Hej Hej!
Say that like a Swede and you will sound like the cutest thing ever...I love the Swedish greeting. Sounds just like 'hey' but they put a little spin on it...it sounds so friendly and warm. Well anyway, where should I start? I hung out with Steffi, Teagan, Katie, and Vash the night before I left and was staying with Jess in Munich since my flight was so early. We found our way to our favorite spot on the Isar after Steffi, Teag, and I had unsuccessfully mingled with the Swedish stammtisch. When I say unsuccessful I mean, I said HI and asked them for a clarification on a phrase. Then I felt awkward and ran back to Steffi and Teag. I mean, they were nice enough, but it was defintiely awkward. Plus they weren't all Swedes. So then we make our way to the Isar and by this time it is pouring outside. And of course our sheltered spot under the bridge is fenced off! Bummer...but there seems to be another part of the bridge with a pedestrian tunnel open. We decide to sit under there and spread out the blanket. Our neighbors were all a bunch of hobos. Quite funny really...Especially when they were offering us pain medication. Oh no...haha. Well Jess finally calls and isn't feeling well, so I met her, and Jess and I just made it back to her place. I woke up really early to catch my flight! 5!
Well I landed in Sweden and it was raining! Oh no! Not what I was hoping for. The bus ride from the airport took about 40 minutes but we got into Stockholm, and I acquainted myself with the map, trying to hide in a corner. My goal was to look as Swedish as possible the whole trip. (Plus I'm always scared to be seen as a tourist) But mostly I didn't want people thinking I was American! Well, I didn't get American at all...which is good. But a few people did think I was °gasp° German! Oh no! Not what I wanted at all and Whitney made sure to make fun of me for that! But happily, the majority was Swedish...Yay! My immediate impresson of Stockholm was...fucking rad. It's a cool city. Gorgeous in fact - because Sweden wasn't involved in WWII the Medieval city center, Gamla Stan, is one of the best preserved in the whole of Europe. And the rest of the city is also just great. There were apparently a lot of old buildings demolished in the 50's but you can't really tell...In short, the architecture is great. And the city is situated on an archipeligo, so there are thousands of islands and plenty of water. Sounds like my kind of place, right?
Well after dragging my suitcase through town (literally dragging...I will never use that suitcase again) because I decided not to take the metro in order to see the city, I was rather wet but had found my hostel. It was actually pretty cosy. I would reccomend it to anyone. Backpackers Inn in Stockholm...not bad. Well, I changed and hit the streets again finding my way to Gamla Stan which was just a huge touristy maze. I kind of fled Gamla Stan for the opposite side of that island, Södermalm. There I found myself walking on cobbeled streets with beautiful homes and alleys. Before I knew it, I had climbed up a considerable distance and was facing the city from a high ledge. It was gorgeous...I just sat up on that ledge for awhile and watched the boats and the city. After detaching myself from that moment I went through some brewery called München weirdly enough, and made my way to Gamla Stan for a coffee. I ended up making a wonderful friend at the coffee shop. She is the most beautiful woman I have ever met...And I still can't believe I didn't get her name! But I ended up meeting her there twice more and we had some great conversations. We'll just call her Anika since I don't know her real name. Anyway, she is working right now but wants to study fashion at one of 3 fashion schools in Stockholm. Just the sweetest girl I've ever met...and we compared cultures for awhile (seems the Swedes have a very different conception of American culture than most people I've met here in Europe which was really interesting) and she is just great. She also helped me learn some Svenska, and told me I did a good job!
After coffee I walked back through town to the metro (yes I finally took the metro) and went back to the hostel to get ready for going out. I prepared a rum and coke from my broughtalong rum since alcohol is so expensive in Sweden, and walked back into town with it. I stopped for awhile and watched the fireworks on the harbor...they must have been for the Olympics because the day I arrived was the start date...I got a glass of a south african red wine at a restaurant place which was pretty nice. Met a great guy who works as a missionary for the Swedish church, but does medical work, worked in Africa in French speaking countries for a long time, and is married to a man who lives in Belgium and works for the EU. He was so great, such a sweet guy, and he told me my Swedish was excellent! That's always good to hear. I think we talked for about an hour, and then I made my way onward to a club reccomended by the great bartender.
