What is Your Favorite City to Live?

I have been pretty nomadic since I was 11, and I have been moving from one place to another in search of my dream (it keeps changing, by the way). And no, I don't move because my family had to move somewhere. I basically moved out of house by sheer luck (and perhaps destiny, if you believe in one).

So if I create a map, this is the extent of my mobility (and I am 25 years old when I wrote this):

I'm pretty sure that you must have read or heard so many people saying "you must travel lots when you are in your 20's". Well, I guess my case is a rather extreme one. So when I feel like I need to spend some of my weekends lazing around my apartment, I have a reasonably valid excuse :P

To people who have never lived outside their own country, or even their own hometown, I get a lot of "Which country/city do you like the best?"

The answer is always difficult because there are pros and cons to each place. And while some places are great for tourism, it's not a great place to live. For this, I will have to nominate Paris. I don't want to say anything further about Paris, but living there for 2 months certainly destroyed my fantasy about "a romantic city".

Living in the US can be rather boring if you are interested into experiencing cultural events because pretty much people are interested in shopping, getting the latest gadget, eating at famous restaurants, etc. Unlike in Europe, Christmas season means big sales, not drinking mulled wines and enjoying little Christmas treats. And living without a car can be pretty painful in the US, since the public transport is pretty bad. Well, it probably differs from cities to cities, or from states to states. The US is a very convenient place to live, with stores open till late every day and online shopping made very easy. The best part of it? Almost in every corner of the US, everyone speaks English and at this point, I am more confident speaking English than my native language, Indonesian.

(image source: dailymail.co.uk)

Cork in Ireland can be rather dull and gloomy. And rainy just like the UK. But what I love from Ireland is the Irish hospitality. I felt so welcome by the locals, and I perceive their kindness as saintly. I remember getting lost in the city as a newcomer, and someone on the road just stopped her car just to ask if my friends and I were lost. They speak English, too, but their accents are a little bit hard to pick up. It took me about 3 weeks to adjust my ears.

In Kinsale, a neighboring town to Cork

Lund in Sweden is a cozy place, although it's pretty much filled in with aged residents in the summer, since the university students would be leaving for home. Things are rather slow-paced, and it is blessed with great nature. I was there during summer and I enjoyed it. Not sure if I'd become a snowball in winter, though. One thing I don't really like about Sweden is that the food is rather bland. With exception of the Swedish meatballs served with real lingon berry - not cranberry - jam. I know that in most IKEAs around the world, lingon berry is not available, so you've been eating the IKEA meatball with cranberry jam instead. The difference between lingon berry and cranberry is probably rather minimal and if you don't even know how lingon berry tastes like, cranberry jam is good enough.

Summer in Sweden

I lived in two cities (well, I would consider the other one a village, but it is officially a city based on legal laws) when I was in the Netherlands. To be honest, Rotterdam has been the most enjoyable city I have lived so far. It was a lively city, not too crowded, convenient, excellent public transport... and almost everyone speaks good English. The weather is considerably mild, and there is almost everything you need. True, it is rather modern and some people may take modern city as boring, but it is very close to good touristic places. And oh, the open market is absolutely awesome. Everything is fresh, the prices are lower than the supermarket, and there are good selections of items, ranging from fresh produce to gorgeous flowers.

The iconic symbol of the Netherlands: windmills

If there are unique things I like about the Netherlands, those are: 1) a lot of people speak good English considering English is not their first language, 2) finding Indonesian (and other Asian food) is rather easy, and 3) it is very international. The hardest thing to get adjusted to was the Dutch directness, which can be perceived as rudeness if you are not aware that they do not have evil intention when they openly criticize something about you. But in the end, I kind of like it. It's better than holding in things and cursing people behind their backs, not giving them any chance to improve.

Singapore, on the other hand, has gone quite tremendous changes over the years and sometimes when I went back there for holidays or to visit my friends, I felt that it was oddly foreign. There are more and more foreigners, and wherever I go, I always meet an Indonesian on the street. It's weird. Singapore is rich with many forms of entertainment, but it can be a very stressful place to live. I remember when I was in high school, someone from the top 3 school across the nation committed suicide because she got one B in her midterm exams. The "B is a failure" mentality can be rather suffocating, but I don't think Singapore can be released from this culture any time soon. But hey, there are lots of good food in Singapore, like Hainanese chicken rice, laksa, and roti prata.

