Valborgsmässoafton

The Eve before May (i.e., April 30)






To celebrate the arrival of spring, the Swede's sing songs and share poems around a big bonfire the night before May 1. They actually sang "La Bamba" in Spanish, which threw me for a loop.








As my friend Henrik explained to me in an email:

"Valborg was a saint, "mässo" comes from the word mässa which means something like "chant", and "afton" means "eve". Its a mix of traditions - originating from ancient european pagan traditions - however, in general and today its mostly about celebrating spring."






The bonfire was followed by music and beers in the pub at the tourist station. Meet "Pika Power", the one-man band! I have to say, it was fun - I did some dancing. Pretty funny though - he covered all kinds of music and had recordings of drumbeats and other accompaniment playing in the background.

At 1 am, the sky was actually dark, though we still didn't need
headlamps to walk home that night. May 1st is a national holiday.
It's meant to be a day spent demonstrating for workers' rights,
though I am told that rarely occurs these days.

Pimpeltävling

Last Sunday, I entered the ice fishing contest amongst fellow residents of Abisko. Early in the morning, the organizers drilled hundreds of holes in the ice on a little bay on Lake Torneträsk. The competition ran from 11 am to 12:30 pm, and you could move around to use any hole you liked. Fish longer than 20 cm could be included in the count.





Most people lie down while ice fishing. It looks super funny. Lake Torneträsk is really clear, so the fishermen watch for fish at the same time as they jig. I looked down the hole as well and it was pretty cool, though I never did see a fish. A friend told me that he doesn't have to watch, but he would be super disappointed if he caught the biggest fish in his life and didn't get to watch it bight the hook! Most people were fishing for arctic char with maggots on a hook and a flashy spoon attached to the line a foot above the hook.
















I still want a spark. I mostly see huskies around town, but I guess the fishing companions include other breeds.




Waiting for the judges to tabulate the results... This building is the field station's wood fired sauna and boat house.

Check out this guy's purple and red snow suit!












I think these men (left) are wearing Sami belts and knives.










Note the reindeer skin rolled up on this person's backpack. A lot of people were laying on the reindeer furs while fishing.

I didn't catch or see one fish. No one did that great. They had to draw names for some of the final prizes - not enough people caught fish! In the end, 12 people won prizes for catching fish, and first prize went to someone who caught 626 g (1.38 lb.) worth of fish.

Life 200 km north of the Arctic Circle

I have not been keeping up on documenting my life in Sweden lately. I'll see if I can catch up. I moved to Abisko on May 31. So far, life here has been wonderful. So much nature to explore, right out my front door. In this picture, I am standing on Lake Torneträsk looking back at town. Well, the town is quite small, as you will see, but I highlight the key public places. The grocery store is just to the left of the restaurant, and that's about all we've got! Note the beautiful view of the famous Lapporten (U-shaped valley) in the background.



This is the entrance to my apartment building. Note all the bicycles and the "spark" (Swedish), which means kick. People ride these like you would ride a scooter, only on snow. I like them a lot and hope to buy one for next year! Also notice the huge shovel propped against the building - you just slide it along the ground to move a lot of snow at once.





The only restaurant/bar in town is on the first floor of the yellow building below, and the school is the red building (bottom, right). There are 14 students from age 5 to 15. Once you are 16, the closest highschool is a 1.5 hour drive away in Kiruna. Most teenagers live in an apartment alone and come home to their families on the weekend. We use the school for aerobics and yoga, and they even have a small swimming pool!















There are still some Sami people and traditions in town. Reindeer meat is left hanging to dry outside an upstairs window, and everyone uses reindeer hides regularly - ice fishing, snowmobiling, on benches outside. I have to say, they are very warm to sit on! I just bought my very own at our local gas station for 380 SEK (a little less than $50)! The Sami people have herded reindeer for centuries, and maintain their tradition and livelihood today... though with new challenges and new benefits.















The gas station (upper left) also sells fishing gear, reindeer hides, and camping gear. This is where I bought my reindeer hide (today!), and I also bought some ice fishing equipment to participate in the local competition last weekend. I'll make a separate blog for that. But for now, check out this Swedish Pimple (left)!

