Start of Summer

It has now been a little over four months since I arrived in Sweden, and the country has changed considerably. The white and grey hues of winter have been replaced with bright green. The clouds and snow removed, and in their place are sun (at least for a greater proportion of the time) and grass. This change is most welcome and has brought with it opportunities to do more things, to see more sides of the dodecahedron that is Sweden.
     An example of which is the trip I did to Hudiksvall to go kayaking. This was a rotary event and there was not so many people participating in the trip, so it was no party. However a fairly pleasant time was had by all, and the kayaking in itself was a nice thing to do. We kayaked in the Gulf of Bothnia, the section of ocean between Sweden and Finland, and the seas were perfect for us. The weather was great for both the days which was lucky because the day before was heavy rain.
     But enough about what I have been doing. Some people have asked me, "What do you think about Sweden?" and I am yet to give them a good, proper, truthful and succinct answer. Those who know me may have noticed what little propensity I have for verbosity, and thus my standard answer is usually something along the lines of "it's pretty good".
     But now I must take a minute to think about Sweden and my experiences of it, and to think about whether or not it deserves a better or worse adjective than "good".
     In my experience it is rare to meet a person in Sweden who is not nice. One point must be awarded to Sweden here, and also kudos to the Swedes for the food. I like it. Another good thing about Sweden is the relaxed attitude. Holidays happen everyone second week and school is more liberal. Emphasis is put on the activities one does, such as sport or music, rather than on your school marks. Again, much kudos.
     However, all of these things are good, but not great. People are pleasant, but shy. The food is good, but is may suffer if compared to great food (e.g. Italian). Holidays all the time can cause one to suffer from laziness. Add this all up, the end outcome is "pretty good".
     Now that I have thought about it the most accurate description I can give about what I think about Sweden is the aforementioned adjective.
     Perhaps by the end of my year away I will think differently. I know that at the end I will be happy to be in Australia again, because there it will be summer, whereas here it will be negative twenty or more (probably). Also I have found that it is difficult to feel completely comfortable.The nuances of the culture will elude me for some time and I find I need to have a fair understanding of everything going on around me (the language, the culture, the physical environment) in order to be truly at ease.
     I will be changing host families next week. I will be moving to my second most family in Sweden. I hope it is not like starting my exchange year all over again like some of the other exchanges say. I suppose I will have to wait and see.
   
To end, here are some photographs from my travels.