-First off, the drive from Trollhättan to Karlstad was so spectacular! We left directly after the driving elimination at the end of episode 4 and drove up to Karlstad and the views around Lake Vänern as we drove were fantastic! I really loved our time driving around Sweden and seeing the beautiful countryside.
-We didn't realize it but in the opening scene where we are walking towards the Amerikakoffert, you could see our hotel in the background. We had gotten in the van that morning, drove to a location and were told to hold...so we sat around the van and waited...and then they changed the location of the koffert - so we loaded up again and drove some more until they dropped us off and we set up for the shot. It wasn't until a couple of days later when I was walking around and exploring Karlstad that I realized they had basically driven us in a huge loop and we had ended up filming a half block away from out hotel. Never a dull moment when it comes to live TV.
-This was a pretty amazing koffert! There were 3 scarfs and soccer tickets, and I quickly put dibs on wanting to go. None of the girls really wanted to go, but Shane and Mike both seemed to want to go, too, so I feel like we ended up getting them kind of by default. And I was really happy it was the two of them who were going to go also.
-The thing that was in the trunk that wasn't really shown or touched upon was meat to bbq (pre-marinated meats in vacuum sealed bags) and one-time grills (engångsgrill). Funny side note - the guys from Donnez told us a story on the tour bus about a guy NOT from Sweden one time who knew about the engångsgrill - a disposable grill for bbq'ing - and who kept getting it confused with the phrase 'en gång till' - which I guess means 'one more time' or like 'encore' basically. They said it was very confusing for him. So the night of the barn dance, whenever I was up near the stage and a song ended, I would clap and shout really loud, "engångsgrill!" to be silly. And the guys in the band would laugh. Everyone else around me just thought I was a crazy American shouting 'ONE TIME GRILL!' for no reason and then dancing off. HA! It was awesome.
-So the sequence of events as they ACTUALLY happened in Karlstad are as follows: Day 1 - Amerikakoffert, ride with Donnez tour bus, set up Donnez show, .go to eat and learn to dance with the 2 groups and then the night ended with the big barn dance. Day 2 - Team Challenge day, then the 2 groups split up (John and the ladies to the animal park and the tattoo parlor, and the 3 of us to the soccer game) and then back to the hotel for the night. Day 3 - Elimination challenge day, saying goodbye to Mike, one last night in Karlstad, low key night. Day 4 - Leave Karlstad and head North. I only lay this all out for you in case you're following my fashion choices and wondering why I change clothes so much. I don't really - it's all just edited that way. :)
-The drive from where we got on the bus in Karlstad up to where the location of the dance was in Molkom was about 20 miles or so...but we were on the bus for longer than that because we did some turn around shots and stopped to pee and all that kind of stuff. We rode probably for about an hour on the bus, give our take a few minutes.
-We actually had to be prompted the first time to turn around to see the Donnez bus. But honestly, how were we supposed to know that a big tour bus was going to be pulling up behind us? The first time the bus pulled up they production staff waited for us to see it, which naturally we didn't because it was behind us, and then they finally were like "Look behind you!" So in watching the episode, you got the VERY best staged response we could muster on a third or fourth take. Our initial response, though, after we were told to turn around was genuinely sheer joy and excitement!
-I know it doesn't really matter, but I love that we're this group of Americans who swoop into a local park, find a big trunk, steal everything out of the trunk and then walk off and leave the trunk in the middle of the park. It makes me laugh every time.
-A few of you have asked about my comment "I lived this lifestyle for almost 2 years"...and it's true, I did. Not with a band - but I spent 2 years on a National Tour of the United States with a stage production of "Willy Wonka: The Musical". It was an amazing adventure. I performed the show over 650 times. I performed in 47 of the 50 States. I had the time of my life! But I would've DIED to have these guys bus - we traveled in vans and this bus was WAY nicer!
-The bus ride was really nice just to hang out with them and chat and laugh and sing a bit. They are such cool, easy going guys...and very VERY funny!
-I am semi-claustrophobic and there is NO way I could sleep in one of those bottom bunks on that bus. NO WAY. Just the thought makes my skin shudder.
-It also took a few times to get the right shots of us peeing off the side of the road - so some of those shots were just mimed urination. Please don't be let down by that fact. HAHA.
-The guys in Donnez are some of the hardest working dudes I've ever met. They drive to their next show, they unload the bus and set everything up, they perform for 4 or 5 hours, they load everything back on their bus and they do it all again the next day. And hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people come out to dance to their tunes. Love the music or not, it's a pretty incredible culture - and it's one that I WISHED existed in the US like it does in Sweden! I would hunt those dances down every week!
-So the "Amazing Grace" thing was a big joke from the first episode. We had talked after we all arrived in Arlanda and we had laughed that the make up of our group seemed VERY different than the make up of season 2...and then we wondered if by the end of episode 1, if we would all be sitting around and someone would be singing "Amazing Grace" like Megan did at the end of Episode 1 in Season 2. Of course that didn't happen because as you have seen in 5 episodes, we are a COMPLETELY different group than season 2...but then we got to testing the instruments and we said HEY! Let's get our "Amazing Grace" moment in here! So we did. (That is why the girls are sitting off to the side laughing.)
