Campusfesten...kudde kriget...eurovision

Hello everybody!

The big party is over - and it was completely different from what I expected, but I'll start from the beginning.
On thursday we had the Goodbye Dinner which was really nice, since there were so many people and everybody was in a good mood. The food was good too, but not enough (at least for me...).
However, on friday the first exchange students from last term arrived in Karlstad - we had a small but cool Party in our kitchen and it was really nice to see everybody again. On saturday morning, the day of the real party, people took sofas and chairs outside, listened to music and had a good time. It was pretty cool and funny, Lene (Norwegian girl from last term) and Björn had a water fight, people were dancing and BBQing...and at 4 o'clock everybody went to the parking place in front of Rumpan Bar (a bar at campus) for the big pillow fight...and that was when everything changed... People who know me know that I'm careful, at least most of the time. And I was careful during the fight - I never was "in the middle", I stayed outside and goofed around with friends...and suddenly I saw Harry, the austrian from last term. I said "HI!" and we started a small pillow fight...and somehow, I don't know how, our two underarms crashed together - and I broke my arm. Ouch. I lost the pillow fight, so to say...and I realized it immediately, holding my arm, looking at Harry and mumbling "oh no, please no...not now...". Poor Harry, he was shocked too...Anyway, Björn called the ambulance and after they asked for my birthday, name, social number etc. they finally said that I should call a cab...which I did, and Sabrina came with me. Marco took his car and followed us.
Together we waited in the hospital..forget everything you've heard about the swedish health system, it's really not THAT good. We were waiting for more than 1 hour before I could go to the x-ray and another hour before they put the cast on...all in all we waited a bit more than 3 hours... Well, the nurses are on a strike (understandable, because the nurse salary is ridiculously low) and that didn't help...
Anyway, my left arm is in plaster now...so I'm typing this with my right hand...hope you appreciate this :P
The rest of the evening was nice...I came back from the hospital, everybody took pictures and was drunk..I called my family and went to Jonathan's place to watch the eurovision...Although I was in a party mood I figured that it's best to have a calm evening. I didn't want to risk more injuries or drunken people running me over, especially because of my arm... Anyway, about Eurovision - Russia won, definitely not my favourite - a bland, Timbaland-produced ballad (why does he have to be EVERYWHERE??)..at least the Ukraine got 2nd...
Sunday was calm - dinner with Sabrina and Marco, since Sabrina left today...
Well, that's it so far...
Pictures of the weekend - including goodbye dinner, hospital,...

Music makes the people come together... Part 2

In march I posted some swedish songs/songs by swedish artists and I think it's time for a new part... click here for part 1
Again, this is just a small selection...there are many many more artists that make good music. I could posts hundreds of videos...but I won't ;) If you want more recommendations, feel free to contact me. And as always - feedback is appreciated (for example in that little shoutbox-thing on the right hand side...).

Salem Al Fakir - It's true
Nice pop-music. He's really talented - he played every instrument himself and produced the cd.



Lykke Li - I'm good, I'm gone
Quite cool...at first I thought "wtf?" but after hearing the song a few times I got used to it...and her Album is really good!


Johnossi - Man must dance
I saw them live last month :P


Björn Rosenström - Pojkarna som busar
Something swedish!! Really cool...I know that it's somebody's favourite artist ;P


The Perishers - Trouble Sleeping
Martin, the other austrian in my corridor, recommended this band to me...and they are really good :)


Peter, Björn & John - Young Folks
A friend asked me about this song recently...and I re-discovered this great band. A very catchy song :)


The Knife - Pass this on
Anders recommended this song/band to me...funny video ;P

Short entry

Well, just to let you know - I had a calm weekend. I watched some movies, went for a coffee with Anders, was invited for dinner at Hong's and watched another Disney movie with Sofia...that's all I did. Exciting, eh?
Anyway, I'm really looking forward to that:

It's Portishead, for the people who don't know the logo ;) Their first album in 10 years...now, THAT'S exciting :))

Music makes the people come together...

Hi again :)

I thought it's time to introduce you to some swedish music (except Kent, Abba, Roxette, Ace of Base, Mando Diao, Sugarplum Fairy,...). Here's a small selection - the last 3 ones are definitely not everybody's cup of tea, but I like them. Feel free to give me some feedback ;)
Some more radio friendly songs will come later this month or in April.
Enjoy :)

Säkert! - Vi kommer att dö samtidigt
A nice pop-song - but there are better songs on her album ;)


Lasse Lindh - Varje litet steg
A live-acoustic version. I like his CD - a lot :)

oh, and THIS SONG (click) was on the Soundtrack of the Korean movie/series(?) "Soulmate" (Hello Matthias ;) )

Familjen - Det snurrar i min skalle
Nice electro-pop (at least for me it sounds like pop). He was the opening act for Kent.


