Walpurgis Night

My apologies...I see it's been a while since I wrote one of these. I've been stewing around and being generally unproductive. Not much has been happening, anyways. Anywho....
Tonight is Walpurgis night, and is, for some reason, is when the Swedes celebrate the beginning of spring (albeit a bit more than a month late, but...each to his own.) by having bonfires all over the city, often, apparently, containing broken of unwanted furniture and other household items. The intent, apparently, of the bonfires, is to scare away witches, a function at which it succeeds quite well; there are no witches in Stockholm after the bonfires, are there? I don't know where the name comes from, but I would guess that "purgis" has something to do with "purge." Just my two cents...
To participate in the festivities, we (myself, my brother, and my parents) took the bus to Skansen, where, we were told, the biggest bonfire and festival is held. It was pretty big, but not nearly as big as the Dartmouth bonfire; granted, it was just piled up, rather than constructed of 2x4's, but all the same -- the biggest bonfire in the capital of Sweden is smaller than the Dartmouth homecoming bonfire....*chuckle*
When we arrived, the first act was beginning on the stage -- one of these big outdoor stages in the middle of a park that you always wonder if anyone ever actually uses -- it was a choral group, singing what seemed to be Swedish folk songs. Of course, they could be about something completely different, such as narrating the Hitchhikers' guide to the galaxy, and I would never have known the difference. Except, perhaps, that they would have taken a bit longer.......
Next up were a Swedish folk group, which the emcee insisted were "a bit rock, too." They might have been, but not really. They were fairly good, though; they had some fast songs which were fun to listen to -- a lot of people actually started doing what looked remarkably like a mosh pit. Yes, at a folk concert.
The most notable thing about them, however, was in one of their last songs, the singers did this amazing thing that sounded like yodeling, only so that you would actually want to hear it -- it was odd; it almost sounded like a flute -- their voices were just high enough and the tune was...flutish in nature.
In any case, that summarizes the night's events; now I am home typing this, and probably smelling strongly of smoke (you can never tell until after you shower...).

In other news, a tanker crashed on an overpass near San Francisco, and exploded, collapseing the overpass onto another overpass, rendering both impassable. Amazingly, this happened at four in the morning, and nobody was hurt (apparently the driver walked away from the crash). However, it has put a stopper in traffic around San Francisco, as people are obligated to find other ways to "get there from here," if you will. Read about it here.

No random add-on this time. Better luck on the next one!

PLaATJ,
--Gazebo

Murphey's Law at Work For You

So...I had a bit of an adventure today. Upon reaching the subway station to make my way to jujitsu (it's not judo, like I thought it was -- but it's not a big difference. If you really care, read about it here and here) I found that there was some problem with the subways going on. Since I don't speak Swedish, and anything said on an intercom in Sweden is in Swedish (they never translate it, because of course foreigners don't exist...), it took some doing to figure out even when I'd be able to get a subway, let alone what was going on -- that I have yet to piece together; all I know is that it seemed to be cendered around Rådmansgatan, which is one of the stops. Eventually, I managed to get one, and got to Jujitsu, albeit rather late.

After Jujitsu, it had been my intent to go see a free concert that my mom had told me about, near yet another subway station, T-Centralen (no points for guessing what that means). What really happened was this: I boarded a train, after waiting some ten minutes for its arrival, and took it forward one station. At this point, it stopped, and something was said over the PA, again, only in Swedish. A great many people got off the train, but Swedes being an anti-social people, none of them bothered to explain the situation to the poor american kid who, like most of the world, doesn't speak their language. After this, the doors closed, and the train showed signs of being about to move again, which it did -- only the wrong way. I was thus carried one station back to where I had started (elased time at this point, approximately 15 minutes). I then waited another ten minutes for another train, upon which I was able to finally reach T-Centralen. This done, I walked around for a couple minutes looking for the place the concert was supposed to be (I couldn't spell it if you put a gun to my head, but it's pronounced like "lava"). Finding it, I walked in just as the musicians were putting their equipment away.

