Vi älskar Luleå!

Hej Hej!

this is a "spark", you can go really fast with that

So I’m now back from Laponia and it was just… AMAZING!

From the beginning to the end it was just perfect, I couldn’t expect something better!

First of all the arrival by plane gave me a first nice feeling when I discovered the frozen sea and those large areas of snowy forests. When I landed on this décor I just had the feeling to be totally cut from the rest of the world, it made me think about those pictures of Northern Alaska that you can observe sometimes on television.

The first day was simple but it was the beginning of a “dream”. My friend Annelie, who I thank a lot, came at the airport to take me by car, there I discovered the wonderful landscape of the north with huge snow wall everywhere in the streets and the garden, between 1.5 and 2.5 meters. Directly after we’ve been to her school because she had one small lesson. So I’ve been with her class and met some of her friends (that’s the way they do in Sweden!). The second part of the day we’ve been walking for a while on the frozen sea and then we made a huge cake cause it was her birthday and after a dinner with her family we’ve been to a small party where I met her friends, after what we moved to a night club where there where a university party. There were more French people than Swedish people at this party.

After a long night I met Annelie’s friends to make a sauna together and then jump in a hole in the ice as you can see on the pictures. The temperature of the air was about minus 10 degrees but it was one of the best experiences of my life! After this crazy bath, I followed my new friends to see a hockey match a the stadium: Luleå (one of the best team in Sweden) against Färjestad. The atmosphere here was crazy, I loved it! After a wonderful victory of Luleå we moved back to Annelie’s place where there were her birthday party and here again, a lot of fun!

The third day began with a walk on a small mountain with Annelie and her father. Arrived on the top of this mountain we had a wonderful view of Luleå and the entire region, the landscape was wonderful! Here we made a fire and ate some typical Swedish sausages, it was really good. As it was late in the afternoon and we were I little bit tired, we stayed home the rest of the evening.

Alfer a calm evening in front of TV and a great night we had a ballad on the ice with ice-skates and a “spark” (the red thing that you can see on the picture). We’ve been by foot to a small island, it was really nice. At the beginning of the evening we moved to Annelie’s friends and there the most wonderful in the world happened… NORTHERN LIGHTS appeared in the sky!!!  It was the last evening, a snow storm was about to arrive some hours later and I was afraid to not see it but finally it appeared and it was just… MAGIC! Those big green lights in the sky moving slowly, like some water, stayed there about 20 minutes. And during 20 minutes I stayed out in the cold air, observing the sky. (The qualities of my pictures are not that good because of the strange “night mood” of my camera but still…) So to celebrate this event and my last evening in the North we had a small party with my new friends.

I was kind of sad to leave the North so fast but I was also really happy. I discovered there a wonderful place with fantastic peoples. I think that I couldn’t expect better days up there; it will probably stay in my memory as one of my most exciting moment in Sweden. I’ll be back there, I swear!

I really would like to thank again Annelie, Annelie’s family, Robin, Johan, Elias, and all those that I met there! It was unforgettable!

TACK SÅ MYCKET ALLA!!!

I also would like to noticed that the weather was very nice and thanks to Annelie’s father who is a hunter I’ve been eating elk, moose and deer every day and it was really delicious.

Otherwise tomorrow I’m taking the ferry boat with my rugby’s team for 3 days to go in Finland to play a rugby tournament.

So see you next week to talk about it.

Take care!

the island we walked to

 

view of Luleå from the ice



fast news

Hi there!

Here is luleå: the red point

I'm sorry for this time  without news but nothing really important happened! But don't worry the 2 next following months will be plenty of "special" events! Actually tomorrow morning I'll get up at 5 to take a plane to visit a friend in Luleå, a town in the real North of Sweden and i hope that i'll be lucky and that i'll have the opportunity to observe "Northern lights". The answer next wednesday!

Otherwise next Thursday I'll move to Finland with my Swedish rugby's team in order to play a "snow rugby tournament".

To finish, in the following weeks I'll visit Copenhagen with my host family and Roma with my class!

