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Why I just couldn’t quit Sweden

Sunday, June 5th, 2011

Today is June 5. On this day in 1305, Raymond Bertrand de Got became Pope Clement V. In 1967, the Six-Day War began with an Israeli Air strike. And in 1956, Elvis Presley performed his smash hit “Hound Dog” to a nationwide TV audience on the The Milton Berle Show, an appearance that generated many letters of protest and ranks among the most controversial in early television history.

And in 2011, it’s the date I should have left Sweden.

Key phrase: should have.

But I’m not leaving. Not yet, anyway.

I love Sweden. Not to be melodramatic or anything, but I love it even more than I love Oberto! brand beef jerky. As anyone who knows me well can attest, that’s saying a lot.

The school year here at Linnaeus University may be over, but that doesn’t mean my learning experience has ended: every day I’m learning new things. Like why you should never, ever wear a cowboy hat at a student pub unless you want to be eaten alive by hordes of women (and men) who want to take pictures with you – thus permanently afflicting my eyesight with the flash of cameras. I’ve also learned that, although it may be wrapped in a manner similar to a sausage, a product bearing the word “soppa” on it is, in fact, soup, and thus should not be cut in half like a sausage.

But what I’ve learned above all else is that you live only once. While different people may have different views on the afterlife, most everyone agrees that what you do in this life is important. And in this life, I plan to get as much out of it as possible.

Now I’m no rocket scientist, but I believe the easiest way to do that is to keep broadening my horizons in a place 10,000 kilometers from where I originally came from.

It hasn’t been easy, to be sure. While in studying here in Växjö, I’ve dealt with some of the toughest challenges I’ve ever had, from the mundane (getting lost in the woods, learning to be patient with the queue system, dating Swedish girls) to the downright terrifying (making new friends, adjusting to life in a new culture, learning a new language).

Yet I’ve also had some of the best times of my life. I’ll never forget the wonders of Köttbullar, the majesty of Teleborgs Slott, or the indescribable beauty that is a Swedish sunset. And the people I’ve met – from the corridor mates I see every day to the strangers I’ve only spoken to once and whose names I’ve never learned – will always have a special place in my heart, and my memory.

Maybe I’m just drawing out the inevitable. Maybe I’m only delaying the heart-wrenching loss I’ll feel when I go back to the U.S. for my last year of college. Maybe I’m living in some bizarro muffy world insulated from the wider world, avoiding things like responsibility and getting a real job.

But I don’t think it’s any of those things. I think it truly is love.

Sometimes, when you love someone, you sacrifice everything for them. And for this particular girl, I’ve done – and am continuing to do – just that. And though there’ve been times when all I’ve wanted to do is leave her behind forever, just like Jake Gyllenhaal and Heath Ledger in “Brokeback Mountain,” I just couldn’t quit her.

Her name is Sweden, and there’s no place on earth I’d rather be.

And besides, Boise tends to be kind of hot this time of year.

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Tags: beef jerky, Ben Mack, Brokeback Mountain, culture, Köttbullar, Linnaeus University, love, study abroad, Sweden, Teleborgs Slott, The Local, United States, Växjö
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Football match mayhem made meaner

Wednesday, May 4th, 2011

You have everything you need to take your kid to a Swedish football match this week? Program? Binoculars? Nunchucks?

Actually, if I were you, I wouldn’t take my kid. I’d take Manny Pacquiao. Swedish football stadiums are rougher than sandpaper thongs lately.

These days, football fans are making hockey fans look like Miss Manners. They’re often buy-a-vowel drunk, spewing cuss words and looking to fight. And the men are sometimes worse.

This past year alone:

A match in Stockholm between AIK and Syrianska was cancelled after a firework hit a referee, giving him permanent ear damage.

In August, a group of AIK fans threw stones and bottles at the visiting Levski Sofia team bus and clashed with police following a Europa League qualifier. The Bulgarian club’s media officer and a masseur were hit by stones while two players suffered cuts.

During a match between Hammarby IF anf IFK Norrkoping, the family section of the stadium, Idrottsparken, had to be evacuated after fighting broke out.

One of the co-managers of Hammarby IF resigned after being threatened… by the club’s own supporters.