-Fun fact: before the guys of Donnez started playing, Becky had actually hopped up on the keyboard and was playing "Amazing Grace". Then the guys of Donnez joined it and we went full throttle musical number!
-This isn't an actual confirmed number, but if I am being honest, I think we stood there and sang 'Amazing Grace' close to 900 times. Of course I am exaggerating that number...but with all the filming and different angles they had to get, we did end up singing it non-stop for a good amount of time.
-Another moment you didn't get to see on camera but that happened and I loved was Donne from Donnez gave me some time to play the accordion with him. He has 2, so we did a little accordion lesson and it was awesome. I have actually been looking at buying an accordion because I want to learn to play one, and then when the accordion showed up I kind of freaked out. So Donne let me play a bit. It was great. (SIDE NOTE: Since returning home, I have bought an accordion off eBay and am slowly teaching myself to play. Someday, I will return and play a gig with Donnez. I hope.)
-OK - the team competition. Here is the deal with our plan on the yellow team. When we FIRST were shown the different games, the can game had 10 cans and were told there would be 1 point for each can - and then each of the other games you could get a total of 4 points on each. We initially thought Dawn would do cans, Becky would do darts, I would do beanbags in the holes and then Mike would shoot. Then as I started thinking (OVER thinking) about the points, I thought Mike would be a better person to throw at the cans because he could power those cans over and get us 10 points - but the shooting was only worth 4 points. So after conferring with everyone, we decided to switch Mike to cans and Dawn to shoot. (As a sidenote here...Dawn was NOT for the change at first...but she also admitted to having shot guns in the past and finally agreed that she could and would do it.) What was interesting at this point was at lunch, the production staff asked me who would be doing what, and I told them. But I don't think they were ready for me to say that Mike wouldn't be shooting. (I am pretty sure they had in their mind the perfect camera angles of Cowboy Mike shooting a gun.WHAT would be more American than that!? ) When I explained that we were going with Mike's power to get the points of the cans (10 points) instead of the points of the gun (4 points), they looked at me strange and then left. About 15 minutes later, they called us all together and said that there wouldn't be 10 cans (10 points), but only 6 cans (6 points). We still decided as a yellow team that Mike could get the 6 points for sure and we'd stick with our plan of Mike on cans and Dawn on the gun. But it was curious that there was this sudden change in the number of cans.
-On my competition, the bean bag toss, I actually asked the director if I could move the table in front of me out of the way because it was tough to toss them with it there - and initially he said it shouldn't be a problem. But then when we asked the producers when I was up to throw, they said NO that I had to throw over the table. So I did. It was awkward - and I guess I could've overhanded it - but it didn't seem right to do a bean bag toss OVER hand.
-MAN ALIVE when Mike threw those beanbags did he throw them fast. He didn't even really breath. It was definitely nerves, but he just picked them up and went with it and as you can see...it didn't do us any good. Afterward he asked me why I hadn't told him to slow down. HA! MAN this was not our competition!
-It was interesting to HEAR the other team compete because we were behind a house and back down a dirt road about 75 yards away, so we couldn't hear much - but we COULD hear the bullets hit the metal - and we couldn't ever really tell what was happening...but it did have a way of playing with your mind as you sat there and wondered how the other team was doing. PING! PING! PING!
-I know this is the first time you saw it, but EVERY challenge in our pre-event team challenge, I said my little tag line: "Clear eyes. Full hearts. Can't lose." I even have a tshirt that says it. I live it and believe it. It comes from an American tv show called "Friday Night Lights" - about high school football in Texas. But - it's a great motto for life, right!?
-Mike's phone call home was actually after the soccer game not after the team competition. Not that it makes a difference...just wanted you to know.
-So there is a voice over when we are heading to meet our dance group that is me saying "We heard there was a group of people in a nearby town...." (or something like that) - and I LOVE that voice over because it was actually recorded ON my iPhone in my house in Washington DC! Truth! They needed it recorded so I did it back in September and sent it to the production team. Modern technology is amazing!
-Our dancing lessons were SO MUCH FUN!!! I even had a chance to teach the group an American line dance, the Electric Slide. It was so fun to all be standing out on the grass doing the Electric Slide!
-This is also the night that we cooked the meat-in-a-bag that we got in the Amerikakoffert. It was delicious.
-Becky and I laughed SO MUCH trying to do the gnussa. Like...SO much. And then I dropped her - but it wasn't on purpose.
-The guy who was our dance teacher, Robert, also is a cool car guy, and Mike and I got to ride with him from the house up to Molkom in his old school Pontiac Thunderbird convertible. IT WAS SO AWESOME. I'm sad you didn't get to see us roll up to the dance in that sweet ride! You'll see pictures on my blog tomorrow. We looked good!
