So for my last cultural post I am going to talk about 20 things to know before you move to Sweden. Now now don't get too excited, I wasn't saying I am moving to Sweden, but it maybe on the mind and I think it would be interesting to see what Swedes think other people need to know before moving there. So let it begin

1: Swedes love their coffee

2: Waiting in line is a big deal

3: Speaking Swedish helps (No duh)

4: Get your shopping done before 5pm because many stores close early

5: Condiments tend to come in things that resemble toothpaste tubes

6: Its not uncommon for a man to be a stay at home dad

7: They love the outdoors

8: A lot of business shut down in July ( that's when many people take their vacation)

9: Lagom is best ( not too much not too little)

10: Melodifestivalen is a big deal (a contest in which Sweden's representative at the Eurovision song contest is decided)

11: Swedes love Ikea

12: Take off your shoes when entering a home

13: winters are dark and cold

14: be on time

15: all liquor stores are state run

16: Charge for plastic bags

17: Swedes have fun food days like waffle day or cinnamon bun day

18: It's okay to drink from the tap water

19: business casual means jeans

20:Not all education and healthcare is free, for routine doctor's visits the maximum you must pay out of pocket for an entire year is SEK 1,100 (166 dollars)

So if you ever plan to live in Sweden keep these fun facts in mind!

So it was our last week today and it felt really weird. We had a large session of almost two hours due to schedule difficulties but it actually turned out to be quite good. We spoke for a long time in Swedish about anything and everything we could think of. I think my language ability is at this frustrating point that it is more advanced than numbers and colors but not advanced enough to speak how I would in English. So I am stuck in this awkward place where I either speak Swenglish (Swedish and English) a lot or my sentences are very basic. I think that this semester we spent a lot of time focuses on grammar and such which was very helpful but I forgot to continue learning new words. I think what I might due this summer is just learn a ton of vocab and then when fall comes around hopefully everything should have improved.

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My friend Charlie from U of M who also takes Swedish agreed to have a Swedish conversation with me.

Malory and Molly Can:

-Introduce ourselves, talk about our families, our backgrounds, and our academic interests.

-Ask questions of others such as their age, occupation, family, area of study, etc.

-Talk about the time.

-Talk about food we like, clothes we wear, things we like to do.

-Answer interview-like questions about our future, our strengths, our weaknesses, etc.

-Ask interview-like questions of others.

-Talk about various countries and nationalities.

-Express our feelings at any given moment.

-Talk about why we like Swedish/why we are studying Swedish.

-Talk about Swedish culture, food, TV, etc.

-Speak Danish, norwegian, finnish, and icelandic fluently (kidding…)

Learning Categories

Speaking

    a. In class

        i. Louise speaks more Swedish

        ii. Translate stories/conversations told by Louise

        iii. Work on listening comprehension

        iv. Acquire new vocabulary

        v. Repeat back what was said, practice pronunciation

    b. Outside of class

        i. Talking to the Anderssons in Swedish during more social contexts

        ii. Thinking in Swedish, coming up with every thoughts in Swedish

        iii. Using Swedish with each other when possible

Writing

    a. Practice creating sentences for homework

    b. Combine vocabulary with grammar concepts

    c. Create sentences/dialogues with those words

Reading

    a. Books

i. Read TinTin/other books

        ii. Add words to vocabulary list

b. News articles

i. Read in Swedish

ii. Translate into English

iii. Summarize in Swedish

c. Texting

i. Texting group in Swedish about homework/planning meetings

        ii. Texting each other in Swedish, teaching each other new words/concepts

Listening

a. Videos

        i. Listen in Swedish

        ii. Write down Swedish (to best of ability)