Having fun, kids?

I wouldn’t take anybody not built like a side-by-side freezer to a match now. With insane popularity comes insane people, and we’re not just talking about Helsingborg IF’s Adrian Gashi. All the Allsvenskan is missing is crowds chanting, “Jerry! Jerry! Jerry!”

Don’t go. Just sit your kid in front of your HD screen with a bowl of Cheetos and the remote. Guaranteed, your HD screen won’t do the following:

(A) Follow her around blowing a vuvuzela in her ear.

(B) Throw punches at her so she misses a goal.

Still, if you INSIST on taking any child who isn’t at least a brown belt, here are some survival tips:

• Don’t wear a jersey.

In being a sports fan most of my life, I’ve learned one hard and fast formula: more jerseys = more mayhem. Sit at YouTube for two hours and watch all the Swedish football fights. Every single one will involve morons wearing jerseys. For some reason, fans think that once they put on that stupid 600 kronor jersey, they are now part of some army that must defend its colors at all cost.

And yet, if one of these jersey boys were on fire, the player whose name adorns the back of that jersey wouldn’t take the time to put him out with his water bottle.

For that matter:

• Don’t wear a jersey, ever. When I considered wearing my yellow Swedish national team jersey to a Helsingborg – Elfsborg match last month, my friend Martin told me that if I did so, I literally would be pummeled, even though Helsingborg has several players on the national team. So much for peace on Earth.

• Don’t bring a sign. At a Helsingborg – Häcken match last Sunday, objects were thrown at children with a large HÄCKEN sign. The oldest looked like he was maybe 12.

• Don’t sit up high. If you sit up high at a football match, more than your nose might bleed. Instead, pay through the nose and sit low, where the generally sober people are. (Exception to this rule: If you or your child is offended by the kind of language that would make a longshoreman blush, don’t sit anywhere near Halmstads BK manager Josep Clotet Ruiz)

• Don’t get within an area code of the Helsingborg/Malmö FF match. This rivalry is to Swedish football what Jennifer and Angelina are to the E! network. For a time, there were so many brawls at this game that the Malmö police installed a makeshift jail in the bowels of the stadium. Saved time.

The match is Tuesday, May 24 in Malmö and it’s the jersey-jerk capital of the world. It’s their own little World War III. For some reason, Malmö fans, especially, will risk broken hands, rearranged eyes and night court to “defend the honor” of their team. But you wonder if they realize that several of the current players weren’t even on their roster last season and probably \will be somewhere else next season, wearing jerseys Malmö fans must despise. To paraphrase Jerry Seinfeld, these people are knifing each other over laundry.

And this is just what’s in the stands. The product that’s on the field now has gotten uglier, nastier and more violent. This brings out fans who not only want to watch violence but participate in it. Against Elfsborg, Helsingborg midfielder Mattias Lidström lay prone on the field. The announcer said, “Mattias Lidström is injured.” And the Elfsborg fans cheered. How will you explain that to your little Amber?

Svenska Fotbollförbundet (SvFF) – the Swedish Football Association – to its credit, is trying to make things safer and saner with increased police presence and tattle-text numbers at every stadium to bring security. “We’re getting very positive feedback,” says SvFF President Lars-Åke Lagrell. “It’s appreciated by fans and it’s working.”

We must be going to different matches. The matches I’m going to seem more menacing every time.

There’s an easy answer, of course, but it’s the third rail nobody wants to touch: beer.

Without beer, football would dry up and blow away, not unlike U.S. sports. But how about stopping sales after a certain point? How about telling the TV networks to stop showcasing single-brain-celled fans like Fireman Ed and Can’t Feel My Face Shirtless Buffalo Guy, dolts who give the impression that this game is slightly more important than their next breath?

Until then, leave the kids home. Let them do something safe and happy and nonviolent.

Like Halo 3.

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Tags: AIK, Ben Mack, blogs, culture, football, Helsingborgs IF, IF Elfsborg, Linnaeus University, Malmö FF, sports, study abroad, Sweden, Syrianska, The Local, United States, violence
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The science of Swede-ification

Monday, April 25th, 2011

Eight months. 243 days. 5832 hours. 349,920 minutes. 20,995,200 seconds. I’ve been in Sweden that long, and it’s taken all that time for me to realize something more profound than the fact that Lady Gaga is actually, ahem, a lady.

