スウェーデンについて/About Sweden.

Me holding a exceptionally good posture while pointing at the land in the north, Sweden!

(i did not use the computer, but having it there makes it look more professional )

Last week I went to a junior high school in the outskirts of Kyoto together with some other students from school to speak about our countries. I have no idea where the school was located, I just followed the guiding teacher. First on the bus to the train station, then on a train (to heck knows where) after that we got picked up by a car from the school we were going to, venturing further into the unknown!

When we finally arrived they guided us in to the school and in to the principal’s office, there we were served some tea and they welcomed us to the school.

After the greeting we proceeded to gymnasium to meet the students. I was expecting a massive number of students considering the size of the school, but I had forgot that this is a country in a “lack of youth crisis”, of course they weren’t that many. A choir sang some nice songs for us and then we gave a short introduction of our selves in return.

After the presentation we were separated into pairs of two and three, each group went together with a class of students from the school to their home classrooms. in the classrooms we held our presentation about our countries. in my group there were Mende (Picture above) from Mongolia and a newly arrived student at our school, Olga from Russia. I guess they bunched up the cold countries together huh?...

During my presentation I talked about the most important stuff. Vikings, Pippi Longstockings, meatballs, IKEA, “Midsummer”, Easter and snus.

i also gave them some “Djungel vrål” and to my surprise and joy, the majority of the kids actually liked it! it might have something to to with the fact that they had just been trough the horrible experience of eating Mongolian “candy”... The closest resemblance I can give is outdated milk in the shape of a very hard rock. Try it!

After our superb presentations we headed out for the next “activity”. The other groups got to play sports of different kinds unlike my group who got to sit down, chat and drink a kind of sweet dessert-ish soup made from red beans. Suited me just fine! When we were full of bean-soup we said our goodbye and even received a “Thank you” speech and gifts.

After the parting we returned to the principal’s office once again. There we gave some feedback on the day, drank some more tea and said our thanks to each other. We also, to my surprise, received money for the effort! As much as 4800 YEN (roughly 425 SEK) That gave me food for the day and even some new clothes, so I was happy as ever!

The colorful necktie I'm wearing is the gift I received, a binding of 100 origami cranes. Apparently given to people in times of favour-asking.

Now a short notice about something completely different. Last week I took the JLPT step 3, it went all right just as I thought it would. The test result will be given to me next year in the beginning of February and I'm sure I will pass it without problems, although I did some stupid mistakes like miscalculating numbers in the reading part of the test. Math has never been my strong side!

The main reason why I took the test was “why not?” it’s fun to put some kind of label on your knowledge, and I will go for the second level next year and even try for the most difficult level before my time here comes to an end.

While we are at it, I can give you all some updates on my improving Shamisen skills. Even though I'm busy every freaking day with studying (even more now, midterm tests coming up next week. More about that later) I try to go practice with the club at least once out of two possible occasions each week. And I can say I'm soon getting the hang of Sakura Sakura! Slowly but steady! Haha!

Bye for now!

(And oh! Thanks mom for the “Kalles Kaviar” (And other articles) ! it gave me some kick-ass breakfast for 2 days.)