So I've decided it's much easier to clump my posts into a single week. From now on, I'll do that! I'll draft the post throughout the week and update at the end, so it's fewer posts for you followers to keep up with. :) They'll just end up being longer and a good deal less detailed.
On Saturday, I went kayaking at Brunnsviken with the KTH group. I didn't have a reserved place, but there were enough left that I was able to pay and go out for an hour. It was actually a single-person kayak, which was nice for a change (I've only ever kayaked in a double before). The weather was breezy but sunny out, and so it was a great weekend overall to be out on the water.
Of course, I love dinosaurs. Part of me has never given up on the secret dream of becoming a paleontologist, and so I took a few selfies with the T-rex skull that is shown below :P Only one of the photos came out, however, and it's on my Facebook for those of you who have me as a friend.
The giant fish shown below is a sunfish in English, as I recall. But in Swedish? It's called a klumpfisk- and I'm surprised nobody stared at me as I burst into laughter in front of this display.
An old, dead, preserved giant squid. It was morbidly fascinating to see, and it reminded me of the squids we dissected in marine biology back in the day.
The tree display was about the same as the mushroom display, again asking for identification.
In case you ever wondered what guinea pigs, iguanas, sloths and chameleons were in Swedish. (Mat = "food", not exactly "guinea pig". Guinea pigs were eaten as food, particularly in South America where they were first recorded. It's a misnomer that they're "guinea" pigs, as they come from around Guyana, and because the foreigners couldn't pronounce "Guyana pigs"... so, they became "guinea pigs" instead.)
A wax sculpture wearing a wig and a fancy outfit? So what, you might find yourself asking. This is Carl von Linné, or Carl Linnaeus as we know him from biology class. Yes, he was a Swede, and yes, he is famous. Below I've uploaded the sign that was set by his shoes with a quote from him.
The last two sections were the marine life and polar life areas. The whale skeletons were cool to see, since it was interesting to compare their sizes with the room around us.
Whale communication. Also labelled in Swedish (although I'm quite positive that the whales don't speak Swedish in most cases).
Tundra life was at the start of the polar exhibit (actually, it was the Arctic and the Antarctic, which is why I'm simply referring to it as "polar").
"I am the walrus."
Elephant seals are amusing-looking, although the males are rather aggressive as I recall. They're very possessive and territorial creatures.
This wooden replica was something I found extremely entertaining, and I took a few dorky selfie photos with it, too.
It was nice enough weather that my friend and I stayed to eat a late lunch at the restaurant there, which was not half bad for the price. It included a salad, drink and bread with butter.
And so, our day concluded as we went home to write our Swedish assignments, which were due today. They were worth 1,5 ECTS and graded as pass or fail. All I know about the other classes, is that the A1 class only had to write 150 words. I haven't heard about A2 or anything higher besides my own class, B1. And we had to write a minimum of 250 words (I reached 500) for ours, on the subject of whether enjoying one's job was more important than making money, or vice versa.
When I post next, it will likely be at the end of this week or on the weekend again. I will compress my posts more!
Med vänliga hälsningar,
/The Swedish Fish
I went on Friday night to attempt to pick up a clothes drying rack that I was going to buy off someone, but it turned into a long story about my failed attempt to manage with the roslagsbana instead. I've written it farther down in this post, along with photos. :P
After that, I went out with a friend to Södermalm. I hadn't explored the area before, but it's got quite a bustling nightlife. There, we also ran into some other friends, and so the night was well spent overall and in good company :)
On Saturday, I went kayaking at Brunnsviken with the KTH group. I didn't have a reserved place, but there were enough left that I was able to pay and go out for an hour. It was actually a single-person kayak, which was nice for a change (I've only ever kayaked in a double before). The weather was breezy but sunny out, and so it was a great weekend overall to be out on the water.
A few photos are interspersed here from the walk to and from the waterside. Above is some "Swedish art", as someone called it, and below are the roslagsbana area and the rentable gardens.
Later on in the day, I decided to try again to pick up a clothes drying rack from someone I had agreed to buy it from. So off to Roslags Näsby I went, for the second time in two days (on Friday, I missed the first train and thus arrived 45 minutes past the agreed time, and felt horrible about that). I was a bit held back for time, since the gubbe from before wandered up to me and said, "ni hao!" and proceeded to ask again if I spoke Chinese. Apparently he can't tell Asians apart, and so he didn't remember me from a day or two before. So I answered him in Swedish, and he handed me another brochure (but this time in Chinese, and if I hadn't seen it in Swedish before, I probably would not have known what it said. "Vem styr världen?" he repeated, pointing at the top where the Swedish brochure would have read that. Just to satisfy him so I could run off to the train stop, I answered "Gud", and then he proceeded to ask me which god I thought it was, and then opened the brochure and pointed to a picture on the inside flap. If it hadn't been that I was in such a rush to get to the roslagsbana, I would have pulled one of those philosophical debates on him to see how he would react, the "ceci n'est pas une pipe" sort of thing (research Magritte and "The Treachery of Images", if you don't understand the reference). "This is not a god! This is a picture of a god!"
Also, don't look up what "une pipe" is in French on Google Translate, unless you feel like corrupting yourself. :P Just assume it's a pipe, as in the classic quote.
And so, I told the man that I was headed to the roslagsbana and he let me go. It took me another few minutes to figure out where the station was, despite having passed it by earlier in the day. But I arrived at the platform and checked to see which was the soonest train. Only this time, I took Line 29 instead of 27 or 28, figuring I could swap trains at the Mörby station.... and accidentally got off in Stocksund. Which is an okej-sort of place, rather quiet, and... the only train line that runs through it is Line 29, since it's a pitifully small station. So I was going to get back on the train headed in the other direction, so I could pick up one of the other lines back at Universitetet station. But the train left as soon as I'd reached the platform, and so I was left in Stocksund for half an hour with no form of transportation whatsoever. Unless I'd chosen to walk.
