Wrapping It Up

Back from Norway, and now it's time to start saying good bye. We kicked around Västerås for a bit to see off some of our friends, then took a short trip to Finland to see Taija and Johanna home.

First day back and the sun's out! Better take advantage and catch some rays in the park across the street.

One day long before this moment, Taija was eating some cottage cheese and I saw. Then I asked if she had ever tried it with peaches and she was like, "no." So this day we tried it. And she was not too enthusiastic about it.

But Megan was nearby and discovered that she actually likes cottage cheese, so it was a general success, I suppose.

Later on, we all made our way to the Sky Bar to have a drink in the highest bar in Sweden. A good day back in Vasteras.

May 20th. Some nice flowers near the naked woman statue. Spotted these on the way back to Junior from shopping.

It's quite a nice area. Except that a couple of weeks later somebody turned the entire flower bed under. Last I saw it was just dirt there.

21st May. Sylvain, our couch-surf host from Paris came to visit and we made him a dinner of Swedish meatballs.

22nd May. Ariel and I made some fried chicken for a picnic.

The finished product. It was even more delicious than it looks.

23rd May. Time for a going-away feast. Johanna and I made cookies. The recipe called for brown sugar, but we had none. So we made some with this syrup and white sugar.

Even with heavy modification, the recipe was a success.

Others had prepared taco/burrito fixin's while the cookies were under construction. This was the main course of the feast.

24th May. A final visit to Spicy Hot with Laimis. We would see him once more in Finland, but he would see his last of Västerås later that day.

25th May. We had an international potluck in Park apartments. So much good food. And a near-deadly bike ride home. Ask Johanna...

26th May. Everybody made their way to another of the student accommodations for a beer pong party.

27th May. Ariel and I found the bulk ice cream delivery/sales truck. I did learn some Swedish: see that blue logo in the top left of the truck...says "HEMGLASS"? I knew (without google) that the name of the company meant "home ice cream."

28th May. The last taco buffet.

29th May. Time to celebrate Taija's birthday! But first there are preparations to be made. First up are the rice crispy treats in place of a birthday cake.

Then Jell-O shots.

Then a rice crispy decorating mishap. (Don't microwave chocolate for extended periods)

It all turned out alright, though.

Tyler made a special birthday cornbread for Taija.

Then the party happened and a huge can stack grew near Ariel's room. It was worth quite a bit of money and attracted many drunk meddlers who thought I wanted a picture of them. Sheesh.

Of course it was of questionable structural integrity and collapsed under its newfound notoriety.

30th May. The night before got out of hand. I woke up to find this in the kitchen to corroborate. The rest of the day was not nearly as exciting.

31st May. We had one more cook out on the terrace.

1st June. One of those days where the activity is to take a picture of my desk.

2nd June. Final Club night. Here's the pre-party.

In the club. It's a little hard to tell what's going on here, but Megan is suspicious of Ariel’s drink because it was empty then full. Ariel explains that the cause of this anomaly was an abandoned beer spotted by him then snatched by me.

3rd June. Time for a farewell feast for Tyler and one last dinner in Junior before shipping out to Finland. It was quite a production.

Cornbread had become a favorite for Tyler and Ariel to make. Ariel lends his expertise in panning the batter.

Things began to shape up as the spaghetti was boiled and Tyler mixed up a batch of fried rice.

The reveal was met with intense photography. The menu: Spaghetti with meatballs and tomato sauce and also fried rice. Cornbread with honey and cookies and pudding for dessert.

Long haired antics.

After dinner and dessert it was time to make some club t-shirts.

Lookin' good.

4th June. This day Tyler moved out.

And the Finns moved out.

Then, these six people got on a boat.

And into this cabin. All six. And everything the Finns own.

The obligatory on-a-boat mirror-roll call.

5th June. Once we got to Finland, we made a bee line to Taija's place.

And I finally got to see that cat!

Here's a card game called skip-bo that we learned to play before beginning a barbeque.

Barbeque! It was kinda cold though.

Once the work was done, all we had left to do was enjoy the fruits of our labor.

Then we played a game of throwing a wooden piece at other wooden pieces. With drinking (it is Finland, remember...).

After enough time, everybody got on the coffee table in the living room to dance.

6th June. We rounded up some bikes to go for a ride.

And we eventually found our way to this bridge.

