Day 60

Had a welcome sleep in this morning – woke up at 8am.  Ate breakfast at the hotel before heading back to Volvo IT again to meet with Kjell.  Got a tour of their two data centers (or big server rooms) in Gothenburg and also saw a third site where all the backups are located.

Getting to the first one was the most interesting, and most confusing.  From the office building that Kjell sits in we took a few flights of stairs down, then went through about 4 or 5 different doors before we reached the ‘tunnel’. 

It was like something out of an Indiana Jones movie – the early ones, not that crappy recent one!

I found out later that the tunnel system ran under the road and through a mountain to where the actual data center was.  The place itself was what you would expect – big rooms filled with lots of server racks.  We saw mainframes, windows servers, storage, comms, all the geeky stuff that makes up a server room.  Although it was impressive it was kind of what I expected it to be.  It’s almost a ‘seen one, seen them all’ type of situation.  Still it was good to see the facilities.

The second site was about 8kms away.  This one looked like an army bunker from the outside – no big signs saying “Volvo IT Data Center”, just a security fence requiring an access card, a sloping driveway and a grey door.  Once we swiped ourselves in through the first door Kjell pressed the intercom button for the security guard.  A voice came through the speaker telling us to look into the security camera and state our name and company.  Apparently we passed because he let us in.  Other than that bit of excitement the facilities were much the same as the last place.  I did actually get to see some of ASSA ABLOY’s actual servers which was cool, in a nerdy kind of way.  I’ve connected to these servers remotely many times, but now I’ve actually seen that they really do exist.

Kjell took me to lunch at a local kebab place – I had a Kebab Tallrik (or ‘plate’) which was not bad, but not as good as the place in Landskrona.  He was kind enough to drop me at the train station after lunch.  Killed some time looking round a big shopping center across the street from the station, but my backpack was heavy and annoying so ended up going back to the station to wait.

Three hours later and I was back home in Landskrona.  Stir fried beef with capsicum and a sesame and soy sauce for dinner.  One more day before the long (and my last) weekend…

Day 59

As predicted, I was woken up by a call at 2am last night – a follow up to let me know that the issue was still unresolved, but that they were working on it.  Very helpful AT&T.  Given that all systems were still up and the problem was with one of our redundant links I politely suggested that any further updates could wait until business hours.

Caught the train from Landskrona station at 8.38am.  The first class cabin was nice and quiet, with highbacked leather seats, tables to put your laptop on and a complimentary drink from the beverage cart.  Spent the three hour trip catching up on some work, talking to mum and Sophie on Skype and watching the latest episode of The Big Bang Theory. 

Met Lars at Gothenburg Central Station and caught a taxi out to Volvo IT.  Had lunch with Lars Herstrommer, our customer service manager, in the canteen.  The canteen was much bigger than ours in Landskrona but the food was about the same quality.  Had a beef curry with rice and some salad.

Our meeting was fairly successful.  The aim was to come up with a way to test if Siteminder, a ‘reverse-proxy’ solution provided by Volvo IT, could be used to replicate our current Portwise authentication system.  The benefits of using their service would be improved availability, increased redundancy and a move away from our current ‘single point of failure’ system.  Of course this will come at a financial cost. 

The downside was that we’re no closer to coming up with a Single Sign On solution.  The Siteminder guys think using a reverse-proxy is unnecessary for this and believe the AD and IIS people should be the one’s we’re talking to.  I leave next week so unfortunately that’s where my involvement will end.

The hotel I’m staying in is only 5 minutes walk from the Central Station and the center of town.  Checked in to my spacious room then headed out to wander the city.  Spent two hours walking the streets, seeing what I could see.  Gothenburg has trams, just like Melbourne, but they seem older than ours.  Didn’t really get many good photos, I’ll have to try harder on the weekend.

Had dinner at the hotel buffet - fish, potatoes, salad, bread, apple.  Not bad.  Don’t have to be in the office until 10am tomorrow morning so I get a little sleep in.  Nice.

Day 58

First day back at work went pretty well.  Found out that I will be going to Gothenburg tomorrow for a meeting at Volvo IT.  I’m going to be staying overnight so I can get a tour of the two Data Centres on Wednesday morning.  Just when I thought I’d be sleeping in my own bed again!

The day at work passed pretty quickly.  It was good to get back into the usual routine at lunch – big meatball and potatoes again.  I’d missed them after a week eating French food.  By about 3pm I was feeling pretty tired though.  Glad when home time came around.

Unfortunately it’s my turn to be ‘On Duty’ this week meaning that the SSC EMEA after hours phone will be coming through to my mobile – day or night.  So far I’ve had two calls (it’s just after 11pm) but I expect at least another at some stage during the night to tell me that the first problem has been fixed.  If I don’t get enough sleep I can always grab a few winks on the 3 hour train trip to Gothenburg in the morning!

Spent a while cleaning up the photos from last week and uploading them.  This one’s of our bus/motel from the trip to France.

These are actually bunk beds, you’re looking at the top bunks…

Made plans to spend the weekend in Gothenburg with Emma, Mats, Lise and Åse.  Should be a good way to finish my trip.  Can’t believe I only have one weekend left!

Day 57

We had half an hour for breakfast at a rest stop somewhere in Germany, then back on the road.  Our route home was changed slightly due to our late departure yesterday.  Instead of catching the ferry at Helsingør in Denmark and arriving at Helsingborg (where I’d caught the bus last week), we drove down through Copenhagen and took the Oresund bridge across to Malmö. 

This was a pain for everyone that wasn’t getting off at Malmo because it added even more time to our journey – pushing our eventual arrival time back even further.  For me it was annoying because Landskrona is situated in between Malmö and Helsingborg – meaning we drove past home and then I had to catch a train back part of the way we’d just come. 

We got to Helsingborg at about 8.30pm, and after a short walk to the train station I found my train left at 9.10pm.  Had a cheeseburger and chocolate sunday at McDonald’s while I waited.  Finally made it back to my apartment around 9.30pm.  Total travel time for the return trip – 26 hours! 

Surprisingly I felt much better than if I’d flown for the same amount of time.  I think the combination of sleeping on a ‘flat’ bed and being able to get out and walk around in the fresh air every once in a while made a big difference.  That and having two seats to myself the whole way.

Unpacked, showered and got to bed by around eleven.  It was nice to sleep in my ‘own’ bed again.  Seems like I’ve been away from work for much longer than a week – not looking forward to seeing my inbox tomorrow.

Day 56

Woke up this morning and found the weather conditions to be as predicted, if not a little worse.  We headed out into what turned into almost blizzard conditions – windy, cold and lots of snow falling.  Visibility was pretty crap and at the end of each run we looked like snowmen from all the snow that had fallen on us on the way down.