And so, I never made it to Roslags Näsby.
The fire was in the newspapers again. This time, it's because it's spreading itself beneath the earth, and growing increasingly larger as it goes along. It's become a serious problem (not that it wasn't bad already), and there has now been one report of a person dying of burns from the fire. I really hope it dies out instead of spreading underground, as it's incredibly difficult to put it out that way. The incoming rains of autumn might help, at least on the surface. The water might penetrate deeper if it floods as much as it has been here- today (11 August) has been another one of those days which reminds people that the end of summer has arrived in Stockholm.
On a lighter note, Sunday was spent at the Naturhistoriska Riksmuseet- the Swedish Royal Museum of Natural History, as I suppose it roughly tarnslates to. I made a new friend and got to see a lot of interesting exhibits there.
Wax sculptures are scarily creepy, especially when they've been sculpted so realistically. They come from Florence, Italy.
There was a geology exhibit with some fluorescent rocks that glowed under a blacklight.
Just about the only thing in the museum that was neither dead and stuffed, nor a fossil, was a little hermit crab that was determinedly clambering up the side of a rock in its tank. The spiny starfish in the other tank seemed to have died.
We caught the 14.00 showing of SEA-REX 3D, in Swedish. So we brought our own headphones to listen to the English dubbing in the receivers we were given, but it was too annoying for me and I gave up near the start of the film. I listened to the history of prehistoric creatures in Swedish for 40 minutes and actually understood most of it, so I feel rather accomplished :P
One of the other students dropped his receiver down a row toward the end, and so I rooted around for it after everyone had pretty much left. Found a random 10 SEK coin, as well, under the seat.
The Cosmonova theatre in the museum is Sweden's only IMAX. It's spherically shaped, which makes for a great surrounding effect (unless you sit all the way on the sidelines). It is 760 square meters large, 11 meters high and 23 meters in diameter. 7 audio speakers and amplifiers together produce 15 000 W of power.
After we finished in the theatre, the group split up. I went to the gift shop to buy a little field mouse keychain as a souvenir. :P My friend and I then continued on to see the remaining exhibits.
The pictures become a bit out of order here, since I took a few on my phone (above) and most on my camera (below). My camera happened to die shortly after we embarked on the exploration of the final exhibits, which explains the untimely gap here. I'll backtrack a bit now.
If our bodies were proportioned based on how many muscles we had in each section, we would look like the model above. Reminiscent of a caricature, isn't it?
Of course, I love dinosaurs. Part of me has never given up on the secret dream of becoming a paleontologist, and so I took a few selfies with the T-rex skull that is shown below :P Only one of the photos came out, however, and it's on my Facebook for those of you who have me as a friend.
The little dinosaur sculpture below has quite a humorous sign in front, if you look closely.
There was a special exhibition (I believe it's a rotating one) on water usage around the world. A very useful topic to know about.
Back to the dinosaur skeletons. :P
And the photo of the hermit crab that I've uploaded below might be a tad clearer than the previous one.
The giant fish shown below is a sunfish in English, as I recall. But in Swedish? It's called a klumpfisk- and I'm surprised nobody stared at me as I burst into laughter in front of this display.
An old, dead, preserved giant squid. It was morbidly fascinating to see, and it reminded me of the squids we dissected in marine biology back in the day.
There was also a display with different types of mushrooms, a sort of "test your knowledge" booth that asked the audience to identify which mushroom was which. All I remember is the very general rule on how to tell if a mushroom is poisonous or not, so you've been warned not to trust me in picking mushrooms in a forest!
The field animals against the snowy background were very well displayed.
The tree display was about the same as the mushroom display, again asking for identification.
A wax sculpture wearing a wig and a fancy outfit? So what, you might find yourself asking. This is Carl von Linné, or Carl Linnaeus as we know him from biology class. Yes, he was a Swede, and yes, he is famous. Below I've uploaded the sign that was set by his shoes with a quote from him.
The last two sections were the marine life and polar life areas. The whale skeletons were cool to see, since it was interesting to compare their sizes with the room around us.
Whale communication. Also labelled in Swedish (although I'm quite positive that the whales don't speak Swedish in most cases).
Tundra life was at the start of the polar exhibit (actually, it was the Arctic and the Antarctic, which is why I'm simply referring to it as "polar").
"I am the walrus."
Elephant seals are amusing-looking, although the males are rather aggressive as I recall. They're very possessive and territorial creatures.
This wooden replica was something I found extremely entertaining, and I took a few dorky selfie photos with it, too.
It turns out that the Swedish Royal Museum of Natural History was among the first (quite possible the first to receive a fossilised coelocanth. They only displayed a replica for the public, as the original is still preserved in formaldehyde. It's likely in the safeguarded collections below ground level, although I can't be entirely sure where they keep it.
It was nice enough weather that my friend and I stayed to eat a late lunch at the restaurant there, which was not half bad for the price. It included a salad, drink and bread with butter.
And so, our day concluded as we went home to write our Swedish assignments, which were due today. They were worth 1,5 ECTS and graded as pass or fail. All I know about the other classes, is that the A1 class only had to write 150 words. I haven't heard about A2 or anything higher besides my own class, B1. And we had to write a minimum of 250 words (I reached 500) for ours, on the subject of whether enjoying one's job was more important than making money, or vice versa.
Med vänliga hälsningar,
/The Swedish Fish
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