Back in the USSR

Greetings blog readers!

You may have noticed that I didn't write anything last weekend. That's because I stayed in Stockholm. I went out Friday and Saturday nights to a few clubs and bars, spent a lot of money, you know, the usual. So that weekend doesn't deserve its own post, neither do the weekdays, so lets skip ahead to this past weekend.

Many of you already know that I took a trip with my floor to Riga, Lativa...and you wondered why I did this...frankly, I wonder why too. Well Riga is the party destination of the former Soviet Union. Yeah. I didn't even know what Latvia was until about 6 weeks ago when we bought the tickets...ignorant american...

Riga from across the river

The transportation part of the trip was a bit sketchy. We took a ryanair flight, so that was to be expected. And then on the bus from the airport to the hostel, I was just sitting there with my stuff, minding my own business when suddenly everything went gray/white and something powdery blasted in my face. I stood up and noticed the people on the bus didn't seem as panicked as I was, but at this point I really wanted to be able to breathe, so I pushed my way off as everyone else exited the bus, which then drove away, without any announcement of what had happened or an apology of any kind. Just a normal bus trip in Riga I guess. So I sat there on the edge of the road coughing and trying to get all the white powder off of me for awhile, as my friends discussed what had just happened. They came to the conclusion that the fire extiguisher in front of me had went off or exploded or something, and I probably got the worst of it, as I was the only one covered in white. I hope inhaling that stuff isn't dangerous.

We soon arrived at the hostel, which seemed like a fun place. Bar open 24/7, friendly staff, seemingly cool people staying there. They gave us a free beer. That was nice. But we soon learned that 24/7 bar maybe wasn't such a good idea...but I'll explain this later. So we went off to explore the city a bit. It was a pretty place- cobblestone streets, colorful buildings, nice parks. Not exactly what I was expecting. We had dinner at a Latvia restaurant....but Latvian food isn't anything exciting, pretty much just meat and potatoes. But we were happy that everything was so (comparitively) cheap. We then went back to the hostel, got ready and waited for an acceptable time to go out, midnight in this case, as the clubs in Latvia don't close until 8 am.

So went out to this place called essential, which was unlike anything I've ever seen. There must have been at least 5 dance floors playing different music, and lots of different bars around. There was always a new section of the club to discover. Just walk up a different set of stairs and see where it takes you. We started off on the techno dance floor with its laser lights and fog machines then we advanced to the hip-hop dance floor where I impressed everyone with my knowledge of hip-hop lyrics. Eventually we ended up at the 80s and 90s pop floor. Any DJ that plays ghostbusters twice in one night is alright with me. At around 2:30 I was ready to leave. I'm used to going home by 2 afterall, but unfortunately, no one else wanted to, so I ended up staying until 5, at which point I was very ready to go to bed.

So we got back to the hostel and the place was pretty empty except for 5 English boys, who were still drinking at the 24 hour bar. They asked where we were staying and, lucky us, we were in the same room! (We were in a 14 person co-ed dorm) So they talked to us for awhile and they were obviously very drunk, but they seemed nice enough. So we put on our pajamas and got into bed and were about to go to sleep, when the 5 of them came in, turned on all the lights, and started talking to us. One of them actually climbed into bed with one of my friends, which was super creepy, so she just sorta inched away and tried to ignore him. The others were drunkenly yelling something about how the bus was coming soon and asked each person in the room individually what kind of sandwich they wanted (I said PB&J) So this went on for awhile, and despite the fact that no one was responding, they kept talking, so finally my friend Titia told them to shut up and get out because we were trying to sleep, or something along those lines. In the process she must have mispronounced a word (she's from the Netherlands afterall, but speaks very good English) so they started making fun of her. So this was not cool, at all, so another friend, Natalie, started yelling at them and went out to the desk to see if we could switch rooms. Unfortunately they were all full, but we at least scared them a bit, and they were better the rest of the night, although still loud, and still obnoxious. We really couldn't fall asleep until they did, which wasn't until around 8 am. Now I had read about how a lot of European countries have issues with English tourists being loud and drunk and obnoxious, but I had never experienced this first hand. What jerks. So needless to say, much of Saturday was spent sleeping.

