Week 17 Cultural

A recent trip to Copenhagen has shown me that while I enjoy Vaxjo and the laid back, relaxing way of life I also miss being near to a big city. We have had an exciting trip and enjoyed visiting the zoo, Tivoli Gardens and going to see The Little Mermaid. With H.C. Andersen being one of my favourite authors I have read many of his stories to the children and we have all seen the Disney adaptation of this particular story so it was really good to see her guarding the harbour.

 One of the things we learnt was that public transport is free for the under 12’s on weekends. I think this is such a good idea and would be encouraged to use buses more if they were to imitate this at home. I must say that every bus driver I have encountered in both Denmark and Sweden could not have been more helpful or pleasant and it is lovely to be greeted with a good-morning when you get on a bus at 7am feeling tired and grumpy. One of the drivers told me that it is a rule in Vaxjo that they must look to make sure no-one is running for the bus before they pull away from the stop.

We also went to the friend-family midsummer picnic on Sunday and it was interesting to see how the Swedes celebrate this holiday (officially in June but they have the party so we can experience it). We made crowns from flowers; watched traditional dancing, with some of the students invited to take part; and were given the opportunity to taste sill (herring) with sour cream and chives. Sill is a traditional Swedish food eaten at Christmas, Easter and midsummer, I surprised myself by actually liking the herring and we all enjoyed the strawberry cake that followed. The day was concluded with all the students and friend-families joining together to dance around a maypole. This turned out to be more fun than we originally thought and even the boys joined in with a little gentle persuasion. I was happy to be given the opportunity to experience this celebration even if it was a little early. It was a lovely way to finish the friend-family project and many people were emotional at the thought of it being the last time they met with their family. We will meet with our friend-family again before we leave so the emotions were kept in check for a later date.