Final Film Project at Guilford

Creative Transformation:  Women Empowered from Sara Stone on Vimeo.

Swedish Adventures and Homecoming

These pictures are from the last day in April, when many people in Sweden have community bonfires. The tradition is that the fire is supposed to ward of the cold and snow of winter and bring in springtime. It is some kind of Pagan tradition. It was fun and the fire was so huge. We also visited a viking graveyard. They make large mounds for the vikings instead of burying them underground. The bigger the mound, the more important the person. Apparently with vikings, the only way to go to heaven is to die in battle, otherwise you will be reborn again until you do. I don't have any pictures, unfortunately, but it was a beautiful place, with many mounds of stone and dirt as well as some old walls to a church. I have been learning quite a lot of things about Sweden, though I am not fully aware of it, because these traditions are just a part of life here and not so spectacular to the people around me. It is pretty cool. Sometime I will come back, visit more places, and learn Swedish. I know a few words and phrases, but I have a lot more to learn. I am coming back to the US with Oskar in tow on June 8th. That is so soon, I am having a lot of anxiety. Maybe a relaxing summer at home, lifeguarding and teaching swim lessons, will be nice. I hope to make a few trips to see friends in various places (mostly NC) who I have missed dearly. And of course, I will be glad to see my family again. Over the summer, I will also spend some time planning my next adventure. I have many ideas, but I need to focus on one so I can plan it out in time. Unfortunately, travel is not so easy with all the issues of money and visa requirements. It is such pain, even if you have the best of intentions, for some reason, immigration people I think just want to make things such a problem. Well, we will see how it goes.

Brida

"She was on the beach with her father, and he asked her to go and see what the temperature of the water was like. She was five years old and glad to be able to help. She we the to water's edge and dipped in a toe. 'I put my feet in and it's cold,' she told him. Her father picked her up and carried her down to the water again, and, without any warning, threw her in. She was shocked at first, but then laughed out loud at the trick he'd played. 'How's the water?' asked her father. 'It's lovely,' she replied. 'Right, from now on, whenever you want to find out about something, plunge straight in.' She had quickly forgotten this lesson. She may only have been twenty-one, but she had already nurtured many enthusiasms, which she had abandoned as quickly as she had taken them up. She wasn't afraid of difficulties; what frightened her was being forced to choose one particular path. Choosing a path meant having to miss out on others. She had a whole life to live and she was always thinking that, in the future, she might regret the choices she made now. 'I'm afraid of committing myself,' she thought to herself. She wanted to follow all possible paths and so ended up following none." -Paulo Coelho, Brida

Mora, Sweden

I am staying in Mora for a couple months. It's farther north than where Oskar lives with his dad, so it's colder, and there is still snow everywhere. Today it is really sunny, so the weather is looking more promising. I am staying with Oskar's mom, his sister Stina (17 on April 28th), and his baby sister Lotta (14 months). So far it has been enjoyable getting to play with the baby everyday and help her mom out. I also bought a swim pass so I can go to the pool everyday. I have a library card, too and just finished my first book: Stieg Larsson's The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. It was a pretty good read, and there are 2 more books in the series. I checked out a book on learning Swedish. It comes with a textbook, workbook, and CD. It is really basic stuff, but I think it will help in the long run. Hopefully I can learn a little bit of Swedish from it, so I don't feel totally stupid after spending so much time in this country. I think if you are in a country this long, you have to at least learn a little bit of the language, or else you are just being a bad visitor. I should be getting my resident permit in my passport soon, since I am a temporary resident of Sweden. Sounds exciting. Now it is time to enjoy the sun while I can, after a little swimming of course. I am sure I got some kind of vitamin D deficiency being here for so long. I miss spring in SC, but I hear it's too hot anyway. It will be quite a shock to go back in June.

The Witch of Portobello

I’m going in search of the adventure of being alive.

And it’s complicated: why am I not looking for happiness when everyone has taught me that happiness is the only goal worth pursuing?

Why am I going to risk taking a path that no one else is taking? After all, what is happiness?

Love, they tell me. But love doesn’t bring and never has brought happiness.

On the contrary, it's a constant state of anxiety, a battlefield; it's sleepless nights, asking ourselves all the time if we’re doing the right thing. Real love is composed of ecstasy and agony. All right then, peace.