A change has occurred in me, and I don’t really know why or how. But I know that my entire outlook has been altered by it.

I no longer see myself as a “foreigner” in Sweden. Sure, I’m here on a student via and, sure, I’m only here for a limited period of time (for now). And sure, I probably wouldn’t have been here in the first place if it wasn’t for a partnership between Linnaeus University and University Studies Abroad Consortium, a group which my home university (Boise State) is a member of.

But here I am. I’ve gone from a nervous, impressionable young man to a confident, slightly less impressionable young man.

I’ve become more comfortable with Swedish culture each and every day, letting it seep into the very marrow of my bones and permeate my entire existence. And when I went home for three weeks for Christmas I found – to my utter surprise – that I felt out of place in the culture I grew up in. Those feelings were instantly dispelled when I returned to the land of lingonberries.

Maybe it’s the fact that, since I’ve been here, I’ve made it a point of spending as much time with Swedes as possible, or studied Swedish until my eyes were redder than a strawberry. When I spoke last Sunday with the editor-in-chief of my home university’s student newspaper via Skype, it was the most English I’d spoken in a week.

It’s even gotten to the point where I defend my adopted country with the same vigor I defend Pie Hole as the best pizza joint in Idaho.

Recently, my ex-roommate invited me to dinner in his new flat, when one of his buddies offered his opinion after I proclaimed sill is just one of many Swedish foods I love.

To be honest, his decidedly anti-Swedish culinary tastes were actually rather funny, until he started making accusations against Swedish society as a whole so hateful that Hermann Goering would’ve cringed. One charge was that women in Sweden have so many rights they don’t know what to do with them, and that allowing gay marriage will ultimately doom society.

To gain experience in both journalism and life, it’s helpful to talk to people from an array of nations, people with every kind of personality and enough people to span the breadth of emotion from abject sorrow to riotous humor. But sometimes you need to take a stand and defend the things you believe in.

I asked him to back up his claims. He said he didn’t feel the need to get out a “dictionary” and look it up for me. I insinuated that his IQ divided by his shoe size would equal one. He suggested I shut up. I felt my inner radio talk show host rise. I told him I was glad to have met him, in that you don’t often get to see the depths humans can achieve.

“You want to shake my hand?” he said, offering it.

“No, but I’d like to spit in it,” I replied.

“If you do,” he said, “they’ll have to call the police to pull me off you.”

“Take a hike, motherf—–,” I said, reaching deep into my clever bag of names, “’cause it’ll take you all day.”

It went on wittily like that until I decided to leave. I know now I was wrong to confront him, for two reasons: 1) it’s impolite to call someone names, and 2) the guy was a lot bigger than me.

Of course, 90% of guys like him also like to express their frustration at refusing to assimilate by blaming Swedes rather than themselves. How do I know this? Looked it up in a dictionary.

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Tags: Ben Mack, blogs, culture, Linnaeus University, Pie Hole, study abroad, Sweden, The Local, United States
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Match night madness, pt. 3

Monday, April 18th, 2011

The Ass was on the move. Or rather, THE Ass. He was a large, overly obnoxious Swedish man, and I loved him.

I was with my friend Martin at Olympia Stadium in Helsingborg and, as usual, I was waist-deep in confusion.

It was April 10, and I was at my first Allsvenskan – the highest division in Swedish football – match. Before the match even started, I was more wound up than Tea Partiers at an abortion clinic.

I had been to Superattan matches in Växjö – and even seen the national team play – but I had never seen anything like the madness that is Helsingborgs IF – If Elfsborg.

The whole day had an eerie Heaven-Hell vibe to it: Helsingborg itself was one of the most beautiful cities I had ever seen in my life (truly, the harbor is a sight not to be missed), but the match itself filled me with feelings of hatred I never knew I had, much less for a team who prior to my friend purchasing tickets a few weeks earlier I had never even heard of.

But there I was, in the madness of it all. Martin and I took our seats, and for 30 seconds all seemed calm. Then the drama began to unfold.