Lo-Fi-FNK - Steppin Out
Another electro song...quite catchy :)



Slagsmålsklubben - His morning promenade
And one more electro song...or let's call it BlipBlop. Reminds me of the old SuperMario Adventures on my Gameboy ;) btw - Slagsmålsklubben means "Fight Club"

Födelsedag

Hi everybody!
First of all - thanks for all the congratulations via phone, facebook, studiVZ, mail,... I really appreciate it and it made me really happy :)
I had a great birthday here in Sweden and in fact, the whole birthday celebrations started on thursday, when I went to my first Hockeymatch. Färjestad (wearing black) played against Mora and it was quite good. The first 40 minutes were a bit boring, but in the final 20 minutes it got really exciting.
We had standing tickets, so we were standing in the centrum of the die-hard Färjestad fans (Färjestad is Karlstad's team) and the crowed was really into it and never stopped singing and cheering - although Färjestad lost - which was quite surprising, since Mora is second last in the League and Färjestad is a really good team which has won the championship several time.
However, after the match I went to Arena, which was really cool. There were quite a lot of people, the music was...OK (Arena music, so what do you expect? ;) ) but I had a good time there.
On Friday afternoon I bought some stuff for the Party in the evening. As I wrote in my last entry, Jonathan decided to make a small Party at his place. It was my "official" Birthday-Party to celebrate into my 22nd year on this planet. The party was really cool, everybody seemed to have a good time. It wasn't a huge party, just a small get-together with some friends. Talking, playing SingStar, eating the delicious snacks Jonathan had prepared,...and at 12 o'clock we celebrated my birthday. Shortly before 12 o'clock the police showed up - it was the real police, no strippers or so ;) - apparently we had been to loud (while playing SingStar ;) ), so that someone called them. But gladly it wasn't a big deal, they just told us to keep it a bit quiet and went away. Afterwards everybody sang/whispered "Happy Birthday" ;)
I had fun at the party - thanks everyone for coming :)

Yesterday afternoon I went to a football match with some friends (it seems this week has been my "Sports week" - first hockey, than football...) and afterwards some people came over for some birthday-apple-pie. In the evening I went to see the kent-concert, which was really cool. I must admit - I was a bit surprised that their concerts are that good. I enjoy their CDs, but they are even better live. The crowed was wild and jumping, screaming, singing...that's how it should be on a concert ;) The stage, the visuals and the lights were great..I was really impressed and I'll definitely go to another kent concert if they play somewhere near again.

So, that was a short summary of the past few days/my birthday...I kept it short, because I don't want to bore anyone ;)
Last but not least - some pictures of the past few days:
Hockey and football - if you want to see some Swedes doing sports ;)
Birthdayparty & Arena - if you want to see some embarrassing pictures of people (incl. me) singing.
KENT - if you want to see some nice concert pictures.
CU & thanks for reading :) I'll write again next weekend, hopefully.

PS - one of my favourite Kent songs which they played yesterday:

Tjänare :) [Hi!, Servus!]

Once again, sorry for the lack of stories... It's really strange, because I always do something, but it's never exciting enough for a new entry.
The last 2 weeks were not boring at all but I have the feeling as if I didn't do much. I went out, went to the gym (which is why I had a terrible muscle ache on muscles I didn't even know I had), studied, went to University, read a lot, met friends,... I was (and still am) really motivated to improve my Swedish - I started buying and reading Swedish magazines (a gossip magazines, one movie magazine and a Swedish comic book). Although I don't know that much Swedish yet, I understand quite a lot. Even if it's just about Posh Spice being jealous of the other Spice Girls, or Hollywood's male bitches (see picture) ;)
I chose the gossip mag because I thought it's not that hard to understand, especially because of the catchy headlines which are - although they are really silly - full of useful words that are easy to remember. I also started watching more Swedish TV - with that I mean Swedish Productions (since all foreign productions are in the original language with subtitles...so e.g House M.D is in English, with Swedish subtitles). I started watching "Melodifestivalen", which is a huge competition to elect the Swedish participant in this year's Eurovision Song Contest. In contrast to Austria, where the competition isn't regarded as being serious, Swedes really take it seriously and have a quite complicated system to elect the participant: First, there are several shows (I think around 4) - in each show, 2 Singers or Bands will come to the final, 2 other participants will get another chance in a show called "Andra Chansen", which will be one week before the final. The winners of this show will come to the final...and eventually there will be just 1 winner, who will represent Sweden in Serbia. Learning Swedish is the perfect excuse to watch this show ;)

Well, on Sunday I went to see Tim Burton's new movie "Sweeney Todd" and I must say, that I enjoyed it. As always, Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter are amazing and Tim Burton did a really good job. The music is not that special, in my opinion. Especially compared to other musicals, but well, the acting and the pictures compensate for that. So, if you have the chance to see it - do it! Watch the Trailer.

