White Family Travelogue: A Swedish Wedding Story

Freja and Lars celebrate their first wedding anniversary today.

Their wedding reception was held in a medieval castle Örebro.  

At the reception, Freja and Lars kissed after people clanked on glasses.  They stood on a chair to kiss, which allowed all the guests to see.  A funny Swedish tradition, if the bride leaves the room, all the females line up and kiss the groom.  If the groom leaves the room, all the guys line up to kiss the bride.  Then one time, for fun (not the tradition) both left the room, and all the girls lined up to kiss the bride's father.   

At one point during the reception, the friends of the groom (in Sweden, neither the bride nor groom have attendants) picked up Lars and cut off the toes of his socks.  This is not tradition, but since Lars is from a small town in the South of Sweden called Klippan, and the Swedes all know English, it sounded like clip, so they cut his socks.

                                     

They had a nice powerpoint slide show/roast of the couple, much like what we had seen at Canadian weddings.  Maybe it is because half of Sweden immigrated to the Great Lakes region in the 19th century.  Many people, including me, representing the American guests, got up to tell a funny story about the couple.

Lisa, Freja, and Bob

It was a very beautiful wedding.

The End

Diane Travelogue: Fairy Chimneys

Fairy Chimneys

The Fairy Chimneys are in the Cappadocia area of Turkey.  It was once the heart of the ancient Hittite Empire, then a Roman and Byzantine province. The landscape is riddled with numerous ancient cave dwellings and subterranean honeycomb cities that were a refuge for the early Christians during Roman persecution.  Many are still in use today, having been passed down through families.  I was lucky enough to visit one family's home, which was quite modern and comfortable inside, including flat screen TV, etc.

 

Travelogue: A View of Paris

Jardin du Luxembourg

Evening stroll in Paris.

Notre Dame (no, not the football team)

The other "Ball and Chain".

Paris in April (and in pink, evidently)

View from the Eiffel Tower

Chateau garden along the Loire River

Versailles Palace through a window frame

Say "cheese"!

Chateau d'Ambroise

A French dog is a shopkeeper's best friend

Smokey Eglise de la Madeleine

 

Kelly & Jacques
"Pillow Talk" at the Paris apartment.

Travelogue: Bob & Lisa in China

The Whites traveled to China the fall of 2008, avoiding the Olympic masses, but enjoying all of the tourist amenities set up for the games.  Below you can get a glimpse of the Great Wall through the polluted air.

The second picture is from the beautiful mountain retreat near the Li River, called Yangshuo.

 The third is Bob, the newest terracotta solder in Xian.

The fourth is us with Pat and Duane Thoms (Bloomfield) at the world's largest McDonald's at the Olympic village in Beijing.  Do they have American takeout in square paper boxes?

The last picture is of Bob on the way to Yangshuo after a tainted meal of Peking Duck.  You cannot see how green his face is, nor hear the special sound effects of his retching.

Diane Travelogue: Gorillas in the Mist

These are Ugandan mountain gorillas (found also in the contiguous mountains of Congo/Rwanda/Uganda).  There are also lowland gorillas in some other African countries.  We hiked 3 hours up and back to see them.  It was a family of one silverback male (picture), 3 mature females, and several teenage boys and girls.  At one point, I was standing in the way of one of the young females so she just rushed by, brushing against me in the process.  Nobody had the presence of mind to get the picture!

 

Today is my birthday

I will be ...

getting up early, and hiking through the woods,

across the dunes,

where I will pose for a picture with my husband,

or maybe sit in the early morning fog with my sister.

Or maybe sit quietly, and
wait for a bald eagle to swoop down low
and wish me a happy birthday.

I will definitely run down the dune and
splash into the water.  Swim if I feel like it.

Walk back to the Inn for breakfast,

where I will chat, and eat oatmeal scones,
and receive birthday greetings.

I will sit on the porch and hear everyone's plans for the day.
Big beach or little beach? Read or bike, or maybe a nap ?  

The girls and I will most likely choose
 the big beach (Lake Michigan).

The day will end with sunset and friends,

and a birthday run down the beach with my sister,
waving sparklers and laughing,
until one of us falls down.
(usually me)

The End

  

Travelogue: Diane in Africa

Diane in the Namib Desert

Noan: When did you go?

Diane: January and February of 2008

Noan:  Where exactly is Namibia?

Diane: On the southern west coast of Africa; bordered by the Atlantic Ocean, Angola, Botswana and South Africa.

Noan:  Why did you decide to go there? 

Diane:  I met a woman from Namibia when in South Africa years before and she planted the idea in my brain.  The Great Namib Desert is the oldest on earth and the country is also home to the Kalahari Desert.  Wanted to see both, especially the red sand dunes that I had seen on travel posters for years.  So I called a friend and she put the trip together for us.

Noan:  Why is the sand that color?  I think I remember you saying that people surf on the red sand, true?

Diane:  Yes, you can and I did sand surf.  What a blast!  The beautiful red color of the dunes is a consequence of the high percentage of iron in the sand and consequent oxidation processes.

Noan:  What surprised you the most about Namibia?

Diane:  Although in Africa, I didn't go to see animals but rather to see the country--its geography, geology, government and people.  I came away with a sense that Namibia is one of the few African countries to get it right.  It is a young country (1990) and seems to have taken the best from many other democracies.  They created a stable country in an unstable continent.  Their constitution emphasizes the rule of law, the observance of human rights, including the minority whites and the ethnic tribes.  They have an elected president, independent judiciary, and a multi-party bicameral Parliament.  Stewardship of the environment is even written into their constitution.