Things I Like About Sweden, Part 4: Hearts and more hearts

Swedes seem to enjoy making things in the shape of hearts...I'm not sure where this comes from, but luckily they don't overdo it too much or else it'd be tacky. My favorite standard heart-shaped Swedish items are:

Outhouse Doors

and Waffles

Incidentally, last Friday was International Waffle Day, which started out as a religious holiday celebrating the Annunciation to the Virgin Mary ("our lady" = "vår fru"), then got deliciously and blasphemously twisted into "våffla."  Mmmm, thanks Swedes...I'll take a hot heart-shaped waffle with jam over a hard church bench any day.

Things I Like About Sweden, Part 3: Everything is Nicer

Last night we were having dinner with an Australian friend and we were talking about similarities between the US and Australia in comparison to Sweden.  We both agreed that everything in Sweden seems so nice and clean and organized and tasteful.  You almost never see plastic tableware, trashy lawn ornaments, or old cars sitting in someone's yard....it's almost safe to say that the word "tacky" doesn't exist here.  The majority of Swedish meals involve sitting down with real plates and silverware, candles, and real flowers on the table.  People use knives and forks to eat McDonald's burgers.  Household appliances are compact, sleek, and well-designed.  TV commercials feature beautiful cinematography, soothing narration, and intelligent ideas...no screaming salesmen or flashing lights begging for your attention.   

Now, as a backwoods, home-schooled, grew-up-in-a-trailer Michigander, I suppose my standards of "nicer" might be a little skewed.   I've spent a good portion of my life living out of mobile homes, crappy apartments, tents, fieldwork cabins, the back of my truck, and a dusty concrete box that passed as a Guatemalan house, so it doesn't take a whole lot for me to think, "Ooooh, fancy." My friend summed it up perfectly when she said, "In Sweden, every time you walk into someone's house it feels like you're visiting the one 'rich' friend you had when you were a little kid."  It really does make me feel like kind of a dirtbag sometimes, but I'm starting to get used to all this fancy stuff.  Bring on the fresh flowers and candles, Jeeves.

Things I Like About Sweden, Part 2: Everybody Sing!

Since I started visiting Sweden last year and have spent one full and wonderful summer here as a resident, I've been finding more and more overwhelming evidence that Sweden Is Adorable.  One cultural phenomenon that initially felt a little too over-the-top and cheesy when I first witnessed it was the sing-along.  Swedes love to sing, they tend to sing quite well, and they especially like to sing all together in very large groups. 

One of my goals for next summer is to attend the famous Allsång på Skansen, a huge sing-along that started 75 years ago at Stockholm's outdoor park/zoo/cultural museum.  Ten to fifteen THOUSAND people attend this weekly event in the summertime, showing up to wait in line ridiculously early in the morning in order to get a good seat and hopefully get their smiling, singing faces broadcast live to the whole country:
   


Look at these people, standing out in the rain and loving it!  There are a few different live sing-along programs on TV throughout the summer, and they always include the lyrics so everyone at home can watch and sing along.

Not only is the sing-along phenomenon popular in the summertime, but at any social occasion with an excuse to belt out a birthday, wedding, holiday, or drinking song.  When I attended a birthday party earlier this spring I was surprised to find pages of numbered song lyrics at every plate, and all the guests linked arms, swayed back and forth, and cheerfully bellowed out the songs between bites of the meal.  I felt pretty silly at first and I was giggling like crazy, but it was quite honestly a blast.  Later on there was a live band with song quizzes and competitions which was also a lot of fun.

Now I just have to learn all these songs in Swedish....

Things I Like About Sweden, Part 1: Public Restrooms

I've started a list of pros, cons, and "meh"s about living in Sweden.  The list is getting pretty long, so I'll tackle it one step at a time.

A big thumbs up in Sweden: public restroom design (I'm talking about the normal ones in restaurants and airports and such, not the stinky little buildings that you have to pay 5 kronor for on the sidewalk in Stockholm).  Instead of rows of open stalls with partitions on the sides, each toilet has it's own private room, a door with full coverage, and a lock that turns red on the outside so the people waiting know that the toilet is occupied.  A lot of the time you even get your own private sink. 

Why haven't we figured this out yet in America?  It seems so silly to have to peek underneath all the bathroom stalls in order to figure out which ones are free, half the time the door doesn't lock at all, and you have to lean over and hold it shut with your hand.  Or, you end up with a big gap between the door and somebody's little kid is running around peeking in at you, all the while you just want to pee in comfortable privacy.

Another feature of Swedish restrooms that make us Americans look downright primitive are dual-flush toilets.  Almost all toilets have two different buttons that let you choose whether you want a big flush with lots of water or just a little flush...I obviously don't need to describe the specific situations as to why you need a big or little flush.  Dual-flush toilets cut back on 50-75% of water usage, and for some reason toilet-clogging doesn't seem to be a big problem here. 

So, like many other things Swedish, the restroom design here is more practical, functional, clean, and comfortably civilized than it is in the States.  Not to mention a far cry from the olden days of Peace Corps Guatemala: