Uppsala and Stockholm, Sweden

Well, I'm back from Sweden. What a beautiful country! It reminded me so much of fall in Washington. There were gorgeous yellow leaves on the ground and on the trees and the air was crisp and made me want to carve pumpkins and drink cider. Unfortunately, they don't have cider in Sweden. I arrived at Arlanda airport Thursday afternoon after a rather sleepless night in the shady hotel in Malaga. I got off the plane, got my luggage and found Mikael who hasn't changed much over the past four years. He's just taller and still as handsome as ever. We took the 30 minute train to Uppsala the college town where he lives. With 130,000 people it's the fourth largest city in Sweden. It's a quaint town full of history. I had no idea how influential Sweden has been historically. We saw museums and even the first ever thermometer which had 0 degrees as boiling and 100 as freezing. After the inventor died they changed this. Mikael took me to his school where he's studying medicine and I got to see a preserved whale heart and he showed me a few slides through his microscope. Tongue is very interesting. Friday afternoon we met Sarah, another friend of ours, at the train station in Stockholm. Stockholm is the world's most ecologically friendly city. It's built on islands and we had coffee and delicious pie with Mikael's friends Bjern and Frida in a cozy cafe in Old Stockholm. Frida had to catch a train so she didn't join us for dinner, but the rest of us ate at a funky little Mongolian restaurant where they were very eager to show the correct way to do things. Sarah had taken my plate to dish me up and the waiter came over and informed her that she was not to have two plates and that one was for me. When Bjern was eating his rice plain, a waitress arrived and showed him how he should put the sweet and sour sauce on it. Very interesting. That night we wandered between 'nations' or student clubs. It was fun, but the walk home was freezing. Saturday we explored Uppsala. The governor's castle, the botanical gardens, an old cathedral and one of the old university buildings. We returned home in the afternoon for lunch (Mikael is an incredible cook) and to get ready for the Oktoberfest party. It was a great time. The party was in the hospital as it was put on for the med students. We had huge steins of beer and German sausage, potatos and saurkraut for dinner. Everyone was very dressed up and we met lots of nice people. If you all ever have the chance to go to Sweden you most certainly should!!!