One month in, I'm still alive!

So one month here is over now and I haven't updated my blog. Whoops! Sorry about that, but you wouldn't believe how busy I am here. School every day, a shit ton of homework, filming for the filmmaker students, spending time with my new friends, I don't even have time to skype my family! But enough about that for now, you probably want to know what happened after I met my roommate (I hope I remember the details).

The Struggle Of Moving In

After waking up and having a great breakfast, Sofia and me are on our way to our new apartment. We're excited and I'm nervous since I've never even seen it before. First we unload our baggage and some furniture, then we visit the apartment complex office to register and get the keys. Simple task, right? Nope. Approximately two hours later, we're back at the apartment with no keys and no place to put our furniture because the staff got Sofia's email completely wrong and she never received the information about how we have to pay the deposit and take care of the water, elictricity and gas contracts before we could get the keys. Luckily Sofia is still living in her other apartment, where I can crash for the night. The next day we take care of the contracts and somehow get the money for the deposit together (which was also a complicated task but I'm not getting into that right now). As soon as we have the keys, we head out to IKEA to buy beds and other necessities. We spend quite a bit of money but come home succesfully. Sofia goes back to her apartment cause she has school the next day, while I built the beds for myself and my future roommate Martta who arrives the next day.

Meeting My Second Roommate

It's wednesday now and I'm nervous and excited all day. My roommate and maybe even classmate arrives today. All I know is her name and where she's from. Martta from Finland. When Sofia comes to build her bed I'm already up at the window looking for when the cab arrives. Sadly it takes almost two hours, but eventually she arrives at the entrance. Our meeting is kind of awkward and I'm a little dissapointed when I realize her humour might be a bit different from mine (turns out the jetlag ate her humour though, our humour is actually really similar). The coming orientation week is really productive and informative. I meet a few of the students I'm going to spend the next three years with and already find some friends. When the second weekend comes up I'm super nervous cause soon our classes and sections will be revealed. Martta and me have already become friends and are crossing our fingers that we'll be in the same class. As fate has it, we do end up in the same class and are destined to spend the next three years together almost 24/7.

To Conclude... (Watch My Teacher Punch A Baby Deer)

And now I'm getting to the boring part, the part where my normal day to day life begins and my free time ends. It's been four weeks since school started and so far I love it. There are a few lessons that I don't enjoy as much as others but I feel like I've learned so incredibly much and feel like I've grown very much as an actor. (Ugh throwing up right now, it sounds so pretentious... but it's true I'm sorry.) My favorite thing here is not the location because believe it or not we've only been to the Walk Of Fame so far.. (I know super boring but as I said time is a rarity here), it's the people. I have met so many lovely people, made so many new friends and I'm having so much fun at school every day, I'm sometimes overwhelmed by it. I'm so grateful for all the people I know and am friends with, you don't even know what you're doing for me. I'm so happy here, I honestly think I've never been happier, more productive, more open or more disciplined in my life. I feel like I made the best decision I have ever made and I'm so happy for how everything worked or didn't work out. And now to make you even more jealous enjoy these pictures of awesome places and people! :)

By the Walk Of Fame

The bridge I cross every day on the way to school omg so exciting

The Universal Studios Backlot where we filmed twice now are you jealous yet

The beautiful, magical, color-changing lights in one of my new friends apartment <3

Gorgeous people (sorry for posting this but I love y'all so it's your fault) whoops <3

Btw the title for this section is thanks to my super cool English Composition teacher who said if we ever use to conclude in an essay, he's going to run into the forest and punch a baby deer in the face... so.

The Day Before & The Flight - Breaking Down Part 2

Finally I get around to write this. I wanted to start this blog even before flying to L.A. but didn't find the time or motivation to actually do it. So excuse me for not sending you pictures or updates, if I promised to do that, it was just all very hectic these past two weeks and now you can just look here if there's anything new, yay!

The Day Before The Flight

It's the day before the flight, the day before saying goodbye and adios to my family and friends. Actually, I said goodbye to my friends a long time ago, before moving, but still. I'll have to leave them behind here in Germany, too. I've cried all day and all I want to do is not think of what is about to come. The day goes on and I should probably try to sleep since I'll be traveling 15 hours and arrive at 1:40pm. But I can't sleep even though I'm super tired from crying. All I'm doing is watching childhood cartoons for some reason. And that's what I do until 3am. I'm up the whole night, occasionally crying when I look at my pugs sleeping on the couch or think about leaving my mom and dad 9020 km behind in a few hours. When my mom gets up at 3am, my dad cooks for me the last time, making me "Strammer Max", so I won't be travelling with an empty stomach. I eat and enjoy it while crying (of course). I change my clothes and gather my last few things. The time of goodbye is coming and I've not cried like this in a long, long, long time. For scientific reasons *cough* I filmed myself, because I wanted to look back on it when I'm over it and laugh at myself for being a whiny little baby all the time. So enjoy me crying, sobbing and blowing my nose in the video below.

