Midsummer

Today it is Midsummer in Sweden - one of the most important - no, THE most important holiday in Sweden. I didn't celebrate it last year either. To me the yearly goose dinner with the family is more important, for that I travel up to Sweden. But midsummer normally means cold weather anyhow - high expectations and often not getting as much out of it as everybody expected. Plus I want to meet as many as possible when I travel to Sweden and Midsummer everybody is out of town anyhow.

And I didn't move away from Sweden to keep doing all the typical Swedish things. It is fun to keep some traditions or at least take the nice parts of them and incorporate them into new traditions, but I don't see why I should keep doing it "as it was always done". Now I pick up what I really enjoy - like the "Fika". And the buffet for Christmas - but in new ways. And yes, I will also eat herring and fresh potatoes in the summer, like a real Swede. And queue when needed...

I was stopped by a colleague yesterday saying "But what are you doing here". I stared at her and didn't understand what she meant at first. And then she said "You should be in Sweden now. It is midsummer tomorrow".

It is a sweet thought but I refer to what I just say: I didn't leave Sweden so I could continue to do everything the Swedish way - although it is kind of funny to say that here in Germany, because so many Germans are trying to do things "the Swedish way", there are many with some sort of "Sweden fetishism" here, people who dream about moving to Sweden, people spending holiday every year in Sweden, people studying Swedish - among them my colleague. I don't really know why Germans are so keen on Sweden, but they are. Not all, but a lot of them are. I guess it has to do with two things: The nature (and how EMPTY it is in some areas, at least empty when it comes to people) and the fact that our queen is German Brazilian (or German, if you ask the Germans) and that is the closest to having their own royal family that they get) and the King of Sweden met his wife since 34 years in Munich (München) in Germany, during the Olympics 1972...

Anyhow: Yes, Sweden is my home country, it is beautiful - but personally I am done with living in Sweden. I will still visit, and you can't take Sweden out of a Swede, not completely, even if trying. And I will always be proud of my home country. But no, I am not going to try and live as if I was still in Sweden - that was not the purpose of my move.

But I will still do goose dinners.