The statues in Latvia scare me

The rest of my time in Latvia was less scary. We did some sightseeing, ate delicious pancakes, and did some serious floor bonding. I learned all about the history of Latvia in the 20th century. Man, they've had it easy. The next night we switched rooms, where I was kept awake by snoring instead. I was careful to avoid the fire extinguisher on the bus ride to the airport, and we got home Monday evening, just in time for me to rush to Swedish class 30 minutes late. Next week my parents will be visiting me. And they're bringing Reese Puffs! Finally, something to look foward to.

You know Dasher and Dancer and Prancer and Vixen....

This last weekend I took a trip to Helsinki, Finland- and much fun was had. I went with two other girls from my floor, Rose from Melbourne, Australia and Titia from Delft in the Netherlands. We took an overnight cruise over there, which was pretty fun. The boat was big with lots of (expensive) stuff to do. Our first stop was the duty free shop, of course. While I was there, I spotted Maynard Wine Gums, my favorite candy back from my days in London. So I bought a big box, which I'm sad to say is now almost empty. Oh, interesting story. While we were in our cabin, we heard music coming from down the hall, so we went to check it out. There were a bunch of Swedish people our age drinking in a room, and they invited us in (FYI- many Swedish people go on these boats solely to buy cheap alcohol and get really drunk). They asked us where we were from, and when I said the US, they were like, oh, all snobby and disapproving like, and they didn't talk to me for the rest of our time in the room. I had never had people react like that to me being from the US. Most of the time people will say, oh we can't wait for you to get a new president, or something like that, but they wont hate me for being from the US. But not these people I guess. Oh well. And later on the boat, we went up to a karaoke bar (I may or may not have sang Summer of 69...) and this Swedish guy was telling me all about his dream to move to LA. I tried to explain that LA isn't really all that great, but I suppose the Swedes just watched too much of the OC. So anyways, the boat was fun. No icebergs or anything. For I would have surely died, being in the poor part of the boat, below the car deck.

Alright, enough about the boat. The destination was Helsinki. After a night of not sleeping very well we arrived, and it was freezing. Makes you really appreciate the 50 degree weather in Stockholm. We took the tram to our hostel, which was located inside the 1952 Olympic stadium, cool, then we set off to explore the city. Our first stop was the modern art museum, called Kiasma. And since I enjoy modern art very much, I was a fan of this activity. I bought a new poster for my collection of posters from art museums. Its a dog in a bee costume, and it says "en ihan ymmärrä" which is Finnish for something that I haven't bothered to look up yet. Oh I just remembered why dogs in bee suits seemed so familiar to me, its that website, with all the dogs in bee costumes....http://beedogs.com/ right. well, if you had trouble picturing what a dog in a bee suit would look like, this website has plenty of examples. After the museum of modern art, we made the mistake of walking through Helsinki's main shopping district on the way to our next destination. I ended up spending all the money I had just taken out of the ATM for the trip on shoes...but the good news is I now have rain boots (also known as wellies in England, gum boots in Australia) for those rainy Stockholm days. And a pair of crocs, but not ugly crocs, you wouldn't even know they were crocs, i swear! Since the majority of people reading this I'm guessing are male, I'll stop talking about shoes and move on. Our next stop was the Helsinki Cathedral. I got some nice pictures of it. It reminded me of what I imagine Russia would be like. Fun fact! Finland used to be part of Sweden, but Russia conquered it in 1809. It later became independent in 1917. So I suppose that's why there are both Russian and Swedish looking buildings in Helsinki.