Drums. There were drums in the distance. Sudden, booming, they reverberated throughout the bowl-shaped stadium and back into the sea air, wafting about in a thunderous loop. Chants soon followed, and suddenly I saw an explosion.

As any good journalist would do, I whipped out my camera and started taking photos. What was happening? Was this a riot? There were more explosions, followed by throngs of people waving banners and marching in unison.

These were the Kärnan, Martin told me, the most fanatic Helsingborg supporters. They were entering the stadium with their usual ostentatious show of force, and we were standing right in their section.

Within minutes, we were surrounded.

A sea of red and blue flags surrounded us, flapping through the air seemingly held aloft by the roar of the 12,000+ in attendance. The insanity was all around us, and there was no way out.

And in the middle of it all was the Ass. His voice rose above the others, leading them on, setting the tone which the entire stadium mimicked. He seemed crazy, deranged, a horrible caricature of the leader of a mob and all that is morally reprehensible about humanity.

But I loved him. He whipped the crowd into a frenzy with masterful execution, and for every vulgar chant he started, I found myself joining in. When the fired-up masses began to make fun of the city (Borås) Elfsborg was from, I participated with just as much fervor.

The Ass and his mob had taken hold of me, and wouldn’t let me go. And I wouldn’t have had it any other way.

I was glad before leaving campus back in Växjö that Martin had advised me not to wear my Swedish national team jersey: a seething distaste for anything relating to the mainstream government was clearly evident, culminating in the unfurling of a giant blood red Skåne flag during player introductions instead of the Swedish flag, and the singing of the club anthem instead of the national anthem.

The entire stadium seemed to vibrate with the ebb and flow of the game. For the whole 90 minutes the deafening roar never let up. Like waves pounding against the coast, the sound crashed against me time and time again. Though I could feel my throat tearing as I screamed at the top of my lungs, I couldn’t even hear myself.

It was official: I had lost all emotional control. Shameful as it is to say, if the frenzied mob had decided to storm out and set the entire city ablaze, I probably would have joined in.

Somewhere in the midst of all this decidedly unwholesome frivolity bordering on violent flashpoint was a football match, but in the heat of the moment the fact escaped me. While I managed to join in the celebration when Helsingborg scored to start the second half, and joyously jeered when Elfsborg missed a potential equalizing penalty shot late, these actions were more or less involuntary actions stemming from a severe case of mob-induced sports psychosis.

To my surprise, the match concluded with little disruption. The roar slowly died down, and supporters slowly made their exit – not in one massed army, but in small groups of twos and threes.

Gradually my mental state began to return to normal. I turned to Martin.

“Was that the craziest match ever, or what?” I asked in my usual very broken, very American-sounding Swedish.

“Actually, it’s usually a lot louder,” he told me in a precise British accent so perfect it took me a moment to remember he wasn’t actually a Brit. “Most of the time we’re much more enthusiastic.”

Lord knows what would have happened to me if it had been one of those other times.

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Tags: Ben Mack, blogs, culture, football, Helsingborgs IF, IF Elfsborg, Kärnan, Linnaeus University, Olympia Stadium, Skåne, study abroad, Sweden, The Local
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One life to live

Saturday, April 9th, 2011

When it comes to wild weekends – and trust me, in all my 21 years I’ve had some pretty nutty ones – I’ll just go on the record and say my self-judgment isn’t always the greatest. Like the time I decided on a whim to travel with a friend to rural Eastern Oregon, where we became lost in the high desert and spent the night in a trailer park that was later raided by the police. Or the time I went with some buddies to Washington State University for Halloween (never again will I wear bedsheets as a costume). Oh, and there’s also the time my ex-girlfriend and I decided to try our hand at camping in the woods.

But last weekend would have been the wildest. That’s the key phrase: would have.

But alas, things didn’t quite pan out. Let me explain.

My friend Nathan and I were hanging out on a Saturday night – engaged in the fine art of making pasta carbonera without a recipe – when suddenly he had an idea: we would go to Copenhagen, Denmark for the evening to eat some real food. We’d leave right then and there. No hotel reservations. No brushing our teeth first. And not even finishing cooking our pasta.