In line for this strange club I met three Northern German guys who were strangely ushered to the front of the line...I think the lady at the door wanted non-Swedes in first! So they pulled me along with and pretended I was German as well. So we got in to the front of the line (I have a feeling being American would have worked for me as well because none of these guys were that great looking) and hung out for a bit in the club. But I was wanting to dance and these guys were more for hanging out on the sides...so I kind of split from them. I managed to find Henrik and Jacob (?) who thought I was 'out' in the Stockholm club scene a lot...So, no, I told them I wasn't, but we just ended up hanging out the whole night! We had fun...I was really drunk. I ended up not remembering some people we met except for one chick in the group who was from COLORADO. She must have been pretty drunk too because I just remember the two of us screaming in the hallway about how much we loved Colorado! It was absolutely hilarious...we then proceeded to tell everyone else how they should come visit Colorado, etc. Later I got grabbed by a really creepy old man that Jacob knew...who told Jacob he was 'getting fat' and was apparently really mean to him! Well guys, if Jacob is fat, then I am 100% obese...anyway. Well he starts trying to physically grab me and pull me over there, so I had to slap him away. Then he started yelling at me or something, it was really awkward and I just remember giving him a really dirty look. Something like, 'woman, puhleeasse' except for not so gay sounding (or I guess looking). But then Henrik, Jacob and I ran away to go somewhere else and dance a little bit more. Ended up leaving, Henrik helped me with the metro, and we said bye.
Next day I woke up early...and when I stood up I felt
very lightheaded -unusual for me. I think it was because I hadn't eaten the night before. I just wasn't hungry...Well, I grabbed the snacks I had, and sat out in the hallway just munching on them for about 15 minutes before I could move again. It was weird...but I felt completely normal afterwards. Got ready, and packed up my stuff to go out and do some museums and all that stuff. I visited first the Vasa museum. It contains an extremely elaborate ship that was built and while sailing out of the dock for its maiden voyage, sank in Stockholm harbor. The ship was lost, and 333 years after it sank was pulled out of the harbor. Turns out it was incredibly well preserved...the wood detailing (which there is a lot of) was almost all still intact. The entire museum is cool, and is dominated by the ship (which is huge) and there are about 7 floors to visit each part of the ship. Really neat. After the ship I just walked around, visited my coffee buddy, and got some delicious lunch which I enjoyed while lying out on the harbor. After that I went to the bus station early to get Whitney. Except there was no Whitney! I waited there until about 10 o clock...and I realized during this waiting period from looking at my money exchange recipt that when the lady at the counter transferred my money she had typed in 200€ instead of the 400€ I had given her. I made a frantic call to the Swedish bank and they said they had 200€ turn up extra that day and I could pick it up when I came to the airport. I almost had a heart attack...but the lady I spoke with was so nice. I seriously almost died. It was so scary! But after waiting, and trying desperately to get ahold of Whit, I just went back to the hostel. Thank god she finally got there....looking like she had been through hell (which she had. Well,
travel hell, which is honestly worse than regular hell, I promise). Some crazy plane changes...ryan air sucks by the way. And she finally made it to Stockholm...well the airport about 100 K
away from Stockholm which is why you don't fly Ryan air...She finally found the bus to get into town, and just settled for a cab. Got out of the cab and found herself in the crazy muscle car show that was going on outside our door. Plus the hostel we were staying in was absolute crap, and we had only booked accidentally one bed. So we settle down, and prepare for maybe the worst night of sleep ever. Yuck, that place was awful. And the drunk Italians that came back at 4 AM did not make it more enjoyable. Plus I thought Whit had disapeered because she decided to sleep in an 'open' bed that belonged to the Italians...Oops.