7th June. Time to go to Helsinki! Everybody saddle up.

On our way to that nice white church, we caught a glimpse of a clear-sided dish washer. Some people (only Megan actually) thought it was a deep fryer.

Made it! I tried to take the same type of roll call that I took when it was just me and Tyler at this white church.

Later on, we went on a boat to a small island. Probably it was called Suomenlinna.

On that island there was a nice park to play in.

Back on the main land, we walked around a bit more, got a snack and found another park to sit in for a bit.

Once we were done with Helsinki, we headed back to Turku where eight of us found a place to sleep in Johanna's apartment.

8th June. This day began with a trip to the boat station to see Ariel off. A bittersweet reminder that things really were coming to an end.

To keep from getting too down, we took a day trip out to Moomin land. We didn't really do any of the activities there except look at some souvenirs and eat lunch.

The place we ate at (despite being mostly for tourists) had some problems with the english translations on their menu. These are usually pretty rare...

I was pretty happy when my pizza came out to compliment my delicious Finnish beer.

But then the other dishes came out (which I thought would be boring and thus went with pizza instead) and I was somewhat disappointed with my decision.

That evening we went to the river to get on a boat and have a few beers.

That boat was called "Cindy" but since it was dark, it was kinda difficult to get a really nice picture.

On the way back to Johanna's place, we saw some stairs and an opportunity to enter Turku's record books for biggest piggy back.

The attempt nearly killed Aaron (barely visible on the left).

Slightly after, Aaron and I lost our pants attempting to put down a rumor that hop-frog could not be played in Megan's skirt. We were successful, I'll have you know.

Famished, we pushed on to acquire a treat. Disturbing was its appearance, but delicious was its taste.

After treat time, we made a pyramid and shortly after called it a night.

9th June. Taija left in the morning and the rest of us just kicked around Turku. We eventually made it to this market to gather provisions.

Laimis left later in the day and the rest of us cooked dinner.

The dinner was a delicious success.

10th June. The time finally came for Megan and I to get on a boat to Sweden.

The boat ride back wasn't so bad. It was a day boat so in place of sleeping in a too-small cabin, we sat on the deck and drank many different types of drinks. Funny story: the bartender didn't know what a mimosa is and it took me several minutes of bargaining and explaining to eventually just buy a bottle of sparkling wine and a glass of orange juice with some champagne flutes.

And the final on-a-boat roll call.

Megan and I decided some time before that once we got back we would treat ourselves to some nice meals in Sweden. We came upon this nice place in Stockholm that had customized water to go with any drinks that you order. That's actually the name of the restaurant on the water jar.

The view from our table. Over the top of the left side of that big yellow building in the middle of the picture...see a church top? That's the one where the princess got married a couple of weeks after.

Start out with bread, of course. That was some of the best butter I've ever had.

Then some delicious salmon-tart appetizer.

I got a delicious steak dish. See that cube of potatoes? Best I've ever had. And the garlic butter. I wish I was still eating that meal...

Megan went with the salmon and potatoes. Equally as delicious..

And finally some delicious chocolates for dessert.

The only reason I dragged you all the way through that meal is because it was my new dinner record. 875 SEK for the both of us. ~$110 at the exchange rate that day. Wooo wee!

11th June. I was hoping to sleep in, but come mid-morning all these tractors began rolling up with super loud sound systems and drunken youths dressed as sailors. I went to investigate.

Turns out the entire city was in on it. After some asking around, I learned that the entire ruckus was for high school graduation. I guess it's normal there, and even the grandparents came out to watch sloshed grandchildren roll by on a tractor dressed as sailors and dancing to way-too-loud music. I should have graduated high school in Sweden... At one point one of the tractors seemed to have a fire in the back. Wish I had a picture of that and the complete lack of appropriate reaction from everyone near by. They all just stood and watched until that fire tractor drove off.

12th June. Megan's last day in Sweden. Gotta take some pictures.

13th of June. 3:45am (see how light it is? something I won't miss). I walked with Megan to the bus.

The last roll call.

This is about where I consider the end of my exchange as I came to know it. The last of my close friends headed for home. I still had a few days before the parents would arrive and a couple of weeks before returning to the states, but without the Junior crew, Sweden became a different place. See the next post for a family vacation in Sweden and a journey back to the States.