporty fleece jacket. We noticed that there were 2 main pieces of clothing that set us aside from these Swedes who had such style. Everyone wears skinny jeans. Male or female, grandma or kindergarten boy, it does not matter. The other piece of clothing that everyone seems to have is a nice jacket. They don’t wear jackets like our Columbia or NorthFace jackets. They wear nice leather jackets or a blazer or a cute fitted coat. With this knew knowledge of what we needed to have ‘style’, we were now ready to actually shop, but we would still need some help. We met back up with Daniel and his friend, David, and now our teammate Jaz was meeting us too. We ate a delicious lunch at an Italian restaurant, and then headed to the mall. We told Jaz that we have no style and that she needed to help us! Our first stop was H&M where Jaz basically just handed us clothes and said try this on. Meghan and I both found some clothes that we liked and some that we cried laughing. I really did have tears in my eyes while trying on a pair of skinny jeans that I could not get past my knees! Meghan had to help me get the jeans back off. We were quite a sit to see! I ended up with a shirt and a dress at this store, while Meghan got a pair of skinny jeans (the exact ones that I couldn’t get on). We went in a few other stores, but only had success in one other store. At Cubus, I found a pair of black skinny jeans that actually fit me in the waist and thighs. And guess what? They were long enough too! I couldn’t believe. Oh, and they were also only 200kr ($30). After my new stylish purchases, there was one more thing that I would need, a pair of cute black boots. We went to a boot store that is buy one get one free, but we left there empty handed. So my wardrobe is not complete yet, but I am on my way to having come stylish European clothes!

Swedish School

     On Tuesday, we went to the school, Astradskolan, where our coach, Daniel, and teammate, Johanna, teach. The school is grades kindergarten through 9^th grade. Meghan and I were special guests in the English classes. The teacher was Swedish, but she lived in England for a while so she has an English accent. She and the students were very excited that we had American accents. My response was we don’t have accents!? We introduced ourselves by saying we were here to play volleyball and pointing out on a map where we were from. The students were nervous to speak out loud in English to us. Instead, the teacher passed out slips of paper to have the students write questions that they wanted to ask us. We did this same thing in 3 different English classes. Some of the common questions were:

How long have you played volleyball?

How old are you?

Do you have brothers and sisters?

What is your favorite food?

Do you watch South Park?

Do you watch Family Guy?

Do you have a boyfriend?

Do you know any celebrities? (This is a very common European misconception. Many Europeans, not just Swedes, have asked me this question. They think since there are so many celebrities that we see them often. I thought about lying and telling them that Jason Segel is my boyfriend or that Blake Lively is my best friend, but I told them the truth that I have never really met any celebrities.)

     There were quite a few immediate differences between this Swedish school compared to American schools. First, Swedish education is free! This includes school lunch being free. School lunch is also very different than American school lunches. They NEVER have hamburgers or pizza or hotdogs. The normal meals are soup or fish or rice. I also noticed during lunch that there were students wearing aprons cleaning the tables. In America, this normally only happens if the students are in trouble. In Swedish schools, when you are in grades 7-9, you help out at school either helping the lunch room ladies clean the cafeteria or helping the janitors clean and maintain the school building. There are also some passing periods that are 20 minutes long!!! This is normally in the morning so that students can eat breakfast at school if they don’t get breakfast at home. In America, this would more than likely cause chaos and loud hallways. I was amazed that the hallways were always quiet. Also during these long breaks, the teachers all went to the teachers’ lounge for coffee and breakfast; they were not on hall duty. The last difference is one of the things that I really hate about teaching in America. I hate being called Miss Bangert! In Sweden, all of the students call their teachers by their first names.