        iii. Summarize in Swedish

b. TV shows

i. Watch Bron

        ii. Pick up on Swedish vs. Danish words/pronunciation

        iii. Understand commonly-used Swedish phrases

        iv. Get a feel for how Swedish sounds

        v. Learn more about regional accents

        vi. Work on own pronunciation independently by shadowing/mimicry

        vii. Ask Louise to clarify pronunciation

Specific Sections

a.     Occupations

b.     Prepositions

c.      Countries/nationalities

d.     Negative sentences/short answers

e.     Coming and going/to make/to become

f.   Past, present, and future tenses

g.     Fruits/vegetables

h.     Conjunctions

i.       Word order/asking questions

j.   Conducting interviews/answering interview questions

This semester we spent a lot of focus on translations of things. So we did translations of video clips and also did translation of music lyrics. The lyrics were my favorite because they were a little slower pace and a little more repetitive so I could catch on quicker.

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These are some text messages amongst Molly and I and then Molly, Louise, and I in Swedish.

So I decided to stay away from the environment on this post just to mix things up. Today I will be talking about why Swedes are okay with paying such high taxes. So according to Sweden.Se the official Sweden website 83% of Swedes say that they have confidence in the government agency. So this can be broken up into four parts:

1. A highly trusted public body. Skatteverket, the Swedish Tax Agency is very popular and very well trusted. Most people feel that the taxes are done fairly.

2. The Tax agency is also responsible for population registration. When a baby is born the agency registers the birth and send out a personal identity number. The parents then apply to register the babies name through the tax company, the tax company then has the power to reject names. Also when you decide to get marries you must apply to the tax agency for a investigation of impediments to marriage. You must also notify this agency of any address changes and deaths.

3.  It is a societal norm to pay high taxes. Taxes aren't seen as a negative things as it is in most countries. The Swedish word for tax is skatt which also means treasure. Another reason the Tax Agency has such a positive view is because of it's customer-friendliness and accessibility. Almost all tax errands can be done technologically.

4. The tax agency also takes the initiative. If something happens it knows about it and sends you the forms need to fix it , so that your tax return shows up in your mailbox already filled out. In the case of having a baby the hospital informs the authority and registers the birth so you don't have to.

So as you can see the tax agency in Sweden has a pretty positive view about it. That's not to say all Swedes love taxes but as a society their view is a lot more negative than a majority of countries.

So this week in particular was very interesting. Louise's brother Freddie had came to Richmond for a visit so we invited Freddie to one of our session for dinner. It was kind of hard speaking Swedish in the cellar because of the noise around but we had some decent conversations. Another thing I noticed about myself and I may have already spoken about this but I can't recall. Anyway, when someone starts to speak a foreign language to me I zone out at first because I am so used to hearing all of these languages and not being able to understand them. It takes me a few seconds to realize I am kind of able to understand them and I should be trying to listen to what they are saying. That happened during a few conversations during dinner. I think what also helped is the fact Freddie was really nice about my Swedish. I didn't expect him to be mean or anything but he was really encouraging when I tried to speak to him. I think im always criticizing the way I say things when I speak it is nice to hear a third party tell me I am not the worst Swedish speaker of all time. It was also really fun listening to Louise and Freddie speak back and forth.

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Here is my 111 Swedish cultural presentation

This is an artifact of me eating Swedish fish with Chokladbollar. Louise brought the Chokladbollar for us from Ikea. We talked about how it used to have a different name until the term became outdated. This then lead into the conversation of what Swedish foods we enjoyed and which ones we didn't.

Today ladies and gents, you get to learn about Eco-tourism in Sweden. Now doesn't that tickle your fancy? Basically Swedes are pretty amazing when it comes to being environmentally aware. The are the second country it the world to introduce an Eco-tourism charter. Which essentially is just tourism that is focused on the land and wildlife. They also set up Nature's best which is Europe's first Eco-certified tour operators around the country. There are about 147 tours run by 87 Eco-certified tour operators. You can do anything from dog sledding to timber-rafting, to sea kayaking with this group. Allemansrätt  is a very important part of why the Swedes love nature so much, it is written in their constitution. The word translated into English talks of every man's right to walk freely in nature. Basically as long as no one or anything is harmed anyone has the right to walk, ski, or cycle anywhere the please (minus private property). It gives a lot of freedoms to enjoy nature at its fullest but it also creates a lot of responsibility for protecting the land.