The idea was absolutely ridiculous. Of course I said yes.

We jumped on a bus to the train station in Växjö and promptly asked a ticket salesman for two tickets on the next train to Copenhagen. I could already smell the braised lamb or whatever ridiculously fancy dish whose name I couldn’t pronounce I was going to eat.

“Sorry,” the man said, “There aren’t any more trains tonight.” I asked if there were any going anywhere nearby, like Mälmö or Lund, hoping maybe we could, if worst came to worst, take a bus or hitchhike the rest of the way. Nothing.

I was crushed. No visit to the largest city in Scandinavia. No strange evening involving shifty go-betweens, shady fellow travelers, or the emergence of potentially embarrassing photos. And no dinner costing more than I could probably afford.

So we went back to Nathan’s apartment, demoralized, dejected, and dehydrated. But we weren’t defeated.

So why’s that, you ask? How could you possibly classify such an evening – the highlight of which ultimately was a spoiled pot of pasta – as anything but an absolute failure more historic than Enron or the collapse of the 2004 New York Yankees? Simple: it’s all a matter of perspective.

Yoda may have said “Do or do not, there is not try,” but I have to disagree. Part of life, of course, is living it. Nothing ventured, nothing gained. Risk. Reward. You know, the stuff those self-help gurus preach about on PBS specials and in seminars at airport hotels.

While being in Sweden may be an incredible adventure in and of itself, the adventure hasn’t ended simply because I’m here. The adventure is constantly unfolding, and every day is a new chapter. And likewise, my experiences here are part of the adventure known as life.

When you reflect on your life, most people want to say they had fun and memorable experiences. And since I don’t honestly know when I’ll be in Europe again, I don’t want to look back and say “I wish I did that.” We all have only one life to live, and I want to live mine.

So yeah, I didn’t make it to Copenhagen. But the attempt was an adventure. And besides, there’s always next weekend.

Or tonight.

BEN MACK/THE LOCAL - Going to football matches with friends is just one example of living life to the fullest. However, it's usually recommended to avoid streaking on the pitch.

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Tags: Ben Mack, blogs, Copenhagen, culture, Linnaeus University, Pasta carbonera, study abroad, Sweden, The Local, Växjö
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How I conquered the cold

Friday, April 1st, 2011

Spring. You know, the season with flowers, sunshine, and that certain holiday where people eat lots of chocolate eggs. In the U.S., it’s sometimes seen as a marker that the school year is coming to a close, adding yet another notch to stress levels already rivaling that of a computer whiz in any rural area.

But here in Sweden, spring means only one thing: I survived winter. If you’re reading this, you should know that I’m not dead. Ben 1, Mother Nature 0.

Somehow, I made it through the coldest temperatures I’ve ever dealt with in my life, getting lost in the woods twice, jumping into a frozen lake, and surviving more than a few long walks back to my on-campus apartment from Växjö’s city center. And in the process, I learned something about myself: if ever again in my life think I feel cold, I’ll just remember my time in Sweden.

Seriously, I don’t know how the Swedes do it. Six months of temperatures constantly below freezing, over a meter of snow on the ground, and eighteen hours of darkness in even the most southern part of the country: where I come from, we’d call it hell. I guess maybe, as Lady Gaga might put it, I wasn’t quite born this way.

By some miracle I made it. But boy, it wasn’t easy. Granted, everybody I knew back home warned me it’d be cold, but when I went jogging in October and my sweat actually froze to my forehead, I realized they were right. And the fact that I spent my summer in Boise, Idaho – where temperatures regularly reached 35 degrees Celsius – didn’t help. At times I feared I’d end up like Christopher McCandless in “Into the Wild,” the only difference being I was stuck in an apartment with no way to turn up the heat.

There’s a long list “thank yous” for helping me survive, including Eddie Bauer, Hennes & Mauritz, my Swedish friends, and of course coffee.

And a special thank you also goes to the inventor of the sauna. You sir, or madam, are a shining example of pure genius. Your invention saved me on more than a few occasions.

So with spring here, I can now celebrate my rebirth. A new “me” has emerged, one that knows if he didn’t decide to study abroad, he’d never have learned just how much the human body can endure.