It weighs 1 kilo! My dad always jigged with these and I even brought some smaller versions to Sweden with me. I had never seen such a huge one in my life! I also learned that "pimpla" means to jig, so now the name of the bait finally makes sense to me! I also heard that it is very similar to a dirty word, so I should just stick to the English.




















This volvo in front of the train station is the nicest car that I have seen here! Pretty cool. In town, you are much more likely to see a big tractor or bobcat, ski-doos (as they call them here), or station wagons. You are also quite likely to see moose! These guys were hanging around town a lot over easter. Note that there are 2 moose, lots of people around them, and a dog that continuously harrassed them. They didn't spook until a train came into town, and then EVERYONE scattered. I watched the whole sequence from my balcony and window.


















This is not the best video, but I chose this one to show how the moose just walk right through town. This lady happened to come out of her building and start walking down the sidewalk... then she looked up and saw this huge moose walking past her and stepped back. Now I have started to look up more often when I walk through town - you never know what you might run into! I had just come home from the restaurant and walked right past that spot. Then I walked onto my balcony and noticed that the moose was right there all along!



Easter already passed by, but I wanted to highlight some traditions that struck me. To the left, you see the easter tree - a leafless tree with a bunch of brightly colored, fake feathers glued on. It actually looks quite pretty. The women at the station brought a small birch branch inside and glued feathers on it as well. Now it is actually leafing out.

Another tradition - the kids dress up like witches and go around to peoples' houses to get candy or money. Sound like Halloween to you? Me too, but I guess they don't really celebrate Halloween here, so you have to get it in somehow! I think the witches are quite different, though. Two braids, rosy cheeks and freckles painted on their faces, and a bonnet and peasant dress. No black witch hats...





The book bus comes to town once a month! I went in the beginning of April and rented a few movies (Hotel Rwanda, Manchurian Candidate, and American Gangster). They didn't have any books in English, but the lady was very nice and is going to hand pick some English novels to bring up next time. The bus distributes books from the library in Kiruna to a bunch of little towns further north. They stop in Abisko from 5 to 7 pm. It was very crowded!



I have started baking my own bread. Our little grocery store has a lot to offer, but no freshly baked bread. So, I figured it was time to start. I have tried 3 times now, and they have all come out quite well. The first time, I burned my hand really badly. You are supposed to heat up the pot first so that the bread doesn't stick. I used hot pads to pull the pot out of the oven, but as I prepared to plop in the dough, I grabbed the pot with my bare hands. Oops! Hope I don't make that mistake again.

Frosty Forest

Nothing much new to say, except that skiing in the sunshine and then having a sauna is a great combination!

This is along the ski trail in Gammlia Forest right by my house. I did the 10 km loop this weekend.








Random sign and a new random Swedish cultural observation: even bathrooms at the bar can be coed. Although the bathroom stalls have a full length door and walls, you are still left waiting for your turn in a roomful of drunk men. Interesting. Let's just say I didn't hang around by the sinks and mirrors to check my make up, and I didn't see other women doing that either!

OIKOS

I went to the Oikos conference in Uppsala this week. Oikos is the ecological society of Sweden, and Uppsala is an old city just north of Stockholm. I really enjoyed the meeting and the couple of hours I spent as a tourist one afternoon. Uppsala was home to Carl Linnaeus, who is known as the father of taxonomy, particularly in botany.


I saw his grave in the cathedral in Uppsala, the second largest cathedral in Sweden. I also heard a most interesting story about Linnaeus at the Oikos meeting. Though a brilliant man, he apparently fostered the idea that birds hibernate at the bottom of lakes during the winter. This led to 100 years of debate, observations, and experiments, one of which involved holding swallows underwater for a considerable length of time. The scientist astutely observed that the birds died, and therefore, could not hibernate underwater. Even this experiment did not convince the scientific community for quite some time.

The cathedral itself was quite beautiful and was also home to a recently purchased organ. They were tuning it during our visit.






















