Week Five, August 25th-September 1st: Scouterna, Skies, and Smiles!

Hej!

This will be a pretty short post as not much happened this week!

I stated off the week at school, which was a normal day! I attached a photo of one of my school lunches which put American school's food to SHAME! All the food is homemade within the school, it's free, and you are allowed as much as you'd like.

Monday night, though, my host sister took me to my first Scout meeting! Scouterna, or Scouts, is the national scouting and guiding organization of Sweden. I am in my local town Scouterna, with both boys and girls, different from Girl and Boy Scouts in the states. Scouterna is divided in five age groups;

• Spårarscout (Tracker Scout) — ages 8 to 10

• Upptäckarscout (Discoverer Scout) — ages 10 to 12

• Äventyrsscout (Adventurer Scout) — ages 12 to 15

• Utmanarscout (Challenger Scout) — ages 15 to 18

• Roverscout (Rover Scout) — ages 19 to 25

As I am just about to turn 17, I am in the Utmanarscout, or Challenger Scout. The younger groups mainly focus on scouting and guiding, but as you get older, it becomes more of a social place to hang out. Meetings happen every Monday night at a center around a 10 minute walk from my house! It is not required to go to every meeting, but I do my best to attend as many as I can!

For my first meeting we met at a park by a lake to roast s'mores and hangout! It was so much fun, and I got to meet so many amazing people who immediately made me feel welcomed.

This week I also cooked my first meal here in Sweden! My eldest host sister helped me to make pizza dough and they got to 'decorate' their own pizza's! It was so much fun to be able to cook for the first time since coming to Sweden! Eventually, I will be cooking dinner at least once or twice a week! I'm super excited to share some Midwest meals with my host family. Any suggestions on what I should make them?

I also hung out with the other exchange students here in Stockholm, like we usually do. We see each other at least once a week, if not more! This week we went shopping and got some dinner. There was a small group of us, but it was nice to see each other and go out!

It also rained for a couple days straight here in Stockholm! This was the last of what they call 'summer rain', as Autumn is soon approaching!

Overall, this week was good - quite a slow week which is always nice.

New Swedish words & phrases I've learned:

• Övning - Exercise/Practice

• Ha det bra - Have a good time!

• Ska - Will

• Skulle - Should

• Första - First

• Bil - Car

• Mobil - Phone

• Fredag - Friday

Talk in a week!

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