Oh, I forgot! Saying “skit” in school (and all of Sweden) is very ok! Google translate it…

Min Fördelsedagen! and the rest of the weekend

     Friday, we were awoken by a phone call, but it was the best phone call imaginable. My suitcase would be arriving at 2pm today! If you know me very well at all, you know that I am not a morning person whatsoever. It was a different story today though. Once Meghan told me the news, I jumped out of bed and was wide-awake. My bag safely arrived an hour later than we were told, but I was too happy to care. We did not have practice so all we had the rest of the day was fika! Fika is a common Swedish word basically meaning meeting for coffee. We all met at Roddy’s for coffee and pastries. The team all knew that the next day was my birthday so they gave me a birthday present! They gave me a giftcard to a clothing store in town called Vero Moda. I can’t wait to go shopping now! We also learned that it is very common in Ljungby to eat tacos on Fridays. Since everyone else was talking about going home to make tacos, Meghan and I decided that we should stop at Maxi’s (grocery store) to get stuff to make our own tacos. I copied off Robin McCoy (missionary in Thailand from my home church) and brought Taco Bell seasoning packets with me, but the grocery store here actually has Mexican seasoning as well. After our delicious Friday tacos, we went to our teammate Lisa’s apartment to watch the Swedish futbol game. They lost, but it was nice to meet some other people in town. We attempted to go to sleep when we got back, but still struggled with the time change and finally passed out around 5am here.

     Saturday was my birthday!!! We slept in late, but Meghan made me a special birthday breakfast of bread with Nutella and sliced bananas that said “23”. We were supposed to work out on Saturday so we got our map and started on our attempt to find the training center. After about 2 hours of walking, we were back where we started. We never found the TC though. This was about the time that we got a text from Lisa asking if we wanted to party. Our response was YESSSSSSSSSSSSSS! We went to dinner at Adonis where we got kebabs that were delicious! We went to one of Lisa’s friend’s apartment that was having a party. We had shots of Mintu, which made me feel like I was back at Green Street Cafe having Rumple Minze! After a while we head over to Harry’s, which is the one and only bar in Ljungby. For you Champaign people, I would compare it to a smaller and quieter Firehaus. It was a lot of fun though because everyone was so excited that the Americans were there! I also got free drinks by using the line “it’s my birthday”, and Meghan got free drinks by using the line “I’m an American”. Just like a typical night in Champaign, when the bar closes, we head to the pizza place. We went back to Adonis; it’s no One World, but it was delicious pizza. It was an overall GREAT birthday! I was very happy that I was able to Skype with my parents and friends since I couldn’t spend the day with them.

     Once again the time zone won… I finally went to sleep around 630am. This had a drastic effect on my Sunday meaning I slept until about 230pm. I only woke up then because Meghan and I were going to our club’s junior team practice. Meghan gave them tips on setting while I talked to them about hitting. It was nice to get out and help out these younger girls. We will definitely go back to some of their other practices.

First Practice

     Before practice on Thursdays, we have an hour of weight lifting. We soon learned that there was not a lifting workout for us, but that we did that on our own. Meghan and I made our way through the weight room and survived our first weight lifting! We will come more prepared for the next lifting time. Then it was off to our first practice. We were interviewed for the newspaper at the beginning of practice, and they took our picture. The newspaper lady got my email address to send me a copy of the article so I will post that on here when I receive it, even though it will all be in Swedish! Practice went really well except for one thing… I hit a ball down the line, and it hit one of my teammates in the face. I felt so so bad! She was super nice about it all though, and after practice she even thanked me for hitting her saying that it made her a better player. We were doing that drill, but then all of a sudden our coach, Daniel, started counting down from 10. Meghan and I both just froze in place while everyone else started running around as fast as they can. We quickly realized that they were running to shag all the balls because if we don’t get all the balls in the carts within 10 seconds then we have to run. Good thing the gym is way smaller than Huff Hall! Another different thing we did during practice was sprinting, but the different part about it was that we had to hold a piece of paper against our chest as we ran. You couldn’t use your hands to hold it there so it definitely did help to make you run as fast as you can. I was so nervous the whole time though looking down at my chest to make sure the paper was still there. We finished practice by scrimmaging. This was normal for me except for one thing… I played back row! This was the first time I have played back row since high school. I was also playing middle back, which was also even more unusual for me. I did alright for it being my first time, but I’m not sure if I will be playing back row in a real match or just in practice. Everyone on the team is so nice and helpful and speaks great English that it makes everything much easier and more comfortable for Meghan and me.