:: Sunday, August 22, 2004 ::

Sweden's Greetings

So here it is, my first post from Sweden. Currently in Falun, it's in the 60s, and raining, though the sun is shining as well. And about an hour ago, it was hailing. This place has the weirdest weather I have ever experienced.

Sorry I've been out of touch for so long, but I've been very busy traveling, settling in, and waiting for my internet connection to get hooked up. I'll try to post more details soon, but basically I'm having a great time here. Sweden is very beautiful, and Falun, the town where I am, is a cute quaint small time. Everyone is very friendly, and I have yet to encounter anyone who doesn't speak English. The only problems I've really had have involved reading street signs and food labels in the grocery store, and those really aren't problems at all.

I've started posting pictures on my photoblog, so check them out. Unfortunately, I just discovered that I can only upload 10 images a day, but I'm going to try to do it every day to get all of my pictures up there. Right now, there are 3 galleries there: Rob in Sweden, which will have all of my pictures about Falun and my surroundings; Amsterdam, which has pictures from my short stint in Amsterdam; and Stockholm, with pics of my even shorter stint in Stockholm. So check out all the galleries on a daily basis to see what I saw.

I'll soon be posting details of my trip, too, about what I did and saw in Amsterdam and Stockholm. At least, that's the plan, but classes start tomorrow, so who knows what will happen? But I'll do my best.

Feel free to email me with any questions you have about things. Basically, things are pretty much the same here as anywhere, though a bit cooler (and definitely rainier, lately) than Virginia. Some things definitely have more of a European feel, particularly in the center of town, with cobblestone streets and old churches, and of course I'm surrounded by a huge contingent of people from all over Europe. But it is really cool meeting different people from all the world, and a lot of them are very surprised to see an American here. But it's all good.

One side note, that I just noticed this morning: it's very quiet here, and I finally realized why. There's no birdsongs. It's actually quite strange. I'm used to birds being everywhere, singing and flying around, but here I've only seen like 3 types of birds, and they don't sing. There's a big blue and white and black bird here that a Swede told me is called skata, which my dictionary translates as "magpie." They're really cool-looking, although the Swede told me that they're annoying (kind of like crows in America, I guess), but I haven't heard them make any noise yet. It's very strange and very quiet, without even the sounds of insects, like I'm used to hearing out in the country in the U.S. Not that I'm in the country here, although there is a lot more nature and green in the towns than you would find in the States.

So for now, check out the pics, and I'll try to update more with my experiences of the last 2 weeks, while simultaneously learning about the Role of Intellectuals in Society.

Adjö for now!

:: posted by Rob 9:16 PM [+] ::

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