BaroqueW

First you need to be aware that fondue comes from Switzerland. Not the chocolate fondue either, but real proper cheese fondue. Yes, “fondue” is a French word. Do you know what language they speak in Switzerland? French! Learn something new every day.

That said, you will need a few things for your fondue.

• A Swiss earthenware fondue pot, preferably with red and white decorations with accompanying fondue forks
• Real Swiss cheese, not American cheese that’s labeled “Swiss” just because it has holes in it
• People speaking French with cute Swiss accents

Kidnapping tends to be frowned upon in today’s society, so cultivating friendships with Swiss people would probably be helpful. KTH campus is a good place to find them (well, it worked for me anyway). Then you can be lazy and hope that they provide the other vital ingredients, muhahahaha.

Baroquew and I managed to succeed in being invited to a fondue dinner hosted by Grégoire and Angela, who you may remember from my adventures in flying. While standing slightly out of the way watching wine be

poured onto the cheese in the fondue pot on the stove, like an alcoholic sacrifice to the cheese gods, I realized that I had no idea what fondue really was, except something involving dipping something into something. Very vague. But apparently it’s not just a bygone of the 60s and 70s and the age of key parties when people really shared everything.

Instead it comes from Swiss townspeople who ran out of fresh foods in the winter months, and needed to liven up their stale breads and dried out cheeses. Sounds tasty, right? Well if you’re going to be picky about it, who was the first person who looked at a cow and said “Hey, how about I squeeze the juice out of that and let it rot in a dark room for months before I eat it?” People make due with what they can, and sometimes they get really good at it. So wine, garlic, and other spices were added and together a community ate out of one pot to symbolically show community spirit.

Of course, we have new traditions now: such as how to punish the person who loses their bread in the cheese, or how to fight miniature battles over the last scrapings of cheese. Your new Swiss friends (and French ones as well, they can’t resist cheese and will show up immediately) will be happy to explain the details and go into fond reminisces of other fondue dinners. The tricky part is getting them to do it in English.

Also, one must remember never to react when visiting a student corridor and being given a large mixing bowl to make tea in. Much like the colonizers of the fondue frontier, students are geniuses when it comes to making do with what they have and doing it very well.

My thanks to Grégoire and Angela for inviting us for proper Swiss fondue. It was surprisingly delicious even to my untutored American palate. Bread and cheese has never tasted so good, or been so fun to eat.

May 20th, 2007 | Tags: Cooking |

Category: Articles in English, Blog | Comments (5)

Après avoir mis en ligne la traduction anglaise des paroles de Caramelldansen (suédois) grâce à Nikkitaa, voilà la version française !

Nous nous demandons si vous êtes prêts à nous rejoindre
Nous voulons voir des bras levés
Allez
Tout le monde est le bienvenu

Alors bougez vos pieds
Oa-a-a
Et faites bouger vos hanches
Oa-a-a
Faites comme nous
Sur cette mélodie

Dansez avec nous
Tapez dans vos mains
Faites comme nous
Faites quelques pas à gauche
Écoutez et apprenez
Ne manquez pas cette chance
Nous sommes là avec
La Caramel Dance
O-o-oa-oa…

Ça fera sensation partout, vous comprenez
À des soirées où tout le monde va se déchaîner
Allez
On reprend les pas encore une fois

Alors bougez vos pieds
Oa-a-a
Et faites bouger vos hanches
Ola-la-la
Faites comme nous
Sur cette mélodie

Allez
Dansez avec nous
Tapez dans vos mains
Faites comme nous
Faites quelques pas à gauche
Écoutez et apprenez
Ne manquez pas cette chance
Nous sommes là avec
La Caramel Dance

Dansez avec nous
Tapez dans vos mains
Faites comme nous
Faites quelques pas à gauche
Écoutez et apprenez
Ne manquez pas cette chance
Nous sommes là avec
La Caramel Dance

May 20th, 2007 | Tags: Musique, video, Web |

Category: Articles en français, Blog, Musique | Leave a comment

Comme vous avez sans doute pu le lire dans la presse en ligne, vient d’être lancée une oeuvre littéraire en ligne, faite de textes fragmentés permettant un libre parcours rompant avec le schéma traditionnel des livres. C’est à voir sur http://www.3espaces.com/

May 18th, 2007 | Tags: Web |

Category: Articles en français, News, Tech >> Computer | Leave a comment

I have very little (read null) interest in politics. Nevertheless, I was intrigued by an offer to visit the Swedish Parliament (Riksdagen) and have a free tour. I let myself be lured in, while swearing I wouldn’t turn to the dark side and become a politics fanatic.

