PS

The city we were in yesterday, Jönköping, had a sign with all its sister cities. It's sole American sister city is none other than Palo Alto! How cool!

Last Day In Sweden

Molly - you are going to LOVE love love Sweden. Stockholm is possibly the coolest city we've visited yet!

Anyhow, today was our last day of this tour! I can't believe it's already here! It has flown by. It was a fairly normal day until the actual show, plus a little more excitement in the air at the thought of going home. Although, I did wake up at 6am to web cam with the kiddos at Poker night at Rohit's house which was the coolest experience ever! There I was sitting at 6 am in central Sweden chatting away with like a room of my bestest friends thousands of miles away at 9m in the evening at the annual poker night. It made my day! I can't wait to go home on TUESDAY! ahhh!!

Anyhow, then I ate some breakfast and went back to sleep. And then the usual 2 hour bus ride, (so much better than Russia!! ) and we were in Gothenburg. A couple of us explored the city and all that and went to the venue which was extremely awesome because it was in this giant amusement park called Liseberg all decorated for Christmas. It was magical! There was an ice rink and so many lights!




We also finished our new dance for China during rehearsals before the show. It's a ceili which is refreshing, because we don't have anything quite like it in the show right now. And the costumes are really pretty! I'll post picture when we get them in China.

The actual show was one of the most fun yet! Everybody had such a good laugh and it meant so much. Tonight was both Paul, a tenor, and Jemma's, a dancer headed for Riverdance, last show with us. Everybody sort of stepped back in their own way to give them the limelight. We tried to step out of certain dances so Jemma could dance every dance. And during her session, the part where four girls get to do a step about, we screamed like crazy for her. The best part though, was at the end bows, four girls do a step in a line. So the four girls, including Jemma did the first half of the step, but then three of the girls stopped and started clapping for her half way though so she was the only one dancing in this line. She had no idea and was crying with joy. It was so special! She did look a bit confused at first though. Other shenanigans that went down were people drawing smiley faces in their armpits, rubbing hair wax all over our hands to spread it to other people on stage, tons of silly faces, tripping each other, dancing in the wings trying to make the people on stage laugh, added gestures such a flick of the hair, a new pose....everybody felt a bit more adventurous tonight which lent to tons of laughs.

Then after the show, at about midnight, everybody kinda started hanging out in the lobby, and Paul played the guitar for a couple of hours and we just sang on our last night before our two week break. Tomorrow we're going home! I can't believe it's happening! I can't wait!!

Tons of love!




Jack, my partner for the dance called Lenister's Lord.

Stockholm

So yesterday, we drove from Copenhagen to Stockholm, a 600 and some odd Km journey, taking about nine hours. It was our longest journey yet for this tour. Fortunately, we did not have a show last night for the first time in a week, which was nice. Instead we had a major snow fight. I was sopping wet by time I finally came inside. Anyhow, today, we had a ton of free time since we traveled yesterday, so we went on an awesome journey all around Stockholm. Bought a 24 hours bus/train/metro ticket and traipsed around the whole city. I'm pretty sure we walked up and down every single street in Stockholm, at least that's what it felt like.




The residential palace -- where the Royal family of Sweden lives.



After the show, we had the tough decision between hanging out backstage at the Black Label Society concert because somehow over the two days we were here, we became friends with this crazy heavy metal band (from California!) since they were staying in our hotel and we have the whole living on the road thing in common, or an ice bar. We chose the ice bar. Sounded a lot safer. So yeah, that's me and my fellow American - Kirsten!


And this is me and my adopted big bro - Barry, the tenor from Longford in Ireland.




A sweet medieval street in Stockholm with my lovely Lenister's Lord parter -- Jack from Scotland.

I love the snowwww!! ack!!

Love,
Laura

ps. I'm coming home Dec 2!! Cant wait to see the fam, the sun, and eat some In'n out burger!

Check It!

I'm in Denmark now and there's a sweet sweet hailstorm going on outside right now. I absolutely love Denmark. It's so beautiful and idyllic. I feel like I'm walking around a freaking tv set though, it's so perfect, it almost seems fake. Anyhow, for your viewing pleasures, I have a little video. It's a bit from the show. This was taken last week at a show in Malmo, Sweden.

Holland <3 <3 <3

I absolutely love Holland. Love love love it. Holland > Russia. We just got here yesterday and I am so excited for this tour!
Firstly, I am on the internet!! Our venue has free wifi! How amazing! So I don't have to disappear into nothingness for weeks like I did in Russia. Secondly, The stage is absolutely perfect. Flat, with some give and giant. The venue has working toilets that aren't holes in the ground, like one of our venues in Russia did. We're in a hotel with normal water that isn't rusty, yellow, and smell funny. We have HOT food -- salmon, pasta, veggies, rice, potatoes and a refrigerator full of cold drinks for catering. Everybody speaks english. And my favorite part, two physical therapists waiting to fix whatever ailment we might have. I had a gorgeous back massage before the matinée and I'm about to go get my shinsplints sorted out.
Ackk!! I LOVE Holland!!!!

