Hej san!
Well, it's easy to see that I haven't yet finished my post about Russia or the trip home. They're still coming, I promise, but a large chunk of my time has been taken up by...surprise surprise...school! The beginning of the end is near for my semester in Uppsala, with final projects and studying for exams attendant. I do refuse to deviate from my weekly updates, however, so I'm taking this break to write about my past week in Uppsala.
For my philosophy class about happiness, we had our final in-class interview last week. I would have to give this one the rating of second out of the five. Martin Smedjeback is a non-violence activist who has participated in civil disobedience actions, breaking into a weapons factory in Eskilstuna and hammering on grenade launchers to protest the Swedish weapons industry. He had very strong ideas about how one should find a purpose in life and then pursue it as directly and passionately as possible. The next two classes will be student presentations of our fieldwork projects. It's this project that's been the focus of my week so far.
My project is focusing on the relationship between being happy, being satisfied and creating something original. I talked to several of my friends from this class and from home, including a musician, a photographer, a writer, and my mom, who paints, draws, and did stained glass windows. I haven't finished compiling all of their answers together, but the conversations I've been able to have were wonderful intellectual romps. My favorite observation has been that every single person, without a question specific to it, has clearly delineated between technical skill and the less quantifiable emotional skill that allows art to be moving, both of which are necessary for creating something good. Now I only hope my writing lives up to the ideas I'm trying to convey.
Another chunk of my time has gone to studying Swedish. I have two exams for that class on May 21 and 22, written and listening. I'm relatively confident in my ability to grasp at least the main idea of what I'm reading, and I have somehow an innate sense of how to order phrases in Swedish grammar, but I talk and write with entirely singular nouns because making them plural is so complicated! Fortunately for the longer writing sections all we have to do is be understandable to a Swede, so hopefully when I write "Three cat jumped on the bed" they'll just laugh at me. Though I am by no means fluent, or even conversational, I know I'll miss hearing the rhythms of Swedish when I go home.
The rest of my time has been divided between two things; what I call domestic goddess tasks, and exploring the neighborhoods on the outskirts of Uppsala. Many of the early spring flowers are fading, but the trees are budding and the grass has attained summer green instead of muddy spring green. Uppsala has always been beautiful, but everyday it continues to surpass itself. I've been eagerly exploring on my bike, taking the time to ride up the river past Kantorsgatan and on the west side of the river, where I haven't spent much time. Uppsala is full of large and small parks. Just north of my apartment I found a delightful neighborhood of colorful houses, and behind it, a soccer field and a little knoll covered with patch of forest. I promptly abandoned my bike under the first tree and went exploring.
It was really very idyllic. Birds were chirping, it was late evening so the sun was coming at an angle in all its golden glory, and everything smelled like spring. The soccer fields brought back lots of memories of long summer afternoons and evenings spent at the field below the high school in Steamboat, when all of us congregated around the ball just trying to kick it instead of passing to each other. When I returned to my bike, I saw a kite string trailing up through the branches of the tree.
This harks back to a story from when my brother and I were little. Mom often had her high school students babysit us, and our favorites where two boys named Austin and Rody. One fall afternoon they were flying my brother's kite in the front yard and got it stuck in the cottonwood tree. What I remember most was how much fun they had playing with us and with our toys, even though they were so much more grown up than we were. Austin and Rody were just over-sized kids.
As I stood there considering this kite, with a different pattern stuck in a different tree, I suddenly wanted to be a child again. I kicked off my sandals, pulled off my sock, and started climbing the tree. There's an argument for me keeping my feet firmly on the ground and not risking a fall, but there's also an argument for me climbing the tree anyway. I chose to climb.
I sat in the tree for a while, watching the sun set over the forested knoll and the colorful neighborhoods. I swore to myself not to spend another day without exploring somewhere. The last two rainy days haven't deterred me in the slightest. My schoolwork is somewhat testing that resolution, but I just keep reminding myself that grades are not the only important thing.
My domestic goddess adventures have been just as rewarding. I like sewing and listening to pod casts, and my projects this week have been hemming my curtains and embroidering a new country name on my bag (I'm working on Finland at the moment.) I'm also taking advantage of cooking only for myself to practice making yeast bread. I've had one completely failure, but my loaf this week came out edible, if somewhat dense and crumbly. I want to try it again to see if I can make it better. Bread-making is an art form, and I'd really like to get good at it. I have dreams of never buying bread again, which of course will collapse as soon as I start school again in the fall. But it's a nice idea.
I am still working on my Russia post, and I'll post it as soon as it's finished. Regardless of that project, I'll be writing again next Wednesday. Tonight I'm making Mexican food for Henri, so I can't wait to tell you that story!
Until then,
Hej då!
