I know that I wrote about some of this on my last entry but I had time last night to add more details and wanted to include more pictures. Here we have me at the farm; the streets of Alingsas with all of the bikes (even in colder weather, they ride a lot of bikes) and Kara, Allison and Rachel Friday night at the musical event we attended.
On Thursday, March 5, 2009 we had a very busy day… our morning started with breakfast at Gunther’s house. I tried a small sip of the coffee he made but just couldn’t do it… coffee is not my thing! Hans and Vivianne picked us up this morning to head into town. Our first stop was a gift paper factory named Flexoprint. Mattheus, the Danish gentleman who owns it, was our host for the morning. He is what we at RWSC would call a “very benevolent” man and it is amazing to me the things he does for his employees (it is easier for him to do so with only 23 employees compared to almost 2400) – the employees eat breakfast together every morning which he provides, he brings in lunch every day as well which they can share in for a small fee, they helped in the design and construction of their new building which opened about two years ago. As part of the plans, he built a HUGE kitchen / bar area along with a gameroom area and a workout room / hot tub / sauna room ----- the employees can sign up on a calendar to utilize the space after hours with their friends and family for whatever (birthday, holiday or just because).
The manufacturing area was fascinating to me. They are already starting to produce paper for Christmas and the process for making a patterned paper is more intense than one might think. Similar to stamping gift cards, they put the pattern (which is on a large rubber “sheet”) one color at a time…. So the first “sheet” has everything that should be printed in red, then another one is run with a different pattern for all of the blue shapes and so on, until you have a bunch of pirates or dinosaurs or flowers or whatever….it’s hard to imagine how much graphic design work goes into a season of gift paper. At the end of our morning with Flexoprint, he offered us rolls of gift paper to take home – knowing how difficult it would be to transport home, I took only a couple along with one of their catalog books with 8-1/2 X 11 inch pages of each pattern (I thought I could use this to make gift cards at home for the next year or two…) while some of the others took an armful.
Our next stop was the Stora Mellby Västergård farm just outside of town but within the municipality of Alingsas. Lars, Susanna and others showed us around the farm. We stopped to pet the goats and cows before wandering out to see the wind mill which Lars’ grandfather’s grandfather built in 1811. Lars enjoyed showing us some of the artifacts in their museum including a large mouse trap that drew quite a few laughs from the group. A woman named Annika joined us for the afternoon – she is a member of the Swedish parliament. After coffee and some delightful treats as well as some animated discussion about agriculture and sustainability, we were taken to see a Wind Turbine that Lars and others in the area went together to put up as an electrical source for their area. Anna-Karin (Alingsas Rotary President and our un-official chauffer for the week) took an AWESOME picture of the group by the wind turbine. (I’ll post it later if I can get a copy of it.)
Jennifer and I were then dropped off at Maria’s house for dinner with her family. Her son, Albin, had just gotten a Wii for his birthday so he tried to show off a bit by playing his dad - - he won the first game pretty easily but Anders got him for the next three games before finally letting him win one more so he wouldn’t go to bed pouting. Then it was back to Gunther’s house, where he was waiting for us with a glass of Chivas Regal before turning in for the evening.
Friday, March 6th - - another busy day, imagine that! On the schedule, it looked pretty quiet but that was not so. We practiced our presentation before our first Rotary Meeting in front of a roomful of interested Rotarians (about 50 or so) who were very gracious hosts and not shy in asking questions. After our lunch meeting, Alison, Rachel & I had an opportunity to wander around the area known as the “Town Center” and shop. A woman that we had met earlier in the week at Futurum named Gunbritt, told me about the Alingsas tourist center and said that there were “lots of elk there” which would be AWESOME to bring home to my “Elks” friends…. Well, in Sweden, Elk are really MOOSE!! I did find some other goodies to bring home so at least I’ve started by “gift shopping.”
Later in the afternoon, thanks to Anna-Karin and others, I had the opportunity to visit a shoe company. They were not manufacturers but sourced and distributed several different lines of product mostly within Sweden. We enjoyed swapping stories about the trade and found a lot of similar ground to the work I do.
For dinner, we went to an Italian restaurant and had ordered our food in advance so it could be ready for us. At dinner on Thursday, Maria helped us translate the menu. Weird enough - - I ordered cannelloni with Salmon and Spinach without the salmon. I wasn’t sure if they’d be able to do that so I had designated Spaghetti as my back-up. But, again, the people of Alingsas came through for me - - it was SPECTACULAR!!
After dinner, we had tickets for a local music production at a theater in town. It was VERY entertaining and they performed a variety of mostly American music in both English and Swedish. Some of the numbers were from plays / movies like Grease, Hairspray and The Little Mermaid.