(image source: forbes.com)

Now, the reason why I started this post was because I just moved to Switzerland almost two months ago, and by far, this move was the hardest for me. Contrary to the "I don't care if you see everything inside my house, I'm gonna open all the curtains in my house" mentality of the Dutch, the residents of Switzerland love to close their windows not just with curtains, but with metal blinds. After working hours (let's say 5-6 PM), all windows are shut.

Enjoying Alpen horns in St Cergue, close to Geneva

You can say it is peaceful, but it is too quiet for me. It's kind of like Wageningen in the Netherlands. But I think I will get used to it soon by picking up hobbies and exploring places. The best thing about living in Switzerland is probably the abundance of good cheese and white wines, the reliability of the public transportation system, and the fact that you are forbidden to work on Sundays (yippie!!).

As for my hometown, Jakarta... I think I see more cons than pros, and if my family is not there, I would not pick it as a place to live. The traffic jam is insane. At one time during my vacation back home, it took us at least 30 minutes to go to the supermarket, which is probably less than 5 km away from our house. My mobility is extremely restricted, and I really hate that. Walking on the streets alone as a girl, even in a broad daylight, can be very dangerous. In the malls, in a restaurant, on the streets, in front of your house, in your car... let's not even talk about in public transport. When I go back, the only things I appreciate are my family, my house, and the food.

Can you imagine that you have a sudden heart attack in the middle of the road and the ambulance can't even pass through? Or you are in labour and you are going to give birth in the next few minutes, when the traffic is like this every day? I mean, let's cross our fingers that we don't have to be in such situations, but if any of these emergencies were to happen... Ugh!

(image source: says.com)

Oh, and finally, Tokyo! I went there in spring for 3 months, and it was awesome. Things are pricey, and people there are rather reserved. Stand out a little bit, and everyone will be staring at you. The morning trains make me understand how it feels to be a sardine in a can. But overall, it is a very convenient city with lots of entertainment (especially the karaoke boxes and game arcades!). Tokyo is rather unique, with very modern buildings blended with natural landscapes. The old and the new are standing side-by-side. Vending machines are everywhere, and 100 yen shops are dens of evil sucking money out of you without realizing it (the items are worth their values, though). People are still shy about speaking English, but the young ones are quite willing to speak English. And there are more and more signs in roman letters, so navigating through the city is rather easy.

In a traditional Japanese inn (ryokan)

What is your favorite place to live?

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International Habits I Picked Up

Being almost 24/7 with people from 13 different countries aside from mine for about a year developed some habits in me.

The Italian gesture
When I feel like saying WTF, I do this sign:

Cooking rice like pasta
Boil rice in a pan with lots of excess water, just like you boil pasta. I do it when I'm too lazy watching over the pot and when I don't want to scrub the pot.

Adding salt to rice
Just like how my friend from Ghana would do it.

Greetings by kisses
On the cheeks, like the Dutch and most Latin people. Twice, and sometimes three times.

Words in other languages
In Paris, I had the habit of saying bonjour, sil vous plait, mademoiselle, monsieur, and merci even to my friends (and none of them are French). In Sweden, we often say hej hej and tack as well. Also, I would greet my Spanish speaking friends with ¿cómo estás and thank them with muchas gracias. And occasionally, I would spit out chingao.

Forks and knives on the table
Instead of spoon and forks. I'm kind of used to eating rice with a fork now. Not very intuitive for me, but it works.

Sunbathing
I still don't like sunbathing but I would occasionally join my friends for a sunbathing session.

"What did you learn today?"
It is a phrase that my dear German friend would ask at the dinner table.

Late lunch and late dinner
In the Latin culture, lunch is at 3 PM and dinner is at 10 PM. Fortunately, this did not happen too frequently.

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Sweden - Malmö

I almost forgot to post about Malmö. It took about 15 minutes to Malmö by train, and about 40 minutes to an hour by bike. I've never biked there from Lund before, but my friends did.