Today was made even better by the fact that Damien's family surprised us by coming to the show! Nobody had any idea that they were coming, but then they showed up backstage after the show! It was so exciting to have someone you know watching the show. Their not even my parents, but I was elated! It's funny because I asked them at dinner when I was at their house if they were going to come see the show because Holland is so close, and they were like 'nah.' They're so tricky! I love it!

Also, the professional basketball team we met in Moscow is coming to tonight's show, fingers crossed.

Holland is the best! Off to Denmark tomorrow, which should be equally awesome.

Love,
Laura

More pictures

Boys being silly backstage.


Guys may get a lot of crap for being dancers, but maybe their lives aren't all that bad....
Enjoying a night out in the VIP room in Kazan.
Some of the boys waiting in the train station.

:)

So, I'm having a fabulous time in Omagh! Damien and his family have been so hospitable. Our first night home, on Tuesday, his mom made us a huge Irish roast. She got home around 1 from work and started cooking.Potatoes, gravy, yorkshire pudding, carrots, peas, and meat! It was so nice after living off this:




Anyhow, yesterday was so nice! Kirsten, Sean, and I took the bus up to Belfast. I quite enjoyed the ride because the countryside is so beautiful here! So many sheep! Natalie and Morgan picked us up and we had a good time shopping. Then they drove us out to their house, about 30 minutes out of Belfast in Larne. They showed us Kilwaughter Castle which is this sweet sweet castle round the corner from their house in ruins.



Then, we had another fabulous roast at their house. Their house is so cozy! It was built in the 1800's, maybe earlier. They have a lovely cat that made me miss Princess Peach so much! I haven't played with a pet in over two months. It was such a treat! We proceeded to have a wonderful night on the town in Belfast and crash at Nicola, the piper's house, who also came out with us as well as a bunch of other kids from the show. We can't stay away from each other, even on break!

Here are a few more pictures from Russia:






Gillian and I in front of Lenin's childhood home.



Fergus attempting to do Gillian's makeup on the train. I think this was the 25 hour train journey. We were very bored to say the least.


The girls in Ekaterinburg. This is the place where the czar and his family lived for a while and were eventually lined up and shot right where that church is now.




Warming up with Smithy for the last show of the tour in Belarus!



Inside the tour bus.







Anyhow, we leave for Holland tomorrow morning! I am so excited! Can't wait!

Love From Omagh

Oh! It's so nice to finally be back in Ireland! What an adventure Russia was. Now I'm in Omagh staying with Kirsten and Sean at Damien's house. I can't even explain how happy everybody is to be back in Ireland. When we got off the plane, Damien literally climbed down the stairs and kissed the Irish ground. Don't get me wrong, we had a great time, but there's nothing like home, or in my case, "home." Anyhow, I definitely owe ya'll some pictures.



The bus! More like our home for five weeks. As well as the trans-siberan railway. Often times we would do a show, go back to the hotel, and then hop on the bus around midnight for an overnight bus journey, where we would arrive in the morning and sleep through the day. Apparently though, we only do that in Russia. I'm looking forward to our next tour in Holland, Denmark, and Sweden where we spend less time on the bus.



My roommate Natalie and I sightseeing in Kazan.



Enjoying cup of noodles, our typical catering at the venues. This picture is from early on in the tour though. I couldn't even look at a cup of noodles after about the first week. So, I mostly ate whatever else was provided like bread and cheese and fruit. Let's just say our eating habits in Russia were eradic. Breakfast usually was some sort of raw fish as well as yogurt, fruit, and cheese unless we were traveling or sleeping and then we didn't eat much after that. Whenever the bus passed a McDonalds though, everybody freaked out and demanded the bus to stop immediately.



Most of the girls during intermission.



Me and Natalie sightseeing in Moscow.




A typical venue. Most of the venues were actually pretty nice! The one in St. Petersburg was the best though. I don't have a picture of it, but it held 4000 people. We had two sold out shows that day. It was incredible! It also helped quite a bit that the Russian audiences were fabulous. They loved us! It was quite a nice feeling. After the show, they would wait for us at the stage door and want autographs and pictures. All in all, they made us feel very loved.

Anyhow, I have so much to fill you in on! It's getting late now though, so more updates tomorrow! I miss everybody so much!

Tons of love,
Laura