Now I can actually look forward to walking the whole three minutes it takes to go from my bed to class. No more parkas. No more mittens. No more spending the first 20 minutes of class waiting for feeling to return to my fingers. And no more dreading the next day’s weather.

Now pass the Påskmust. Because I need to celebrate, and the last time I had adult beverages… well, you can ask the fellas at the local pool hall about that one.

BENJAMIN MACK/THE LOCAL

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Tags: Ben Mack, blogs, culture, ice, Linnaeus University, sauna, snow, spring, study abroad, Sweden, The Local, United States, weather
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What gives?

Saturday, March 26th, 2011

If you’ve never read anything I’ve written before – like most people with the exception of four guys named Joe and a hamster that lives in Abilene, Texas – know this: my mouth tends to get me into trouble. A lot. Really, even nationally syndicated talk show hosts named Beck, Rush, or O’Reilly don’t get into trouble as often as I tend to.

That being said, I’d like to say that people in Sweden should not, under any circumstances, own a chihuahua.

Go ahead, call me a hack. Call me heartless. Call me other things which can’t exactly be printed. I don’t care. Because when you truly believe in something, you need to stand up for it.

Just think about this: where do chihuahuas come from? That’s right, the state of Chihuahua – Northern Mexico. The desert. Last I checked, Sweden doesn’t have any cactuses, scorpions, rattlesnakes, chupacabras, or Dia de los Muertos.

But for some reason, many young college students in Växjö seem to think they make a great pet. And I agree – if only you didn’t live in one of the coldest countries on earth. I know global warming is a problem, but I don’t think you can fry an egg on the hood of your car around here like you can in Mexico.

C’mon people: this is absurd. Sure, you can try to justify the whole “my dog won’t freeze to death” thing by putting your virtually hairless canine in a goofy sweater – usually featuring an image of Mickey Mouse or the rather puzzling word “juicy” – but it still doesn’t make up for the fact that your pet is more out of place than Christina Aguilera at a nunnery, or yours truly at a fancy hotel.

Granted, I’ve seen some weird things in my life (a raccoon in my kitchen, some guy selling art made out of pizza boxes, Legoland, and the Phillie Phanatic), but I can assure you that this is beyond surreal. Heck, it makes even less sense than Tom Cruise jumping the couch, or Indiana Jones nuking the fridge.

If you have to have a dog in Sweden, and a small one at that, then try something like a Lhasa Apso. You know, something that actually has fur. Or a Jämthund, which I assume would be used to cold weather considering they’re Swedish.

So there you have it: I’ve laid my soul bare. Let’s use common sense, people. Virtually hairless dogs in cold, snowy places = massive veterinary bill waiting to happen, potential emotional crisis flashpoint for human owner and the next edition of Real Men of Genius.

Maybe I don’t understand this whole owning a pet the size of a teacup phenomenon because I’m not Swedish, or because I usually prefer my dogs to be able to adequately defend themselves if they come face-to-face with a seagull. Or maybe it’s because I’m, quite honestly, more of a cat person anyway.

All I can say is, what gives?

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Tags: Ben Mack, blogs, chihuahua, culture, dog, Linnaeus University, Mexico, study abroad, Sweden, The Local, United States
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Uh, this is Sweden, right?

Friday, March 18th, 2011

Unless you’ve been living under a rock – or come from the strange and faraway land known as Oregon – you probably know that it’s Lent, regardless of whether you’re Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist, another religion, non-religious, or worship the Flying Spaghetti Monster. While Lent may mean more different things than the Barry Bonds steroid investigation, the day before it begins – called “Fettisdagen” in Swedish – is usually seen as a time to celebrate, with parades, dancing, and drinking way too much. In other words, it’s Thomas S. Monson’s worst nightmare, or Paris Hilton’s dream.

Although New Orleans is much closer than Växjö, I’ve never actually experienced the pageantry of Mardi Gras until I came across the Atlantic. I know: in 21 years I have never worn a single pair of cheap plastic beads. Until now.

And I’ll be honest: I learned a lot. Among the more important revelations:

1. For some strange reason, many foreigners and Swedes seem to think that anything involving the word “party” means they should dress up in Halloween costumes. And when everyone else dresses up, you tend to do the same.