The rest of the story continues in more or less the same fasion, but is rather anti-climactic -- I had to switch trains on the way home, but met a Swede who was willing to explain it to me, and then managed to catch the bus from the subway station home; nothing more exciting went wrong. Shame...

In other news, I had vacation last week, and did...well, not much actually. The one thing that I had intended to write an entry for was going up to Upsala (pronounced "oop-SAH-la" -- my dad cannot say the word...). In short, we took the train up in the morning, saw the cathedral, took pictures of the latin inscriptions, of which there were quite a lot, for Mr. Buck (which I will post sometime in the near future, along with an attempt on my part to translate them -- just sit tight, Magister), and managed to get on the wrong train coming home. This was sorted out, but mildly inconvenient, as it resulted in us sitting on the platform for twenty minutes in the cold. Other than that, it was a good time.

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Song of the week: House of the Rising Sun, by whoever you feel plays it best.
Chords:
Am - there is a - C - house in - D - New Or - F - leans,
They - Am - call the - C - rising - E - sun,
Am - It's been the - C - ruin of - D - many a poor - F - boy;
Am - God, I - E - know I'm - Am - one...

You can either strum the chords, more or less on the beat of the melody, or you can arpegiate them, which is harder to do while singing, but makes it closer to the Animals' version of the song, which seems to be a popular one. I prefer the strumming, myself, both becuase it gives it a heaver feel, and because I have it stuck in my head that way, but each to his (her) own. Look up more lyrics for yourself (or here)

And now, I really must be going to bed.
PLaATJ,
--Gazebo

Easter

Happy Easter, all!

Not being remotely religious, I should note that upon the mention of "Easter," rabbits come more readily to mind than empty tombs...feh, rabbits are more fun, anyways.

Speaking of rabbits, I have a funny story for you all, which I was going to post yesterday, but never got around to. Perhaps posting it on Easter is more appropriate anyways, given the subject matter of the story.

In Stockholm, wherever one looks that is not paved (parks, gardens, etc.), if one stares at the spot long enough, one will see a black rabbit pass by. They are absolutely everywhere. Apparently (and I don't know how true this is, but it's amusing nonetheless), they are black year round, even when there is snow on the ground, becuase rather than being indigenous to the Stockholm area, they are all the offspring of a pair of pet black rabbits that someone released in 1991, and as such, don't change color. I got a kick out of this -- it almost made me want to be in Stockholm in the winter, just to see all the little black rabbits in the snow...and then I remembered that I really do NOT want to be in Stocholm in the winter. At all.

So, enjoy your Easter, celebrate in what manner you will, and remember, it's a pagan holiday :),

PLaATJ,
--Gazebo

Judo/Climbing

So, as some of you may or may not be aware, I started Judo yesterday, after taking about two weeks or so to figure out when it was, where it was, (if it was), how to get there, and how to get into it. After all that, the question is, of course, was it worth it? In my perhaps-slightly-less-than-humble opinion, I would say that yes, it was indeed worth it, and looks like it will be a good class, and a lot of fun (hey, look at that! I actually talked about something without focusing on the negative! I'll have to make that two somethings in a moment...)
My other exciting news of the past...couple of days is that today I found (when I say "I found," what I really mean is that my parents found, and I went to) a climbing gym, which was very cool. It reminded me of the wall...plus the dartmouth gym plus "on crack."

So it's pretty cool. And look at that, a whole post, free of cynicism...oops.

PLaATJ,
--Gazebo

Just In Case

I feel that I should explain myself...
In case you were taken in by my blog entry of yesterday (*point and laugh: ha!*), it was my april fools joke on all of you. I'm sorry if I scared anyone...actually, no, I'm not. That was the point, eh?

Anyhow, I shall return as originally planned, probably a couple days before school starts in september/august, and I hope no one died of shock (however flattered I would be).
PLaATJ,
--Gazebo

Bad News

Bad news, everyone. My parents have decided that we're staying here. Permanently. We might be in town sometime in the next couple of weeks to start shipping our stuff over, but after that, this is goodbye. So sorry. Must go strangle something now...