By the time we got to the UCPA at Val d’Isere for lunch Matt, Lise and me had already made up our minds that we’d be leaving the group and catching the shuttle bus back to Tignes where we were going to have a nice relaxing spa.  Unfortunately the roads were closed due to all the snow, meaning we had to no choice but to head out into the snow and make our way back (with the group) the old fashioned way – riding and lifts.

It took about 10 minutes to walk to the start of our first run.  What we saw when we got there was the stuff of dreams…

…the snow stopped, the skies cleared and we were looking out at a whole mountain of unmarked white.  At least 30 – 50cms of fresh powder and practically no one around to share it with.  The next few hours were the best I’ve had at the snow.  Ever.

It was like the whole mood of the mountain lifted.  We heard music playing at every lift and restaurant, people laughing and squealing with pleasure, and every person you passed had a huge smile on their face. 

All the aches and pains accumulated throughout the week miraculously disappeared and we rode run after run of beautiful fresh powder.  On piste, off piste, wherever we could.  I can’t think of a better way to have finished the week. 

Unfortunately, after we stopped riding my body pretty much gave in.  My left ankle hurts, my right arm is sore, I still have some pain in my wrist and my legs and back are worn out completely.  After dinner we stayed at the UCPA bar for an hour or two but I decided to call it a night around 10.30pm. 

It’s snowing right now and if the weather’s any good tomorrow morning I fully intend on getting in a few more runs before we have to leave at 2pm. 

Day 55

Unfortunately for me my wish didn’t come true – the weather this morning was beautiful once again.  The wrist still wasn’t feeling too crash hot so I stuck to my original plan of resting for the morning.  It was hard to stay behind because my energy was back after a good nights sleep but I didn’t want to run the risk of doing more damage to myself. 

Instead of going out riding I spent the morning exploring the village of Val Claret.  People say Tignes doesn’t have the same charm as older resorts like Val d’Isere, but I think they’re just being picky.  Sure, some of the buildings are a little plain and lack the traditional feel of a ski village but it still seemed perfectly nice to me.

Met up with Matt and Lise at lunch and heard all about how good their morning’s riding had been.  The afternoon’s lesson was great – I had my energy, confidence and enthusiasm back.  Had an awesome time on the slightly wet, soft snow.  We spent most of the lesson over in Val d’Isere, had a few runs in the park and generally just mucked about.

It’s amazing what a difference a day can make to your mood.  On Wednesday I had no energy and was wondering how I was going to make it through the rest of the trip.  Today I felt great and can’t believe we only have one full day of riding left…

The weather tomorrow is still predicted – light snow and stronger winds than we’ve had so far.  The plan is to spend the whole day skiing in Val d’Isere, eating lunch at the UCPA over there.  Bring it on.

Day 54

Woke up feeling fairly ordinary today.  Our pubrunda (which finished around 2am last night) may have had something to do with it.  Luckily there was no lesson scheduled for the morning session so we were all able to ease into the day.  Didn’t feel like eating at breakfast so settled for a glass of orange juice.

The pain killers I’d taken the night before because of my wrist had worn off by the morning and it was feeling pretty crap.  One of the girls, Åse, lent me her wrist strap which helped but by the time it came to get ready for our afternoon lesson I was feeling less than enthusiastic.  Still, we kitted up and headed out – hangover, sore wrist and all. 

I have to admit I felt very shaky for most of the first hour.  I had almost no energy and was a bit short of breath as well.  This didn’t make for an easy riding session.  The shaky knees and sore body hit my riding confidence hard and I struggled to keep up.  As the session wore on though things slowly returned to normal. 

We headed to the snow park to practice some jumps and rails, and to give the boarder cross track a go.  This was fun right up until I landed hard on my sore wrist again after a poor landing.  Suffice to say I took it fairly easy for the rest of the day. 

I finally got round to downloading the photos from my camera to the computer.  The good news is the camera still takes great pictures - even though I can’t actually see what they look like until I get home!

Decided to take the morning session off tomorrow to rest my sore wrist.  Hopefully the weather will be crap so I don’t feel too jealous of everyone out riding…

Day 53

The weather gods smiled on us today – we had a perfect ‘blue bird’ day.  Blue skies and sunshine all day.  Unfortunately we didn’t have any fresh snow to go with the great weather so conditions varied from outright icy in the morning to mogully and slushy in the afternoon.  Not that I’m complaining you understand, just stating the facts.

The body’s been taking a beating over the past few days.  My muscles are tired, but not as sore as I expected.  I took a tumble on the ice this morning and landed hard on my right wrist and butt.  Wasn’t sure if it was broken right away (the wrist, not the butt), but it’s been getting better all day so it should be okay. 

Got back to the UCPA lodge this afternoon to find it was ‘crepe night’.  Make your own crepes/pancakes with jam, sugar and butter as toppings.  They had these little crepe makers with four hotplates (each about 10cms in diameter) and ready made crepe mix.  You could make as many as you could eat.  I’m not greedy so I only had five.

Speaking of food, the meals haven’t been too bad.  Every meal (breakfast, lunch and dinner) is a serve yourself buffet.  They have freshly baked French sticks with every meal and you can have as much as you want.  For lunch and dinner they also have a cheese bar – camembert, swiss, brie… the best bit is the dessert bar – all you can eat ice cream (about 10 flavours), plus nightly specials such as chocolate pudding, custard etc.

We’re heading out for a good old Swedish ‘pubrunda’ (or pub crawl) tonight.  The main reason for this seems to be that there are no ski lessons tomorrow morning, only the afternoon session.  Apparently this is a perfect reason to go out drinking!

The weather looks to be going downhill later in the week. Tomorrow should be another nice day, but then Thursday, Friday and Saturday are all predicted to be snowy, windy and cold.  The snow and cold I can handle, but the wind will make for some unpleasant conditions.  The aim is to make the most of the good weather while it lasts…

Day 52

Woke up around 7.15am and made my way down to breakfast by eight.  Legs were feeling okay but my back and shoulders were quite stiff and sore.  All of us agreed perhaps we would have been wise to take it a little easier yesterday but at least we had lots of practice before the classes today. 

We met our instructor (and the rest of the group) at 9.15am.  There were thirteen of us altogether – two Swedes (Matt and Lise), an Australian (me) and ten Frenchies – a mixture of girls and boys.  Our instructor, Julian, was very French but also spoke quite good English so we weren’t completely in the dark the whole day.  There were times when he’d say something in French that took about 2 minutes to say, then give is about two sentences in English as a translation but all in all it was okay.

I chose a class that was one level below my riding ability – partly to be in the same group as my new friends, and partly because it gave me a chance to have more fun and not concentrate on getting to the bottom in one piece all the time.  By the end of the day I was sure I’d made the right choice.