2. Semla buns are addictive. Really addictive. Hell, they’re even more addictive than my grandma’s peanut butter cookies, something which I previously thought was impossible.

3. The more alcohol Swedes consume the more they speak Swenglish, a hodge-podge reminiscent of the Mets pitching staff. If you ask melancholy linguistic experts, it’s the reason why Swedish will become a dead language.

Okay, so I’ve heard that the global culture is spreading, that thanks to innovations like the Internet and Rice Krispies you can now find anything, anywhere. But when you celebrate an originally Italian holiday by wearing a Nigerian costume while eating Swedish and Mexican food on plates made in Hungary with silverware from China while partying with Germans, Dutch, French, Finns, Koreans, Norwegians, Swedes, Canadians, and Romanians, you know it’s true.

Though I should probably repent one of these days for all I’ve done in my life, exposing myself to new cultures doesn’t quite make the list. Besides, if it wasn’t for global culture and Frommer’s Travel Guides I’d probably still think that all Swedes eat herring, listen to ABBA, and only smile at a funeral. And Swedes, likewise, would never have gotten their semla in the first place.

I’m sure that won’t earn me any brownie points from Svenska Motståndsrörelsen.

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Tags: Ben Mack, blogs, culture, Fettisdagen, Lent, Linnaeus University, semla, study abroad, Sweden, The Local, United States
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Why Swedes say F$%#! on television

Wednesday, March 9th, 2011

BENJAMIN MACK/THE LOCAL - Compared to its American counterpart, Swedish television features less censorship. Some foreigners find this shocking for a country which until 2011 had the world's oldest film censorship laws, dating back to 1897.

Think back to the most shocking thing you’ve ever seen or heard in your life. Before you decide you finally should call your lawyer about that column written by a certain Idaho college student, let me share my experiences with Swedish television, possibly the most shocking thing since Plaxico Burress decided to bring a gun to a nightclub.

Though I tend to consume media with the voracity of Scooby-Doo at a Hostess factory, anyone who knows me can attest that I’ve never exactly been a big TV guy. But it was one of those lazy Sundays – you know, the kind where you should be doing something productive like studying or trying to replace a carburetor – and I really didn’t feel like doing anything. Even getting up to microwave a bowl of popcorn was too much.

So there I was, mindlessly flipping through all seven channels offered on Swedish analog TV. Within a few short minutes, I realized that anything that had been popular in the U.S. three years ago is now all the rage in Scandinavia. The lineup consisted of – I kid you not – such one-hit wonders as “Top Chef” that are now relegated to late-night premium cable.

I finally settled on “Family Guy,” deciding it was a little better than watching brightly dressed people ski down a mountain, British people with an eerie resemblance to Roger Moore debate the meaning of life, or even some Swedish guy salt fish by a lake.

Despite my best efforts to keep up with cartoon irreverence, I found myself falling asleep. Just trying to read the Swedish subtitles at the bottom of the screen was too exhausting. I was fading faster than the New York Giants defense in the fourth quarter.

But suddenly something caught my attention. Or rather, a single word. It was four letters long, and started with an F. I leaped to attention.

I’d worked with student radio back at Boise State, and remembered being told on my very first day that such an utterance would immediately elicit a fine of several thousand dollars, and the eternal hatred of the semi-secret society known as the FCC.

Maybe I was just hearing things, I thought. There was simply no way profanity on TV would be allowed in such a “polite” society as Sweden. It had to be my body’s way of telling me I needed coffee.

But a few minutes later I heard it again. I hadn’t imagined it. They actually cursed on television. I was stunned.

I decided to investigate this phenomenon further. If I were back in high school, my parents would have killed me.

My investigation revealed the following results: cursing, nudity, and virtually all other forms of otherwise indecent behavior are perfectly acceptable on Swedish TV. Heck, even the occasional racial slur is alright. You know, the kind that got Don Imus yanked off the radio.

Ladies and gentlemen, this is downright shocking – especially in a country which, until this year, had the world’s oldest film censorship laws (dating back to 1897).