The Helsinki Cathedral

This is where the trip starts getting a little bit dangerous, except not really. We read in the Lonely Planet guide about an old Finnish wood burning sauna, and we decided to visit it. The subway was sketchy (especially compared to the tunnelbana in Stockholm) and then the neighborhood we got dropped off didn't seem all that safe either...We had a hard time finding the building, but once we saw the old fat men in towels sitting outside this building with a huge sign that said 'sauna' we figured we were in the right place, but were beginning to question our decision to come there. But we decided to stay and use the sauna, but I wouldn't say I exactly enjoyed it. It was very old, and there were a lot of old (naked) people... anyways, it wasn't the relaxing experience I had imagined it to be. Our next stop was dinner, which again was picked out from the Lonely Planet guide, but don't worry, this time they got it right. We went to a little restaurant outside the city center with Finnish food. We opted to do the buffet, so we could try everything. I tried reindeer, which I was excited about, but I didn't care for it much. Not very flavorful. We stayed there for hours. Even when we wanted to leave, the old couple who owned the place kept talking to us, so we couldn't. They were nice though.

The next day, we started off the morning at Cafe Espanade. We bought 4 pastries between and 3 or us. I knew I was in trouble after eating the first third of a pastry and already feeling full. But I finished everything on my plate, a bad but delicious idea. We then took a ferry to Suomenlinna, an big fortress built on an island near the city in the 18th century to protect Helsinki. We walked around the island for a few hours, exploring different tunnels and buildings. It was huge, had the weather been nicer and if I would have had a flashlight to see inside some of these tunnels, I could have spent all day there. I imagine its a very nice place to visit in the summer. We took the ferry back and visited another cathedral, the Uspenski Orthodox Cathedral. Gotta love churches...especially if you're travelling in any city in Europe. We went back to the hostel to retrieve our bags, ate lunch/dinner in the big food market by the water, and got back on our boat. The ride home was pretty low key. Titia and I went to the sauna on the boat (much nicer than the scary one in Helsinki) and we went to bed early. The next morning, the boat arrived at 9:30, and I rushed back to KTH in time for my class at 10. Check out my new facebook album with pictures from Uto and Helsinki. http://www.new.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2239592&l=75664&id=16915404

A weekend with the family

This weekend, I visited the former home of Per Erikson, my great great grandfather. He had 8 or 9 children, Arvid, Gustav, Erik, Anna, Hilda, Jenny, some others I can't remember now, and my great grandfather Axel Pearson (back then if you were Per's son, your last name reflected that fact, I'm guessing Per's father was named Erik...) Axel eventually immigrated to Chicago along with his brothers. Jenny had wanted to go to America, but wasn't allowed to. So she remained in Sweden and eventually inherited the family home. Meanwhile, in Chicago, Axel married a woman named Elsa and had a child, Marian, who had 2 daughters, one of which was Janet, and she had 2 daughters, including a beautiful baby named Amy. You still with me? So in short, Marian is my grandma. Ok, so Jenny had a daughter who had a son an his name is Björn. Bjorn is married to Kajsa and they have a son in college (or rather university) named Jerker. They had lived in Stockholm for several years, but when Bjorn retired, they moved out to the old family home in the country where they live now. So I guess that makes me some sort of 2nd niece of Björn's, 3rd cousin to Jerker, or my own grandpa...either way, I'm related to these people. Of all the children of Per and their families, the only one that Björn managed to stay in contact with was my grandmother Marian. So they write letters to each other a few times a year. My grandma had mentioned in one that I would be studying in Sweden and they offered to have me stay there whenever I wanted.

The Pearson family home

Now that we're done examining that branch of my family tree, I'll tell you about my weekend in the country visiting Björn and his family. I did all sorts of typical Swedish stuff. I've only met a few Swedish people in Stockholm so far so this was very exciting for me. Anyways, everywhere you go in Sweden you see these yellow mushrooms for sale. I have always been curious to try them, as the Swedish people seem so obsessed with them. In the woods outside of Björn's house, many of these mushrooms grow, and if you're quiet and you look hard enough, you can find them. So we went out searching in the afternoon, and we found quite a lot, 2 kg (4.4 pounds). We then went back to the house and cleaned each one with a little brush, which took a long time. But if you're drinking at the same time, this task isn't so bad. They gave me lots to drink. When I first got there they gave a beer, then more beer with dinner, and a shot of aquavit (a popular Scandinavian liquor) during dinner (shots with dinner is very common in Sweden, I told them that this is typically not the case in the states....) then whiskey after dinner...beer with lunch, gin and tonic in the afternoon, more whiskey, more shots...anyways, I tried my best not to drink too much, as I didn't want to appear like an obnoxious drunk to my hosts. But the were very insistent...I suppose this is how we can tell we're actually related...

