From Autumn to Stockholm

Dear Everybody,

I’m back from a weekend in Stockholm, and I came home to a quickly-ending study abroad experience. I don’t know how that happened. I sometimes feel like I am living in an alternate reality where time is warped because it feels like I jumped through 3 months in about one night of sleep. I go back and forth daily between being ready for the US again and a sporadic second wind sort of feeling that tells me I could keep running around here forever. The latter mood usually kicks in after I hear something about the Republican primaries in the US, which seem to be immune to time-warpiness and are obviously in an alternate reality of their own.

Stockholm was “fantastisk”! I am pretty sure I told you all that I was staying with a friend of one of my Danish friends. Well, that was a raving success. Really. Lina and her roommates Johanna and Noomi were so immediately and incredibly warm and open and friendly with Autumn and I that it felt like we were old friends. Lina insisted on picking us up from the airport and then we all went into the city together and had a mini-tour d’Stockholm given by Johanna, who is a native in love with her own city. It was so beautiful. It was every bit as charming and “hyggeligt” as Copenhagen, but with a clean, fresh, open feeling to it as well. Perhaps because of all of the water? Anyway, it was lovely.

Lina had also invited Autumn and I to a movie night with some of her friends at the LDS Institute building for Young Adults the night we got in. So we went! Meeting all of the people that were at the movie night (where we watched 17 Miracles) gave me the thought that traveling is about 3 things, mostly (at least for me): sightseeing, food, and meeting people. Actually I suppose that the first two combined with some other things could just as well be called culture. The point though is that it was great to meet so many Swedes. I was even more surprised that everyone we met there used whatever magic charm Swedes are apparently born with to make us feel like they loved us and knew us and couldn’t believe we were only staying 2 days. And they were so convincing that I am convinced they meant it, and at the same time, reciprocated the feeling of sheer dismay at the thought of leaving them so quickly.

Then there was the city itself, which we explored the next day.  Autumn sort of took the reins and planned an awesome day. We went to a Pippi Longstocking Museum. I wasn’t sure how that would go, but it was actually amazing. There were little blonde kids running around all over the places smelling like a foot and then there was a bookstore with all sort of magical books that made me want to be a smelly little 7 year old again too. I think we must have spent an hour and a half in the bookstore alone. We wrote postcards and read little sweet stories and it made me feel like retiring from society to go live in a treehouse.

Instead of moving into a treehouse or bungalow, we went to Skansen which is an open air museum made to look like Sweden hundreds of years ago. In fact, there were little bungalows here so naturally I felt like I had hit the jackpot. They also had Scandinavian animals like rams and goats and one stuck up cow that wouldn’t come out of its barn to say hello to us. We saw her though. She was quite a lovely.

Oh! I almost forgot about Swedish Design! Ooh lala. Autumn and I went to about 4 different Marimeko Stores which is actually a Finnish design store, although I bet that Stockholm has one of the larger stores. I mean who goes to Finland, you know? Haha… I don’t know what it is about Scandinavia but they really really do have great design here from textiles to furniture to architecture (Ikea, H&M… both Swedish). I love it.

I just realized I’ve been name dropping and never even told you about Autumn! She is a friend from California! I met her last summer and she just happens to be a big fan of Scandiland. So she visited! It was so great! I showed her around Copenhagen and we even did a few things I hadn’t done yet! For example, we went to Tivoli!! The world’s first theme park, basically. It was one of the inspirations for Disneyland. In fact, Disney tried to buy it some years ago but the Danes were so distraught at the thought of their beloved Tivoli falling into the hands of Americans that they instead sold it to a cigarette company. Seems odd, but I guess they just panicked... Anyway, it was great to have Autumn here! And I got to practice my tour-guide skills which is especially important this week, but I won’t tell you why until next week. I have to keep you all on your toes.

 

Lots o love
Brittany