I saw the beautiful interior of the main building of Uppsala University. I also saw Uppsala Castle, which was built in 1549 but, like most things in Sweden, burned down in 1702. Apparently the current structure is entirely different, reconstructed with a "French classical style".














But, to my surprise, my favorite part of my visit was viewing the old manuscripts and documents in the Carolina Rediviva Library. I wanted to check out this historic building, home of over 5 million books, but did not expect to stay long. However, they had a very interesting collection of historic documents.





I saw the first edition of Isaac Newton's Principia Mathematica











and...
I saw a handwritten composition by Mozart!








The library also had many original copies of hand written biblical texts. It was amazing to see the writing and painted pictures on the pages. The most famous, though, is the Codex Argenteus or Silver Bible, which dates back to 520 A.D. The story of the four Gospels was written in Gothic with silver and gold ink on purple vellum in Ravenna, Italy. No one knows where it went for 1,000 years. Then it turned up in Werden, Germany, then to Prague, and then the Swede's took it to Stockholm after occupying Prague near the end of the Thirty Year's War. After the queen of Sweden left the throne, her librarian took it to Holland, then sold it to the Swedish Chancellor of Uppsala University. It was sent in an oak case on a ship that sunk, but someone boated back to the sinking ship to retrieve it. This time the book was placed in an iron case that was soldered shut. Obviously, it made the journey. The book was eventually donated to Uppsala University. What incredible travels this silly book has been on!


But I think my favorite item on display was the Carta Marina by Olaus Magnus from 1539. This was the most accurate map of Scandinavia in its time. Although it was still far from correct, I found the illustrations of the people, their activities, the wildlife, and the sea monsters extroardinary! I think these men are supposed to be seal hunting in the Baltic, but you see that these seals have legs! I was also impressed by the man-eating lobster! You can see the whole map at:

http://bell.lib.umn.edu/map/OLAUS/indexo.html

Blue Skies

Last Sunday marked the FIRST day that I saw blue skies in Umeå! Though the sun does rise, clouds have filtered what little sunlight we receive. So I was delighted when I woke up Sunday morning and saw the snow sparkling in sunlight. I enjoyed a beautiful ski through Gammlia forest by my house. I do this quite often, but the forest looks so much more beautiful with the long shadows of trees cast upon the snow and the rays of light filtering through the evergreen branches.






Umeå is known for its birch forests. The city has burned down and been rebuilt so many times, that they finally started to plant stands of birch between buildings to act as a buffer. Apparently birch trees hold a lot of water and are quite difficult to burn.








Swede's also seem to have mastered little tricks to decorate outdoors during winter. You can all make your very own ice sculptures. Just fill a bucket or garbage can with water, place some leaves or other organic materials in the bucket, and let it freeze for a few hours. Then dump out the remaining water and voila - you have yourself a series of little ice sculptures to decorate your doorway!







I also managed to go out to a night club last weekend called the Plaza. After standing in line for 40 minutes, we entered the hotel that turns two of its floors into a night club once a month. The DJ's on both dance floors seemed to adore techno versions of 80's and early 90's music, much of it from the states. Though I did not recognize some songs, they all had a similar flavor. A huge marble staircase connected the two floors and appeared to be the place "to be seen". That was the only reason I could imagine that so many people lined the railings.

Although I did dance, I spent most the night gawking at the outfits everyone was wearing. Men in tight jeans, one whose rode so low that his tighty-whities were the only thing covering the upper half of his butt. Several men wore fitted pants, white shirts, suspenders and boots... others wore teal and hot pink warm-up jackets covered with stripes and triangles. The women wore tights and scandalously short dresses that really looked more like long shirts. Another woman wore an outfit that made her look like a German beer maid. Hot pink and black zebra print stretch pants, a black puffy sequined dress with black gloves, a strapless black unitard with a fat red belt... had I been old enough to go to the clubs in the early 90's, I think the scene would have looked very similar. Needless to say, I felt a bit old and outdated (or maybe a bit too new) in my black lace shirt and black, wide leg pants. Next time I will bring my camera!