So I think I have made progress. This week Louise made Molly and I have a conversation about what things we did like and did like about Swedish food, and for the first time I didn't feel like I was going to faint. Mind you I still was not comfortable in any shape or form, but the fact I did get all red in the face this time is a major improvement for me. I think what gets frustrating but will get better with time and knowledge of the language is you will be trying to for a sentence to say and you just don't have the vocab to say everything you want to. So basically you start speaking Swenglish, filling in the words that you don't know in Swedish with English. I feel like this is just going to be something that will eventually get better with the more words we learn. There is no way to learn everything now.

So for my final project I decided to look into depth about Sweden and how swedes interact with nature. This post I will be focusing on the festival of midsummer. So the origins of Swedish midsummer came from agrarian times in which Swedes would welcome summertime and the season of fertility. People would dress up as 'green men; and decorated their houses and farm tools with foliage and would raise maypoles to dance around. The festival being their five-week holiday by heading out to their summer homes in the country.  During Midsummer eve is always between a Friday between June 19th and 25th.Midsummer night (eve) is the lightest night of the year so it was and is considered to be a magical night and the best time to tell people's future. As usual there is a typical meal that follows in suite with a midsummer menu. Such as pickled herring, boiled new potatoes with fresh dill, sour cream and chives with some meat such as spare ribs or salmon. For desert there would be the first strawberries of summer with cream. There are many little traditions that go along with midsummer such as how young women are supposed to pick seven species of flower and lay them under their pillow and at night they will dream of their future husband. Overall it seems like a very fun time and a holiday that depends on the beauty of Swedish nature.

I finally finished the Speak Confident CDS, but now I have over 300 hundred new words to learn.. I think the thing that was most unusual but kind of helpful was that I met one on one with Louise. I really wanted to work on my speaking and it takes me a little longer to process things. I think one of the things I have figured out about me is I don't at all retain things when I just saying things in passing, I have to write it down for me to remember. For example when Louise and I were speaking I couldn't remember the world "then", and she would tell me what it was and for two seconds I would remember it. But then two seconds later I had no idea again. I think I need to take more notes during the sessions when we meet up. Im not very good at understanding quick conversations or even regular speed conversation for that matter. But slow basic conversations Im getting good at. Its kinda cool.

This week I discovered the beauty of "Speaking Swedish with Confidence". I am nearly half way through the CD and it has been a huge help. I haven't had the time to go over and memorize the new words and grammar and pronunciation tips I have learned but just knowing them is a big help. The CD is kind of annoying to listen to sometimes but I think having concrete rules is something that helps me a lot. To be honest I kind of feel way too overwhelmed with the video translations, listening to the CD and then on top of that trying to memorize the rules. Im not awful at learning languages but nor am I a prodigy. I think I need to break things down into smaller sections and not try to do everything at once. Like watch on clip, listen to two conversation and memorize 10 words or something like that. Because at the rate im going at it feels like I am doing the work but not getting anything out of it. I felt a lot like that last semester with the vocab. but when I broke it down, things got easier. So I will try that. I am still trying to come up with some sort of cultural project, I have spoken about it with everyone and their mother but nothing really seems to click. I think I am going to put some more thought into and if I can't figure out something go with some previous ideas. Although one I think that could kind of be cool is comparing Swedish to the nordic languages. Like Swedish to danish. Because I know there are some words in Swedish that mean one thing but in Danish mean another. But I am not quite sure how that would translate into a cultural project, I feel like its more a language project. hmm I still have to to decide.

