Hey all,
I'm going to be away from my computer for the next 12 days as I will be travelling to Russia for my Easter vacation so there will be no further posts until I get back.
Cheers,
Dave
Friday, March 30, 2007
Sunday, March 25, 2007
Hiking in Skåne
Yesterday myself, Chris the Swiss and three German friends of Chris' went hiking in Skåne (the Southern part of Sweden) just outside of a small town called Steffenstorp, about half an hour away from Lund. Here are some pics:
Rene and Chris stopping for a break
A small lake
A large mansion from the late 1800's
Looking out from the backyard of the mansion
Another typical Swedish house
Typical countryside in Skåne
Rene and Chris stopping for a break
A small lake
A large mansion from the late 1800's
Looking out from the backyard of the mansion
Another typical Swedish house
Typical countryside in Skåne
Wednesday, March 21, 2007
Pics From Last Friday
Here are a couple of pics from last Friday when I was working at Goteborg nation. I think they give a pretty good indication of what a party is like over here in Sweden...
Some fire juggling going on up on the roof prior to the sittning
Some of the bar staff
At the sittning - these guys all play on the same football (soccer) team and were ridiculous the whole evening...
Swedes love to dress up
Things start heating up...
During the nightclub - I don't think this guy was looking to see if his date needed a refill...
My Novischfest mentor Jen dressed up as an elephant
Some fire juggling going on up on the roof prior to the sittning
Some of the bar staff
At the sittning - these guys all play on the same football (soccer) team and were ridiculous the whole evening...
Swedes love to dress up
Things start heating up...
During the nightclub - I don't think this guy was looking to see if his date needed a refill...
My Novischfest mentor Jen dressed up as an elephant
Saturday, March 17, 2007
The Week in Review
So here's a quick rundown of what's been going on here the past week:
Tuesday: played a game for Goteborg nation's co-ed volleyball team (our team won of course!). Afterwards, had beers in the sauna in the basement of Goteborg nation - nothing more relaxing than drinking beer in your underwear with a bunch of Swedes!!
Wednesday: had a Spanish/French dinner with our Spanish corridor-mate Ricardo and his friends from Spain and France. Dinner consisted of Spanish omelettes, sausage soaked in beer, baguettes and cheese. Meal was served later than scheduled in typical Spanish fashion...
Thursday: Christoff, Ivan and I rented a car and went on a road trip back to Ystad where we visited Ales Stenar (translated: Ale's Stones), a human-created stone monument dating back to AD 500. The stones are arranged in the shape of a ship and it is speculated that the monument has an astronomical purpose or is the burial place of King Ale. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ale's_Stones] Ales Stenar is located on the southwest coast of Sweden, next to the baltic sea so after visiting the site we made our way down the coastline to a small fish shop where we ate a lunch of freshly cooked fish before making our way back to Lund.
Afterwards had a Dutch dinner cooked by Annabelle - was a plate called stammpot -- basically mashed potatoes with garlic, carrots and bacon - simple but good.
Friday: Worked at Goteborg nation's bar. One of the Swedish girls on my v-ball team, Ellen, is the head of one of the bar crews and signed me up to work on Tuesday. Showed up at the bar at 5:00pm to help with the cooking of food and setting up of tables for the sittning (dinner party) being held that night. Served drinks during the sittning from 7:00 - 10:00pm before clearing all the tables and chairs out to set the bar up into a nightclub. Served drinks from 10:30pm - 2:00am, cleaned up then bar staff had our own sittning in the basement of the building at 3:00am. Got fabulously drunk and made it home to bed at 7:00am. Fantastic.
Saturday: worked out flight details to London. Will be heading there April 25th for three days to visit Shehz, Karim and Hindle. Bring your A-games gentlemen...
I should also note that I'm now a bit of a big deal here in Lund after appearing in Southern Sweden's newspaper, 'Sydsvenskan'. A reporter came by to our residence on Wednesday to interview international students on their reasons for choosing to come to Lund. Both Ivan and I were interviewed and appeared in the Thursday edition of the paper. Picture and a transcipt of the article are at the bottom of this post.
On the way to Ales Stenar
This person had a sauna in their backyard - nice.
Some of the 'typical' Swedish houses outside Ystad
Ale's Stones. Mysterious...
Walking along the coast
Two ducks. On rocks. Magnificent.
The reason for my celebrity.
Rough translation:
Dave Horne, 23, Waterloo, Canada. Studying civil engineering.
I have never visited Europe before and heard that Swedes are nice people and of the European countries Sweden is the most like Canada. My home university has an exchange agreement with Lund University and it was important for me to choose a program where my courses were taught in English.
"I like the history here, many of the buildings in Lund were built at the same time Columbus was exploring North America."
That last quote was incorrectly attributed to me - it was actually Ivan who said it. Also, the journalist didn't understand my explanation of systems design engineering so just listed me as studying civil engineering. A bit of a slap in the face I would say :)
Tuesday: played a game for Goteborg nation's co-ed volleyball team (our team won of course!). Afterwards, had beers in the sauna in the basement of Goteborg nation - nothing more relaxing than drinking beer in your underwear with a bunch of Swedes!!