The weather was better than yesterday – skies were a little cloudy but the sun was shining through nonetheless.  In fact, at one point I saw that the current temperature where we were was +15°C.  I felt very overdressed with my thermals and beanie on and took my gloves off at the end of each run to cool down on the lift ride.  Given the temperature, the snow conditions in the morning were much better than later in the day, when the snow was much heavier, wetter and ‘slushy’.

Headed out for après ski at a bar/restaurant in the village with some of the people from our Swedish bus group.  Had a couple of pints there before heading back to the UCPA for dinner.  As luck would have it, it was Italian night in the kitchen.  Spaghetti bolognese with parmesan cheese, a bit of salad and vanilla ice cream with warm choc fudge topping.  Mmmmm…

As I mentioned yesterday, I managed to break my camera.  I was carrying it in my pants pocket and somehow managed to break the LCD screen at the back.  The camera itself seems to be working as normal but taking photos with no viewfinder is not very fun.  I didn’t take it out with me today, which was a shame because the scenery is just beautiful.  They’re predicting a sunny day tomorrow so I might take it with me and see if I can get any shots worth keeping.  It will kind of be like the ‘old days’, when you couldn’t check to see if your photo was any good until you got the film developed - except I won't be able to see what I'm shooting, I can't change the settings and using the zoom will be impossible...

Day 51

Woke up at 7.15am this morning, read for a bit then got up and met Matt, Lise and the others downstairs for breakfast at eight thirty.  I’m not a big breakfast person so all I had was a bowl of cornflakes and an orange juice.  By 9.30am we were kitted up and waiting to catch the lift up for our first run.

When I say lift, what I really mean is train.  Yep, they have a train (or funiculaire) that takes you from Val Claret, where we’re staying, to the base of the Grande Motte glacier.  The ride lasted less than 10 minutes and was much nicer than taking a chairlift!  We intended on starting the day with an easy blue run but somehow ended up on a black run instead.  The snow was beautiful but visibility was only so-so.  It had been snowing lightly overnight (in fact it was still snowing when we started the day) and we had about 10 cms of fresh snow.

We skied until about 12pm then headed back to the UCPA for lunch.  Headed back out around 1pm and skied for another four hours.  I was absolutely buggered by the end of the day.  The place is so big that by the time we decided to head back it took an hour to make the trip – up a lift, down a run, up another lift, down another run…

The longest run we did had a vertical drop of 1200 meters, so who knows how long the actual run was!  The runs seem to go for ages and the lifts seem to go on for just as long.  The trail map says the ski area, known as Espace Killy, has 300km of piste skiing, 2 glaciers, 88 chairlifts and covers an area of 10,000 hectares.  One of the best parts was that we never had to wait in line for a lift once which was a welcome change from previous experiences at Mt Buller.

Had a stretching session in the corridor with my room mates and the others when we got back, complete with beers and music.  Just had a shower and I feel refreshed – muscles are a little sore, but I survived the first day.

Headed downstairs for some ‘Welcome Drinks’ and music at 7pm, then dinner and probably more drinks.  I’m pretty wrecked from today so think I’ll sleep well tonight.  Lessons start 9am tomorrow.

Oh yeah, and I broke my camera today…

Day 50

It was a long trip, but we made it.

At around 11pm last night the bus made it’s final stop, allowing us all to had a last toilet break and brush teeth etc. while the bus crew made up the beds.  Returned to the bus to find I’d been assigned a ‘sleeping buddy’.  This was a little disappointing given I hadn’t had to share my two seats during the daytime part of the trip.

My ‘buddy’ and I grabbed a blanket each and headed on to the bus.  Once we climbed the stairs we encountered an amazing site.  The seats had been converted into upper and lower ‘bunks’ on each side of the bus.  This was done by somehow elevating every second pair of seats by about a metre and a half, then laying them completely flat!

The ‘beds’ were pretty narrow (imagine the width of a bus seat) so you couldn’t really sleep on your side, and bumpy – because the seats are not completely flat.  I slept fully clothed, with my slippers on, using the blanket and my jacket as a pillow.  Put in my ear plugs and an eye mask, popped a sleeping pill right and slept a full seven hours before waking up. 

We stopped at a little town in Switzerland called Gruyeres for breakfast around 8am.  This wasn’t included in the trip cost but 10 Euro for fresh scrambled eggs on toast, orange juice and tea seemed very worth it.  We made it to Tignes by around 1pm, making the total trip time about 23 hours.  Being able to sleep through the night really made a big difference – this trip actually felt easier than catching the bus from Melbourne to Adelaide.

Matt, Emma, Lise and Åse (my friends from the bus) took a walk around the town and found a place to eat.  A (fairly large) pepperoni pizza and a beer cost me about $23 AUD and the hot chocolate I had at the next place we went cost about $12 AUD.  I’m glad all the rest of my meals are included in the trip cost otherwise it would be an expensive week!

There are four people to a room, so I’m sharing with a couple called Sandis and Maria, and another guy called Johan.  The shower is shared with the next room, so there’ll be eight people fighting for a turn tomorrow.  We have a balcony, but that’s the only luxury.  Two bunk beds and four small closets squeezed into a space a little bigger than my laundry.  Still, it’s a place to sleep.

Wifi is free, but only from the communal area downstairs.  Not that I’m complaining, it’s great that I’ve got access at all…

Day 49

Once I’d finished packing last night I realised I was actually taking almost everything I’d brought with me from Australia.  The only things I was leaving behind were my work clothes, two jackets and the various food stuffs I’ve acquired over the past seven weeks.  Suffice to say my suitcase and backpack were pretty full.

Successfully negotiated the bus trip this morning with all my luggage, and made the walk from the station to work with no issues either.  The morning went quickly and before I knew it lunch time had arrived.  Had roast chicken breast with potatoes and gravy which was pretty good. 

Left the office around 1.15pm and headed back to Landskrona station to catch the train to Helsingborg.  Johan rode the train with me – he was going there to have another session done on his back tattoo.  This will be the sixth or seventh one, about 25 hours altogether!

Jens, Marta, Elsa and Axel were waiting for me when the train arrived.  They’d come to see me off and I can’t tell you how nice it was for them to do that.  Changed some money to Euros then we all walked down to where the bus was waiting.  In fact, there were four buses – each one going to a different resort in France.  Found a spare seat on my bus, said goodbye to Jens and family then we were off.

The bus is a double decker, not completely uncomfortable.  I managed to score a double seat to myself, which is awesome.  The best part is that later tonight they’re going to somehow turn the seats into horizontal ‘beds’ for us to sleep in.  I can’t quite figure out how this will work so I’m interested to see what it’s like.

