Fika småpratar: A Freudian slip

At afternoon fika today I attempted to speak Swedish, and was describing one of my samples. I'll report the content of the conversation in English, with the Swedish in parentheses:

Me: "I have a sample that comes from... Wolf Island." ('Jag har en prov som kommer ifrån... Wolf Island.')

Grad student N.: "Every beer?" ('Varg Ö?')

Me: "Ahh... one more time please?" ('Ahh... en gång till tack?')

N.: "Every beer?" ('Varg Ö?)

I admitted defeat. "Wolf Island," said N., "Varg Ö." Which is literally Wolf Island: Varg = wolf, Ö = island. I had misheard "Varg Ö" ('Wolf Island') as "Varje öl" ('every beer'). Everyone had a good chuckle, including myself. "Sure, sure," I said, "Varg Ö. I could have figured that out. I have to remember that the first thing to do when someone speaks Swedish at you is not panic."

Silence fell.

"When someone speaks Swedish at you?" said K., sounding almost hurt. "You make it sound like it's an attack."

Oops.

A game in Stockholm

Joe is awfully busy with homework and tests and group projects and things like that these days, so last weekend I trundled off into Stockholm by myself to watch a soccer game. Good thing I checked the home team's website just before I left and found out that the game was not being played where I thought it was being played—that pitch had been usurped by the European women's championship rugby tournament. Instead, it was being played in an even cooler place, Stockholms Stadion, which was built for the 1912 Olympic games.

Stadion is a red brick pile, in that early-20th century nouveau/deco style that I really like. The northeast stands have a wooden roof, the columns of which have been decorated in simple style to be evocative of a long house. The king has his own covered seating area, complete with potted flowers (he did not deign to be present at the Djurgården-Linköping ladies football match, however). The stadium is sort of strange size, being too big for small sporting events (like women's soccer) and too small for big sporting events (it was really too small even for the 1912 Olympics). It's now often used as an outdoor concert venue. It lots of little decorations and embellishments—one of my favorites was this walrus-head poking out of the wall and now being used as a hose-keeper.

One nice thing about following a relatively obscure sport, with low attendance, is that security is rather relaxed. So when I sat myself in the media section (complete with desk and chair with a backrest), nobody said a peep. Perhaps it was not quite as posh as the press boxes at the football stadiums at UM at MSU, but it was a big step up from the bleachers I usually find myself in. It was extra fun because I met a friend there, and we yapped happily about soccer through the whole game, which itself was a good one—here's my write-up if you're interested. Also, it was warm in the stands, being in the full sun and out of the wind. All in all, a really good day.

Fika at the Soldier's Holt

Not a five minute walk from our apartment is Soldattorpet, which means "The Soldier's Holt." The Upplands regiment of the Royal Army had several companies; Upsala [sic] Company in turn had eight soldiers, one of whom was sponsored by the village of Norby, which is now the suburb of Uppsala that we live in. In or around 1680, Norby set aside a small area of land for its soldier to farm and live on (a "torp"), and this particular torp has had a soldier living on it up until the 1940s. A local nature trail, one of Linnaeus' botanical walks, has a trailhead right beside it, and apparently Soldattorpet a popular place for people to sit after their stroll through this end of Stadskogen.

The house isn't generally open to the public, but a few times a year the Soldattorpets vänner society sponsors an afternoon fika. 20SEK gets you some good strong coffee, a choice of baked goods, and the chance to either loiter outside at a picnic table or in the grass, or sit inside and imagine living there yourself. The house is tiny (about the size of our living room), with two stories (a ladder up to the second), and the red color is typical for the region. Its back is to the forest, and its front faces onto a rocky pasture in which one can find our local runestone (more on that later). There are two outbuildings, a woodshed and a smaller shed built partially underground (root cellar? sauna?), and a modern outhouse has been discretely tucked into a glade near the road. There are two rooms on the first floor, with a large fireplace set in the inside wall for the kitchen/living area and presumably the upstairs as well.