Wednesday: had a Spanish/French dinner with our Spanish corridor-mate Ricardo and his friends from Spain and France. Dinner consisted of Spanish omelettes, sausage soaked in beer, baguettes and cheese. Meal was served later than scheduled in typical Spanish fashion...
Thursday: Christoff, Ivan and I rented a car and went on a road trip back to Ystad where we visited Ales Stenar (translated: Ale's Stones), a human-created stone monument dating back to AD 500. The stones are arranged in the shape of a ship and it is speculated that the monument has an astronomical purpose or is the burial place of King Ale. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ale's_Stones] Ales Stenar is located on the southwest coast of Sweden, next to the baltic sea so after visiting the site we made our way down the coastline to a small fish shop where we ate a lunch of freshly cooked fish before making our way back to Lund.
Afterwards had a Dutch dinner cooked by Annabelle - was a plate called stammpot -- basically mashed potatoes with garlic, carrots and bacon - simple but good.
Friday: Worked at Goteborg nation's bar. One of the Swedish girls on my v-ball team, Ellen, is the head of one of the bar crews and signed me up to work on Tuesday. Showed up at the bar at 5:00pm to help with the cooking of food and setting up of tables for the sittning (dinner party) being held that night. Served drinks during the sittning from 7:00 - 10:00pm before clearing all the tables and chairs out to set the bar up into a nightclub. Served drinks from 10:30pm - 2:00am, cleaned up then bar staff had our own sittning in the basement of the building at 3:00am. Got fabulously drunk and made it home to bed at 7:00am. Fantastic.
Saturday: worked out flight details to London. Will be heading there April 25th for three days to visit Shehz, Karim and Hindle. Bring your A-games gentlemen...
I should also note that I'm now a bit of a big deal here in Lund after appearing in Southern Sweden's newspaper, 'Sydsvenskan'. A reporter came by to our residence on Wednesday to interview international students on their reasons for choosing to come to Lund. Both Ivan and I were interviewed and appeared in the Thursday edition of the paper. Picture and a transcipt of the article are at the bottom of this post.
On the way to Ales Stenar
This person had a sauna in their backyard - nice.
Some of the 'typical' Swedish houses outside Ystad
Ale's Stones. Mysterious...
Walking along the coast
Two ducks. On rocks. Magnificent.
The reason for my celebrity.
Rough translation:
Dave Horne, 23, Waterloo, Canada. Studying civil engineering.
I have never visited Europe before and heard that Swedes are nice people and of the European countries Sweden is the most like Canada. My home university has an exchange agreement with Lund University and it was important for me to choose a program where my courses were taught in English.
"I like the history here, many of the buildings in Lund were built at the same time Columbus was exploring North America."
That last quote was incorrectly attributed to me - it was actually Ivan who said it. Also, the journalist didn't understand my explanation of systems design engineering so just listed me as studying civil engineering. A bit of a slap in the face I would say :)
Sunday, March 11, 2007
Oslo Cruise
Hey everyone,
So the past two weeks have been pretty busy as I was studying for my Swedish engineering course exam which I wrote Friday morning. It was a bit trickier than expected but I think I passed it - it certainly didn't hurt that I had 5hrs to write it (SO much more relaxed than at UW)...
So to reward myself for my 'hard' work it was only fitting that I take off on a booze cruise to Oslo 1.5hrs after finishing my exam.
A group of eight of us, mostly medicine students, caught a bus to Copenhagen at 2:30pm where we boarded the party boat. It was pretty large, with 11 stories in all and contained a number of pools, restaurants, cafes, bars, one nightclub and a duty-free store. Four of us, Julie (France), Charlotte (France), Ricardo (Spain) and I shared a compartment on the boat - the compartments were similar to the ones on the trainride to Kiruna but with more space. After eating dinner the group of us went to one of the bars and drank the alcohol that we had brought with us before heading to the ship's nightclub.
Saturday morning we reached Oslo and departed the ship at 10:00am. We made our way over to Karl Johans Gate, the main street in Oslo with an assortment of bars and cafes. At the western end of the street was the Royal Palace where we were in time to see the changing of the guard (which, by the way, was hilarious to watch).
From there we headed east to Vigelandsparken, a park dedicated to the works of the sculptor Gustav Vigeland (1869-1943). The park is supposed to depict the human condition with hundreds of sculptures of men, women and children engaged in typically human activities such as laughing, running and fighting. The sculptures are all made of bronze, granite or cast iron. The two centrepieces of the park are the fountain consisting of a number of men carrying a large bowl on their shoulders and a large stone pole ("The Monolith") with sculpted forms of humans spread across its surface (see pictures below). The area at the base of this pole is also quite high above the city and provides a great panoramic view of Oslo and the distant mountains.
Lastly, we made our way to Oslo's art museum where the famous painting 'The Scream' by Norway's Edvard Munch is displayed. Unfortunately the painting was not being shown at the time as it had only recently been recovered in 2006 after it was stolen by a couple of armed robbers in August 2004 [actually Munch painted a number of versions of The Scream, the most famous of which was stolen in 1994 then recovered three months later - http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/5303200.stm]. However, the museum had a couple Picassos and Monets on display which were interesting (I guess) to see firsthand...