If you buy train tickets from Lund to Malmö, you can actually still use the tickets to ride the buses in Malmö for free up until the specific hours stated on the ticket. Normally it's around 1.5 hours after the purchase time of the ticket. We took bus number 3, which goes in a loop around the city. From the station, head towards the Tourist Information centre, and the bus stop is right outside the Tourist Information. After we took a round trip with the bus, we walked through the city.

Our first trip to Malmö was one week before Eurovision Grand Finals 2013. All the tickets were sold out, but luckily there were two outdoor screenings.

Malmö is a cozy city. Except during the Eurovision Grand Final weekend, you don't see a lot of people on the street, even during weekends. However, if you go to Lilla Torg, you'll find nice cafes crowded with young people.

One cafe called Cafe Pronto serves extraordinarily fantastic cheesecake.

I had raspberry lemon cheesecake with white chocolate. I really loved it!

The city itself is not that big, but you can find shopping streets around. Also, according to the Tourist Information, there is a big shopping mall in Triangeln, one station to the south of Malmö. I've neven been there because I knew I could not shop anymore because my luggage was already heavy enough from all the basic needs.

Anyways, we took a little walk around the city and the outskirts of Malmö towards the Øresund, the strait that separates southern Sweden from Denmark.

We visited the famous Turning Torso (the tall, twisting building next to the water) from afar. My friend who went to Malmö on another trip said that you could go up the tower and there is a really nice ice cream shop.

It's a pleasant town :)

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What I learned about the Netherlands, Ireland, France and Sweden

Officially, the end of my first year of European Master in Food Studies was over. With tears and hugs, byes and kisses, sweet and sour memories. Friendships developed - sometimes temporarily broken for reasons I could never comprehend - and memories woven. It was almost always lively around me, and I felt that I had a new family in Europe.

Now, let's put aside the emotional moments (because I'll start crying, alone in Rotterdam) and talk about things that I learned from staying in different countries throughout this one year. Just as an overview, our masters program involved being enrolled in four different universities in four different European countries, with students from all over the continents. In my edition, we have people from the Netherlands, Germany, Italy, Romania, Indonesia, Thailand, China, Hongkong/UK (dual citizenship), India, Ghana, Guatemala, Mexico, Argentina, and Colombia.

You may agree or disagree with some points that I mentioned, but keep in mind that whatever is written here is merely of my perspectives, and I don't mean any harm when I write this.

Well, let's start with the Netherlands :)

1st stop: Wageningen University, The Netherlands
- The Dutch are super punctual, with the exception of a few. Some professors may decide to lock you out if you come late to class.
- Appointments are crucial, even when you lost your phone and wanted to make a police report.
- Similarly, when you are sick, you need to make a doctor's appointment. If you're lucky, you can see the doctor on the next day.
- If you can't bike, you seem like a handicapped person in the Netherlands.
- Consider yourself comparable to a Dutch when you know how to bike while drinking beer, dragging a luggage behind you, or some crazy stunts.
- 'Gratis' is a nice word.
- They put sate sauce (Indonesian peanut sauce) on fried rice and even French fries (they call it the French fries warfare). And I really still find it weird up till this day.
- Ketjap manis in the Netherlands doesn't taste really good.
- Words borrowed from Indonesian language seemed to be written in what we call "ejaan lama / Van Ophuijsen" or "old spellings" in Indonesia (use Google's translation function to read the article about Van Ophuijsen spellings - it's in Indonesian). After all, Indonesia was colonized for 300 years by the V.O.C.
- When washing dishes, the Dutch people do it like how the street food carts wash dishes in Indonesia: the same water with some dishwashing liquid, reused over and over again to wash and to rinse the plates (they don't use clean water to rinse the plates).
- You hear so much "khrrr" sounds in Dutch sentences, and you'd probably be interested to try mimicking that sound for a while (if you're not so used to it).
- The Dutch people have a different sense of humour that might be a little bit hard to understand. Sometimes, you might think it's a cruel joke, but you'll get used to it. They don't mean harm.
- If you don't want to eat insipid, cold sandwich with only either one slice of cheese or one slice of ham, with no tomatoes, lettuce, or sauces of any kinds, or eat fresh cucumbers during lunch, then you have not adapted well to the Dutch culture.
- You will get familiar with the smell of weeds.
- If you have a somewhat fair skin and eyes that are not as big as the Europeans or the Latins, random Dutch students on campus may shout "nihao" to you regardless of where you come from. And I still don't get why they find this amusing.
- Most Dutch people pronounce "idea" as "ID". At specific occasions, it can be pretty confusing until you get used to it.
- Kroket is eaten with a toast or bread. McDonald's in the Netherlands even sells McKroket, which is basically a burger with kroket inside.