We stayed inside, in part because the society had laid out some pictures and historical treatises on the place, and in part because it was not really warm outside. We flipped through the books, then wandered outside to inspect the property (about 2 acres), visit the old fruit trees, admire the sheep pasture... then the clouds started rolling in, and Joe suggested we get for home. We almost made it—in the five minutes it took us to walk back to our apartment past the field and then forest, the gentle rain turned into hail, and we got pretty wet. Joe, in shorts, needed a cup of hot chocolate to warm up from our coffee break.

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The little village of Norby is quite proud of its history, I think; at their website you can read all about their general history (first mentioned in writing in 1299), or very specific histories, such as the etymology of the name of each street (no fewer than eleven streets are named after mushrooms, see them listed under "Tema Svampar").

Fika småprater: Evaporated milk

Det finns ingen "evaporated milk" i Sverige. Well, that's not entirely true, of course, but it is an odd specialty item that you can only find in the foreign section of some grocery stores, or Asian markets. For some reason evaporated milk came up at fika last Wednesday, and the Swedes had never heard of it. Sweetened, condensed milk, yes: evaporated milk, no. "It's not sweet?" they said, puzzled.

We have a few cans of the stuff (country of origin: Holland) that Joe found on the "discontinued" shelf at a grocery, and we had used half of one for macaroni and cheese the other night, so I took the rest of the can in to work yesterday morning. The fika crowd peered at it skeptically. "But it's a little yellow," said S. doubtfully. Well, yes a little, because the lactose carmelizes, and so it's a little sweet too, but not much. Bravely, K. took a small spoonful of it. "It tastes like milk," she said with surprise. Yes, yes, it is milk, just milk, I reassured her. Others took small amounts, and each one of them said "It tastes like milk" in the same odd tone of voice. "Milk but... more milky," said someone. "But it's in a can," said E. She looked at the bottom. "It says it's good until January 2010," she said with a tone of disbelief. "Was this some sort of American invention for the nuclear war?"

It makes me wonder what other little cultural differences remain to be unearthed. It also makes me wish I could adequately convey the intense and grave suspicion with which they all regarded that poor can of evaporated milk.

Comrade J! and May Day

A post attempted in the vein of Wodehouse; here's a link to Comrade Bingo in case your memory is hazy

Last Thursday, Sista April, was a big holiday in these parts, in which all the Uppsala University students engage in entertainments like spraying champagne about and pelting each other with baguettes. The older and more restrained alum show up as well, in their student hats, and reminisce about the good old days, though they generally prefer to filter their champagne through the kidneys first, rather than pour the stuff directly into the drains leading to the river. As previously reported, Monty and I had met up with such a bunch in Engelska parken, where the alum of a certain age loll on the grass. It was there that we met up with my old pal Kipper (post-doc K.) and her claque, eating their s. and sipping their ch.

As we talked it happened to come up that tomorrow was första maj, that is, May Day, the Worker's Day. Kipper and her bunch were going to be spending the day in the nearby suburb of Bälinge, where Charlie and Emma (a couple of Kipper's friends sprawled on the blanket opposite us, who took a little umbrage when Kipper referred to their fair hamlet as the "countryside") have a house. We announced our intention to be in town, to watch the parades of Socialists and Communists and Syndicalists and this year even Christian Democrats. I popped a wine-soaked strawberry into my mouth and ventured my opinion that high taxes are good, because it helps us all that we pay so much so that other people's kids can have free day care. If we get so many benefits from a 40% tax rate, who knows what kind of luxury we would be living in if only we paid 50% of our salary in taxes? I would therefore be protesting tomorrow in favor of even higher taxes. "Yes, I quite agree," said Kipper, a most egalitarian type if there ever was one. "But hang on, old thing, you have a stipend, you don't pay taxes!"

That last assertion was fair enough, I suppose, but I saw no reason for the mere truth to get in the way my enjoyment of speeches excoriating imperialism and unfair labor practices and only six weeks of vacation per year and rubbish like that. So yesterday morning, at civilized hour of noon-ish, Monty and I girded our loins for the upcoming struggle and boarded a bus to the castle park, from where previous experience had shown us that one could get a taste of all the parades at once. Just like last year, the city gnomes had done an admirable overnight job of cleaning up Sista April's forgotten blankets, empty alcohol containers, and the odd inebriated undergraduate or two. The Syndicalists were observed massing in Engelska Park, site of yesterday's revelries, but we passed them by and picked a spot at the top of the natural amphitheater behind the castle. Our timing was impeccable; within a quarter of an hour Vänsterpartiets parade came marching up and emptied itself into the bowl, complete with a bull-horn wielding chappy egging them on. We toasted with water, being still rather shy of the ch. after yesterday's festivities.