Over break Louise had us write a paper about a topic that we that we knew a lot about in the Swedish culture or something we had never heard of. I chose to write a topic about St. Martin's day. The history of this is when St. Martin tried to hide to avoid being ordained . In order to do so he hid in a goose pen. But the geese made ​​noises and people found him . He celebrates his name day in November. This is the month when the geese are ready to kill it also was an important medieval autumn party. The practice came to Sweden from France. This feeding of geese is most popular in the south of Sweden in a place called Skåne where many of them are farmers. A lot of people like to eat black soup with goose. There is no tradition to eating soup with goose but a lot of people think it tastes really good. St. Martin's Day is similar to American groundhog's day. In the sense of it's silly tradition.  If it was snowing on St. Martin's day there would be no snow for Christmas. If the holiday was on a Friday or Saturday, the winter of that year would be hard. Now more about what you do on the holiday. Some people cook goose in their homes but most people go to a restaurant. There is a lot of food on the day and all parts of the goose was used. The dinner begins with black soup, made ​​of goose blood and goose broth. It has also purees and spices. The soup is thick, red, and black. Things such as : goose liver sausage , prunes and potatoes are also eaten. The goose tends to have things like apples and prunes inside.

So I feel like I am at a standstill with Swedish. We are in a more advanced level and in advanced levels you need to speak more. The problem is I am so terrified of speaking that whenever we try I figure out a way to avert attention or change the topic. I was super motivated a few weeks ago to practice speaking every day but life got in the way and I just stopped. Recently we have been reading articles and having to summarize them for class. The problem is I feel like it isn't helping me at all because I don't know what most of the article is saying, so then I go to google translate, which is kind of defeating the purpose. Also another frustrating thing is that I need to start learning more verbs. But then I go to learn more verbs and get so confused with the semantics of grammar that I tell myself that I will come back to it later. Also I feel like vocab tends to be easier because when learning about fruit there are so many vocab words that go under the category of fruit. But how does one do that with verbs? There is no real over arching category for that. I think I am just a point of frustration because I feel like I am not getting better, due to no one's fault of my own. But I am not quite sure what to do to get passed this point.

This week we primarily focused on what major project or assignment we should do over break. We decided that we should continue to look up and summarize articles. Which I am have not decided if that really helps me that much. I think I tend to be more confused than competent when it comes to understanding the articles. Although it could just be that I am choosing the wrong articles to summarize. Last time I chose one that was about poetry and most of the terms they used in Swedish I didn't even know what they meant in English. So hopefully that one will go better.  Then we have to look up rules on verb conjugations. This one makes me nervous, because I know there are so many ways to conjugate a verb and I forget when you use which. After Molly and I should skype twice over break to talk about what we have done over break. This one is a good one but one I am reluctant on. Just because my fear of speaking swedish aloud is still very real. And lastly we will have to write a mini essay (one page) about a Swedish tradition. It will be very similar to our cultural blogs we have to do for 111 but this time it will be in Swedish. I think this is a lot to do but forces us to continue using and learning Swedish over the break. Because if we don't practice it, we tend to forget it.

So I realized there was a flaw in my plan to practice speaking. I don't actually know if I am pronouncing the words correctly. So I need to figure out how to practice speaking by myself but actually learning the right pronunciation. I thought about google translate for a second but then I realized google probably pronounces it just as bad as myself. I think I will try to look for some videos with subtitles or something along those lines. Or maybe even skype my friends some more. I have a few friends in Iceland and Sweden who speak Swedish. Perhaps if I could some how coordinate with them to speak once a week, that could help with improvement. But I am just so gosh darn shy when it comes to speaking it. Oh well I'll figure it out.   I also went to the global studio to check out what Swedish material there was. I didn't have a lot of time to spend there but I think it could be helpful, I just really need to review the basics. As for meeting this week, we did practice speaking the sentences we prepared and asked the questions we had. I think what has really been helping me is forcing myself to spend an hour on Swedish each day and by the time I have class with Louise I have a list of questions to ask.