I somehow managed to leave my snuggle pillow packed in my suitcase (which is now packed away under the bus) and my inflatable back pillow has somehow disappeared since landing in Copenhagen all those weeks ago.  Still I have high hopes of getting a reasonable sleep tonight. Fingers crossed.

The ferry crossing from Denmark to Germany is usually when people eat dinner, but there was some kind of strike on the ferry so none of the eateries were open.  Emma, the UCPA representative, just cooked up some hot dogs on the bus which were not bad.  It’s now 7.20PM and I think we’re still somewhere in Germany.  The second Swedish movie is playing on the screens (no English subtitles) so I’m about to start watching The Hurt Locker on my laptop. 

Made friends with a group from Gothenburg - three girls and a guy that are travelling together.  The guy, Matt, has been kind enough to translate the announcements Emma keeps making over the PA system, which has been helpful. 

Only another 20 hours till Tignes!

Day 48

Had meetings for most of the day today.  Our account manager and customer service manager from Volvo IT were in Landskrona for our monthly ‘Operational Review’ meeting.  It’s an opportunity to review things like disk space, cpu usage, memory usage, page file sizes, up times etc. for all the servers hosted with them, any pending/outstanding requests and any incidents that occurred during the previous month.  It’s also a chance to go over any other things that have come up during that time.  The whole process takes a couple of hours but it’s not too bad.

We also had the first steering committee meeting for the Trioving, Norway data centre migration.  This will be one of the largest migrations so far, about 70 servers altogether – although the actual number of new servers at Volvo IT will be a bit less than that as some will be consolidated etc.  The plan was to have the migration finished by end June, but staffing shortages in Norway will most likely push that out until after the summer break.

I went into Helsingborg with Johan and his friend Carl after work.  We grabbed a quick bite to eat at Max (the hamburger joint) then went to see Alice in Wonderland 3D.  I was surprised when they said it was the first 3D movie they’d seen.  The movie itself wasn’t terrible – I’m not really a huge Tim Burton fan – but it wasn’t the best movie I’ve seen.  The 3D was similar to that used in Avatar.  More of a background effect than the focus of the film, which works well and seems to be the growing trend.  They had previews for the new Toy Story movie and a dance flick called StreetDance (think Step Up) that were also in 3D and both looked cool.

This may be my last post for a while - tomorrow I leave for France. 

In fact, this time tomorrow I will have been on a bus for about 8 hours and will still have at least another 12 hours to go.  From what I understand the bus will be full too, so pretty sure I won’t have an empty seat next to me.  Let’s just say it’s not going to be the best part of my holiday…

Jens tells me that they should have free wifi at the place I’m staying, so hopefully I’ll be able to put up some pictures and continue these posts.  If not, the next time you’ll hear from me will be Sunday 28th of March.  Until then, au revoir!

Day 47

Compared to my yesterday’s moose-spotting excitement today was fairly quiet.  Woke up a little tired, but it was good to sleep in my own bed again.  Made it to work on time and spent a fairly uneventful day putting some documentation together for a new meeting room booking system I’m working on for the ASSA ABLOY head office in Stockholm.

Lunch was great – yes, it was a big meatball and boiled potatoes, but instead of the usual gravy-type sauce we had tzatziki.  It was really tasty.

With only two sleeps until I leave for France I still had a few things to organise.  Heidi, my landlady emailed me today asking if I had any clothes I wanted washed before I left.  Isn’t she wonderful?  She also emailed me an old photo of the house we all live in. 

Ye Olde Towne of Landskrona (we're the third building, with the balcony)

When I asked her where she got it from she said:

“I stole from Landskrona Museum; they have the picture as this building was visited by the old king for fancy dinners and owned by noble folks.”

I’m thinking that her use of the word ‘stole’ is just an unfortunate slip due to English not being her native language.  Either that or she’s a closet klepto…

Had an interesting visit at the local Frisör, or hairdresser, after work.  Would you believe he was the first person I’ve met here in Sweden who spoke practically no English.  The fact that all I wanted was a basic short haircut probably worked in my favour – I figured it would be hard to stuff up.  He actually didn’t do a bad job – I guess all the hand gesturing and saying ‘not too short’ a few times did the trick.

Started to pack the suitcase for my trip after dinner (left over pasta e fasoi).  I’m going in to Malmö after work tomorrow with a few friends to see Alice in Wonderland 3D.  I’m pretty sure it’s English with Swedish subtitles.  At least I hope it is…

Day 46

Up at 7am this morning, said a quick goodbye to Serg then headed downstairs.  Happy to find my taxi waiting for me.  It was about a 25 minute ride to Brommer airport where I met Jens.  He’d had to get up at something like 4.30am this morning to get here before eight!  We found our hire car, scraped the ice off the windshield and we were off. 

The drive to Eskilstuna took about 2 hours or so.  We stopped to get breakfast at McDonalds along the way which was good, because I was hungry and tired.  I love that they have a separate hole in the wall for each type of rubbish…

Rubbish disposal, Sweden-style

We arrived at the ASSA head office (yes, the ASSA part of ‘ASSA ABLOY’) by around 10am.  Our visit involved a couple of meetings to do with the upcoming move of all the servers at one of their other sites to the big ‘data centre’ in Gothenburg.  Apart from this, the highlight of the visit was a guided tour of their factory. 

ASSA, like Lockwood in Australia, is the biggest and well known lock manufacturer in Sweden.  Unlike Lockwood, they still enjoy almost 100% market share in the country.  Apart from that our businesses are fairly similar, and the factories were too.  Saw lots of the same machines doing the same things.  Some things I thought were an improvement on our processes in Australia – I have a few things to talk to people about when I get back.

Left for the airport around 4.30pm to catch our plane at 7.25pm.  We stopped along the way to check out this big, multi-storey computer/tech store just outside of Stockholm and grab a bite to eat.  Prices are very similar to those we have in Australia – something I’ve noticed about most things in Sweden. 

After an hour long plane flight, a fifty minute bus ride, a twenty minute train trip and another five minute bus ride I’ve finally made it back to my apartment in Landskrona.  Met a guy called Sam while waiting for the last bus.  He’s from South Africa and has been in Sweden for a year now.  He said it took him about 7 months to learn the language but he’s still not an expert.  May catch up with him before I go home, he only lives about 500 meters away from my apartment.

Oh yeah, I SAW MY FIRST MOOSE TODAY!  Two actually, on the drive from Brommer to Eskilstuna.  Awesome.

Day 45

Woke up at 7am after a horrible sleep.  I blame playing a vigorous sporting activity at 10 o’clock in the evening, getting home around 11pm and trying to get to sleep immediately.  Whatever the reason, if felt like I hardly slept at all.

