summer break

The term ended with a great degree exhibition and party in the beginning of June.

Umeå gets very quiet during summer, as almost all students leave for their families and do not return before autumn. Jassi and me decided to spend some more time in northern Sweden as we don't know when we will be able to spend an subpolar summer again :)

We were in Umeå for the rest of the Euro-Cup and midsummer, which is really a special day not least for the lack of darkness during night. People go crazy here.

I took the opportunity to go for a hiking trip with my family, which was great, even though the mosquitos up here are pretty thirsty when it gets warmer. A net in front of your face and a bottle of "Mygga" is definitely recommendable.

We went to Skuleskogen National Park, which is located around 150km south of Umeå. Even though it is a pretty small area it is stunningly beautiful and offers pretty impressive sights. (This sounds like from a tourist ad)

I spent most of the summer in Germany (Berlin, Cologne and Munich) visiting family and friends. I also did some freelance work for Axiros, an IT company based in Munich. They offer hardware and software solutions for businesses and enterprises to manage networks and large amount of terminal devices. My task was creating UI / usability concepts for database and search-engine applications.

Jassi and me returned to Umeå end of August. In the meantime, the night returned and you could sleep without hanging another bed sheet in front of the window. We drove with the car from Munich to Stockholm and had stopovers in Hamburg, Copenhagen and Malmö. That way you realize how far north we actually are. In times of air travel i totally lost my feeling for larger distances.

winter_2

One thing you can do with vast amounts of snow: building 3D mazes for ice-marbles. And yes, we actually do have sun in here in Umeå!

We are working on a 'design for sound' project at the moment: How to collect voices for a big music project. It will be done on Friday, so I might post some results soon.

winter

Umeå is covered with snow since I returned from my 2 week trip to Germany. It feels like a REAL winter, not that rainy, muddy German 4 month lasting November. The temperature drops to around -10 degrees, so it's not that cold (yet). Days are getting longer since end of December, it's almost 6 hours now.

some impressions

fall turns to an end in Umeå. It gets colder and darker every day...I heard, the river will be completely frozen during wintertime. There were people having a picnic on it once. Cozy!

Memories on celluloid

Right before we left to Umeå, a friend of Jassi and mine gave us a disposable camera to take some memory pictures. Even if we both own digital cameras and smartphones we used it and took it with us. Today we take it to a shop to develop the pictures.

I can not even remember the last time I was so curious and excited to see pictures! As it is some four weeks ago when we took the last picture, I can not remember all the motifs and people who are on them.

I have to say, this is a beautiful, and sometimes even thrilling experience, that got lost over the years due to technological progress. I am wondering if there is a way to do something on this?

WLAN in every bus in Umeå

In Umeå every bus now has a free Hotspot. Nice, especially if you still have a German contract :)

Arrived.

 Arrived.  It looks like we expected it to do :) Actually even more cliché, but in the authentic welcoming way. This is Bullerbü!















Jassi bought a bike. This is definitely a bikers town, never saw so many cyclists (but in Münster) (okay, Holland as well...) And what is great about it: Cars actually care about you! They even stop if you want to cross a street, and stay behind you until you turned - greetings to Munich at this point ;)