Peace? If we look at the Mother, she’s never at peace. The winter does battle with the summer, the sun and moon never meet, the tiger chases the man, who’s afraid of the dog, who chases the cat, who chases the mouse, who frightens the man.

Money brings happiness. Fine. In that case, everyone who earns enough to have a high standard of living would be able to stop work. But then they’re more troubled than ever, as if they were afraid of losing everything. Money attracts money, that’s true. Poverty might bring unhappiness, but money wont necessarily bring happiness. I spent a lot of my life looking for happiness, now what I want is joy.

Joy is like sex – it begins and ends. I want pleasure. I want to be contended, but happiness? I no longer fall into that trap.

by Paulo Coelho ( “The Witch of Portobello” )

I have read this book about 4 times. I still love it. Everyone should read it. Paulo Coelho is amazing.

Cross Country Skiing

When I got back to Sweden after my trips to Morocco and France, I discovered the wonderful sport of cross country skiing. Needless to say, I mastered it in 2 minutes, and I will be in the next Olympics of course!! Ok, not really. But it is a lot of fun! We went out on the frozen lake in Hjo and I got some pointers on the basics of cross country skiing, then I was off! It is a wonderful full body workout. A few days later, Oskar, his friend Erik (now my friend, too), and I went on the cross country skiing trails in the woods just outside Hjo. We brought snacks and hot chocolate for afterwards. I may have fallen on every downhill, and it may have taken 20 minutes to get up every small uphill, but it was great! We had a wonderful laughter-filled day, even though I got some bruises. I have decided that I need to live somewhere where I can go cross-country skiing a lot in the winter. This could be my second favorite sport now (second to swimming of course). Downhill skiing is something else entirely. I just got back from a three day skiing trip in Sälen. I have a lot of difficulty maneuvering myself with skis on, which ended up in my tripping over a lot of people in line, but that's ok. Though I went on a skiing trip there just after Christmas, I felt like I started over completely in learning. I suppose it didn't take quite as long for me to get used to it, but the second day I had to start getting over my fear again. It's scary going that fast! It's not so bad when it's slower, but once the speed picks up, I feel like I have no control over my skis, and then I am afraid of running into people or into a tree or something. Oh well. We had a great time, and I think I did really well, considering I am pretty much a beginner. Here are some pictures of the slopes and the frozen lake skiing.

Hammam and Last Days in Morocco

I went back to Marrakech to spend a couple more nights. The weather is warmer and sunnier there, so I thought it would be fun to go back. It was a lot of fun. I met a few nice people at the market and we ended up spending the rest of the time together. There was a nice couple from Poland on break from school. They had been to Agadir and Essaouira before spending two nights in Marrakech. Next time, I need to go to these cities. They are beautiful and warm all year round. Marrakech is pretty great, too. The market at night is wonderful, with all the lights and the food cooking. We shopped around a little and I got a couple scarves and a tunic. Then we had some traditional Moroccan soup at one of the food stands. We listened to some good drum music and then after being hassled for money for watching, we decided to call it a night. It is wonderful meeting new people and spending time getting to know them and their culture. I hope one day I will make it to Poland and stay with them. For the last day I had in Morocco, Zineb and I went to hammam. Hammam is almost like a spa or just a bath house. But I felt like it was a spa and I was getting excellent treatment. You go into this room, in your underwear, lay out a mat and rub this brown gooey soap they give you into your skin. Then an old lady comes in and takes this scrub brush (everyone brings their own) and scrubs you: back, side, front, side. She basically is tearing off a couple layers of skin, she scrubs so hard. But it certainly gets you clean. Then you rinse off, wash your hair and such. There are dozens of buckets of warm water all around to use. It is a nice experience. I felt so clean. Afterwards, we went to get our hair dried and manicures. I know, not really a typical Sara thing to do, but it was fun to feel a little pampered. It was a nice way to spend my last day. The hammam is so relaxing and wonderful. It is really too bad they don't have them in the Western parts of the world. My trip to Morocco is over, sadly. However, I know I will come back, and next time I will bring a travel friend so I can feel more free to do all the amazing things there are to do in Morocco (backpacking in the Rif mountains, riding camels in the desert, etc). I am in Paris for one night before I head back to Sweden. I am staying with some old campers from the camp I used to work at (Camp Celo). It's kind of nice knowing people in different countries. It makes finding accommodations a lot easier. Hopefully, I will find a way to continue to stay in Europe (job, work permit, etc), we'll see!