Yeah, it takes some getting used to. But then again, so did the Internet, Frank Sinatra’s death, and $3 a gallon gas. It’s just the way things are.

So to all foreign visitors to Sweden, let me say this: watch some TV. It’ll definitely keep you on your toes. Or at least give new meaning to the word “uncensored.”

Who needs Cinemax?

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Tags: Ben Mack, blogs, culture, Linnaeus University, media, study abroad, Sweden, television, The Local, United States
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Ice and death

Wednesday, March 2nd, 2011

Ever since I was a child I’ve had a penchant for over-dramatizing things, making even the most ordinary days sound like they came straight from one of the “Die Hard” movies. And since I’ve been in Sweden, I’ll admit that I’ve sometimes made things sound much more extraordinary than they really are.

But when I say jumping into a frozen lake recently was one of the dumbest things I’ve ever done, I’m not kidding.

In my usual flair for theatrics, I thought leaping into an ice-coated body of water wearing only a bathing suit would be a great thing to write about. While that’s debatable, one thing I can say is I have never known cold like the waters of Lake Helgasjön.

And mind you, I’ve dealt with below-zero temperatures on more than a few occasions.

Nothing has ever come close to the cold I had to endure, a numbing of the body so intense it even made my last breakup – which caught me so much by surprise I had just gotten out of the shower when it happened – seem enjoyable by comparison.

But I also have a weakness for not being able to say no to things. Some friends wanted to travel to Yellowstone for Spring Break, spending a week with nothing but freezing temperatures and grizzly bears. I said yes. When Girl Scouts appeared at my door last summer selling cookies, of course I bought some. And when my host family, the Nordmarks, invited me to their “summer” house for the day, I couldn’t refuse.

With the exception of trying to retrieve the head of a drill used to make holes in ice that had fallen into the lake – by ingeniously attaching a magnet on the end of a string – most of the day was going pretty normally by Swedish standards.

We were sitting in the sauna my host father Lennart had built several years earlier, losing large amounts of weight in temperatures well above 100 Celsius, when he proposed something radical: a dip into the lake. I laughed; there was no way he was serious.

But then I saw his face. He wasn’t joking. In that instant I knew this wasn’t going to end well, like my last visit to the barbershop.

Crazy as it was, I couldn’t exactly say no. I often crave attention, and this would definitely get me more than just a little of it. Plus, I didn’t want to give the impression that Americans were wimps. The hopes of a nation of over 300 million people were riding on me. It was my patriotic duty to do this. For some reason I suddenly had images of the fall of the Roman Empire.

I slipped on some flip-flops, threw on my bathrobe, and plunged into the blinding light shining through the open door and out into the subarctic air.

Lennart took the lead, sprinting to the hole we had sawed earlier in 40 centimeter-thick ice. He hopped in without missing a beat. Within seconds, he was out.

Now it was my turn. I said a silent prayer.

“You don’t have a heart problem do you?” Lennart asked through chattering teeth, breath more visible than Charlie Sheen’s alcoholism.

For perhaps the first time in human history, I actually wished I did.

I disrobed, already shivering. I threw off my flip-flops, and leaped in. I was genuinely surprised my life didn’t flash before my eyes, or think about that within a couple of seconds I might very well find out if there’s an afterlife.

The cold hit me with the equivalent force of a Lawrence Taylor sack. Blasting, penetrating, all-encompassing. “Bone-chilling” didn’t even begin to describe it.

My body was shutting down. I needed to get out faster than Pete Rose at the Four Seasons.

Summoning my last reserves of strength, I exploded out of the water. For the first time in my life I actually saw what the benefits of being on swim teams for more than 10 years were.

Almost slipping on the ice, I threw on my robe, grabbed my shoes and ran back to the sauna. If only the Guinness World Records people had been on hand.

Feeling was just beginning to return to my body after near-death encounter No. 413 of my life when Lennart walked in.

“It’s cold, isn’t it?” he said of the lake.

“Not as cold as I thought it would be,” I lied.

If Pinocchio had been in my place, his nose would have reached all the way to Norway.

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Tags: Ben Mack, blogs, culture, ice, Linnaeus University, sauna, study abroad, summer house, Sweden, The Local, United States
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