Badrum
Yup. Bathroom. Now you may be thinking ,"What in the world is she thinking?! Why is she writing about bathrooms?!" Well, it is because I think it is interesting to learn how different societies approach the same challenges. And so I offer to you some insights on Swedish bathrooms. I should say, that some of the following is not unique to Sweden, and can be seen in other areas in Europe, but is different than what one usually sees in the United States.

What I find humorous about this, is that this deadbolt, which flips to red when locked, is not in a public bathroom, but is inside our lovely apartment. 

I really appreciate that in Europe the toilet tanks have a water conservation option.
The only place I have seen this in the U.S. is at the Eastern campus of TriC.

Hand held showers are popular here.  Truthfully, I could take them or leave them.  They don't seem all that convenient, and they give kind of a messy appearance.

The radiators are exposed throughout all the homes.  And all the piping is also exposed.  I can only guess that it is for ease when repairs are needed. What we find very interesting is that hot water is central in Sweden.  That is, no one has a hot water heater in his or her home.  The water, and the heat that is generated by it, is covered by the tax dollar.  There is no other bill for it.

What you see pictured is the bathtub drain.  Yup. 

Lastly, hooks, rather than bars, are used to hang towels.  What I love is that the towel's tags  are strategically placed so that they can be used to hang them.

On a final note.... we can't find deodorant soap....could be a problem.

InterNations

Tonight, John and I went to a meeting of InterNations.   InterNations is simply a meeting place for ex-pats.   The people we spoke to were from the U.S., Brazil, Argentina, Spain, Great Britain....   Last month there were 31 nations represented.  There was no formal agenda, just a time to get to know people.   Another nice evening...

Thought I would share this picture I took on a walk.  

There are many rapeseed, or "raps" fields in the region.   Raps is used to obtain/create raps or canola oil.  I only just found out that Canola oil was developed by a Canadian, and so canola oil got its name from CANadian Oil, Low Acid.   Love it.

Växjö
Sorry for the station break.   My Blog tabs were reading in Swedish, and it was slowing me down.
On Friday, we took a train trip to Växjö.  It is around 240 km (roughly 140 miles) away.  Växjö is not a big town, but it has a few museums and... hey, what else did we have to do?   And we enjoyed the train trip. 

There were a lot of forests in the region of Växjö.  This allowed glass blowers to set up shop there, and so the region became a magnet for glass artisans.  There is now a glass museum there, which carries both hand crafted glass and molded glass. 
Let me share a few pictures:

The second museum we visited was House of Emigrants.  It covers immigration from 1846 to1930, when 1.3 million (or 20%) of the Swedish population emigrated, mainly to the US.   The exhibit spoke of various regions/cities which had a praticulary high Swedish immigration - including the little town of Jamestown NY.  J got a particular charge out os seeing Jametown, which is a small town near where his Mom grew up, alongside Chicago and Minneapolis. 

Lastly, we went to the area in the museum which illustrated Swedish culture and history. 

Love the top shot of the boot.

The second is part of the nativity story illustrated.

The third... I took for Jacque and Jan....

Till next time! xo

Today is Ascension Day, and in Sweden it is a national holiday. J, like most Swede's has the day off. Businesses, if open at all, have Sunday, or holiday hours of operation. - (But of course, that didn't occur to us till we were part way through the morning.)

Our first course of action was to buy some fresh fresh fish. So - after sleeping in a little: off we went. We walked through a lovely city ("Stad") park. It runs along the canal and there was a windmill!  There was also a circus setting up, which was fun.

The fish market, though fun to see, was closed.  But we will be back.  I doubt you can get fish that is much fresher than what is available here.

While there, we started conversing with the man who was basically, a garbage man who sweeps items out of the canal.  It amused me to see that he had a bicycle in the canal.  But then he told me that they get around 60-70 per week.  People get drunk and think it is great sport to steal a bicycle and throw it into the water.  The one that you see pictured was, if I understood him correctly, only in the water ~ one week.

From there we walked to a nice little coffee (koffe) house where they roast their own beans. We enjoyed a nice buffet of juice, coffee, ham ( I love the ham in Europe - it is drier and more flavorful. Somewhat like prosciutto), ~liverwurst , cortison pickles and raw vegetables, sausage, cheese, yogurt, muesli, hard boiled eggs (the yolks were almost orange), jams, breads and pain au chocolate (croissants with chocolate inside). It was a lot to eat, but we did what we could.

