All is well here at the little taste of Sweden we call Sjölunden, as we approach the end of a truly wonderful session. You can just begin to feel the buzz of conclusion in the air, with portfolios due Tuesday and our Slutterminsprov (final) on Wednesday, followed by our Studenten (Swedish-style graduation) that very evening. Yes, you can indeed feel in in the air, the scent of pencil shavings and Sharpies mingling with the beginnings of an emotional stormfront about to bring a mess of teary farwells come Saturday.  

And then there's the storm currently raging, a mixture of stress, minor exhaustion, motivation, and as always, pure awesomeness (because this is 

Sjölunden, afterall) that results in such moments as this:  (Mia, in a rare moment of repose) 

 And then there's this gem, in which Nils appears to have cracked (but that's just Nils)

However, to say that the ledare have not also been affected would be false, as you can see by this picture, in which Saga smiles bravely for the camera. 

All in all, things are going all right here, as all the studenter forge on through courses in life skills as well as Swedish skills, whether through lessons in personal responsibility or past tense conjugation. And here we sit, connected by more than just language or shared living spaces, connected by something that encompasses all of us in this moment. Not sleep deprivation, or the fact that we may never have been  friends in the real world, but something that is happening here and now, something that has been happening for the past four weeks. I don't know if there's a precise word for it, but the phrase "enkel gladje" comes to mind. 

I believe I need to go to bed now. 

~ Elvy 

Hejsan!  My name is Kerstin and it is my day to blogg!

As usual, we began the day with classes, but we also had Fika!

During Kultur, we finished watching the film Winter Light, which was directed by Ingmar Bergman!

Hej alla! My name is Kasper and it's my turn to take a swing at the "plog" (picture-blog, I know, super clever) life.

At camp today we had Jul, commonly known to most of the world who don't speak Swedish as Christmas. We always

have Santa Lucia the night before, and we credits help out with the festivities. One of the girl credits dresses up to

portray Sankta Lucia, while all the other credits and some of the counselors follow behind singing songs about Sankta

Lucia and Jul. After a hearty breakfast this morning, we were told our koola kompisar. "Koola Kompisar" is a small thing

where each credit student is paired with 2 or 3 two-weekers, so that the two-weekers have someone to talk to if they need

help or want a friend to talk to/look up to. Here is a short collection of some of the credits and their kompisar.

Above are some of the credit girls and there koola kompisar.

Here is a picture of some of the guys. Nils is looking pretty fly if I say so myself.

Kerstin and her two-weekers.

Vivvi and co.

Max getting to know his kompisar.

Sander finding out a little more about his kompisar.

Myself (in the sunglasses) and my kompisar Oliver and Alrik.

Tekla gets to know her kompisar.

They're all becoming close already!

3 guys having a good time!

Here is the Jul tree, just one of many things used to promote our celebration of Jul here at Sjölunden.

Here is the choir intresse.

Plugga plugga plugga (study). It's all we credits do (not really).

This year for dinner we sat together with our cabins, which was a first for us. So I thought I should get a picture of all the cabins while they were eating (though I forgot my own.....)

Visby (the credit girls).

Rymdstryelse (2 week boys)

Skolverket (2 week girls)

Kulturrådet (2 week girls)

Dramatiska Institutet (2 week girls)

Jul was such a fun day and I can't wait for all the other activities that are coming up, like Midsommar and Restaurang Kväll.

Camp is definitely one of my favorite places in the world, and I can't wait to come back next year!

Hej då alla!

~ Kasper

Hej alla! 

Today was another great day at Sjölunden! We had wonderful weather and interesting classes. Also, everyone is making pretty good progress on their portfolios. 

We had a fun time in mode (fashion) intresse today. We sketched outfits and talked about what we want to do for our Swedish fashion project that's going to be permanently displayed at the ASI. We also watched another Swedish fashion show.

Another interesting thing that happened today was our kvällsprogram. It started this morning at around 7:45, when whistles were blown and we were told to get to breakfast be 8:30, which is what some stugor do already, but Visby usually gets to breakfast a half hour later. The whistles were really startling to sleeping people, but it was a highly effective way to wake us up. Once at the breakfast line, we were split into two groups. One group got to go and have breakfast right away, and  the other group (that I was in) was told to go downstairs to the classrooms. After a long wait, we were ushered into separate classrooms and given a test. After we finished or time ran out, we were allowed up to breakfast. This trend of unfairness continued all day. The people in the discriminated group were told to go to the back of lines, change seats when eating, and they were constantly questioned and asked to show their passports. By the end of the day, many people were on the edge.

During the kvällsprogram, we were split into groups and we talked about what had been going on all day. Some people were more upset by it than others. We talked about discrimination. Discrimination is something you are usually born into. Discriminatory people have been taught that superior line of thinging by their society. People who are discriminated against realize how horrible it is and they know how much it hurts them, but they know there's really nothing they can do about it. I guess the lesson I learned is that everyone needs to try to be an individual and think for themselves and be aware of what's really going on. 

Sweet dreams everyone! 

~ Katja Stenkil:)

Hej alla! Today is my day to plogg! Today is Wednesday. 

After breakfast of the credits go to class for an hour. I am in Tyra's class. 

For kultur we have a special guest speaker, Torsten. He is telling us about Ingmar Bergman, the famous movie and play writer. It is really fun and interesting to listen to. We also watched a couple of clips from some of his movies. 

