Planes, Trains and Automobiles… and Buses

After a little more than a week here in Sweden, my attic room shared by seven other guys is slowly starting to feel more and more like home. Jetlag has finally loosened its grip on the majority of the guys as we all begin to grow accustomed to our daily routines on this trip. Waking up to the 4am sunrise is no longer a worry of mine as I can sleep through the night with no problem. The living situation is nice, however in tight quarters, but that has yet to cause any trouble or discomfort for anybody.

The monotony that usually accompanies long trips has been broken up by a trip into downtown Malmo in order to see a league game, as well as a steady stream of games of our own, with three in the bag already. The bus rides to the games have been pretty long and somewhat scenic, but considering my lack of knowledge about Swedish/Danish geography, it is not so fulfilling when you don’t know where you are or what you are looking at.

The bus however has been quite a good means of entertainment, for me at least. After our game this evening against Gais, we come out to the bus to find that in one way or another, it had rolled down a hill and crushed a very large, very solid steel gate and the connected fence. I found it hysterical, though the bus driver didn’t seem too happy. I just hope there isn’t a farmer counting on that fence for the containment of his livestock. We had not heard the last of that bus though as it refused to start after a stop for dinner. This one wasn’t too funny as another bus had to come pick us up, hours later.

The games have been awesome so far, with one of them held in a top-notch Swedish league stadium called Boras Stad, which seats almost 18,000. This stadium was where our team played a very fine IF Elfsborg reserve squad, and was very memorable to me by just the venue alone. The other two games were played in another very nice stadium in Hvidovre, Denmark, and another Swedish top division training pitch which was one of the nicer grass fields I have seen in a while.

Tomorrow we are off to Denmark again for an evening game against another very good Danish team. If only I could remember their name. Hopefully as our trip continues we can get some more positive results in the games we play and represent ourselves, the program and all the people involved in a positive manner.