"Fire is motion / Work is repetition / This is my document / We are all all we've done / We are all all we've done / We are all all we've done / We are all all defenses."

- Cap'N Jazz, "Oh Messy Life," Analphabetapolothology

Sunday, September 03, 2006

jag vilja att veta svenska

[literal translation: i wish to know swedish]

hej!

sorry for the lack of posts but i'm back at school now and am already struggling to keep up with my insane schedule: i'm in class 9-9 practically every day. on wednesdays, until 10. thursdays, due to work, i don't get home until 11:30. i miss having a social life. :-(

when i'm not studying or applying for scholarships or programs or doing living wage work, i'm learning swedish.

why? you might ask. b/c it's so much fun! (lots of glossolalial tricks that don't exist in english! and the mere challenge of reproducing such a foreign sound is cognitively distancing. i see a swedish word and have no idea how to find the root or interpret its function, have no idea how to read it without a pronunciation guide, have no idea how to take this phrase and combine it with this other phrase to make a sentence, don't know how to conjugate verbs, how to use conjunctions, how to separate verb parts from their indirect object pronouns... it's terrifying, it's dizzying, it's so completely foreign and nonderivative... it's FANTASTIC!!)

i have been terrifyingly sick of oxford lately, and to maintain my loose grip on sanity, i've been opting for any kind of escape possible. before it would have been film, but since i am taking two film classes this semester, i've been kinda tired of the cine.

one of my ill-conceived plans for getting out of this slump is to take a semester off and travel to europe. of course, this could work out in the form of a study abroad venture, but given the poor choice of classes, and my verging proximity to the daunting senior project, i'm thinking that is not going to be a possibility any more.

but i think a semester abroad/away is exactly what i need. i need a change of scenery. some new faces. new strangers. a new kind of anonymity. maybe some time off to quit my worrying and simply live.

you can call it hedonistic if you want, but i think i'm just trying to survive. my advocacy is burning a whole in my heart and my search for truth has dead-ended me here in oxford.

so i've been doing research on sweden and i must say, it seems a magical place. healthcare-communism and a democratic monarchy (which is probly more democratic than our current system anyway... i'll take a monarch over a despot any day). plus, the swedes have been gradually lessening their dependence on petroleum and nuclear power, relying instead on hydro- and solar power. seems like a perfect fit to me...

anyway, sweden is bouying my spirits. as we all zombie around this campus in our respective existential comas, i am dreaming of sweden and mumbling jag vilja's ["i wish"es] with each breath.

jag vilja...
-stephanie


p.s. stephanie is such a non-swedish name that whenever i say "jag heter stephanie" i feel foolish. will someone suggest a swedish name alternative? the one i like best might get a prize!!

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

the spammer here

hope the cold's better there guy

still negotiating with someone's pc (upon which i write, bien sur!) and with radio.indymedia for posting up one of my many old unreleased electronica albums, for release, so check it out under my handles: jAFFA Refugee or 3D1on, mostly

- some of the first democracies in ancient india were monarchies -> it is what "the People" want that makes it demo-cratic, not dogmas (ie the democratic party) but as for autonomy on petroleum, also check out the prices of gasoline relative to national production supply

>are truly higher gas prices a sign of intelligence in the universe?< ^o^

anyways, really enjoy the bl0g nuveax - hope you continue not let anything hold you down or whatever (: but i and myself usually fuck off the interent and ppl's pc's in general about this time of year to spend more time with my sixteen yr marriage to poverty

so maybe 'til next spring, barring lingered effects
goodbye

stephanie lee said...

sorry about the cold. i'm worried sick i'm going to get sick myself. wait...

;-)
-stef