Well Whit and I did some sightseeing after leaving that awful hostel...I thought I lost my bag with my passport and our train tickets...luckily Whit found it after staying with our bags at our locker at the train station while I went back to the hostel to search. (The two of us were honestly plagued with bad luck the whole trip! It really was still a great time though.) We got a great recomendation for a lunch place from a really nice guy we met at the city hall. After touring around a bit Whit and I went to a place where you can rent canoes. We went out on the harbor a little bit...It was interesting when the wake from a big boat would come to the canoe. Whit thought we were going to tip, but I felt ok. Plus I thought it would have been extremely funny if we had tipped. Whit disagreed with that! After a gorgeous, funny, but overall relaxing canoe trip we decided to walk around some more. We headed back into the city center to meet Henrik for some coffee at a fun little cafe he knew. It was really sweet of him to meet us - he's a great guy. He even bought the coffee for us...what a guy! After coffee Whit and I made our way to the train station to get our train to Oslo leaving at 22:30.
Wow...we did not have a sleeping compartment the 1st train ride which was a bummer because we were sitting next to these strange Chinese people who would not stop talking the whole train ride! They were being fairly quiet, but when they are sitting right next to you it's hard to sleep with 'ping chwanchurr ming lang chwaaaaaaaalaaalingggg' going on all the time. Well we got to Oslo really early in the morning. I also woke up for a gorgeous Norwegian sunrise somewhere on the way to Oslo. Norway was nice, but I do have to say there didn't seem to be a lot going on. I guess they are just really relaxed people...and granted it was a Monday. Well, Whitney and I saw the harbor (pretty nice) and then splurged on a boat cruise around Oslo Fjord because we read it is definitely the best thing to do in Oslo. We saw the city hall where the Nobel Peace Prize is awarded (Oslo is the most peaceful city in the world apparently, and I could believe it after being there!) Then we went on the lunch cruise which took us around the Fjord, and we ate shrimp for lunch where you had to peel the shells off. It was really pretty...but the seagulls were annoying especially when the German family thought it would be funny to dump their shirmp overboard so the seagulls would fight over it. Not very cool to feed wildlife in my opinion...Call me a boyscout here if you want...Anyway, Whitney and I (being the two blondest people alive) missed our stop on the boat, so we had to walk to the museum part of the city which is quite a distance from the center. However I'm glad we saw some of the stuff we did...the city of Oslo is really quite gorgeous. I think I would love to raise a family there...But it started raining really hard, and we got soaked! We finally found our way to the museums just to realize they are really expensive, so we ended up getting lucky and going in one for just at the enterance and still seeing everything. Everything being a famous Viking boat that is right at the enterance of the museum, but it still worked for a quick picture. We stayed there for a little bit, and then I wanted to take a quick dip in the water which was not nearly as cold as I thought it would be. We then took the ferry across the water as opposed to walking which would have taken forever and got a really expensive (but really good) late lunch. Then we bummed around...window shopped. Oslo seemed to be a little more alive at this point in the day. The streets were crowded finally...I thought it was a ghost town at first! We kept ourselves busy till 830 when our train left. Thank god we had a sleeper car this time! It was definitely better than the chairs! I went into a complete coma from about 930 PM until the next morning when we arrived in Stockholm at 8. Somewhere along the way our train hit a moose as well...so we were delayed two hours. I thought it was terribly sad! I hope the moose is OK...they stopped for two hours, but they didn't say why. Whit says they were fixing the train - I hope they were fixing the moose!