-Dancing at those barn dances REALLY is a full-contact sport! The girl I asked to dance got an elbow to the face. I got strong armed a number of times. I learned real quick to keep up or get trampled. But it was also so much FUN! Even the trampling was fun. It really was a fantastic ending to a really magical day!!!!
-I LOVE John's story - I love how it is told - and I love that John and I had the chance to become friends! He's a good dude.
-So initially we were very excited to have the scarf of the local team and to head to the game wearing it. But we quickly realized we stuck out like sore thumbs....because there were only 3 people in the ENTIRE stadium wearing those scarfs...and it was the dumb Americans! HA! But we wore them the whole game! I am actually looking at mine right now hangning over a door in my house.
-The crowd at this game REALLY was so quiet. Evidently the team we were watching was toward to bottom of the standings in their league. But we did learn that we were watching a game from a lower league in Sweden. This wasn't the elite level soccer. We get it now.
-Since this game was after the team competition and the night before the elimination competition, it was actually really true when Shane said, "It was really relaxing..." it was a really relaxing night with 2 friends just hanging out at a low key soccer game - thinking about anything but the possibility of going home the next day.
-The night after the soccer game, Mike and I ended up sitting in my room and chatting about life and this whole experience for like 3 1/2 hours. It was such a great night getting to know him better, and I am really thankful for that time we had, because as you know, he left the next day. I'm really thankful Mike and I were able to become friends through this whole thing!
-The morning of the elimination challenge, our team did that little walk out to sit along the lake and talk about the challenge. While we were waiting to walk along the beach towards the rocks, a big bus of Chinese tourists pulled up and they poured off the bus and walked RIGHT down to the water - blocking the path between us and the camera crew. It was actually really comical - and a nice bit of lightness for our group - as the camera crew scurried around the beach shooing the tourists out of the way and out of the shot. IF you watch back to that point in the show (about 44:22 in) you will see a few of them standing around staring at us walking by. It was pretty funny to remember that as I watched the episode and saw them there!
-Even though we were gearing up for an elimination, it really WAS so calming and beautiful sitting out on those rocks on Lake Vattern. MAN it was beautiful.
-I'm fine with crying on TV if it happens - like it did - but I'm REALLY glad I didn't do an ugly cry anywhere in this episode. Like that sobbing, heaving type of cry where your face distorts. SO GLAD I didn't have any ugly crying going on!
-We we all walked in to the elimination challenge this week and go a view of it, I think we all kind of figured out we'd be stacking pucks...but in our minds, or at least in my mind, we'd do it individually and whoever got the highest won and whoever was the lowest lost. So imagine our immense surprise when they said we would be going head-to-head. It was the worst possible scenario! I didn't want to actually compete against someone head-to-head to send them home! UGH! My stomach sank when they said 1. it was head-to-head; and 2. I would be against Becky first round. This is beyond not awesome at this point!
-Håkan Loob might be the nicest man alive. He was just awesome to meet and chat with - and he was SO excited to be part of the show. He's a big fan of AFS...so he was excited to meet Anders. And Anders is a big fan of hockey....so he was excited to meet Håkan. It was actually cute to watch the two of them meet for the first time. They are both such cool dudes.
-The thing that can't be shown in this episode is actually how QUIET the arena was. Deathly silent. There is no way to describe it or explain it - but even with us in there stacking - AND about 15 people from the production staff behind the cameras, there was this silence that engulfed that arena and it added a thick layer of anxiety and tenseness to the proceedings. It truly was a silence I had NEVER heard before - and it had a way of playing into the stress that I know I was feeling, and I think the others were feelings as well. It had a way of heightening everything - but most of all, our emotions.
-When our stack fell, Becky and I actually weren't sure WHO had possession of the stack at that point. We both just kind of stood there - and looked at each other and then at the crew and then back to each other - and then at the crew - and then back to each other. All of that is edited out, naturally, but if it was in there, it would look more like a comedy scene with both of us looking bewildered as to what happens next!!!
-After we said goodbye to Mike, we went back to the hotel and were free for the night. So Shane and I actually went and walked around Karlstad and found a place to eat. While we were eating, I got an email from Mike saying he was taking off from the Karlstad train station in an hour...so Shane and I finished eating, went to a store and bought a bunch of bulk candy and then went down to the train station to see Mike one last time and give him a going away present of the candy! It was nice to see him away from the game and away from the cameras. Mike and Shane and I became pretty close, and so it was good to have this one last little farewell with him at the train station!
That's about all she wrote on episode 5! Thank you all for checking in and following along! And my apologies if I got a little wordy this week. There is just SO much to say about the episode...so I just kept writing!!!! I hope some of it was worth the read!!! See you next week!!!! And now, it only seems fitting to end with a big fat......engångsgrill!!!!!!!!
3 comments:
Thanks Matt! You are so enjoyable to watch this season.
If only I was along for the adventure this season with you guys, we'd have been friends in a heartbeat. You are truly genuine.
Can't wait to see what happens in episode 6, and I hope you have YOUR day.
Will be back of course to check in on The MAnderson Report!
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