From Polska to Sverige: I Heart Råslatt.

Råslatt

Pronounced Rur-sl-ah-tt (With the ah like the 'u' in 'up'...It's the best description I can do!) is the accommodation I've been placed into here in Jonkoping, Sweden.

It's the ghetto 'slums' of Jonkoping, where immigrants from all over, students (Swedish and foreign!), young families and miscellaneous youth reside in a community of 100, yes 100 buildings! I liken it to Collingwood meets Brunswick in Melbourne with much prettier infrastructure.

Everything here's pretty really..

My building, the 4th floor.

From my window.

Our kiosk.

First drops of snow.

The local supermarket is called 'Willy:s" (Notice the colon. It's the way it's printed in the sign!). Due to my absolute lack of Sverige language skills, I found a simple exercise like grocery shopping very entertaining. I live with two Swedish girls (One who lives in the 'Swedish igloo' i.e keeps to herself) and an African exchange student who lived in France for four years. She made me delicious crepes on her first night and loves to cook. Sweet. I can sense slight anal retentive inklings though, so I need to clean up my slobby ways. Thankfully, I have my own bedroom decked out in IKEA (Of course!). It's ridiculous how cheap it is AND such a novelty to visit.

Sam and Perri, fellow Melbourne folk.

Mmmm..Dirty snow..

Here's our common room called Sokertoppen, translated: Sugar Hill!

On our first night out, we discovered Sweden's equivalent of Hungry Jacks. It's called MAX and on our drunken trip into town we got a...MAXBOX! The toy? A Tom & Jerry toothbrush!

'Akademien' is the club and melting pot of the city, where Swedes and internationals mingle, bump and grind to retro 90's, shitty pop and Eurovision crap. It is AWESOME. At least for now. It's only open on Wednesday nights, thankfully.

Swede's can, in some cases, come off as cold, reserved and overtly formal in normal settings..Oooooh, not once they're wasted! Arms flail, jumping in unison in circled fashion with Snus tucked neatly in their gums. Snus is a tobacco product that's flavoured and a replacement for smoking that many Swede's love. There's even a eucalyptus flavour!

Jonkoping Uni have a sort of sorority/scout pants system that a lot of students partake in. Each faculty has a colour and on these pants are 'badges of honour' that represent duties performed, how many people you've slept with, stuff like that.

I think I'll pass..