Potpourri in Swedish blizzards

Lots of updates so this may be a tad long. Last week can basically be summed up with class and my first experience lost in Copenhagen. Basically, after a night out at Streckers and a great pool place by Kateys, we were heading back, thinking that the train ran until 110. Little did we know it stopped at 1250 so the one we caught only went two stops and then we got kicked off. After trying to find the night bus we gave up and did the half hour walk back to Katey's place where I cuddled with her while Spanky attempted to fit on her couch..which would have been too small for me to give you an idea of its size.

We decided to head over to Malmo, Sweden for the weekend since its only a 30 minute train ride away. Spank and I went on Friday and Katey joined us on Saturday evening since she wanted to stick around and go to the monthly bike auction. We knew we arrived in Sweden when we were greeted by a view of IKEA on the horizon. Spanky and I got off on the first Malmo station (we asked if there were two and got laughed at so we assumed it was the right one...but it wasn't). After getting back on the train we got off at Malmo Central and wondered around in the blizzard until we found our hostel which was about a half an hour away. After getting settled in, we went and grabbed some pizza at the nearest place since it was freezing outside. FYI, they were not fond of Americans and we got some death stares once we opened our mouths and proceeded to explain ourselves with pointing and gestures. Pizza was good though. Night was pretty uneventful as we had no desire to go back outside so we just hung around the hostel watching random Swedish tv shows. We found one similar to Saturday Night Live and from that they pretty much think Americans are represented by "Im a barbie girl" and cowboys.


Saturday we decided to make a massive circle around Malmo and see everything possible in a day. We started the day off with the Folkets Park, which is an amusement park- it has a batman ride!! Its closed so we headed off to the Chocolate Factory...which really turned out to be a little cafe and one room "museum" but I got to see the home of the Tooty Fruity. After some more getting lost...street names are impossible to find in Sweden too..we went to St. John's Church of Roses which was gorgeous and had hand-carved roses very embedded in the architecture. Warming up was also a huge plus because I couldnt feel my hands at this point. After that we found Konsthallen, which is a modern art museum. As my usual reaction to modern art- loved some, very confused by others. They had a room with four projects flashing pictures of a car wash..Im sorry I still dont get it. Some of the photography was really interesting though and they had an exhibit about the sexual revolution which was intriguing to say the least. Also, people here are A LOT more fond of and open with nudity because it is everywhere..I dont mean on the streets but in posters and books and art and just all in your face. From the museum, we stopped by the Opera House, which we couldn't actually get into but the whole building is incredibly modern and not what I imagined at all.

We spent the main part of the day in Malmöhus Castle, which is definitely different from any castle you can imagine. First of all, as we were walking up to it, there was a massive picture of Nelson Mandela hanging on the outside and (not with the picture) a sign which said "white people only." I have no idea what this meant and really hope that this was part of some exhibit of something because thats an incredibly twisted and disturbing combination.

As for the castle, the whole thing is turned into a museum of the its history and the history of the region. They have a very intricate and detailed exhibit of the prison system with testimonies and pictures etc. Also, Im pretty sure it wasn't supposed to be part of the exhibit but they had a section with mice to show that there were mice everywhere, but the mice just had babies and if you dont know, mice eat their young...probably the most disturbing part of the day. In the castle basement was an aquarium with a bunch of different fish and snakes..I said it wasn't like any other castle. To further intrigue me, there was a huge exhibit on Nelson Mandela (which explains his picture outside). We didnt have much time so we rushed through it but it looked very well done. Never thought I would go to Sweden to learn about Mandela. They also had an exhibit on AIDS and HIV, but we didnt stick around to see it.

At this point we met Katey at the station and went to St. Peter's Church, which will without a doubt leave you speechless. Ive seen a lot of beautiful and intricately decorated churches so far but this one was impeccable. After, we went to las empanadas..which turned out to be a very strange mixture of italian and mexican food. This was later made more confusing when we saw Burger King advertising to "super size your mexican meal" Later that night we went to Big Mamma's Pizzeria and Shwarma house. They seem to like to just get everything in all at ones. We tried to go out that night but apparently Malmo only consists of high class bars with people over 50 so instead we got some wine, what we decided must be Swedish nattys, 37% chocolate cookies (we have yet to figure out what the 63% is but they tasted great), some little cinnamon rolls and chips and spent the night in the hostel watching a strange British mystery movie and playing checkers. Living the good life. Anywho, came back to Copenhagen Sunday and did the insane amount of work I had to catch up on..which I will continue to do tonight.

Human rights in Africa started today....I spent out 10 minute break talking to a Danish woman who spent 3 years volunteering in Congo. Class seems great but our whole great will be a paper in the end and apparently they grade crazy hard. My mondays will now be 10-545. Fun times ahead. Also, got my volunteer assignment today- Palklub. Ill be helping organize the after school programming for immigrant children, which seems very fun. Aright I think this is more than long enough.