If you are familiar with the origins of this blog and my plans for next couple of months discussed under ‘Travel Tips‘ section, or explicitly in one of the first posts ‘Getting Ready‘ you know about my idea to learn another language. As I already know English and Italian, had been studying Chinese and Japanese, I thought it shouldn’t be THAT difficult. The language I picked up might surprised you and I bet that the first thought after reading the heading was: “Why on earth anybody would like to learn Swedish if it’s spoken only in Sweden?” There is a short story behind. As always. Couple of years ago I went to Sweden for the first time in my life.This was not a trivial city walk around Stockholm. I started from Swedish Lapland. And fell in love with this beautiful country the moment I got off the train in Kiruna. I spend unforgettable time walking along the King’s Trail mountain huts. All huts are run by the Swedish Tourist Organization and in order to pay less for each night spent in the huts I become member of this association. Being member of STF entitled me to receive their official journal titled: Turist. And so every year I was receiving all journals published and guess what: even if it was sent to my Italian address it was all written in Swedish! It simply drove me crazy! I mean, the photos were great but I wanted to understand what it says. After couple of years I thought I simply need to learn Swedish. One way or another, I visit this country regularly so there is no waste. While thinking about the way how to learn Swedish I also met one person who was fascinated with this language and it pushed forward my thinking about it from ‘perhaps-I-could-study-the-language’ towards ‘yes-I-can’. BUT I didn’t want to get engaged in any serious or formal language course. Mostly because of my travels and high absence rate. So I thought I will do it totally STRESS FREE. So… Here is what I did First, I borrowed a self-study book to make sure that Swedish is not difficult. I browsed it, listened to the tape, read some dialogues and although Swedish might sound complicated I liked the sound of it. Simply the melody of this language is lovely. Second, I browsed Internet searching for BASIC 100 WORDS in Swedish. It’s simple to find. Third, I completed a basic online course on babbel.com and… …and that’s the best part: I got an e-book of my favorite Swedish tales Emil i Lönneberga and started to listen to it all day long: when jogging, cooking, ironing and when traveling, of course. Now this is experiment and I will keep you posted on the progress I made. My target for this September is to be able to run a short conversation about the weather and general stuff. Before I go to Lapland this year I’ll be able to say hello, ask for somebody’s name, where does he/she come from, and which part of the King’s Trail she/he walked. Keep your fingers crossed!  

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