It was remarkable how much this year was like last year, except perhaps we understood a little more of the speeches this time. We nibbled daintily at our brie and crackers while Comrade Bullhorn greeted us heartily as "Kamrater och vänner!" and then got down to ripping into the Idle Rich; a Palestinian spoke in English about how peaceful her people were; another speaker told us that the real enemies of the People are poverty, illiteracy, and disease ("Well, that's true enough," I thought, warming to their rhetoric). Then a sensitive fellow came down front to serenade us with a guitar and a song about how love crosses all borders, but just as he was really getting going and whipping the crowd into a nap, the brass band for the Social Democrats started drowning him out. We hauled ourselves up by our bootstraps and crossed the yard just in the nick to catch the Syndicalists tripping down Drottningsgatan, then we proceeded across the street to inspect the S.D.'s impressive amount of signage. I don't know about you, but I find reading signs while they are being marched in a quick-step down a hill is a chore, especially when they're written in a language with which one is only acquainted on a head-nodding sort of basis. What I mean to say, is that Swedish and I greet each other cordially enough, and I'm sure that, were we to run into each other in some far-flung corner of the earth, surrounded by speakers of Uigher casting rummy glances in our direction, we would fall into each other's arms and be the best of chums; here, Swedish has a distinct home-field advantage that one feels keenly at times.

That was pretty much the day, rally-wise. We sauntered along in the tail of the parade up the street and to the bus stop, passing hordes of natives re-enacting the October Revolution, in which the parts of the aristocracy were being played by ice creams on sticks. We took the hint and also the next bus for home, in order to fill a couple glasses with ice and the refreshing orange soda that we had purchased from the communist's table, for the princely sum of 10SEK—how they expect to make any profit charging only 10SEK for a bottle of orange-ade strains the old bean but they know their business best I'm sure...

De mest Uppsaliensk dagen för alla

So our MP declared last night, standing on the burial mounds of Gamla Uppsala as the majbrasan burned merrily below. In translation, her next assertion ("I resten av Sverige är det Valborg, men i Uppsala är det sista april") doesn't make much sense, but as we mentioned last year, the day before Förstamaj is a special day in Uppsala, full of traditional celebrations like hat throwing, river rafting, and picnicing—but mostly very, very full of drinking.

While we had a good time at last year's sista april, this year we were determined to do it right. So I got up bright and early Thursday morning, packed up the food I had made for us the night before, and hopped a bus down to the river. At 8:30 I had my pick of nice spots along the grassy west bank of Fyrisån, and so opted for a shady position in the anticipation of a sunny morning; by 9:45 when Jennifer arrived both banks of the river were packed as far as we could see. It worked very well though, as we were able to eat our porridge before the start of forsränningen, and by the time the first float came by we had moved on to the next traditional course: champagne and strawberries.

I won't dwell on the floats too much, not even those that to my foreign sensibilities seemed downright innappropriate; those who are interested should check out the gallery . I will just say that there were at least three Darwin floats, plus an HMS Beagle, and that a group of students near us stood up and sang "Ja Må Han Leva!" to the first of them1. There was also a group of Chinese students who put together a very detailed Chinese dragon. My favorite though: Danskjävlar!

I actually knew a few people who built a raft this year (that's them to the right), and it was nice to have somebody to cheer on. By the time they finally floated by, though, we'd been sitting for a couple of hours, and the shade (at least in combination with the fact that I'd opted to wear shorts instead of jeans) was turning out to be, well, a little over-optimistic. So we bailed on the last 40-odd floats. Staying even that long made us some of the more die-hard observers, though, as most of the university students had already wandered off to their next engagement of the day, a champagne and pickled herring lunch at their nation. For pretty much everyone else, the next step is to find a square meter of unoccupied grass somewhere in town and have a picnic, and that's just what we did. We wound up next to the cathedral, where we ate the salami and brie baguettes we had packed, and rehydrated a bit2, while warming up in the sunlight and watching the charming Swedish families at play. Across the street, yet another sista april tradition was being enacted, as hundreds of students waited in line. But more on that later.