Now just a few weather report to say that the snow is leaving Stockholm a little bit more everyday and the temperature is kind of warmer, between minus 1 and plus 6 degrees. The days are also longer and longer with the sun from 7h30 in the morning to 17h-17h30 in the afternoon. It's just nice to have nice weather with more sun.

See you next week for a new article about my trip in Lapland.

Swedish Winter!!!

Hej hej!

So this week the "real" winter arrived everywhere in Europe and also in Stockholm!

It has been now more than 3 weeks that the snow is in Stockholm without leaving and this weekend we have around 15 centimeters in Stockholm. The weather is pretty cold, it was around minus 15 the howl week, and the water in Stockholm is finally frozen. (A part has been broken to let the boats move as you can see on the pictures)

Nothing really special happened this week except this cold weather, so i'll just put some pictures that i took this weekend.

 

Idre!!!

Hej hej!

I’m sorry for this “long time” without news!

view on the morning from our houses

I’m using some free time at school to write this article, I’m on the library and outside I can see the snow falling behind the window. It has been now a little bit more than a week that it’s snowing every day! More or less of course but the ground is always white and it makes me happy! The temperature is always between 0 and minus 5 degrees outside. Some people in France might think that it’s really cold but let me say that it’s absolutely nothing if you compare to the minus 15 that I had this weekend in Idre.

Idre… What’s that?! Maybe you can remember that at the beginning of the year I bought a ticket for the annual skiing trip with my school? This skiing trip was this weekend and the name of the skiing station is Idre. Even if I was sick after that, I can say that it was probably one of the best week-end in my life!

Idre is situated in the North-West of Sweden, really close to the Norwegian border. We were 380 students from Norra Real (my school) to go there. After a 7 hours bus trip, we arrived in Idre around 00.30 in the night from Thursday to Friday. The journey to go there as really nice because it was the opportunity to discover the land of another part of Sweden: the North. Imagine driving in the middle of a forest for 2 hours with only darkness, snow and firs without seeing anybody, any cars or any houses. It was just wonderful!

In Idre we were leaving in 6 huge houses all divided in 5 big apartments with each a capacity of 12-17 persons! The night was party time, the time where you can meet many people that you never talked with before, it was just amazing! And during Friday and Saturday it was skiing time. We were free of what we were doing: Skiing when we want if we want, sleeping when we want, eating what where and when we want.

Friday was a really nice day, not that much cold but Saturday was really horrible: minus 15 degrees, snowing, windy… But we all had so much fun! When the weather is that much cold the funny thing is that the snow stay absolutely EVERYWHERE! On every part of the trees, on the clothes (my scarf and my ears were frozen:  hard and impossible to feel it) on the metal, on the vertical surfaces, everywhere everywhere everywhere!

Idre is one of the biggest skiing stations in Sweden but it is totally different from the station we can find in the Alpes. It doesn’t look like a big town with huge buildings, but like a village with many typical Swedish wood houses, really nice! Furthermore the station is not on a big mountain but on a really small one in the middle of nowhere, in the middle of a flat land with only firs forest covered of snow! In this country you don’t have to go high to find snow, and this one is just perfect to ski!

So from this station you just have a wonderful view of the North of Sweden…

We came back to Stockholm on the Sunday evening, many people were tired and sick, sleeping in the bus, but I think that for everybody this weekend was just legendary…





our houses on the morning





view from our houses



Snow is back!

Tjena!

After a rainy Christmas, snow is finally back in Stockholm! Here are some pictures that i took this afternoon (5th of January):

 

 

 

 

 

MERRY CHRISTMAS AND HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Hej hej  GOD JUL och GOTT NYTT ÅR!

I hope that every of you had a nice Christmas and I wish you a happy new year plenty of happiness.