Spent the day working from the ASSA ABLOY Head Office in Stockholm.  Had a few quite productive meetings, got to know Lars (one of the IT guys that works here) a bit better, and ultimately felt that my trip was justified – not just an excuse to get to Stockholm for the weekend.

Serg’s apartment is in a great area for eating out – there are so many varied options to choose from.  Within 5 minutes walk from his house he can choose from Spanish, Italian, Thai, Indian, French, Scottish and even an Australian sports bar called the Boomerang.  We chose Indian tonight.  We stuck to the safe bets and had Butter Chicken and Lamb Korma with naan bread.  Everything was great but it was a lot of food.

Called up Stockholm Taxi before I left work to book my ride tomorrow morning.  I have to meet Jens at Stockholm’s Brommer airport at 7.50am.  All the prompts were in Swedish, but I eventually got a girl on the line.  I’m sure my pronunciation of the street name was not perfect, but I’m fairly convinced a taxi will be arriving to pick me up at 7.20am.  Hopefully.

Day 44

Another beautiful day in Stockholm today.  Temperature was hovering around zero but the sun was shining and the sky was a clear blue.  Got up around 10am, showered and headed out.  We walked down Östermalm (which took about 25 minutes) and stopped at this little café by the water along Strandvägen for breakfast.  I had a hot chocolate with whipped cream and a raspberry muffin.  We sat outside on these cute little chairs and soaked up the sun.  It was great just to sit there and watch the world go by for a bit.

Strandvägen Café

From there we headed on to the Vasa museum, home of the world famous sailing ship of the same name.  The ship had sunk in Stockholm harbour on its maiden voyage back in the 17th century.  It lay buried under the water for 333 years before being rediscovered and raised in 1961.  The less salty waters of these parts meant that it was almost perfectly preserved and was reconstructed over a period of many years before finally being put on display.

It really was an impressive sight - the photos don’t do it justice at all.  I’m not really a huge museum person, but this one was quite well done.  There were all sorts of different displays spread over the building’s five - multimedia presentations, a small theatre showing a 25 minute video, and awesome three dimensional exhibits.  They even had free MP3 ‘tours’ you could download to your mobile phone!

The Vasa (in the back) and a 1:10 scale replica

After spending a few hours in the museum we took a short walk around Djurgaden (the island on which the museum lives) then headed back in to town.  We walked all the way around to Södermalm – a ‘bohemian’ island to the south of central Stockholm.  Found a great bar right on the main plaza and spent an hour or two lounging in the sun with some beers.  To eat I had a baguette – shrimp, mayonnaise (I think), lettuce and tomato.  Very Swedish, very delicious.

We ate dinner at a little Thai restaurant near Serg’s apartment - I had the Pad Thai with beef – before heading out again to join Marcus and his friends for their weekly game of Innebandy (or Floorball).  It’s a type of indoor floor hockey played on a field that resembles an ice hockey rink.  There’s a half metre high barrier running around the field, the goals are much smaller (since there’s no goalie), the sticks are like smaller versions of ice hockey sticks and the ball is plastic with holes through it.  The game lasted for an hour and, with only one ‘extra’ player per team, I was absolutely buggered by the end. 

Day 43

Woke up to blue skies and sunshine in Stockholm today.  Both Serg and I were a bit worse for wear this morning.  The alarm went off at 9am and we both had to force ourselves to wake up.  I have to admit the IKEA futon and pillows didn’t provide the most comfortable sleeping environment so I woke up feeling like I hadn’t slept properly at all.

We went out for breakfast at a nice café around the corner from Serg’s apartment. Tea and a croissant were all I needed to start feeling human again.  A quick stop back at his place to pick up the ice skates he’d borrowed and we were off to Norrviken for some skating. 

Much to our disappointment the place where you could usually hire skates was closed.  This meant we had to share the one pair of skates we’d brought – meaning one of us was able to skate and the other waited for the to finish. 

I went first and, after a shaky start, had a wonderful time.  It was beautiful and peaceful out on the ice.  There were not that many people and the scenery was breathtaking.  I managed to take this short video while I was out there…

Once we’d both had a shot on the skates we headed back into Stockholm and went for a mammoth walk.  We walked from Serg’s place, along the frozen canal (which was a unique experience in itself) down to the old town.  Then further around a few of the different islands that make up Stockholm.  Got some great photos along the way.

Once we’d finally made it back to his place we had a quick shower then headed out again.  We walked to O’Leary’s Irish Sports Bar, intending to watch the ice hockey.  We arrived only to find that English soccer was on.  Marcus met us there and, lacking any better ideas, we stayed to watch the final of the Swedish Melodifestivalen.  It was actually a good laugh.

We kicked on from there to a bar/nightclub not too far away called ‘Lemon’.  We couldn’t believe it when they started playing all the music we’d just been listening to on the Melodifestivalen.  It was even more amazing to see all the girls (and guys) singing along to all the songs!

Left around 1.30am and finally made it back to Serg’s place by 1.45am.  Time for bed, it’s been a long day with a lot of walking/standing.

Day 42

tMade it to Stockholm today without any problems.  Arrived about 6pm and met Serg at the ASSA ABLOY office.  We went out to a bar on the top floor of Stockholm’s tallest ‘skyscraper’.  When I say ‘top floor’, we’re talking the 25th floor – they don’t really have any tall buildings in Sweden!

The bar was awesome.  Floor to ceiling glass windows all the way around with great views of the city.  Serg, Henrik (one of the guys from work) and me met the others – Magnus and Louise – there and had a few beers before heading down to a local kebab shop for some food.

Serg, Henrik, Me, Louise and Magnus

We had the best lamb kebabs ever - with couscous, lettuce, tzatziki and chilli sauce.  Great food after a few beers.  The others headed home but Serg and I kicked on to another bar for a few more beers.  Made it back to his place around midnight.

My brand new IKEA sofa bed is calling me so it’s time for bed.  We’re going to try and go ice skating on a frozen lake tomorrow.  The weather will be cold but sunny – perfect.  Hopefully I’ll have some good photos by the time I leave.

Day 41

With Jodie working in the city and not able to Skype in the morning I’ve been able to sleep in a bit longer.  I’m now getting up around ten past seven and still making it to work by eight.  Unfortunately I’ve fallen back into my old routine of not eating breakfast before I leave, but the lunches at work are pretty hearty so it’s not so bad.

A few of us drove into Landskrona for lunch today.  We ate at this crappy little chinese restaurant called the Asia Palace.  It was one of those places that look dodgy from the outside and you wonder who would ever go in to try it out.  Inside was just as bland as the outside – bare, white walls; 70’s era air conditioner; a plant that looked like it was about to die; and silent – no other customers or even any background music. 