By then, the rain had almost passed, and so off we went. Our plan was to go to the train station because we had heard that a Starbucks had recently opened. -- Not that we were looking for a beverage, but, up until that point we had not seen any decafe coffee and we wanted some (as it turned out, it is indeed in the grocery store. We needed to look for the term: "koffeinfritt").

Starbucks - though it has the same smell (!) and in many ways is similiar, is, of course, different here. Which is as it should be.

Then off to the grocery store…and home (so J. can nap.  After all, it is his day off...)

Let me try this again...
IKEA
 

Yes, we had fun making our pilgrimage to this Swedish marvel. American’s love Ikea. I have several friends who have traveled three hours to browse and shop in a neighboring city. That love of all things IKEA is even truer in Sweden. And for good reason. Swedish homes are smaller than homes in the U.S. and the IKEA designers are masters at efficient use of space. IKEA is also fashionable, reasonably priced, and practical. Granted, the quality of the furniture is not great, but it definitely fills a niche. Here, it seems like IKEA is part of the household. No less than half of our small furnished apartment was out fitted there. And now that we have gone, the apartment holds a few more items with the IKEA stamp on the bottom!

The Malmö store is much like that in the States, in that is huge and labyrinthine. Too overwhelming to browse, you really need to approach the store with an idea of what you want or need. We had a small list which we easily filled. The only item that we bought which might look odd to American’s is the kitchen dish rack.

For those of you who have not visited the store, they have a café which serves real food. So – for our first dinner out in our newly adopted country – John ordered fish, kaffe (coffee) which is strong and on-tap (which is as it should be!!) and a great pastry. I had a Swedish meatball sandwich, which has some sort of sweet pink beet dressing and a strawberry/ apple juice.
Some beverage options which I would not have seen in the states are lingberry juice and, of course (?!) beer and wine. – Yup, in the department store. Yup.

IKEA !!

Yes, we had fun making our pilgrimage to this Swedish marvel.  American’s love Ikea.  I have several friends who have traveled three hours to browse and shop in a neighboring city.  That love of all things IKEA is even truer in Sweden.  And for good reason.  Swedish homes are smaller than homes in the U.S. and  the IKEA designers are masters at efficient use of space.  IKEA is also fashionable, reasonably priced, and practical.  Granted, the quality of the furniture is not great, but it definitely fills a niche.  Here, it seems like IKEA is part of the household.  No less than half of our small furnished apartment was out fitted there.  And now that we have gone, the apartment holds a few more items with the IKEA stamp on the bottom!

 The Malmö store is much like that in the States, in that is huge and labyrinthine.  Too overwhelming to browse, you really need to approach the store with an idea of what you want or need.  We had a small list which we easily filled.  The only item that we bought which might look odd to American’s is the kitchen dish rack.

For those of you who have not visited the store, they have a café which serves real food.  So – for our first dinner out in our newly adopted country – John ordered fish, kaffe (coffee) which is strong and on-tap (which is as it should be!!) and a great pastry.   I had a Swedish meatball sandwich, which has some sort of sweet pink beet dressing and a strawberry/ apple juice.
Some beverage options which I would not have seen in the states are lingberry juice and, of course (?!) beer and wine.  – Yup, in the department store.  Yup.

Swimming at Aq-Va-Kul

Well, on Wednesday, life somewhat returned to normal (?) as John went to work and I went to the pool. 
The swimming complex here in Malmo is named the Aq-Va-Kul.  It is apparently a play on words for "Oh! How fun!" It has (8) 50 meter swim lanes.  I was able to buy a discounted pass that allows me to swim M-F 9 am to 2 pm which works out well as that is when I swim anyway.   There are a few differences from the N.O, pool though.  First of all - sadly - I did not see my dear N.O. friends there. (Pause to reminisce ...). Another significant difference may be, and I am not sure, but it is possible that women may be allowed to swim topless at the pool.  I was told by someone at the relocation office that swimsuits are required in city pools,  but I just read an Internet article stating that several years ago some feminists fought against being required to wear bathing suit tops since men didn't have to. Yeah - anyway... let's hope for the best.
On the upside: the tile floor in the pool area is heated, the shower and locker facilities are very nice, and - of course - there is a sauna.  This is Sweden after all.
Actually there is also a very elaborate water park and a Turkish bath that is segregated into male and female.  But, boring though it may be,  I just go to the lap pool and swim back and forth.. and back and forth... and... well, you get it.