Mine was a special one but obviously a really good one. As I said earlier I was in Gothenburg (picture from a lake behind the house) with my host family’s family who is really kind. If this Christmas was special, this is because it was my first one without my family and therefore a Swedish Christmas is a little bit different than a French one. But hopefully “special” doesn’t mean “sad” because it was really interesting to discover how to celebrate Christmas in another way and I also had really good moments with my host family. Moreover this type of experience happens once in a life time so the minimum to do is to be happy and enjoy it!

Now what could I say about Swedish Christmas… Mmmmh first of all let’s talk about the food which is kind of different than in France! The typical Swedish Christmas meal is very simple and it comes from hundreds years ago, when Swedish farmers and people didn’t really have the time and the money for special food, they were used to cook really simple things. That’s the reason why for Christmas you can eat meat-bowls, a type of ham with Swedish bread and butter or moreover salmon.  But it was very good! Concerning the drinks, Swedish people usually drink some “snaps” (strong liquors) with Christmas beer but it wasn’t the case in my family. Swedish people have another special Christmas drink: “julmust” which is a kind of coke but better! Every Swedish children (and adults) love drinking that around Christmas time. Otherwise I don’t know if for Christmas you usually spend 3 hours or more around the table, but here in Sweden it is not the case, it’s less than an hour then sometimes you come back for a little coffee or Fika (*see my firsts articles in Sweden). During the “free” time the children usually play with their games and watch TV and the adults talk together. Concerning the presents, everybody receive it the 24^th of December. Usually, the morning you receive a small one in a Christmas sock and the “real” ones, “important ones” during the afternoon. One “important” tradition at Christmas happens just before the presents. At 3 in the afternoon, every year, there is on the TV a cartoon made especially for Christmas and which is a mix of Walt Disney cartoons. Swedish people watch it every year and after that, around 4 o’clock the “Christmas presents time” can start. Traditionally a Santa clause comes and gives some presents, and then it’s a kind of distribution. One person gives the presents, one after one, to everybody. Then the evening continues with dinner to late in the evening.

Now, what about New Year’ Eve? Despite a cancelled party, I had a nice evening. Usually Swedish people (children and teenagers include, most of the time) have a kind of “traditional” dinner (but without traditional food, just good food) with their family or friend. And AFTER that (not so late thanks to Swedish meal time), party time can start. Concerning me I have been with my host family to their friend’s house, next to Stockholm, and we were 6 “children”, it was quite fun! Usually every Swedish family buy some big fireworks for New year’ Eve and around 12 everywhere in the sky you can see all those lights, it was really nice.

This Christmas and New year ‘Eve was really special, but really nice. This year is plenty of strange feelings that you can just feel in this type of experience I think… I’m thinking about before the departure: you really want to be there, to discover everything but you are also kind of afraid and you want to enjoy time with your relatives. At Christmas time you feel strange to not be with your family but you are also really happy to discover and to leave this experience and I guess that before leaving I will also be really excited to see all of you again but really sad to finish this trip, this type of life. I think that if one day you or your children have the opportunity to be an exchange student, just to it! Go for one year because it will be the best experience of your life! And every day, every single moment, just keep in mind that it happen only once in your life, so enjoy it!

BONNE ANNEE 2012!

just before Christmas



Inez my little host syster, building
 a ginger bread house with me



Hej hej !

I’m sorry for didn’t write on the blog last weekend but I was quite busy. The think is that in this time of the year, just before Christmas there is a very important tradition here which is to build “ginger bread houses” in order to break it 20 days after Christmas in order to eat it. So last Saturday many exchange students met at the YFU office in Stockholm to build, to “cook” ginger bread houses.



view of my school from the appartment



But this day was also a very important and fantastic day for many exchange students because the snow really came and stayed on the ground! Some students who come from other parts of the world never saw snow before. It was the occasion to build their first snow-men and to make their first snow battle! The snow is still a little bit here but everything should leave this weekend.  Otherwise tomorrow I will go to Gothenburg (by train) for 3 or 4 days. I just would like to notice you that in Sweden Christmas is the 24^th of December instead of the 25^th. But I must be able to talk a little bit more about it next week!

 I wish everybody a GOD JUL!!! (merry Christmas) And see you next week!