2nd stop: University College Cork, Ireland
- The houses are colourful because it is almost always cloudy and gloomy.
- There is no special bike lanes, unlike in the Netherlands.
- The Irish are unbelievably nice. They are almost like saints, and I'm not joking. I wonder how this kind of nice culture can be developed. A bus driver stopping the bus in the middle of the road to show you directions, and no cars behind the bus honking in anger? Uber coolness.
- If you open a door first and you see someone coming from another side, open the door and let that person pass first.
- Paddy Wagon is the best friend of students who like to travel around Ireland.
- The English Market is super awesome, and chicken and pork meat are insanely cheap.
- Bailey's cheesecake is a must to try, especially when Bailey's originated in Ireland. Anyways, there are a lot of Bailey's product in Ireland that you should try, including this Bailey's chocolate sticks.
- Guinness ice cream is nice, even if you don't like Guinness (I think it tasted like medicine).
- It's quite difficult to understand the English accents and expressions of the Irish, but after 2-3 weeks you'll get used to it.
- Girls wear 15cm heels and dresses with ultra short skirts at night to the pub / club / bar. Very sexy.

3rd stop: AgroParis Tech, France
- The French are, in general, not so friendly to those who don't speak French. Of course there are exceptions.
- Speaking English is definitely not a plus point when you're in France.
- If you try your best to speak French, people are in general more willing to help you.
- Pickpockets are everywhere on the train and train stations. Always be alert.
- The trains in Paris smell bad. Most of the time.
- Paris is the heaven for food. Almost always you will find good food, although your wallet may hurt.
- Baguette is a student's best friend. It's cheap (80 cents each), it's long, and the best is the one that just came out of the oven. It's crunchy on the outside, and soft on the inside. In Indonesia, a baguette can be used to hit a house burglar, just like a baseball bat.
- McDonald's in Paris sells baguette, too.
- Eating too much baguette may cause horizontal expansion of your body. Not kidding.
- 3 course meal for 3.10 euros from school cafetaria is awesome. But again, horizontal expansion of your body is inevitable.
- Lunch time is 1.5 hours.
- When you're under 25 and you're a student, go to as many museums as you can because they're free.
- Never go to Notre Dame du Paris during Easter if you want to pray properly. The tourists and their cameras will distract you, and prevent you from getting a seat.
- International mass at church means having the first reading in English, and the rest of the mass is a mix of Italian, Spanish and Latin.
- Macarons are everywhere. And Laduree is a little bit overrated.
- If you walk along Champs-Élysées, you will find Asians (especially from China and Indonesia) crowding expensive stores like Louis Vuitton and Long Champ.
- Arab Markets are great places to buy cheap, fresh fruits and veggies. And even your undies.

4th stop: Lund University, Sweden
- Fika (a break) is an essential part of the Swedish culture. No matter what, they always have fika every day without fail.
- Lagom is also an important word, which means "not too much, not too little".
- Once again, you will need a bike.
- Going to IKEA is always awesome, even though now it is owned by the Dutch.
- Swedish meatballs should be accompanied with lingonberry, and not cranberry. It's different.
- H&M is a Swedish brand, but the prices are not any cheaper. Still, they have good collections, especially when you go to Stockholm. There are at least 5 H&Ms around the city centre, one of those being called H&M Home (the 'headquarter' of H&M).
- Herrings, herrings and herrings of all types.
- Pickles in Sweden contain mostly sugar.
- Cheesecake in Sweden can be savoury, filled with seafood.
- Sweden is a safe country, but it doesn't mean that you can lower your guard down. 3 people, including me, had their phones stolen.
- Skåne is a region in south of Sweden.
- Everyone in Sweden is always ready for summer. Weekend + sunny weather = picnic.
- Good weather = barbecue time.
- Sometimes, when it says 10:00 on a schedule, it means 10:15.
- Travelling with Jojo card saves you 10% of travel cost.
- Buying duo-family ticket (works for 2 adults) saves you additional 20% of travel cost. Sadly, you have to travel in even numbers.
- You can pay tickets from the ticketing office with a combination of jojo card, cash or card.
- Getting a bike in early May is difficult because everyone graduates in late May.


