After talking Swedish business and time management with Emily's dad PerOlaf in Varnamo I said goodbye to her and her brother Daniel and got on a train to Gothenburg, where Eden (who lives down my road here in Hull) met me from the Station and showed me to a hostel she had booked for me.

Gothenburg is a wonderful city, very compact but lots of open spaces as well. We visited Liseburg(?) park , which was all decked out with christmas lights, and as with all the christmas lights in Scandanavia they were tastefully white.

unfortunately it started to spit that evening and by morning it was a horribly drizzly day, I had decided to head to Oslo so I could see Alex before he went home, but I text Johannus, who I was going to be staying with in Oslo and he said that he wasn't going to be in Oslo intil the day after, Monday. I had already decided I was leaving Gothenburg because of the rain, so trekked to the bus station and took the bus to Oslo anyway. A snow storm hit us on the way, I have never seen so much snow, and was regularly amazed as the 60 mph bus changed lanes through a foot of thick snow. Obviously very used to it, as we still arrived on time. When Snow hits the UK and everything stops. I hope it snows here this year, my house mate Andrew from Malaysia is looking forward to it.

I stayed in the Perminalen in Oslo, in the heart next to Carl-Johannes Gate
, the central street. Very nice place, 28 quid, but only one night and there isn't much cheaper (14) I had heard, and it was booked up.

Oslo was great too, again very small, 500,000 but very nice, and full of snow. I think I preferred Oslo to the other cities I visited. Met Alex (NTU singapore), who I had not seen in a year and we went for a hot chocolate in a Jazz cafe-nice. Met with Johannus (ntu singapore, usm malaysia) the following morning, he drives an ambulance when he's not studying, and had promised to take me on a whistle-stop tour of the streets, unfortunately people were needing him in the ambulance, so had to put that plan on ice.
Took the train to Tonsberg and was met at the station by Magnus (Ibero, Mexico) had a fantastic two days around the area south of Oslo. Went to the end of the world (that's its name in Norwegian) and back again, which was awesome, blue, ice, shivering waters. Stayed with Magnus's mum in Tonsberg who's house opens out onto a beutiful river. Met Stena again, Magnus's sister who had come to Mexico to visit him. I met the rest of the family too whilst Magnus went to work at the local shop.

Magnus gave me a lift to the airport the next morning and I arrived back to the UK at 13.00 I think, on xmas eve. mum and dad picked me up and I enjoyed a relaxing christmas at home in Watford with the family. I got itchy feet very quickly and came back to Hull to get some of my project done, now back and the internet is down here in my house! So slightly frustrating, but I think I have aeverything I need. Here for new year, but no big plans. Back to Watford on Friday for Ted's birthday on Saturday. Looking forward to that and going out with Jon and Mike, Stuart, Iain, Lewis, Rachel, Sean, Karen, all the old school friends.

Went to a party at the Billingtons on Saturday, saw lots of people I havn't seen in 2 years, Tom's band Mohare still looking to make it big, they came to Hull Uni in October, but I didn't see anything about it unfortuantely, would have been good to see them again.

All is good. will apply to Edinburgh, Newcastle, Manchester for Bioinformatics Masters, this week I think- John