The good news is that the food was great.  It was a serve yourself, all-you-can-eat buffet and for 65 SEK (less than 10 bucks) there were 5 different types of sushi, prawn crackers, steamed rice, deep-fried prawns and chicken, noodles, chicken with vegetables and seafood with vegetables.  The price even included a drink, which for us was a light beer.  The guys reckon they discovered this place a while ago when the restaurant they’d been heading for was closed.  They’ve been coming back ever since.

Got home after work and watched some of the European Winter X-Games live from Tignes, France.  Yep, the very place I’m heading to next weekend!  Tonight they had the women’s snowboard superpipe finals.  Our very own Tora Bright, fresh from her gold medal at the Winter Olympics, took home the silver.  This picture of the superpipe came from one of the live webcams on the Tignes website. 

It’s pronounced ‘Teen’ or ‘Teen-ye’, not ‘Tig-nez’

Just threw some clothes in my backpack, ready for my trip to Stockholm tomorrow.  Spoke with Serg and was delighted to hear he’s bought a sofa bed and even some new pillows and a blanket.  Looks like I won’t be sleeping on the floor after all.  Awesome.

Day 40

Last night ended badly.  Not ‘death-in-the-family’ bad, or even ‘sliced-my-finger-with-a-knife-while-chopping-potatoes’ bad.  But bad enough.

As I mentioned in a previous post, I’ve found a website where I can watch the latest episodes of all my favourite shows.  You might wonder why I would even need to do this, since I brought hundreds of hours of TV with me on my PVR.  The truth is I left halfway through the current season of shows like 30 Rock, Cougar Town and my absolute favourite – The Big Bang Theory and I’ve missed them.

Knowing I can continue to watch these shows has been great.  I haven’t watched them all that much, maybe one or two episodes a week at random times.  Well last night I watched an episode of Cougar Town, then Community and the latest two episodes of The Big Bang Theory.  It was halfway through the final Big Bang episode that it happened:

"You have watched 72 minutes of video today. Please wait 54 minutes or click here to enjoy unlimited use of…"

Like I said, not the end of the world but annoying since it was 10.30pm and I was going to go to sleep after finishing this episode.  The ‘please click here’ was basically asking you to register for a paid account to continue watching!  Pay?  Not likely.  Had to go to sleep never knowing what the lads ended up doing with the Lord of the Rings ring they’d found…

Only Jens and I in the SSC office today – Niklas was travelling and Jan was working from home.  Actually had a pretty full day of work – a few phone conferences and more work with Guido and Kjell on the Netherlands AD management setup for Volvo IT.  Should be all finished by the end of the week. 

Lunch was a big meatball with some kind of cheese bits inside and, of course, potatoes, gravy and lingonberry jam.  As far as canteen meatball dishes go this one was pretty good.  Had my left over goulash for dinner and yes, I finally got to see the end of Big Bang Theory.  Hooray!

Day 39

Had a good day at work today – spent most of it teaching myself how to set up a SharePoint site.  Without going into too much detail, SharePoint is a Microsoft product that lets you set up a web-based workspace where teams can (among other things) share documents.  Anyway, I’ve been modifying an existing site for use by the new EMEA AD/Exchange team. 

SharePoint is designed to be a ‘user managed’ website – no need for IT geeks to do fancy programming to get things working.  It’s all click here, drag there.  What I spent the most time trying to get right was access permissions.  With a bit of trial and error (during which time I managed to somehow remove my access, essentially locking me out of the site) I eventually figured it out and got everything working the way I wanted.

Lunch today was a bit of a strange one.  I wasn’t exactly sure what I’d ordered (less so than usual) but I thought it was something with pork and potatoes.  In a way I suppose it was, except that the ‘pork’ was actually crispy fried bacon and the ‘potatoes’ were inside these savoury pancakes that were folded in half.  This combination was served with a side of lingonberry jam – which is sweet like strawberry jam.  When eaten all together the combination actually wasn’t that bad.  Separately, the pancakes were average and the bacon tasted, well, like bacon.

The supermarket had mostly finished the renovations so I managed to get the diced beef I’d been looking for yesterday.  Cheffed up an awesome Goulash.  Cooked it for about nearly an hour and a half so the meat was super tender.  Cooked enough for dinner tonight and tomorrow…

Jodie’s started training at her new job so timing our daily Skype has become a bit harder, since she now gets home after I’m already started work.  Tonight we tried while she was getting ready in the morning.  It was okay, but it’s hard to have a conversation when you’re doing your hair, taking the dog out, packing your bag etc.

Started watching a new TV show today – Community – about students at a community college in Denver, Colorado.  The biggest name on the show is Chevy Chase, although he’s not the main character.  IMDB gives it 8.6 and, based on the pilot, that sounds about right.

Day 38

There was a swan in the middle of the big roundabout at Landskrona station this morning.  It was a strange place for a swan to be.  There were no other swans around but there were lots of cars – it’s a busy intersection.  I think he was lost.

Crazy swan...

Work was a pretty normal Monday – meetings in the morning; Swedish meatballs with gravy, lingonberry jam and boiled potatoes for lunch; work in the afternoon then home.  The sun was still out today, but the sky wasn’t as blue.  The mornings are still a bit chilly, the grass is silver with frost on my walk to work and the air has a bite to it.

I stopped in at the supermarket after work with plans to make Goulash.  I’d written out my list an everything.  It wasn’t even a long list – some potatoes, a carrot and diced beef.  I picked up the veggies and when I got to the meat section I found cheese instead.

I discovered they were in the middle of remodelling parts of the store.  The meats had been moved and when I tracked them down I found no beef.  I think they were still in the process of moving things because there were lots of empty shelves.  Suffice to say this killed my idea for dinner.

I went back to my nightmare of wandering the aisles, trying to come up with dinner ideas and find ingredients.  After about half an hour I settled on some pre-packed potato salad and tomato sauce, which I had with some polpette I’d frozen and, of course, bisi in teccia.

Uploaded some photos from the previous week, then watched the final three episodes of Dexter – Season 1.  It was good.

Day 37

It’s official - I’m now more than half way through my Swedish adventure!  It’s scary to think that I only have four weekends left before I come home…

Spent most of Sunday morning on Skype catching up with the Nonni; Dan, Amy and Leia; and my wonderful wife Jodie.  It was the first time since leaving that I’d seen my little niece and she was looking gorgeous.  It’s only been a bit more than a month but she’s already bigger than I remember and looking more aware of her surroundings – I swear she looked right at me and smiled (or maybe that was gas?).

Needed to get some food for lunch so decided to walk into town and see what I could find.  Ended up at City Gross so picked up some essentials – more cordial, some corn chips and Pringles for snacking and, most importantly, some sugar to have with the pancakes I’m going to cook tonight for dessert.  I’m excited about the Pringles – Sea Salt and Black Pepper flavour!