This day in Stockholm was probably the best one we had. Whitney and I got our stuff out of the lockers, and went to the boat hostel where I was staying the next two nights. That hostel was also really nice. It's called Rygerfjord if you ever want to stay there. The location is better than backpacker's inn for sure. But then we walked up to that lunch place the guy had reccomended called Hermans. It was absolutely delicious and fabulous and wonderful. It was an outdoor restaurant perched up on a cliff overlooking the harbor and old town. It's a vegetarian buffet with the best bread I have ever had. Whit and I could not stop talking about how wonderful this place was! The only bad thing were the pigeons. They attacked our food when we went back for seconds on coffee...So we had to get some new food, which wasn't a huge problem either! Then we sat out in the sun for a bit, and just talked while we digested our food a little more. We then walked around the old town shopped, and 'osloed' which is something only Whitney will ever know! After shopping we made reservations at the Absolut Ice Bar for 930 which was a lot of fun. We got the last of the rum before the ice bar and went to the Stockholm culture festival which was full of great music. We listened to a sort of bluegrass/africian/samba/irish mixed band which was beyond cool. Then we found our way over to a Swedish hiphop group and they were really good as well. After listening to the music for a bit we went on over to the Ice Bar! You get some big parka coat things that come with gloves and the expensive cover comes with a drink thank god. The drinks come in ice glasses...and I'm definitely not crazy about vodka. Unfortunately for me I think the drink was almost pure vodka! Yuck! But the ice bar was cool...the only bad thing is that it was full of old people some of whom were pretentious Canadians. I've never met a Canadian I didn't like until then. After Ice bar, whit and I went out for a few beers at Torget, some sort of gay bar. It was really cool and they were playing old films on the wall. Whit had to leave, so we went back to town center, and dropped her off. We had passed a really fun-looking outdoor club that was situated on the front porch of this huge historical building. So you went up a flight of steps, and then the two dance floors were on your left or right side. It was OK...but I found out later it is the summer 'see and be seen' club of Stockholm. So it was a little pretentious which I didn't like, but the music was really good. However, I was surprised at how unruly the crowd was - honestly I have never been to a club where people are so crazy. Everyone was just dancing...they didn't care if they hit other people and the other people also didn't care if they got hit. People just plowed their way around. Really strange...but I guess this is also the reputation of this club. Funny that it is populated by the see and be seen then....You would think they would be more polite!
The next day I got up early and took a train to Uppsala which is a University town and houses the oldest University in Scandinavia and also has the biggest cathedral in Scandinavia. It was a really gorgeous town, but really dead. I think the students must be on a break right now, because there was literally no one there! But it was nice to go there and see for myself where I might end up if I decide to leave Colorado for med school. I had a great lunch (Swedes know how to cook, I tell you what) again, and that made the day really nice. I decided to just hang around in the sun and read a little until I left. I was tired of walking around and doing touring...I had already done that in Stockholm about a thousand times! Although I did see a fair amount of the city including a big fort on a hill, the cathedral, and parts of the school where I was able to pick up course listing book. Got back to Stockholm and went directly to the hostel. I did a nice run around the Södermalm island and found another funky little restaurant area I will have to try when I go back. Stockholm is a JOGGERS CITY. I loved it...there were so many people out running! Thank god, because I am sick to death of Bayern (Bavaria) where I am outnumbered by bikes 700:1. Itstarted raining, so I ran really fast back to the hostel where I ended up hanging out with Dan from the UK and his friend Brandon from Miami. Dan was really cool...Brandon was kind of strange. Typical American muscle head...the two of them seemed an unlikely combination of friends, but whatever works I guess. We hung out on top of the boat for awhile...Dan played us some accordion, and we also met this Japanese guy Hiroshi. We all decided to go get dinner, and then we ended up grabbing a beer and meeting Dan's Scottish DJ friend. We made our way to the club where he was performing, but I decided I was just going to get some rest since I had to be up at 5 AM the next day. I walked back with Hiroshi...and then met my bunk mate, a super cute/nice Dutch girl, and a French couple who was staying next to me. Everyone was really nice...it was good to meet some nice people before I left Stockholm. Anyway, overall good vacation...the only scary thing is that I could really see myself in Sweden. But I'm still not sure if I ever want to leave Colorado again! I just love it so much...Man, you really don't know what you have until you leave. I am so happy to have realized this lesson though - I will come back with a full awareness and appreciation for everything in my wonderful life and that is truly something to be treasured.
Hej då från München,
Sean
Whitney and I chilling (haha no pun intended) at the Ice Bar
Whit looking excited in Oslo Fjord. We have been best friends since 5th grade, people!
Cute summer homes for Norwegians in Oslo Fjord
Me outside Hermans....that oh-so delicious vegetarian buffet.
Beautfiul Gamla Stan
City Hall of Stockholm with a rainbow. :)