And aside from this, I'm sure I have some learning points missing. This one year has been filled with a lot of learnings: in class and outside the class. The differences in cultures and perspectives can be somewhat a challenge, but this one year is the perfect time to not only notice the differences, but also to understand the differences and to learn to compromise. I have never been immersed in a group so rich in cultural differences, and I have to thank this masters program for it.

This one year has been very awesome, and even though it comes with a price of having to move almost every two months with all belongings, worrying about overweight luggages and shipments, with internship, where to stay next, an ongoing team project, classes and exams, financial spending... it's not as breezy as people think about this program. But it's definitely worth all the effort :)

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Sweden - Cellphone Theft in Stockholm

I'd like to warn you if you plan to travel to Stockholm in the future. Someone stole my phone while we were eating at a cafe, and this method, according to the local police, has been commonly used in the recent two months.

Here is my full recollection of the event:

I went to Stockholm last week with two other friends of mine. We arrived around 2 PM at the train station, and after checking in at the hotel we decided to have a lunch at a cafe in one of the streets near our hotel in Kungsgatan.

The weather was nice and we decided to grab the seats outside the cafe. When I arrived from the cashier from getting some napkins, I saw a man in hoodies approached our table with a piece of A4 paper that looked like a note with some handwritten texts of a language we did not recognize. We thought he was weird, and that he was a beggar. We gave him cold what-the-hell, go-away stares and after about 10 seconds he went away.

Having a habit of taking pictures of food with my phone, I took my phone out and after taking pictures of delicious-looking quiche on my plate, I (think) I put it on the table. A few seconds after we savour our food, the man came again for the second time. This time, only about two seconds. He put the paper right on top of my dish, and more than anything else, I was annoyed.

We finished our lunch at around ten to four, and we had to leave because we signed up for a free tour around the Old City. And then I started realizing that my phone was gone when I wanted to check the time.

We ran back to the restaurant, and we could not find the phone. Three of the waitresses said that this kind of cellphone theft incident had happened 2-3 times before. I was already wondering why no action was taken if they knew that the thief operates around the area.

My friend tried to call the police, only to end up describing the whole incident for 30 minutes and was told "Thank you for the information, now please go to the police station."

To our surprise, it was difficult to find the police station because hardly anyone knows where it is. Finally, we found one at the central station, but it is closed during the weekend. Bummer!

The central police station, open during the weekends, was on the other island on the west of the station, about 10 minutes on foot. In the end, all I could do was to get a police report and hopefully it is covered by travel insurance.

So please, if you see a suspicious-looking guy approaching you, watch out for your belongings. Don't let your guard down just because Sweden, in general, is a very safe country. The man looked Eastern European, and more specifically, according to the cafe workers, a Hungarian.

I am not very good as distinguishing the Europeans, but if you see anyone suspicious approaching you, please be alert. I hope this post is useful for you, and for people whom you know of. And feel free to share this story.

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Sweden - Recycling cans + bottles = MONEY!

Today is my last night in Sweden, and while sitting down enjoying sunshine on the hill behind our house, my friend asked, "What will you miss from Sweden?"

My answer was the recycling machine. Why?

It made me feel happier cleaning up the cans and bottles accumulated at home because I will be earning some discount tickets to shop at the supermarket.

Small PET bottle = 1 SEK

Large PET bottle (1.5 litre) = 2 SEK

Cans = 1 SEK

I know, 1 SEK probably worths very little. You can't even enter the public toilet with 1 SEK. But when you accumulate cans and bottles from 5 other people in the house, you can get as much as 40 SEK at one go.