But enough about alcohol. I'll tell you more about the food (this is what you've been waiting for Jake) Besides the mushrooms which we worked so hard on, I tried a lot of traditional Swedish foods, which I either had read about or had seen at the store but had no idea how to prepare correctly. The thing I'm most proud of trying was herring. They put herring in a jar filled with vinegar, onions, and sugar, then eat it with potatoes (we ate a ton of potatoes that weekend) or with knäckebröd (this hard cracker type thing that they devote an entire aisle to at the grocery store) This was surprisingly good. I also tried beets. Now I know what beets are, but I don't think I ever bothered to try them. These again were in a jar with some sort of sugar liquid, and were very good. We attempted to go crayfishing as well. We went out on the lake and dropped in some cages. The next morning we went back only to find that we had caught none. They say a disease from Denmark came and killed most of the crayfish in the area. Stupid Denmark. But this was alright, I secretly wished for failure. As you might remember from my last post, I do not like crayfish (So, thank you Denmark....) Oh and we drank quite a lot of coffee. 3 or 4 times a day we'd sit for an hour and drink coffee (and whiskey...) and talk. I had read that Swede's like their coffee, and I can assure you this is true. Anyways, after than weekend I never want to see another potato or cup of coffee again! (Actually I just had potatoes last night, and I'm drinking a cup of coffee as we speak...I'm so Swedish)

Gosh so much already. You can stop reading now if you wish. But I want to remember my weekend, so I'll keep writing. On Saturday, we woke up early and first checked the crayfish cages, and then drove out to a iron mine nearby. In this area of Sweden, known as Västmanland, there are many mines- copper, iron, silver- but most of them are closed by now. Now this particular mine, which I remember correctly was called Stråssa, was on top of a hill with a beautiful view of the villages in the area. It was a bit gloomy outside that day, so I don't think my pictures really do it justice. After our visit there, we drove through the woods to the Löa smelting house, which Björn and the other families in their village (of 300) each own a part of. It is no longer in use, but it is now a museum and a popular (maybe popular isn't the right word here...sometimes frequented) tourist attraction. I learned all about the process used to convert iron ore into iron in the 18th and 19th centuries. I won't make you listen to that. But I will tell you that I found some pretty sweet rocks. The rest of the evening was spent picking mushrooms, drinking coffee, eating Swedish food, and looking at old pictures of the family. We spent the next day driving around the area looking at some of the old villages and towns, and some of their smelting houses (these are called hytta in Swedish by the way and every village in the area seems to have one- not all are as well preserved though as the one I visited) We spent awhile in Örebro, the 7th largest city in Sweden, which has a very nice castle (former prison) in the middle of the city. On Sunday afternoon we said our goodbyes and I took a bus back to the city.

View from the Stråssa mines

Anyways, I was very lucky to have a opportunity like this. It was a bit awkward at first, as I had never met Björn before, well I suppose they visited Chicago when I was 2, but that doesn't count. I felt bad making them speak English all weekend (well I didn't make them, but they were very good hosts and were careful to always make me feel welcome) but their English was very good anyways. I may visit them again sometime this semester. They told me I was welcome anytime. And I would like to, that is if I manage to find a free weekend...I'm planning way too many trips. So that's it. If you want to know more about iron mining, just ask me. I think I know way too much on the subject now...

If you care to see more pictures from my weekend, here they are:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/30355022@N06/sets/72157607197969241/