Sweden

Hej!

After my travels in Berlin, I got the opportunity to visit a friend of mine up in Sweden! This was a pretty special trip, mainly because I am Swedish and I have always wanted to venture to the land where my family is from (at least my Moms side of the family). It was also really cool to finally visit my friend here. I was pretty excited, and when I finally got there, my friend and his parents were waiting for me at the Gothenburg airport.

The Falkenberg Cathedral

It was awesome to meet them, and after that we drove into the city of Gothenburg to check it out. It was pretty cold/windy so not the ideal conditions to walk around the city but we managed. They live about 1 hour South of Gothenburg in the countryside on a farm so they weren't extremely familiar with the city of Gothenburg (the second largest city in Sweden, next to Stockholm, only Gothenburg is on the west coast of Sweden) so it was a bit of an exploration for all of us, which was cool. It was a pretty cool city, there were a lot of ports because its right on the water, and there are a ton of little islands. We had a really nice lunch there and after walking around a bit more, we got in the car and headed to a popular island destination during the summer. This was really neat, because to get to the island, you drive the car onto a ferry that's run by an underwater cable, so you drive on the ferry, stop the car, stay in the car, and then you begin to move forward on the ferry. It was kind of crazy and it felt a little weird to be moving in the car without it even being turned on and it was on a level surface haha. But the island wasn't extremely crowded during this time of year, especially since it started to drizzle now in the cold wind. But we got to see a cool ship/fishing museum when we got there which had a lot of really neat old shipping stuff and it was full of history. After checking out the museum we made our way to their home about an hour South in the countryside. They live in the small city of Falkenberg, which has about 40,000 people. They live a little on the outskirts on the city since they're on a farm. But they live in a pretty nice little Swedish house, and when we got there I met the rest of Filip's (my friend) family; his brother, his super crazy dog Ikoros (don't know if that's spelled correctly) and his brothers' friend who is there most of the time, Thomas. They were super nice and really cool people and it was so cool to be living with a Swedish family for a few days! I was excited and when we got there we had pizza kebab, which was pretty awesome, and I could not believe that they had it in Sweden haha. After that, we pretty much just got comfortable at the house and I got settled into my own room that they had for me which was pretty cool. The whole time I was there it was great.

They fed me a huge amount and even did my laundry since I had pretty much dirtied up all of my clothes up to this point after Greece and Berlin. I really just hung out with Swedish people the entire time and got to experience their culture first hand. It's definitely different there compared to Italy. Everything is much more fast-paced and things are much more expensive since they have such a good healthcare system. We did a lot of stuff when I was there. Some of the highlights were when I was able to attend some of Filips' classes since he was still in school at the time. His classes were much more relaxed than America and they were a lot smaller too. I got the opportunity to go to one of his English classes and answer questions about America to some of the students. They were pretty shy at first but then I spent the last 20 minutes of his class explaining the American school system to them. It was really cool to get an outside perspective of America from their point of view and to explain to them how different America is compared to Sweden. I also got the chance to meet some of Filips' friends and they were really nice. They were really interested in meeting me and asked me a lot of questions about America. I got to hang out with them a good amount which was pretty awesome. Filip also showed me around his town which was really cool.

Coolest Calzone Ever

It's a pretty old town and there is some really cool architecture there, especially the main church which was nice. After that, I had the chance to learn how to drive stick, since Filip had a car that was manual, he decided to let me try and learn it since I have never driven a stick shift before. I must say that this was a bit of a learning experience. I stalled the car a good 100 times and it got pretty embarrassing. Eventually near the end I started to get the hang of it, but I guess I can say that's where I learned how to drive stick shift, Sweden, haha. We also got a chance to go to the beach while we were there but it was FREEZING. The combination of cold air and wind made the weather extra cold and when I saw people going into that water I could not believe what I was seeing. One day, while Filip was in his classes, me and his brother, Emil, went out to a pretty awesome fort outside of the city. This place was really awesome. There were old cannons lined up against the walls of the fort and you can feel all of the history around it. It was really neat to see that place. Also, all of the food that I had in Sweden was really good. The kebabs were really good, the pizza kebabs were really good and even the cheeseburgers were really good there too. One of the last days I was there, me and Filip and his friends all went to this pretty neat skateboarding competition about an hour and a half away and it was pretty awesome. His friends are really into skating and there were a lot of really good skaters there, most of them were pros. It was really neat to see a skateboarding comp in Sweden and I never thought I would have the opportunity to see that.

The House

That night we decided to go out to a club. We went to a party the night before at one of Filips' friends houses and that was pretty fun too. The club was pretty nice there, and although the one that they originally wanted to go to was closed that night, we were able to go to a pretty nice one. It was cool to chill with his friends there and see what some of the club life was like, and after that, we headed back to Filips' house and the next day it was apparently Mothers day for Sweden so we had a really nice lunch at Filips grandma's house and then it was time for me to head to England to see my friend Jon. They gave me a ride back to the Gothenburg airport after having some delicious Swedish meatballs and I was on my way. Overall, this trip was incredibly awesome. I was able to experience firsthand the Swedish culture and Filips family took really good care of me. They were really generous and made sure that my time there was a great one, and I thanked them very much for that. By the way, Filips dog, Ikoros, is the craziest animal I have ever seen. He's probably over five feet tall and he's only about two years old so he acts exactly like a puppy and he has sooooo much energy it blew me away. We had a few good fights and he was always up for a good fight whenever I saw him. He was really fun to play with and that made my trip even better. This was definitely one of my best trips that I took (I think I say that for every trip) and I will definitely never forget my time in Sweden. Next stop, England!

Hej då!