SWEDEN

Mmm, Swedish breakfast. Sweet bread, butter, cheese, jam, just-baked scones, lots of tea, and Pink Stuff ™. I may switch breakfast styles when I get home.

Yesterday was pleasantly undemanding, a quiet walk around lovely Uppsala, through a graveyard and the University/Cathedral district, with lots of interesting local history stories from Anna and Andreas. And in Uppsala local history goes back to the 16th century and further.

I learned that Spring in Sweden can't start until the president of Uppsala University makes his Spring Speech from the balcony on the library.

The University has a Book Tree, where books grow. Seriously, I have pictures. Why have they not exported this technology to the world? Surely they could make cuttings. I wonder if the immature trees grow pamphlets?

Sweden's most important king, Gustaf Adolfus, is buried in Uppsala cathedral in a magnificent chapel he stole from the Virgin Mary (Reformation, you know) and furbished with wonderful propaganda. We know he was Sweden's greatest king because he made sure people would be saying so for the rest of time :)

And there was a lucky lunch in an Italian restaurant where the lunch menu turned out to be more Swedish than the Swedish restaurant that we couldn't find in the first place.

And a lovely supper of pea soup and pancakes. Swedish food seems very satisfying and easy to make. Also, there is a lot of singing and alcohol. You're not allowed to drink certain alcohols 'till you've sung about them first. Last night I learned a Punch song.

Swedish punch is not like the bowl punch we get back home. *hic*

Now I sign off, finish packing, and head for the train to Arlanda airport. Flight at 2:10pm, an hour and a half stopover in Reykjavik, then arriving in Toronto at 6:55 in the evening. Canada here I come back!