What can you buy with 40 SEK? 20 SEK gives you 4 long bars of Daim chocolate, and biking to the supermarket costs nothing but your effort.

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Sweden - Stekt Strömming

I don't know how many times I mentioned this, but going to the supermarket is the best way to know what the locals do (and eat). I schemed through the seafood aisle in attempt to find surströmming (fermented herring), but I couldn't find it. Instead I found this:

I'm starting to get used to buying things I don't know what they are because of language barrier. I know strömming means "herring".

So, what is stekt strömming?

It is a deep fried herring breaded in rye flour coating, and then pickled. In Sweden, according to my professor, pickling involves a lot of sugar, so most pickles in Sweden is rather sweet. The ingredients to pickle this herring is water, sugar, onion, vinegar and salt.

Taste? Hmm, it's quite complicated. I can't say I really like it, but at the same time this was a new flavour and texture to me. I'm used to eating fish marinated in sweet sauce because in Indonesia we grill fish with sweet soy sauce. I think the stekt strömming was a little bit too sweet for me.

By the way, if you are interested to try this and you are not in Sweden, I found a recipe to make this at home in this link. 

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Sweden - Lund

It's been almost a month since I arrived in Sweden, but I haven't been posting anything about my current city. Lund is a very cozy city, with enough things to do and yet is not so crowded. It's much bigger than I thought it was, and Lund is actually one of my favorite cities that I've ever been so far.

I had been busy with projects lately that I didn't really have time to explore the city. Sometimes living together with your project mates can be a bad thing - you can have meetings in your or your friend's living room at any time of the day, including close to midnight.

We arrived at the best time of the year where the sun is beaming, the flowers are blooming and the grass is green. There are tulips of various colours in most parks. For a little while in early May I was jealous by the fact that I was not in the Netherlands to see countless tulips blooming in Keukenhoff, but hey, these are pretty, too, and they made me smile! :)

The buildings in Lund are somewhat in between classic and modern, and the streets are made of stones. It has a nice feeling, but it can be quite a pain walking on the street with high heels, especially the pointy one.

There are in total of 27 churches in the city. According to the lady who gave us a tour around the city on our first day at school, most of these churches used to be Catholic, but now they have been converted into Lutheran. The building below is the Lund Cathedral.

And the tour guide said the area around the church used to be graveyards for people who died during the war against the Danish back then, and one lady who lived nearby the church once experienced a creepy feeling when the sun set when she was in the basement doing her laundry. Well, the laundry room always have weird noises (from pipes, machines, etc.), but you never know what the noises exactly are and when you feel something unpleasant, it's a wise decision to just... run away ;)

There are various shops around the city; nothing exclusive like Louis Vuitton or similar, but there are shops like H&M and Vero Moda around. Oh, by the way, I didn't know that H&M is actually a Swedish brand until I came to Sweden. I had always thought it was an American brand because it's  everywhere in the US.

There are gelato shops, coffee shops (not like the one in the Netherlands, for sure), sushi restaurants, Thai restaurants, pizzeria (of course, they are EVERYWHERE), Burger King, McDonald's... pretty much the food here is not too bad.

Last week I finally had a free time in the afternoon to explore the city further. I found a city park, about 5 minutes away from the city centre by bike.

Yup, that's my tiny bike. It's a little too small for me but I had no choice; we arrived in Lund in early May, just 30 days before the end of the school term. There were not that many bikes available for renting, and cheap bikes were kind of hard to find. This bike was the only bike left, and not having a bike in a group of bikers will make me a handicapped person. I had to get it. Well, it's a really nice mountain bike, so it's not too bad.

Back to the topic. The city park was quiet and serene. The sound of fountains, birds chirping, rustling grass and trees... it was a truly relaxing moment for me. I love being in the nature after having to sit down in front of my computer typing reports and all other school documents.

 Ah, and also in the city park, there is a small section at the corner with animal cages. Swedish hens are irresistibly cute!

If you look carefully at its legs, you can see that its legs are covered with thick feathers that look like brush tips. I've never seen hens like these before. Well, tropical hens don't need extra insulation against the cold; it's already hot enough.