BaroqueW and I showed up early on Saturday (the 5th of May, although it shames me to say I’ve put off writing this article that long) outside of the building in Gamla Stan. Typical of Sweden, there was construction going on so it was a bit messy and confusing. According to the building entrance, we were in the right place – main entrance. There was also a small entrance to one side that was nearly a funnel with construction creating a narrow tunnel with rough wooden planks to carry us “safely” over ditches. That entrance was supposed to be for guided tours, but it was small, cramped and no one was there. So we decided to camp out on the steps like hobos and surreptitiously check out other students who showed up for the tour.

Once in a while people would surge to the left, in the discovery of the secondary entrance… like sheep being led to the slaughter. It was extremely amusing. 8 people trapped in a tunnel because the last person can’t hear that the first person is saying that it’s a locked door never fails to amuse.

Eventually the woman who had sent us the email making the offer showed up, and complained that we should have been twice as many people. But I’m glad that we weren’t, because some of the rooms we were shown were quite small and I don’t think 30 people would have been able to comfortably view them. Like this lovely picture shows, of a committee room where apparently the “real” decisions are made.

Parliament

That leads us to the actual tour, which was actually quite fascinating. Important things to know: Sweden is a democracy, and not the Russian kind of democracy but an actual democracy with voting and all that entails. Swedes are also extremely fanatic about all things being a matter of public record, so when you vote for someone or for a political party, you can see what THEY in turn vote for when they’re in office. Every member sits at a special assigned desk where they press buttons to vote on issues. The vote shows up both immediately on the wall in the room, and is recorded as well for the public records. No one can say that they’ll vote one way and then do something else without everyone knowing it. There is a special section to the back of the room for the media to stand in, as well as two glass walled rooms to each side for reporters and with balconies for photographers to stand on. Big brother is being watched.

There are 349 individuals elected every four years, which is a throw back from the days when there were two parties in constant clash with each other. So the original 350 created the possibility of 175 members from each party who were in permanent discord with each other who, just on the principle of the thing, refused to agree with each other which made getting anything done impossible.

Each constituency’s number of fixed representatives is calculated on the population within the constituency. Unlike many other parliaments, they aren’t seated according to their political ideology but rather by their constituency. It leaves everyone very mixed up and a left-wing member can easily be sitting next to a right-wing member. The party members are also required to spend 3 days a week in Stockholm, and 4 within their constituency. The people who live more than 50km from Stockholm
are entitled to 7000sek in addition to their basic salary of 49,200sek (before tax.. yes, they pay tax) – per month – to make up for their needing to stay overnight in Stockholm for those 3 days.

It’s a cushy job with cushy seats.

That’s about as deeply interested as I got in that lecture. But you could get more information and details from Riksdagen’s Webpage.

The building itself looked quite nice. We had it entirely to ourselves.

They didn’t even have us followed by security guards. You’d never see 10 foreign students walking with only one small tour guide through an empty government building in USA or France. The only concession to security was the requirement that we store our bags in lockers before we started the tour. The only security guards we saw were in the lobby and actually drinking coffee and eating donuts (or something in the gist of the Swedish “fika”) in the best of stereotyped Hollywood tradition. They paid very little attention to us except perhaps a node and a smile.

The upper floor made from steel and glass was in stark contrast to the original parts of the building. They have a beautiful view of Stockholm as well as a clean fresh look. The painting hanging in the main chamber looks a little faded, but is meant to be a fantasy picture that all members of Riksdag can relate to. It’s representative of an older Sweden that strived to blend in and be as unobtrusive as possible. But modern day Sweden is starting to be learn to be proud of it’s heritage, and our guide seemed particularly proud to tell us that newly formed government of Belarus sent a delegation to Sweden in order to mirror their own parliament after Sweden’s organization.

I probably learned more about Swedish politics and the political system on this day than I learned total through conversation, media, and my various Swedish classes.

I’ve maintained my political isolation and still have no interest in becoming a member in a political party, even if they do have cushy seats.

May 17th, 2007 | Tags: Riksdag, Stockholm, Sweden |

Category: Articles in English, Voyage / Travel | Comments (3)