Map Loading...

Shortly after one we headed further up the hill to join K., on of Jennifer's coworkers, who was picnicking with a bunch of her friends at their traditional spot, Engelska Park (right behind the main university library). Here it was a more sedate crowd, mostly families but with a scattering of large student groups. There was even a men's choir performing as we first arrived, although they soon dispersed (choirs gotta picnic, too!). So we spent the next couple of hours hanging out with K. and her SO and their friends.

By four it was time for us to head home, so that we could rest up for the evening. This, too, is nearly traditional: for the students the afternoon is supposed to center around the bubbelgalop, in which they gather at the library at 3 to hear the university rector give a short speech, then throw their student hats in the air and go running back to their respective nations, whereupon they are showered with champagne for the next two hours. That's the theory, anyway. In reality, the champagne part is so popular, and so many guest cards get sold each year, that people have to queue up hours in advance to get in to the nations (hence the line of students, earlier). So the gallop is now more of a meandering, since those people all know they can't possibly get in to their own nations. For us, though, it was just a bus ride back to the apartment, followed by some hard napping.

But by evening we were out again, this time with our Swiss friends G. and D., who accompanied us to the majbrassa at Gamla Uppsala. Last year we were a few minutes late, so things were well underway by the time we arrived, but this year we showed up early enough to witness the local scout troop marching over the hills bearing torches with which to set the huge pile of brush alight. Then we were treated to some choral music, and finally our MP's speech. My Swedish is still… rudimentary, let us say, but I was proud to recognize the lines I quoted above, and that I understood when she began to quote one of my favorite bits of T.S. Eliot:

April är grymmast av månaderna - driver 
syrener fram ur de döda markerna, blandar 
begär och minne, kittlar 
dova rötter med vårregn. 
Vintern höll oss varma, svepte 
jorden i glömska och snö, gömde 
en droppe liv i torra lökar.3

After the speech we wandered up the hillside to get a better view, and I wound up in a long conversation with a Swedish man who had just pulled up on a tandem bicycle with his wife, who overheard us talking and was eager to know what the youth of America were thinking these heady, Obama-esque days (not an uncommon thing for Swedes to wonder recently, mind you). I, unfortunately, am neither a youth nor terribly well informed about what it is like to be in the U.S. right now, but I did my best to represent my peeps, and we spent some time talking about the state of American music (i.e., it is true that all the old bluesmen are dead and gone, except for R.L. Burnside), and he told me about the days when he was a computer programmer for IKEA (in the early 70s). Eventually, though, it was time to head down to the fire and warm up.

We stayed until about 11, and then headed home, although not before I took the opportunity to stand atop one of the largest burial mound for a few minutes in the dark (the mounds are all off limits, but Sista April is not a day for rules, so the kids spend the whole evening running up and down the hills). Then home, and to a well-deserved rest. After all, it wasn't even May Day yet…

1 Which is a little odd—most people singing that today are singing it to Karl Gustaf XVI, seeing as he's the king and it's his birthday. But I didn't hear anyone sing to the King Karl float that drifted by.

2 One of the less fortunate parts of last year's sista april experience was the difficulty of finding publicly accessible bathrooms, and this year did not start off looking promising, as the one public toilet we found last year was not there any longer. In the end, though, it turned out that we were just on the wrong side of the river last year: the east bank was noisy, crowded, and not equipped with toilets, while the west bank where we were this year was pleasant, full of people lounging in parks, and every restaurant and cafe was letting people freely access their toas.

3 Not her own work, I hasten to add; she was quoting the original Swedish translation of Eliot done by local girl Karin Boye in 1931. I love it so, I quote the original:

APRIL is the cruellest month, breeding  
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain.
Winter kept us warm, covering
Earth in forgetful snow, feeding
A little life with dried tubers.

Reading it again, it's hard to believe it wasn't written by a Swede in the first place…