Then we had lunch, which was good. Also, there was a special celebration. It was Elin's namnsdag (name day). 

 During long fritid there was a big mystery....... someone robbed the kiosk! A car drove in to camp and 2 people got out and ran into the kiosk and grabbed all of the bon-bons. 

Then  we have stugtid. Where everyone goes back to their cabins and talks with their cabin mates. Also we get our mail during this time. 

After stugtid we have class and time to work on our portfolios. Many people are working on their portfolio's because they are due in less than a week! 

Then the whole camp gets together and lowers the flag for the night. We sing Du gamla du fria while we lower the flag. 

At dinner we always have a great time with eachother and with the counselors. For dessert there was lemon mousse and some of us got a little carried away with it, Kasper especially. 

Then we have allsång which is super fun. We sing so many awesome Swedish songs. Then we have kvällsprogram. Last night we were all Italian families and we had to go around camp and do different fun tasks for clues. The family with the most clues won. My family, Sverker got 5 clues and we won!! 

After the kvällsprogram we have our repitition class and a pluggcafe, we go back our stugas to sleep. :)

All of the credits are having so much fun together. It is so awesome here. 

With love from Sjölunden

~ Elsie 

It was the first whole day of the new session and there is certainly a different atmophere this time around. Sjölunden is not as cozy this session but it is full of life. With many familiar faces and some new ones as well it will surely be an exciting two weeks. 

In credit news, we are have a special guest for our Kultur Klass. His name is Torsten and he was the Dean på Sjölunden in between Linda and Pia. He is teaching us about Ingmar Bergman. He makes the class interesting because he is so enthusiastic about the subject. For most of the week we will be watching Winter Light.

We also started our new intresse aktiviteter idag. The different activities are kör (choir), segling,  mode (fashion), kanot (canoing), dalmoning, och vavning. I am in the fashion intresse and we will be putting together a project that will be displayed at ASI. We also watch swedish fashion shows. After that we have fritid and the stugtid where, if you live in Visby you basically play with ballons in the loft and talk about food and the weather.

During allsång we experienced a missing person drill where the counselors go running to find out what happened and the campers are gathered for attendance in the matsal and then we sing songs until the person is found. Luckily it was just a drill.

We ended the day by going with our families and traveling by boat from one coast of Sweden to the other. For one of the stations we were required to dress up for Lucia. 

~ Tekla

Hej alla, jag skriver om förra veckan för att jag var jätte upptagen med min portfolio.

The two-weekers arrived last Monday, and they're all really friendly, many of them have been gone to Sjölunden for many years. I've gotten to know many of the girls that are in sailing, which I've been taking for the last week and a half because sailing is by far the most exciting intresse in my opinion. We're watching a really cool movie right now called Play, so far I like it, although it's pretty slow. It's about life in Sweden and it focuses on a goup of Swedish kids and some immigrant kids that have been bullying people. Oh and Torsten (pretty sure he used to be dean) came last week and taught us all about Ingemar Bergman, which was really interesting. We watched some clips and a movie of his. Here's an picture of one, I'm not sure if anyone uploaded this before:

Anyways, that's about it.

<3 Mia/Hannah

Hey alla! My name is Lars and it's my turn to write for the day! (Sorry but I didn't take any Selfies.) 

I plogged over lediga helgen, or off weekend. On off weekend we can speak English at meal times, we get our contraband back, and we get a lot of free time.

On Saturday we had the Bachman lunch where we ate Swedish hotdogs with mashed potatoes. Two ten year villagers, Jens and Sanders also gave speeches about what it is like to return to Sjölunden year after year. 

We also threw a huge rager (think J Gatsby meets Project X) in the dansbarn and we invited the Spanish camp, El Lago de Bosque. 

Next morning we drove into Bemidji to wash our clothes, watch a movie, and purchase (almost) anything at Target. 

Here is the credit class posing next to Paul Bunyan!

~ Lars

 Friday started with reviewing for our mitterminsprov in Kärnklass. Here is one of our wonderful teachers, Astrid, in Östermalm.

Here I am at Fika with one of our kökspersonal, Marianna.

In Samhällsämne my class is working on our big project, to create a video of differences in Swedish culture such as table settings, manners, and other social differences. My subject is bordsskick/placeringar.

in Kultur we are thinking up ideas for our Minnesmärke organization projects.

Friskis och Svettis Intresse! Yoga time.

Time for mitterminsprov!

Flagghalning

Sten, Tage and Janne during Middag.

Practicing for föräldrars programmet.

 Finally, we ended the night with a disco to celebrate surviving our tests and the beginning of lediga helgen!! Also happy 10 months to min pojkvän, Zach :)

-Ida Inga

Hej Alla!  My name is Gabriella and today is my day to blog about camp life.  

This morning, we started something new at camp.  Below is our Twitter wall.  

All the credits made a twitter name and all of us can write out tweets on strips 

of paper and tape them to the wall.  Tack to Saga for the great idea!

(Tweet at me !  @gabs_ ;))

A tradition for Torsdag (Thursday) at camp is to eat pea soup and Swedish pancakes for lunch. 

The food is always amazing here, but we especially love it on Thursdays.  We have the best cooks ever!  

Credit students get to work somewhere around camp once or twice.

Today I got to work with Elin in the kiosk (our camp store).  

Other than that today was a pretty normal day here at camp.

We're having fun and learning lots! 

~ Gabriella