Saturday, September 18, 2010

Speedos

I can now die knowing I have seen European men in speedos, not. I think scarred for life would be a better statement. Last weekend I was able to go on the Archipelago Trip with the other exchange students where we went to the island of Kluntarna. Most days lately have been pretty rainy and cold so a lot of people have been using the sauna, except me. I refuse to decide to sit in a 100 degree room for fun. Everyone in Europe loves the sauna and one of my roommates, Pierre, actually has one in his home back in France. So when everyone found out there would be one on the island they had to use it. After everyone explored the island we all ended up at the beach with a bar-b-que and sauna. Soon after we were finishing eating guys just starting stripping in front of everyone to their speedos or boxers. There were half naked men everywhere just talking to their friends like it was normal. I have forgotten or I guess have learned that Europeans are a lot more comfortable with nudity than Americans are. Thank you Jesus I did not have to witness any nudity, but at one point I looked behind me to see a stark naked white hairy French butt changing in the bushes. I didn't realize how unattractive a man can get when they're wearing a speedo.

I have noticed lately everything that is different than Tennessee and it's a long list. The list begins with my current pet peeve their paper is not 8 by 11 it is about 8 by 12 so when ever I have things to put in the notebook I brought it always sticks out and gets crinkled. They do not have post offices here to send packages you go to the grocery store to send and recieve packages where they also have stamps and special envelopes to use. Everyone rides a bike everywhere they go into town, to school, and shopping. It's very common to see someone lugging something on the back of their bike. The other day I saw a women strap the new printer she just bought to her bike. The way to say hello in Swedish is hej, but j's in swedish are pronounced like a y so you say hej like we say hey. So where ever you go people will say hej to you and it took me a while to get used to people saying it to me because you only say hey to people you know well in the USA. Their bathrooms here are rooms to themselves with their own toilet, mirror, and sink even if it is a communal bathroom. The toilets also have the flusher on the top of the toilet instead of the side and you pull up on the flusher. Whenever you flush the toilet a whole monsoon of water comes in the bowl. I have yet to eat out at restaurant other than a small little shop because it is so expensive to eat out here. When you do eat out though every meal includes the main course of your choice, drink of your choice, salad, bread, and coffee no matter where you go. Also no matter what grocery or conveince store you go into there will always be a very extensive candy isle with every kind of candy you could ever imagine and then some. The same is also true with cookies. Another thing that gets me is Sweden food packaging have not got the concept of servings. Whenever you buy something no matter what it is or how big or small it is it's weighed in grams. It will not tell you on the back how much a serving is although it will tell you how much 100 grams of the food is even if the package doesn't have 100 grams in it. You could imagine my surprise when I looked at the back of a bag chips and it told me there was 540 calories of what I thought was a serving. The milk here is a whole nother story. There is enough types of milk in the dairy isle to sink a battleship. There is 2%, 1%, skim, and then it gets iffy because then you have a choice whether you want your milk to be half yogurt and then what flavor yogurt. The milk containers are a phenomanam of themselves because you can only buy 1 liter containers which is about 1/3 of a gallon. So at the store you'll see people with 10 boxes of milk in their cart. Yes, I said boxes their milk comes in containers kinda like school milk but not with the contraption at the top to open it. You have to flip a flap on the side and then cut it with a pair of scissors. Everyone recycles here and if you don't then it doesn't matter because everyone does. It's not paper and plastic in Tennessee its ten times as complicated. When we first moved in we where given three pages front and back of what articles go were in the recycling room. There is things you can burn, compost, paper you can't burn, clear glass, colored glass, plastic, colored plastic, then special plastic, and lastly cardboard. Lastly, the ovens are the hardest things to figure out if you have no idea what your doing. First you have to decide if you want to use the oven or burners, then you must pick the temperature for the burner, then which one, then you have to set this little timer on the wall. I can't tell you how many times I have put water on a burner to boil and sat there for 10 minutes wondering why it wasn't boiling and had forgot to turn the timer. There is many more but that's all I can think of a the moment. Another thing I can't stop thinking about is Barberitos and El Torito and any other type of food in America because they don't have anything I want here. I am probably considered a vegatarian because chicken is to expensive and I don't eat any other meat other than that. Peanut Butter has become my main food group.

As far as the experience is going I love Sweden the nature is amazing and the sunsets are beautiful. I am anticipating winter and the snow. I can't wait, I was talking to one of my Swedish friends and she said that a little bit of snow on a off winter is 3 feet! I need to find some good snow boots soon. The darkness is coming though pretty quickly. When I got here the sun was setting at 11:30pm and rising at about 3:30 am. Now within just a month the sun is setting at 7:30pm and rising at 6:00 am. It should be only 3 hours of light by mid october. I'm not looking forward to it, but now I will be able to sleep a lot better.

Hope everyone is doing well and sorry I haven't posted in awhile! I will post pictures soon on here or facebook of the weird things here.

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