Åre (20.-24.1.)

In the end I decided to do the trip (thanks, Maria and Mama for not getting too tired of my Hin und Her!)! At the latest by the time I took my first ride down the hill it was clear that this was the best decision I could have made and the spread of adrenaline/serotonin literally swept the illness away from my body (well, maybe the antibiotics did their part too...). We used to start our skiing day by taking a ride down the slope next to our stuga, taking advantage of the freshly groomed slopes and some days even the untouched fresh-fallen snow. Wow! After some rides we would take a bus to the main skiing area in Åre where there were plenty of different slopes and, as it was the student week, various free events and activities like a career fair including "speed dating" on the lift (unfortunately Christian didn't find what he had expected there ;-), a mobile throwing competition (did Telia really intend to strengthen their brand recognition by that?!) and free korv every day.

After the sun had gone down (remember, that was at about 4) some of us did some After ski while I prefered to take a sauna before we all cooked together. Every other day we even did some night skiing and one evening Maria, Katharina, Annika and I went sledging - such fun (see Annika's video)! We also tried one of the students parties one night which I found quite disappointing (and I don't think it was only because I had to stay sober) - apparently "students week" did not only include university students and most of my readers will know how Swedish people act when they had a drop too much... All in all, the eight of us spent some great days on the slopes and in our cosy appartment in Tegelfjäll. It was a pitty that we already had to leave on thursday evening, especially as it had been snowing the whole day and the next morning would have greeted us with lots of fresh snow. If you want to get a more lively impression of our trip, don't miss watching the excellent film Annika made! You can also read about our trip in German on Annika's blog or in French (and English :-) on Mathias' blog.

Better not get sjuk!

This holds true in two ways.
Firstly, to avoid visiting a Swedish vårdcentral. I don't want to hear one single German person complain about the German health care system anymore - otherwise I'll send them to a Swedish medical centre! If it had only been the waiting time, I wouldn't have complained, that is usual in every country I guess. Maybe I was even lucky with the three hours I spent in waiting rooms to be able to get a climpse at a real Swedish doctor for 10 minutes! A friend of mine had spent the same night waiting for 5 hours at the Närakuten (emergency ward) because of a stomach ache and for an operation Swedish people sometimes have to wait for years! Vårdcentralen even has a very informative homepage where you can look up the waiting times for different operations at different hospitals! No, it's also the complicated system with having to call for a telephone appointment (telfontid) first, being called back an hour later to get an appointment at the medical centre (läkartid), when at the medical centre having to go to the Kassa first to pay 140kr just to be treated, then going to the reception, to the Kassa again, to the laboratory and back to the reception before they finally decide that you really have to see a doctor, because the nurses (at the reception and in the laboratory) weren't able to define your disease yet. Not to mention the procedure at Apoteket! When entering I was smiling about the little benches they had built in front of each counter - when it was my turn I was more than happy they were there!
But finally I got the antibiotics I had wanted because of the second reason why better not to get sick - the skiing trip to Åre which I was supposed to go to 3 days after getting fever and a sore throat! I was really afraid of not being able to join the trip, especially because the doctor couldn't really say what my disease was and so I terrorized my mum and my friend Maria with my horror scenarios of diseases I could have and protract if I went skiing. The night before we finally went I still didn't feel a lot healthier, but on the other hand I was longing too much for the snow! If I would die anyway ;-) it should at least be on the slope! :-)

In any case, I could have done without that little intermezzo...

Visitors!

Long time no see. This does not only hold true for this blog, but also for the people who came to visit me here in Stockholm at the dawn of 2008: first my friend Axel came to celebrate New Year's Eve with us and straight after he had left I welcomed my cousin Max and his friend Peter. It was really nice to see all of them again (well, Peter I hadn't met before, but it was nice to see him anyway :-) and show them Sweden's capital as I got to know it over the last months including not only sights, parks and museums but of course also bars, clubs, cafes and my university.
Some impressions:

New Year's Eve in Lappis

Welcoming the New Year with view over the town

Axel exploring Stockholm

Max and Peter in Stockholm

A veeeeeeery funny night in Debaser

Someone afraid of hights?!

a walk through winterly white (and cold) Djurgården

...och Gott Nytt År!