They are really, really chubby, and if you look at them from the back, you see fur balls crawling on the ground. If there were no nets around the hens I would have tried to touch them! :D

 I really love this city.

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Sweden - Eurovision Grand Final Live at Malmö

I've officially been 2 weeks in Sweden but I haven't had the chance to update my blog!

I had to write something today because... it was the Eurovision Grand Finals! I am currently living in Lund, Sweden, which is about 10 minutes away by train. Yes, it's very close. And what a great timing for me as well!

There have been celebrations in Lund and Malmö throughout the week, but we were so busy with projects and meetings so we didn't really participate in the festivities on the weekdays.

Lund, with the slogan "We party too!", organized great performances at the city centre.

My friend and I decided to go to Malmö around 4 PM to walk around the city for a little bit.

I went to Malmö last week, but I still don't know many places in Malmö. It's not as big as Paris, but it's definitely pretty big.

The streets were filled with supporters from all over Europe. They were wearing their flags, had their faces painted... the city was really lively.

Just across the Central Station of Malmö is the Eurovision Village.

Thank God the weather was so beautiful! It was sunny, around 23 degrees C and a little windy.


It was a really pleasant feeling to see people enjoying the festivities on the streets, looking forward to cheer their countries, and perhaps just to watch the Eurovision grand finals (like me).

We wanted to buy the ticket at the Arena but of course they were sold out. Fortunately, we could watch the Grand Finals live on the screen at the City Centre.

When we came around 4 PM, there were magnificent dance performances filled with energy and passion of the youth from various dance studios.

Their dances made me feel energized after a long week of meetings until 11:30 PM. Living together with your project team members is nice, but it means that you can have a meeting at any time of the day, including close to midnight.

But anyways, aside from the performances and the buzz around the city, there was also the Street Food Corner, featuring traditional dishes from the area.

To be honest, I was very disappointed when my friend appeared to be disinterested to try these foods because she was craving for sashimi. In the end, I managed to try one of the foods served there:

It has a really unique flavour. The flavour itself is not in particular strong, but what makes it unique is the radish-looking root vegetable they put in the dish. I wasn't sure if it was radish, but it looked like radish and maybe it tasted like radish. I haven't had raw radish before, so I'm not entirely sure about this.

And we also went to a cheesecake cafe called Pronto. My friends from the program and I really liked the cheesecake here, but my friend who came all the way from Ireland didn't have a good impression of this. I still think that the raspberry white chocolate cheesecake was wonderful and if I ever go to Malmö I will definitely eat it again.

Back from the food business. Around 6-7 PM, the city became even more livelier than ever. I encountered these passionate supporters from Denmark:

Even though I'm in Sweden, I felt that 50% of all the Eurovision contest supporters in Malmö were Danish. Aside from the fact that Copenhagen is just across the bridge from Malmö, it seemed to me that they really love their country :)

My friends then texted me, saying that you can sit down on the grass at Folkets park while watching the big screen outdoors. It was quite a long walk from the City Centre.

It was really crowded with people from all over the place. I think my group kind of stood out a little bit because we were a mix of different countries: Guatemala, Italy, Indonesia, Singapore, Argentina, the Netherlands, China, Colombia and Greece.

Most people who came there were people of the same country. Nevertheless, we had so much fun, as usual :)

By the way, the Danish are powerful drinkers. Look at that 1 litre beer can! It's HUGE!!

We were having fun at Folkets Park until the Eurovision Grand Finale started. Why? It was because the sound system there was horrible and was beyond salvation. All we heard was boom boom boom boom and we heard nothing like a human voice. Everyone there looked so disappointed, and many started to leave the park - for home, or for the city centre. In our case, we tried going back to the City Centre because we heard that the sound system there was much better.

And that was actually a great decision.

The crowd was lively, and it was surprisingly peaceful to be amongst the crowd. There was no one pushing you and there was no big fear of pickpockets or dangerous drunkards. Even if it was not your country, you still cheered for them (the Swedish and Danish flags never ceased to wave no matter which country's song it was).

It was a great night, and a really awesome experience. I'm glad I didn't decide to watch it from the TV at home.

By the way, the Danish won. I thought Sweden would win again, but I can see why Denmark won :)

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