More Mullsjo, Please!

 It's been a wild week, so here's a rundown of our first days in Mullsjo!

The breakfasts at the Folkhogskola are delicious; I typically make myself a breakfast sandwich with some coffee and an egg, and occasionally they'll have seasonal fruit or cookies to choose from. In Sweden, they have light breakfasts and dinners with big lunches in between; however, they also have something called fika which is more like a coffee break between 10am and 10:40am where everyone on campus gets together for a drink and a snack. It's a very enjoyable Swedish custom that I wish we had in the US. They serve a good amount of fish related dishes since they're so close to the ocean, but we also had authentic Swedish meatballs just the other day which were absolutely mouth-watering. They also have a good amount of vegetarian and pescatarian options here, which is a nice change from the overwhelming amount of meaty meals I'm used to in America.

There are hiking trails all around the Folkhogskola that go for miles. We were able to follow some further into the woods and took a few wonderful shots of each other in the foliage. Mosquitoes and ticks are just as prevalent here as they are in the Midwest, so we made sure to do thorough tick checks before returning to the dorms.

Also, all of the Swedish students here have been especially hospitable. They even invited us to paint a mural of flowers with them on an outdoor wall installation. I chose to paint lily of the valley's, a white flower on a white canvas, so I mixed the white paint with different amounts of yellow to resemble sunlight hitting the flowers, giving it just enough color to contrast the completely white background.

The group and I got the munchies eventually, so we headed to a local pizza joint called Mullsjo Pizzeria and were astounded by the Swedish Special, a pizza topped with tomatoes, cucumbers, red onions, lettuce, banana peppers, french fries, and their signature sauce. We got the largest pizza size they had which was bigger than my torso, and we had to get a box to take some back to the dorms even after six hungry college kids ripped into it. It was massive!

Instead of Walmart or CVS, Sweden has a supermarket called ICA that is very popular with the locals. It's roughly the size of a neighborhood market and has just as much stuff; food, drinks, toiletries, etc. I bought some very odd snacks like glazed rib flavored chips and biscuits based on the Moomins, as well as other strange snacks. Their medicine section is unfortunately very scarce because they don't tend to sell nearly as many over the counter medications that we do in the states. Luckily, I packed enough medication for myself in the event of a migraine or stomach ache, but it's still a bit disconcerting how few medicinal products they stock in the case of an emergency.

The vice president of the school invited all of us to dinner at her home near the end of the week, so we made our way over and enjoyed some Swedish sausages and kebabs. I was able to take a few good shots of some dogs for my photo assignment as well!

All in all, a great way to start out our first week at our homebase in Mullsjo, Sweden.

Looking forward to the weeks to come,

Eli Goodwin