Love in the Mine

95% of all of the houses in Sweden are either yellow or red, and here's why. I'll start with my trip to Falun. On Wednesday I had to take a train (for the only time in my life, as far as I can remember) to a city called Falun about 2 hours northwest of Vasteras. I had to change trains twice and all announce- ments were in Swedish, so it was definitely an adventure. But the countryside was really beautiful... through the forests and across lakes. I got to Falun and Gunnel (a PhD student who does research on time-assisted devices for children and adults with special needs) took me to the Kopparberget, the old copper mine that the town is famous for. Falun, and the surrounding region, is really considered to be the heart of Sweden. There is a true story about a young man and woman who had fallen in love and were engaged to be married, several hundred years ago or something. The man worked in the mine and disappeared on the day before his wedding. Most people thought he got cold feet and ran away, but whatever the reason, he was never seen again. Forty years later, some miners were working in the mine and ran into an old abandoned mine shaft. At the bottom of the shaft they found a man who had died from falling down the shaft, breaking both of his legs, and not being able to climb back out. They didn't know how long he had been down there, but he looked like he was in his 20's and hadn't yet begun to decompose. They pulled him out and put him on display in the town square in a glass coffin. The woman who had lost her love so many years before immediately recognized him as her fiancee because he still looked the same, although she and everyone else had aged 40 years. The townspeople paraded the man around the country as proof of the preservative powers of the mine's minerals. Now those minerals are used in house paint, and the houses only need repainting every 20 years or so. Because of the paint, you almost never see a house in Sweden that looks faded; all the houses are bright colors. Long story but cool ending, yeah? Then Gunnel took me to a hill above the city where there are 2 HUGE ski jumps that run in the winter time, and I really cannot imagine how freaking nuts you have to be to do that. I stayed at Gunnel's house after visiting the hospital that she worked at. Her 21-year-old son is in a medieval band and he played his hurdy-gurdy for me. Really cool. Then his friends told me how stupid they thought American football was. I ate pickled herring for dinner...don't ever try it. It's nothing like sushi. But the homemade Schnapps that we drank with it made the meal fantastic. Moonshine will do wonders for a slimy salty fish.