Week twelve in Sweden has involved some more cultural experiences for me as I have ventured in and around Trollhättan. This week I have been to eat in a restaurant in the town centre as well as taking a long awaited visit to the big shopping mall.
Megan, Maria and I as well as Pierce an American exchange student visited the best Chinese restaurant in Trollhättan this week. It is definitely the best treat I have had all week as it is a rare occasion I get to eat anywhere but our own apartment. It was lovely to be able to sit down in a restaurant and enjoy the company of others whilst we waited on our food. The prices at the restaurant were very reasonable and the food was delicious which made it even better.
I also got to hear Pierce speak some Swedish to our waitress which seemed really strange but he was surprisingly good at it and even had the accent which has made me a little jealous that I can still only say a few words with a ridiculous accent! Once Pierce had explained that we didn’t speak any Swedish the waitress just said ‘oh that is ok’ and spoke to us in perfect English from there on. This still amazes me even though I spend the majority of my time with a lot of other students who can switch their language very quickly and seemingly without much difficulty.
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| My lovely food at the Chinese restaurant. |
My visit to the shopping mall known as Överby has A LOT of shops and it has made me realise I miss my freedom of being able to go shopping in Belfast anytime I want as I just drive rather than waiting on a bus. The mall was great and had plenty of shops with lovely clothes and I even managed to buy myself a few things in my favourite shop in Sweden – ‘ginatricot’ which is actually one of Scandinavia’s most popular fashion retailers for women.
Whilst at Överby I happened to come across a fashion show that was happening in the centre of the mall, it was interesting to see and similar to any fashion show that would happen in Northern Ireland although it was spiced up a little with some of the models singing. One of the songs was the Swedish song for Eurovision 2012 ‘Euphoria’ by Loreen, the song is really catchy and probably overplayed in our apartment as Maria is playing it at top volume any chance she gets. Here is a link of the Swedish Eurovision song so that you can judge for yourself whether you think it will be in with a chance of winning or if Maria is obsessed! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xK8VKc24RaM
Easter is just around the corner and even though University West don’t celebrate it by giving the students holidays (unlike the usual three weeks at Stranmillis) there are still plenty of decorations around the building which adds to the atmosphere. Our lecturer Ulla also gave us a brief description of what Easter is like in Sweden. She informed us that it is a long tradition for children to dress up as witches and go around houses in search of sweets, much like Halloween for us. For more information on how the Swedes celebrate Easter there is some background knowledge on their traditions and customs from a Swedish newspaper known as ‘The Local’ - http://www.thelocal.se/3525/20110421/
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| Some of the brightly coloured Easter eggs at University West. |
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