Well, it's easy to see that I haven't yet finished my post about Russia or the trip home. They're still coming, I promise, but a large chunk of my time has been taken up by...surprise surprise...school! The beginning of the end is near for my semester in Uppsala, with final projects and studying for exams attendant. I do refuse to deviate from my weekly updates, however, so I'm taking this break to write about my past week in Uppsala.
For my philosophy class about happiness, we had our final in-class interview last week. I would have to give this one the rating of second out of the five. Martin Smedjeback is a non-violence activist who has participated in civil disobedience actions, breaking into a weapons factory in Eskilstuna and hammering on grenade launchers to protest the Swedish weapons industry. He had very strong ideas about how one should find a purpose in life and then pursue it as directly and passionately as possible. The next two classes will be student presentations of our fieldwork projects. It's this project that's been the focus of my week so far.
My project is focusing on the relationship between being happy, being satisfied and creating something original. I talked to several of my friends from this class and from home, including a musician, a photographer, a writer, and my mom, who paints, draws, and did stained glass windows. I haven't finished compiling all of their answers together, but the conversations I've been able to have were wonderful intellectual romps. My favorite observation has been that every single person, without a question specific to it, has clearly delineated between technical skill and the less quantifiable emotional skill that allows art to be moving, both of which are necessary for creating something good. Now I only hope my writing lives up to the ideas I'm trying to convey.
Another chunk of my time has gone to studying Swedish. I have two exams for that class on May 21 and 22, written and listening. I'm relatively confident in my ability to grasp at least the main idea of what I'm reading, and I have somehow an innate sense of how to order phrases in Swedish grammar, but I talk and write with entirely singular nouns because making them plural is so complicated! Fortunately for the longer writing sections all we have to do is be understandable to a Swede, so hopefully when I write "Three cat jumped on the bed" they'll just laugh at me. Though I am by no means fluent, or even conversational, I know I'll miss hearing the rhythms of Swedish when I go home.
The rest of my time has been divided between two things; what I call domestic goddess tasks, and exploring the neighborhoods on the outskirts of Uppsala. Many of the early spring flowers are fading, but the trees are budding and the grass has attained summer green instead of muddy spring green. Uppsala has always been beautiful, but everyday it continues to surpass itself. I've been eagerly exploring on my bike, taking the time to ride up the river past Kantorsgatan and on the west side of the river, where I haven't spent much time. Uppsala is full of large and small parks. Just north of my apartment I found a delightful neighborhood of colorful houses, and behind it, a soccer field and a little knoll covered with patch of forest. I promptly abandoned my bike under the first tree and went exploring.
It was really very idyllic. Birds were chirping, it was late evening so the sun was coming at an angle in all its golden glory, and everything smelled like spring. The soccer fields brought back lots of memories of long summer afternoons and evenings spent at the field below the high school in Steamboat, when all of us congregated around the ball just trying to kick it instead of passing to each other. When I returned to my bike, I saw a kite string trailing up through the branches of the tree.
This harks back to a story from when my brother and I were little. Mom often had her high school students babysit us, and our favorites where two boys named Austin and Rody. One fall afternoon they were flying my brother's kite in the front yard and got it stuck in the cottonwood tree. What I remember most was how much fun they had playing with us and with our toys, even though they were so much more grown up than we were. Austin and Rody were just over-sized kids.
As I stood there considering this kite, with a different pattern stuck in a different tree, I suddenly wanted to be a child again. I kicked off my sandals, pulled off my sock, and started climbing the tree. There's an argument for me keeping my feet firmly on the ground and not risking a fall, but there's also an argument for me climbing the tree anyway. I chose to climb.
I sat in the tree for a while, watching the sun set over the forested knoll and the colorful neighborhoods. I swore to myself not to spend another day without exploring somewhere. The last two rainy days haven't deterred me in the slightest. My schoolwork is somewhat testing that resolution, but I just keep reminding myself that grades are not the only important thing.
My domestic goddess adventures have been just as rewarding. I like sewing and listening to pod casts, and my projects this week have been hemming my curtains and embroidering a new country name on my bag (I'm working on Finland at the moment.) I'm also taking advantage of cooking only for myself to practice making yeast bread. I've had one completely failure, but my loaf this week came out edible, if somewhat dense and crumbly. I want to try it again to see if I can make it better. Bread-making is an art form, and I'd really like to get good at it. I have dreams of never buying bread again, which of course will collapse as soon as I start school again in the fall. But it's a nice idea.
I am still working on my Russia post, and I'll post it as soon as it's finished. Regardless of that project, I'll be writing again next Wednesday. Tonight I'm making Mexican food for Henri, so I can't wait to tell you that story!
Until then,
Hej då!
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