At about 4:30pm we headed back onto the ship then watched the sunset as we left Oslo. However, soon afterwards the ship started to rock and most people on the boat became sick so most of Saturday night was spent laying in bed.
Our boat arrived back to Copenhagen around 9:00am Sunday morning (I think it's a 16hr trip from Oslo to Copenhagen) where we caught our bus back to Lund.
Getting on the bus to Copenhagen
Setting sail to Oslo
Our cabin
On deck with my mates Charlotte and Julie
SOMEBODY walked in front of the camera - jerk...
The crew gettin a little loose Friday night (from left: Ricardo, Julie, yours truly,
Saw this in a parking lot in Oslo - it appears to run on love...
The thinker...
Navigating the streets of Oslo
Monument to Gustav Vigeland, the famous Norwegian sculptor, at the entrance to Vigelandsparken
One of the scultpures inside Vigelandsparken...
The Angry Baby - one of Vigeland's more famous works
"Man Attacked by Babies" - hilarious.
The fountain in Vigelandsparken - looks heavy
The Monolith - open picture to see better detail. The whole thing is one piece...
These trees are all over the place in Scandinavia - Julie says the branches look like my thumb - not very nice...
Oh my god they killed Kenny!!
A small island we saw that was covered with houses
The island's church
Sunset in the land of fjords
Group glamour shot
Charlotte sick inside our cabin Saturday night
So the past two weeks have been pretty busy as I was studying for my Swedish engineering course exam which I wrote Friday morning. It was a bit trickier than expected but I think I passed it - it certainly didn't hurt that I had 5hrs to write it (SO much more relaxed than at UW)...
So to reward myself for my 'hard' work it was only fitting that I take off on a booze cruise to Oslo 1.5hrs after finishing my exam.
A group of eight of us, mostly medicine students, caught a bus to Copenhagen at 2:30pm where we boarded the party boat. It was pretty large, with 11 stories in all and contained a number of pools, restaurants, cafes, bars, one nightclub and a duty-free store. Four of us, Julie (France), Charlotte (France), Ricardo (Spain) and I shared a compartment on the boat - the compartments were similar to the ones on the trainride to Kiruna but with more space. After eating dinner the group of us went to one of the bars and drank the alcohol that we had brought with us before heading to the ship's nightclub.
Saturday morning we reached Oslo and departed the ship at 10:00am. We made our way over to Karl Johans Gate, the main street in Oslo with an assortment of bars and cafes. At the western end of the street was the Royal Palace where we were in time to see the changing of the guard (which, by the way, was hilarious to watch).
From there we headed east to Vigelandsparken, a park dedicated to the works of the sculptor Gustav Vigeland (1869-1943). The park is supposed to depict the human condition with hundreds of sculptures of men, women and children engaged in typically human activities such as laughing, running and fighting. The sculptures are all made of bronze, granite or cast iron. The two centrepieces of the park are the fountain consisting of a number of men carrying a large bowl on their shoulders and a large stone pole ("The Monolith") with sculpted forms of humans spread across its surface (see pictures below). The area at the base of this pole is also quite high above the city and provides a great panoramic view of Oslo and the distant mountains.
Lastly, we made our way to Oslo's art museum where the famous painting 'The Scream' by Norway's Edvard Munch is displayed. Unfortunately the painting was not being shown at the time as it had only recently been recovered in 2006 after it was stolen by a couple of armed robbers in August 2004 [actually Munch painted a number of versions of The Scream, the most famous of which was stolen in 1994 then recovered three months later - http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/5303200.stm]. However, the museum had a couple Picassos and Monets on display which were interesting (I guess) to see firsthand...
At about 4:30pm we headed back onto the ship then watched the sunset as we left Oslo. However, soon afterwards the ship started to rock and most people on the boat became sick so most of Saturday night was spent laying in bed.
Our boat arrived back to Copenhagen around 9:00am Sunday morning (I think it's a 16hr trip from Oslo to Copenhagen) where we caught our bus back to Lund.
Getting on the bus to Copenhagen
Setting sail to Oslo
Our cabin
On deck with my mates Charlotte and Julie
SOMEBODY walked in front of the camera - jerk...
The crew gettin a little loose Friday night (from left: Ricardo, Julie, yours truly,
Saw this in a parking lot in Oslo - it appears to run on love...
The thinker...
Navigating the streets of Oslo
Monument to Gustav Vigeland, the famous Norwegian sculptor, at the entrance to Vigelandsparken
One of the scultpures inside Vigelandsparken...
The Angry Baby - one of Vigeland's more famous works
"Man Attacked by Babies" - hilarious.
The fountain in Vigelandsparken - looks heavy
The Monolith - open picture to see better detail. The whole thing is one piece...
These trees are all over the place in Scandinavia - Julie says the branches look like my thumb - not very nice...
Oh my god they killed Kenny!!
A small island we saw that was covered with houses
The island's church
Sunset in the land of fjords
Group glamour shot
Charlotte sick inside our cabin Saturday night
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