Tuesday, March 24, 2009

A little about sweeds and Sweden.

Woke up this night when the house started to tremble. Couldn´t understand what happened at first, but then I heard the wind. It must have been storming for a short while I think, outherwise the house wouldn´t tremble like that. Unfortunally the wind came from north east and my cottage always gets freezing cold then. The arctic winds has flown down over our country all day and will continue to do so for a couple of days. The newspapers screamed that we were going to have extreme weather this week, but when I read what the article said I understood that we just were going to have normal March weather :-) :-) But they had probably no other news yesterday and extreme weather always sells copies :-)



Today I had to walk in the forest because the arctic wind was terrible out on the fields.


Perhaps You want to know something about Sweden and the sweeds?

It seemes that sweeds is seen as some what stupid out there in Europe :-) In Spain they have a saying: “Don´t make Your self sweedish”, by that meaning “don´t make Your self more stupid than you are” :-) And in Brittain they call the rutabaga for a sweed :-) I don´t think that we are more stupid though. But when we think we know someone very well we have a tendency to trust them what ever they say or do.



There were two deers that didn´t get especially bothered by me and my dogs.



If You walk into a home in Sweden (as in Japan)You always take of Your shoes as soon You are indoors. It´s a big NO NO to let Your shoes stay on Your feet, unless they who lives there says that You can keep them on. I have three big dogs that makes the floors at my home durty, I usually tell people to have their shoes on :-)


We have the highest taxes in the world, but few complaines about it. Sometimes we actully wants it that way :-) But we do get a lot for the money. For instance we never pay more than (in todays American dollar price) 218 dollars for healthcare a year. The same amount for medicines too. So next time I have to get my hip fixed I only pay that amount.



The little creek once again has a layer of ice. It´s awfully cold at nights now.

Suicide is the most common way to die here if You are between 15 and 44 years old, but we are far from being worst of that in the world. We have everything to be honest, but still we seems to feel miserable.

Sweden is slightly bigger than California, but we are only nine million people living here. Sweden is the fith biggest country in Europe and has the third, sixth and ninth biggest lakes.
Our National day is june sixth, but few knows why :-)

It is said that it was swedish vikings that founded Russia, but don´t blame us for what has happened there since then :-)


The only birds I saw today was four swans flying just above the tree tops.

We have a king and queen and our flag is one of the oldest in the world (the danish is older though). Sweden hasn´t been involved in a war since 1814, before that we were always in war with someone. If it wasn´t Denmark/Norway it was with the russians. Sometimes we were way down in Europe too.


We joined the European Union, but we don´t like it :-) If we can protest about what the union wants to do we protest :-)
We also were the first to start reality shows and I do appologise for that :-) The first one was what most countries calles “Survivor”. No other country thought that was a good idea, but us. Since it became a hugh succes here other countries followed. After that all the hidious shows just started all over the world and I do appologise once again, I´m so sorry about that :-)
Have a nice day now!”



12 comments:

HelenJ said...

Are we really that bad? =)
Still, I like it here...
/Helen

Wsprsweetly Of Cottages said...

:) Thanks for the History, Christer. I had never heard the dumb part. However I think something is said about every group of people..goodness knows why.
Your weather sounds a bit like our own. We never get rain we are promised..and ten drops to me does not "heavy to moderate precipitation" make! :) We get a kick out of it and laugh. Great post today..and thanks so much for your comment on my post. I appreciate it greatly.
Mona

Anonymous said...

I enjoyed your writing about the sweeds and Sweden you are a great story teller however Europiens got it all wrong there is NOTHING stupid about a country that can control health care for its people and stay out of war since 1814. Hooray for Sweden I take my shoes off to you:>)

The cottage by the Cranelake said...

Hi Helen!
Yeah! We are :-)
Christer.

The cottage by the Cranelake said...

Hi Mona!
We´re not better here in Sweden, we have alot to say about most European people too :-) and not always nice :-)
Christer.

The cottage by the Cranelake said...

Hi Woody!
To be honest, we´re not better then the others :-)You should know what we say about the norwegians :-) and it was us that let the reality shows free :-)
Have a nice day now!
Christer.