Thomas and his son, David, picked me up around 2.30pm and we headed into Malmö.  The Malmö Stadium is a relatively new building with a capacity of 30,000.  We were sitting in row seventeen, almost level with one of the goals so we had a good view of the game.  I’m sad to say the home team – the Malmö Redhawks – lost 2-1 in a close game.

Malmö Redhawks vs AIK

The final score came with 20 seconds left on the clock.  The Redhawks had called a timeout and came back on the ice minus their goalie, choosing instead to field six regular players.  Unfortunately this backfired big-time – they lost control of the puck and the other team made an easy score against an empty goal.

Thomas, David and I all had a good time – even though we didn’t understand what was going on some of the time.  I understood the rules better than they did, but couldn’t understand the Swedish announcements telling people what was happening.  Still, I managed to explain what ‘icing’, ‘hooking’, ‘offside’, and ‘power plays’ were so they weren’t completely lost. 

Home about 7pm.  Tomato soup and toasted cheese sandwiches for dinner – followed by crepe-style pancakes with butter and sugar.  Mmmmmmm…

Day 36

Slept in until 10am this morning then talked to mum and dad on Skype for almost an hour.  They told me about the ‘freak’ storm that had hit Melbourne today so I spent the next hour looking at youtube videos people had taken of the rain, hail and subsequent flooding.  Pretty amazing, wish I’d been there to see it.

Before I knew it, it was midday and I was still in bed.  Got up, had a shower then had some breakfast cereal and a couple of left over polpette.  The sun was shining outside but I couldn’t think of any reason to leave the apartment so I watched some Dexter instead.

Claire randomly popped up on Skype at like 12.30am Melbourne time so we had a good catch up.  It was great to speak with her and find out how things have been going back home.  I promised she’d get a mention on the blog today, so Claire – you’re welcome…

Went round to Johan’s for dinner tonight.  He lives about a 10 minute walk from my apartment in Landskrona.  He’d cooked up a fantastic spaghetti bolognese which we washed down with quite a few Carlsbergs.  After a while we ran out of beer.  In Sweden you can only buy alcohol from the System Bolaget – a government run bottle shop.  The stores are open until 8pm Monday to Friday, until 2pm on Saturday and closed on Sunday.  Basically this means you have to be prepared for the weekend – no last minute “Hey lets get some beers and have a BBQ”.

To get around this, Johan has a ‘smuggler’.  Not only does he get the beer cheaper, but the guy delivers!  Apparently these smugglers get the beer in Germany (for about 60 krona) and he buys a slab for 150 krona.  If he was able to buy from the System Bolaget it would cost upwards of 200 krona for the same amount.  Yeah, it’s criminal to buy alcohol on the black market, but you could argue not having a bottle shop open on a Saturday night is kind of criminal too!

Spent the evening with Johan and one of his friends, watched some of the Melodifestivalen (competition to decide the Swedish entry into the Eurovision song contest) and ended up watching heaps of Bill Bailey and Stephen Lynch clips on youtube.  Funny shit, had us all in stitches.

They walked me back to my apartment around 12.30am and then headed on to Tages.  I decided to give it a miss – two nights in a row is a bit much for an old fart like me.

Day 35

Finally – some snowboard action!

Woke up feeling very ordinary this morning.  It may have had something to do with all that red wine we drank last night.  Forced myself out of bed and made it into the office by about 7.30am.  For the fourth day in a row the sky was blue and the sun was shining.  Of course it was still minus 6 degrees on my way to work, but what can you do?

Made it through the morning and was ready to leave at 11.30am.  Just as I was about to walk out the door my desk phone rang.  Spent a few minutes on the phone with a guy who wanted to speak with Magnus Roos about Microsoft Exchange licenses because Niklas wasn’t returning his emails.  Of course, Magnus hasn’t worked for ASSA ABLOY for about six months but eventually we agreed that he would call Niklas directly. 

My train to Helsingborg was leaving at 11.38am so I practically sprinted 1km to the train station with my heavy-ass backpack, stuffed full of snow gear and – of course – my laptop.  Made the train with about 30 seconds to spare.  Spent the whole 15 minute ride trying to catch my breath and realising how hopelessly unfit I am. 

Jens and Elsa met me at the train station and 40 minutes later we were at Vallåsen.  The car park was much less crowded than last time and we only had to wait three numbers to get our rental gear then it was off to the slopes.

The weather couldn’t have been better.  Along with the sun and blue skies we had not a scrap of wind – perfect snow weather.  We made it to the top of the lift, took off for my first northern hemisphere run and fell right on my butt after about 10 meters - talk about an ignominious start! 

The snow was pretty average – a thin covering of powdery snow on top of ice.  My boots were incredibly loose and my board was, well, a rental so let’s just say it wasn’t the most relaxing, cruisey day I’ve had.  However, anyone that loves skiing or snowboarding knows that it’s kind of like like pizza – even when it’s bad it’s still pretty good.

The three muskateers!

Apres ski at Jens’ place again.  Märta had cooked a wonderful tomato and vegetable soup which we had with little balls of mozzarella.  Hung around to watch ‘Amigo!’ with the kids (a Friday night ritual at their place) then caught the train back to Landskrona.

Buggered as I was when I got home I stuck to my original plan and met Johan at Tages nightclub around 9.30pm for a ‘Reggae’ night.  He’d been filling me in during the week and apparently Reggae music became hugely popular in Sweden a while ago and still has quite a strong following.  The Swedish version of reggae is a bit more up-tempo and has more of a rapping style to the vocals. 

We saw a local Ska band from Landskrona and a Danish reggae band (all white, but the singer sounded full-on Jamaican mon).  The highlight of the night was the third act – ‘General Knas’ from one of the most famous Swedish reggae bands, Svenska Akademin, performed a set with the Danish band.  It was amazing to see all these young Swedish people singing and dancing along to reggae music.

Svenska Akadamien - Swedish Reggae

Had another great night, shook my booty on the dance floor and collapsed into bed around 2am.  Phew, what a day!

Day 34

Another early start this morning – got to work around 7.10am.  We had Riek Lassig from Germany visiting Landskrona today.  He’s the IT Infrastructure Manager for Central Europe.  I walked down to the station to pick him up when he arrived – the Australian picking up the German on his way to visit the Swedes.

Had a fairly long meeting with him, myself, Jens and Niklas to discuss upcoming and current projects.  He’s been appointed the team leader of the AD/Exchange migration team for EMEA and is involved with the Belgium and Netherlands data centre migrations at the moment.