Well, it’s nearly midnight here (5 PM for those of you back in Minnesota) and I’m getting tired. Luckily, probably because of my in-ability to sleep on airplanes, I’m not experiencing the jet lag issues that others are. I am, however, trying to keep my stomache under control with all of the different foods I have been trying. (No, not fish but a lot of other things that I wouldn’t normally eat!) God Natt!!! (Which means “good night” in English)
The manufacturing area was fascinating to me. They are already starting to produce paper for Christmas and the process for making a patterned paper is more intense than one might think. Similar to stamping gift cards, they put the pattern (which is on a large rubber “sheet”) one color at a time…. So the first “sheet” has everything that should be printed in red, then another one is run with a different pattern for all of the blue shapes and so on, until you have a bunch of pirates or dinosaurs or flowers or whatever….it’s hard to imagine how much graphic design work goes into a season of gift paper. At the end of our morning with Flexoprint, he offered us rolls of gift paper to take home – knowing how difficult it would be to transport home, I took only a couple along with one of their catalog books with 8-1/2 X 11 inch pages of each pattern (I thought I could use this to make gift cards at home for the next year or two…) while some of the others took an armful.
Our next stop was the Stora Mellby Västergård farm just outside of town but within the municipality of Alingsas. Lars, Susanna and others showed us around the farm. We stopped to pet the goats and cows before wandering out to see the wind mill which Lars’ grandfather’s grandfather built in 1811. Lars enjoyed showing us some of the artifacts in their museum including a large mouse trap that drew quite a few laughs from the group. A woman named Annika joined us for the afternoon – she is a member of the Swedish parliament. After coffee and some delightful treats as well as some animated discussion about agriculture and sustainability, we were taken to see a Wind Turbine that Lars and others in the area went together to put up as an electrical source for their area. Anna-Karin (Alingsas Rotary President and our un-official chauffer for the week) took an AWESOME picture of the group by the wind turbine. (I’ll post it later if I can get a copy of it.)
Jennifer and I were then dropped off at Maria’s house for dinner with her family. Her son, Albin, had just gotten a Wii for his birthday so he tried to show off a bit by playing his dad - - he won the first game pretty easily but Anders got him for the next three games before finally letting him win one more so he wouldn’t go to bed pouting. Then it was back to Gunther’s house, where he was waiting for us with a glass of Chivas Regal before turning in for the evening.
Friday, March 6th - - another busy day, imagine that! On the schedule, it looked pretty quiet but that was not so. We practiced our presentation before our first Rotary Meeting in front of a roomful of interested Rotarians (about 50 or so) who were very gracious hosts and not shy in asking questions. After our lunch meeting, Alison, Rachel & I had an opportunity to wander around the area known as the “Town Center” and shop. A woman that we had met earlier in the week at Futurum named Gunbritt, told me about the Alingsas tourist center and said that there were “lots of elk there” which would be AWESOME to bring home to my “Elks” friends…. Well, in Sweden, Elk are really MOOSE!! I did find some other goodies to bring home so at least I’ve started by “gift shopping.”
Later in the afternoon, thanks to Anna-Karin and others, I had the opportunity to visit a shoe company. They were not manufacturers but sourced and distributed several different lines of product mostly within Sweden. We enjoyed swapping stories about the trade and found a lot of similar ground to the work I do.
For dinner, we went to an Italian restaurant and had ordered our food in advance so it could be ready for us. At dinner on Thursday, Maria helped us translate the menu. Weird enough - - I ordered cannelloni with Salmon and Spinach without the salmon. I wasn’t sure if they’d be able to do that so I had designated Spaghetti as my back-up. But, again, the people of Alingsas came through for me - - it was SPECTACULAR!!
After dinner, we had tickets for a local music production at a theater in town. It was VERY entertaining and they performed a variety of mostly American music in both English and Swedish. Some of the numbers were from plays / movies like Grease, Hairspray and The Little Mermaid.
Well, it’s nearly midnight here (5 PM for those of you back in Minnesota) and I’m getting tired. Luckily, probably because of my in-ability to sleep on airplanes, I’m not experiencing the jet lag issues that others are. I am, however, trying to keep my stomache under control with all of the different foods I have been trying. (No, not fish but a lot of other things that I wouldn’t normally eat!) God Natt!!! (Which means “good night” in English)
Saturday, March 7th -- Today has been a relatively quiet day on our schedule. We went to a district Rotary training session for a bit this morning / early afternoon to meet others in the district that we will be seeing again throughout our stay.
Anna-Karin picked all of us but Kara up after lunch and we were dropped off down town to do a little shopping. I picked up a couple of scarves to add some color to my wardrobe and a new pair of black shoes (Sorry Kevin! You'll see the total when you balance the checkbook!!) along with a few other small momentos. Saw some scrapbooking paper in a book store but figured it wouldn't survive the rest of the trip!
Tonight, we are at Anna-Karin's house for dinner and she has wi fi so I'm able to catch up on emails, Skyped my sister for a few minutes and hopefully, will get a chance a little bit later to skype with Kevin & Tyler. It will be 9 PM here / 2 PM at home when we will try to connect.
Tomorrow, we move on to another town and I'm not sure when I'll get a chance to post again. Thanks for checking in!
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