Valerie said...

Hi Christer!

Loved today's post! Thank you so much for the history lesson. As a former classroom teacher (3rd graders) I love learning about other countries and cultures.

I find it interesting that Sweden would be at war with Denmark. Tell me more! Why? My husband's mother is Danish-American. Her grandparents came from Denmark and settled in western Iowa to farm.

I don't know much about the Danes, but really need to learn more since my children have Danish lineage! (I'm pretty confident I can fill them in on their Polish heritage LOL.) I do know that some study done on the happiness factor found that Danes were the happiest people in the world. They interviewed several young Danes who were all American-educated, but said they would never want to raise families in America. Enlightening, huh?!!!

So it was the Swedes that unleashed reality TV? Thanks. (Just kidding) My husband is a huge fan of survivor, but I'm not much for reality TV. I like to joke that after working all day and taking care of 2 babies at night I get all the "reality" that one could possibly need! Dirty diapers, runny noses, Kraft Macaroni and cheese, you get the picture! Ha Ha

Take care.

Anonymous said...

Swedes, dumb? They are too alert and thought-filled to be dumb! Swedes are not defensive, mean, or petty. They are good folks just living life the best way they can and making do. Would I trust a Swede? Yes, more than most others in our wary world because they are 'neutral'and walk softly but carry a big stick.
Take care, Christer - GeeGee

The cottage by the Cranelake said...

Hi Valerie!
For about thousand years ago big parts of what today is Sweden were Denmark.We don´t have a long coastline to the west, but all the way up to what now is Gotheburg belonged to denmark. Not much further north Norway began. So Sweden had just some miles of coast there. The danes and norwegians took the chance to make money on custom if we wanted things from outside. Every time Sweden tried to build a city on that short coastline, they burned it down. We weren´t innosent in any way, we did our stuff too :-)


In the fourtennth century the Danish/Norweigian queen, Margareta, attacked the king we had then (Albrecht af Mecklemburg) with the help from the Sweeds and became queen of Sweden, Norway and Denmark. She won here at Falkoping where I live 1389. The union didn´t last long though.

Denmark was a superpower in those days and we wanted that too. So the wars went on and on. We took all parts of denmark in the south of our nowdays kingdom and bits from Norway too.


Around the seventeenth century Sweden was a superpower and had the Baltic sea within it´s area. The final blow to the danes was when Sweden supported England/russia and the german states against Napoleon, but the danes supported Napoleon. They lost and we got Norway (we had already lost everything else of what we had concured). The union with Norway lasted from 1814 to 1905.

So the wars has always been about land, power and influense in Europe.


Yes it´s true. The happiest place on earth is a danish village. I always feel that danes are easy going people that don´t get bothered by small things. They eat what ever they want, drink what ever they want and smoke like chimneys :-) Denmark is also the only industialised country where the average age is sinking, but they die at least happy :-)

I do get the picture, who need more reality than a mom :-)
Christer.

The cottage by the Cranelake said...

Hi GeeGee!

Yes we do shout Neutral now and again :-) :-) :-)
Christer.

Valerie said...

Wow...are all Swedes as well educated on their motherland's history as you are?...Wait, don't answer that...as a former public school classroom teacher I am well-versed on the state of American education! IMPRESSIVE though. I am going to wow my mother-in-law with my new and vast knowledge of Norweigan history. THANK YOU!!!

My mother-in-law does like to remind us from time-to-time that Danes are the happiest people on earth. I'll have to share with her their shrinking longevity rates! (I also have to admit that I'm not much of a fan of her Danish cooking, but then again, she doesn't rave about the kielbasa or pierogies that I prepare at Easter!) :)

Thank you again for taking the time to explain the war bewteen the Danes and the Swedes! Valerie

The cottage by the Cranelake said...

Hi Valerie!
Pierogies that tastes so good! In the eighties Pierogies becam very popular here in Sweden, we could get many different sorts depending on wich country the recipe came from. But then came the Kebeb and the pierogie sort of became forgotten. I miss them though.

I´ve always been interested in history, so I could have continued to write for hours :-)
Christer.