Had the most wonderful dinner at Heidi’s apartment tonight.  She’d invited me, and the couple that stay in the apartment next to me – Tina (a Landskrona local) and her boyfriend Martin (from Argentina).  They’re both in their early thirties and have spent the last five or six years working on cruise ships either travelling to the Caribbean and back, or within the Mediterranean. 

Me, Tina, Martin and Heidi

They’re a lovely couple, and Heidi was the most gracious host.  She had prepared the most amazing dinner for us – a salad with rocket lettuce, Spanish ham, cherry tomatoes, mushrooms and avocado; salmon with roast vegetables; and fresh raspberries, blueberries, chocolate ice cream and cream for dessert.  Delicious!

We had wine from Verona, Italy and Scotch Whiskey.  The conversation was interesting and the soundtrack varied from Mozart to Jazz to Blues.  All in all a great night.  It was great to finally meet the people who I’d heard coming and going from their apartment for all these weeks. 

Heidi’s apartment is awesome, took some photos so I hope they turn out.  Another early start tomorrow – half day of meetings then off to Vallåsen again with Jens tomorrow for another go at snowboarding.  Fingers crossed we have more luck this time.

Day 33

Got to work about 7.15 this morning – not the first there, but nearly.  Jens said he’d heard on the news today that the winter just finished was officially the coldest in Sweden since 1987.  I feel kind of lucky to have been here to see some of it.  In true spring fashion the sun was out and the sky was blue all day today.

Five of us walked down to the local pizza joint for lunch.  Although the weather was beautiful it was still freezing outside.  The ‘restaurant’ was cute (even if it looked a little dated) – it had booths with fully upholstered seats and an all-you-can-eat pizza bar (complete with little Swedish flags on top).  As well as pizza you could also get hamburgers, kebabs, chivapcici and fried chicken.  I went for the pizza bar.  The pizzas were deep-pan, like Pizza Hut and tasted pretty good.

Before I left work I wrote out a list for the supermarket.  I decided to cook polpette with bisi in teccia and mashed potatoes.  On the list was mince, breadcrumbs, Italian herbs, cummin, frozen peas, potatoes and garlic – easy right?  Kind of. 

Kind of over-did it with the potatoes...

The mince, herbs, potatoes and frozen peas weren’t too hard to find.  The garlic was okay once I thought about where it should be, but the breadcrumbs?  Forgetaboudit!  Spent about 15 minutes scanning every aisle for something that looked like breadcrumbs with no luck.  Spent another 10 minutes walking around trying to find someone that worked there to ask.  Eventually found someone and, once she figured out what I was asking for, was able to track it down – right there with the rice crackers and biscuits… sure, why not?

The preparation was okay – no potato masher so had to use a fork, which was actually way easier than I thought it would be.  Had to look up a conversion of cups to dls (whatever that is) for the breadcrumbs.  1 cup = 2.3 dls in case you were wondering.  Peas were done in the microwave with garlic, salt, pepper and water.  Hardest bit about the polpette was finding a dish suitable to use as a mixing bowl.  Decided on a kind of shallowish rectangular serving dish.  It worked, barely.

All in all the meal turned out well and tasted delicious.  I don’t think I’ve gone this long without mashed potatoes before!

Day 32

The sun was shining all day today.  It was still on or around zero degrees outside, but sitting in the office looking out at the blue skies and green grass felt good.  Apparently we’re expecting some cold weather come this weekend, but for the moment it’s nice.

Jens and I are going to try and give Vallåsen another go this Friday, so it’s early starts for me for the next few days (to make up for leaving early on Friday).  There’s no more school holidays and the sun should still be around, so hopefully I actually get some downhill action this time.

Had a good lunch today – pork medallions with pepper gravy and, of course, boiled potatoes.  I’ve never really eaten much pork at home but I quite like it.  It’s certainly much more common here in Sweden than it seems to be back home.  At the supermarket there’s always a big section of pork, as big if not bigger than the beef section.  Lamb, on the other hand, is hard to find and very expensive.

The sun was still shining while I was making my way home so I got off the bus a few stops before mine and walked home.  Finally tracked down that windmill I can see from the bus each day – right in the middle of a bunch of houses.  Stopped past the old cemetery as well and got some shots just as the sun was disappearing behind the houses.

 

Gotcha!

  

This 7 foot tall angel statue is carved out of wood...

Spaghetti for dinner tonight, no sauce – just butter and parmeasan cheese like we used to have as kids.  Made plans to go to an ice hockey game on Sunday in Malmö.  It’s the last game of the season:  Malmö Redhawks vs AIK (from Stockholm).  It’s not the top league, it’s the division below (kind of like the VFL), but should be fun all the same.  Going with one of the guys from work and his son – they’ve never been to a hockey game either.

Just finished watching ‘The Tournament’ (5.5/10) and about to hit the sack early.

Day 31

Good day today - my back’s better, my cold’s better and I made it through my first month without turning into an ice block.  Although I’ve missed everyone at home (my lovely wife especially), being away by myself hasn’t been as tough as I thought it would be. 

Cooking for one has been okay although finding ingredients has sometimes been a challenge, as has the lack of an oven.  Dishes I’m used to doing, and it’s much easier to wash one person’s dishes than two’s.  Clothes washing has been done by my landlady, so that’s been a piece of cake.  It’s weird to think that I’m thirty years old and this will be the longest that I’ve ever lived by myself…

Only one thing worth talking about happened at work today.  At exactly three in the afternoon a siren started sounding over and over again – kind of like a ship’s horn.  This lasted for almost 5 minutes.  When I asked Jens about it he explained that it was just a test of the ‘emergency alarm’.  I pressed him for more information and what he told me was amazing!

Apparently there are about 5000 of these sirens all over Sweden and they are all tested at exactly the same time – on the first Monday of March, June, September and December at three o’clock on the dot.  It’s supposed to be used to inform the public of some kind of life-threatening danger such as a big fire, or explosion (or war I guess).  If people hear it and it’s not at 3pm on one of those days they’re supposed to get inside, lock the doors, shut-down the ventilation system and turn on the radio or TV.  Crazy stuff right?

He said it’s happened once that he can remember, when they had some kind of chemical spill/accident somewhere near Helsingborg.  In the office today no one even seemed to notice it, so if you’re thinking about invading Sweden – do it during one of these tests.

Had what I thought was going to be beef stroganhoff at work today.  I got the stroganhoff part right, just not the beef.  I had to ask someone what the meat was – it was strips, roughly 5cm by 1cm, of sausage.  The pieces were kind of floppy but if you ate it quickly enough it was bareable, just.

Tonight I tried my first ‘microwave meal’ - a mexican pizza.  A bit of a cop out, especially after talking about cooking and cleaning for myself, but I really couldn’t come up with anything while I was at the supermarket after work.  Turned out surprisingly tasty.