The Flight To London

After a two hour drive to the airport, me and my mom figured out where to go and are sitting at a café. I start crying again when we get up to go to the gate. I'm crying while writing this just thinking about how scary it felt to go through all the customs, knowing I'm going to be on my own from here on out and knowing I won't see any of them again for a long time. 
Given the time, around 7am, the airport is pretty empty and quiet, wich is good cause the last thing I need is feeling hectic and rushed on top of the anxiety I'm already dealing with. I don't have much time to look around though, cause my flight is being called out. I head to the ticket control and walk across the bridge, observing the airport wich is still pretty dark, the sun hasn't risen yet. The flight is only 1 hour and 45 minutes, so it's over pretty fast. Unfortunately I didn't even touch the food cause I ate at home and am not very hungry. If I had known what was ahead, I would've stuffed everything in my mouth at the same time.

Bringing more than 100ml of a liquid is not allowed, therefore I didn't bring anything to drink with me. First getting into the wrong queue cause the London Heathrow airport is too stupid or greedy to put up signs describing wich line you have to get into, I'm now standing in a approximately 15meter queue. After finally passing this first control, we're just sent to the next queue. And the next. And the next. After an hour of standing in lines with my handbag and heavy suitcase, I start getting very, very thristy. But I can't go and buy something to drink cause custody isn't over yet. After another hour the end is in sight but still far away. I haven't slept in almost 24 hours now, haven't eaten in seven hours, haven't drank anything in almost 3 hours, have stood in this queue for almost 2 hours. Approximately 100 people are squeezing around me in the queue, I'm wearing my coat cause I don't want to carry it. Obviously I start getting very hot, dizzy and dehydrated. Luckily after 10 more minutes I'm finally through custody. But even if I would have enough time to get something to drink, I don't have the right currency with me. So I rush to the next gate and get on the plane. 

Flying to L.A.

Glad I'm finally sitting and not standing or walking anymore, I relax a bit. Also seeing the monitor in front of me and the awesome selection of movies and TV shows I am not as nervous about the flight anymore. But still I'm almost willing to go to the toilet and drink the water there. After drowsing and watching a movie only half awake, finally we get something to drink. I feel strange, weak, dehydrated, tired, hungry all at the same time. And the weird feeling of flying isn't helping. I try to sleep but there's just no way to find a comfortable position. So I keep drowsing and listening to the sound of Guardians of the Galaxy, Game of Thrones and other things. When the food arrives I feel like puking, I eat a few bits of rice and keep the bun wich I eat within the next hour. Overall the flight isn't as bad as I feared it to be, but given my state, it's not very pleasant either. Below is a video documenting the best thing about the flight, the super nice view.

Meeting My Roommate

Arriving at LAX Airport here in Los Angeles and going through custodies is surprisingly not as stressful as in London, but still very draining. The custody takes a lot less time and is way more structured. It still takes me about an hour to finally get to the suitcases though. Finding my suitcase is really stressful and I almost break my arm trying to grab mine and pulling it off the baggage carousel. Of course the woman in front of me didn't even bother to help before she saw me struggeling for the second time. After fighting through the masses of people with my two heavy suitcases I'm now lost at the entrance. So many people talking all at once, running around, getting into cars and whatnot. I have no idea where to go, what to do and most importantly how I will get to my destination. After standing there for about ten minutes a nice man helps me out by telling me to just wait for the next taxi. The taxi is awful, it smells of cigarette smoke, it's way too hot and the price oh boy. But at least the driver is nice. When I finally arrive at my destination, I'm too tired to be nervous about meeting one of my roommates, Sofia, for the first time. As always, I'm hella awkward but soon we're talking and laughing. She's super nice and we have a lot in common, I feel like she's going to be a great roommate. Her aunt and uncle whose house we're staying at are incredibly kind and courteous as well, and they love pugs! My first night in L.A. is very long cause I can't keep myself awake longer than 8pm. It's a good night and I feel like I've just stepped through the next door to my destination. :)