Oh and here's a picture...another sunset, because it's been a while since I posted the last "oh so romantic" sunset picture. I took it yesterday, because the sky looked so amazing. I was in my room, that's why the detail isn't the best.
Talking of sunsets brings me to the next topic - traveling (you can figure out the complex and philosophical background of that [very weird] association yourself ;) )
The next big trip I will (certainly) do is in April - I'll see Rufus Wainwright in Stockholm (wohoo...again!), so I'll be in Stockholm for 3 days. I hope that the weather will be nice, because I really want to see Stockholm with sunlight - and I want to make a boat tour to the archipelago (gosh, that's a hard word to spell).
Other than that - Jonathan and I were thinking about going to Manchester in March, but it doesn't look like it will happen (it's a loooong story. Never trust an "English bloke" who wants to sell you football tickets.). But we'll go to Gothenburg and hopefully Malmö in the near future.
So, that's it for now...
cu
manuel

PS: I forgot...I'm heading to the big 30...in 1,5 weeks is my 22nd birthday, then I'm in my early late 20s (quote from Hedwig) and I will celebrate my birthday with a concert - I'll see KENT live - a Swedish group that's really successful here. Since they give a concert here in Karlstad, I thought I should take the chance and see them.
here's a video to one of their newer songs "Ingenting"...

Rufus + Kiruna

Well, until tuesday I will be in Kiruna - this means no messages etc. before tuesday evening. But feel free to write me, I'll answer as soon as I am back.
Here's a short video of Rufus performing "14th street" not in Stockholm, but he sang the song in Stockholm too ;) (oh yes, I'm still amazed and in awe ;) )
greetings from Sweden,
manuel

forget all your troubles, come on GET HAPPY :)

Hejhej :)

I'm speechless. In awe. Unbelievable.
The past weekend was absolutely amazing - mainly because of the Rufus Wainwright concert, but also because of Stockholm. This time I had the chance to see some not-so-touristic parts of Stockholm and it was amazing. All the tourists go to the (boring) palace and shopping in the Gamla Stan where you find one tourist shop after another but the swedish people are somewhere else. I discovered some really nice cafés and a really cool independent bookstore that sells all kind of books - in english ("New York Stories" - Odengatan 100). The shop owner is a really nice woman who comes from NY but has been living in Stockholm for 25 years now... and the shop is really small and cosy, I almost forgot that bookstores like this exist (nowadays you mostly see these huge bookstores without personal contact and so-sophisticated-and-cool-looking reading cornes everywhere...that sell paperbacks and sheepworld-stuff).
However, I spend the whole saturday afternoon shopping for christmas presents and discovering some parts of Stockholm. In the evening I went to a small and really cool looking coffee house ("Chokladkoppen", Stor Torget 18, Gamla Stan) and had the best hot chocolate...
Afterwards I went to a bar and back to the hostel.
On Sunday morning I went to the Museum of Modern Art which was...OK. Nothing too special, in my opinion. There were some really good pictures (some Picassos ;) ) but nothing too extraordinary. They showed some movies of Gunvor Nelson, a swedish film maker/artist who made some interesting art-movies - mostly in the 70s and 80s up to today.
In the afternoon I met Linda, a swedish girl I know from a Rufus Wainwright Message Board. Together we went to the concert arena and waited for the concert to begin...and that was the Highlight of the whole weekend! The concert was amazing and the audience was in the perfect mood. Believe it or not, but Rufus is a much better entertainer than Robbie Williams. He's sincere, honest and really charming.
At half past 7 Rufus and his 7 bandmembers entered the stage and started the show which ended up being an amazing night full of surprises and greatness. He wore a green suit which glowed in the dark (*lol*) and after a 10 minutes break he changed to his fabulous Lederhosen from Austria ;). The encore was amazing...for the last 2 songs Rufus got dressed on stage - he was wearing a bath robe sat down and started putting on lipstick, high heels,... I know, this sounds freaky, but the crowed went wild. Then it got dark, the music started and his band members came on stage, wearing black suits and dancing a funny choreography...Rufus sang Judy Garland's "Get Happy" (original Judy Version... RUFUS VERSION). He ended the show singing "Gay Messiah"...
It was an amazing show (oh, I think I already mentioned that several times*lol*).
However, I could go on forever about the show... but I think I won't waste your time any longer ;)
Tonight we have a big christmas-dinner in my corridor, since this will be one of the last evenings where everybody is here... :(
On Friday we'll fly to Kiruna (that's in the far north) and I'm really looking forward to that. Although it will be really cold (today it has -12 degrees) but we will get warm clothes up there...

bye
manuel
PS: As always - you can watch some pictures HERE (I didn't take many pictures on the concert since they always end up looking blurry...)

Ingenting

Some Swedish music...KENT - Ingenting, taken from their new album "Tillbaka Till Samtiden".[Back to the presence"]
The video is strange, but I really like the song (and the whole album :) ).
Enjoy :)