Euophoria and pride

Eleven years of waiting is finally over. AIK beat IFK Göteborg yesterday evening and I can not really put words on the massive happiness and joy that I feel. I will not try to draw any conclusions about the season that just passed because I can't, there is just too much and too many feelings at the same time. I need some distance to this in order to really understand what happened. I just want to point at a post from one year ago, written by me shortly after the appointment of Mikael Stahre. This is what I had to say then. This is what I want to say now: Micke, förlåt! I was wrong and I admit it! When I attended the first game of the season on April 5th earlier this year I could not imagine that this season would evolve into what it eventually did. November 1st 2009 is a day that I will never forget, and I still cannot believe that it is true.

I found some strong images from the game yesterday (courtesy of Magnus Neck).

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thank You!

Fathers' day

• It's fathers' day today, the second Sunday of November. Isn't it amazing? A year ago I wrote the TOEFL test in order to prove the people at the International Office of Linköping University that I am fully capable of going to the United States of America to pursue my academic studies. My result on the TOEFL test were high and I was far above the lowest acceptance levels. I still didn't make it due to fierce competition. It's OK though, life took another path and I can't say that I am unhappy about it right now.

• We spent the evening at Barolo, congratulating my dad. The dinner was great and it was a pleasant evening. It feels like six months ago, not 12. I had to return to Linköping that same evening so shortly after we had finished our meals, dad drove me to Södertälje Syd train station for the late train back to "Camp Bad Accent". The following weeks were calm compared to the rest of 2007, I saw a light at the end of a very long tunnel.

• The meeting with the former exchange student on Friday night was cool, nothing special though. He was very nice and he liked to drink a lot of beer. He emptied three Stiegl bottles while I was struggling with one. Sara told me that he had four beers altogether that night, we only had one each. Anyhow, the bar (or whatever the fuck it was) was situated on the top floor of a student dorm. The building was a typical soviet-like, spartan and ugly concrete block. Ten tenants were supposed to share toilet and showers, and the walls (including the very scary elevators) reminded me of a prison. We'll see if we meet again.

• AIK finished 5th in the league this season after a 2-0 victory over GAIS (stupid name).

• I am currently taking a break from a very long and exhausting chapter about "Customer Centric Organizations". I am supposed to present Nokia from a customer centric viewpoint in a couple of days but I am not very motivated about it. It is a lot of reading...

• Something that actually does motivate me to continue, despite the enormous amount of text that I need to read, is the fact that things are going well. My grades have been hight this far, and if I can manage to nail the exam on Wednesday, it means that I have passed my second course down here.

• The coming weeks are stuffed with lectures, seminars and deadlines/exams. After that things will hopefully cool down a few notches.

• Quantum of Solace was impressive, but I saw it in German so I don't have much of a clue what the story is about. I feel obliged to watch the English version, but the question is if it is worthwhile, I have already seen all the scenes and nothing will surprise me. I am mentally cleft. Nevertheless, it was a very pleasant evening, and I would like to this again. Thank you Nicole!

I am heading back towards the books. Thank you for reading!

More sunny (and inspiring) Tuesdays please

This has been a long but inspiring day. I had the great luck to see the sun today as well.

It began with studies, a lecture, followed by another lecture and more studying. The day was rounded off with a long meeting. It's been fair.

The second lecture today was actually more of a talkshow kind of thing where one of Sweden's most successful businessmen was present and where two students openly asked him questions about himself and his work. It was very inspiring to hear about his life and his business, an how he had made himself a fortune.

The same guy is also the chairman of the Swedish football club Hammarby IF from Stockholm. We were allowed to ask questions during the lecture, and I had to ask about the current situation with the goalies in Hammarby. They bought one of Sweden's best goalkeepers (Rami Shaaban) before this season, but after three games of something they benched him and threw their reserve goalie (Kristoffer Björklund) out on the pitch. The reserve goalie proved to be better than we all had expected, and excelled his rival. For example, he managed to deny Henrik Larsson several goals in the game between Hammarby and Helsingborg last week, and on top of that he saved a penalty kick from Larsson in the same game.

Anyway, the chairman said himself that they had bought one of northern Europe's best goalkeepers and that they regarded him as their number one, no matter what. But they had to be consequent and fair now that the reserve goalie was performing this well.

As I said earlier, this was a very interesting and inspiring person, and I told him that I practically am the neighbor of one their players. And of course, I also told him that I am a die hard supporter of one of their greatest (if not the greatest of all time) antagonists. Despite all the trouble AIK is having right now.

ARGENTINA

+

= GLORY!

I spent another day in paradise today. After almost three months away from home I revisited the holy ground of Råsunda. It has not been a good season so far and I have no high hopes anymore. I just hope the team can advance in the table from this point onward. The first step was taken today and 2 new players from Argentina played their first game ever; Lucas Waldemarin and Mauro Ivan Obolo. The latter scored the first goal of the game and assisted the second goal. Finally we have found some class players with a license to score!


It felt good to be back at Råsunda and to see the team win again. It was a while ago they did so and I really hope things will become better from now on. We deserve it.

I was at the physio's earlier today and I'm making progress. Strength is returning but unfortunately I still have no sense in my upper right arm. I don't know when it'll come back but hopefully in a few months. I still have a lot of work to do with the physiotherapy. The fucking injury is a nasty one. I'm sure there are worse injuries around, but this one is really busting my balls. I can't do much because of it, nothing too demanding that is. I was looking forward to tennis, basketball, football and a lot of swimming this summer but those are just "no go's". I can't even run, that's how fucking bad it is. It really hurts inside my arm when I run. The bone isn't steady inside there yet and the muscle was obviously stretched pretty bad. I am determined to return to my full strength and to get back in shape. I am sick of not being able to do what I love to do. I had to turn a more or less free trip down to the French Riviera because of this injury, and believe me that hurts!

The rest of this week has the potential to turn out to something good. A possible concert, a big party at a friend's place and live football on TV are listed. The weather is said to be fucked up so I guess the concert is something I might have to forget about. We'll have to wait and see. Stay tuned for more updates and images from Life in Sweden.

Some kind of anticlimax... or something

After 5 long months of waiting and dreaming the day I had anticipated for so long finally came. Unfortunately things didn't turn out as I had wished. But hell, that's nothing new, is it ^^?

Anyway, I had been waiting for the premier game of the Swedish football league since the 5th of November (see the specific post from that date). For as long as I can remember (10 years), the spring has never arrived earlier than this year. I remember that the 6th of April 2003 was a day of extreme winter and endless piles of snow. I walked through the streets of Stockholm with my winterboots and I was freezing my ass off. So this year I had a really good reason for longing for the premier game. As we all know, football is best played on green pitches with the sun in the sky, and I was more or less sure that the game would take place in these conditions.

This is what I saw when I looked out the window of my old room when I woke up on the morning of the matchday.


What the fuck? My brother was dancing of joy and I was cursing all weather Gods for this terrible view. My dad had changed from winter- to summer tires, and I started to picture myself on a fully loaded train with drunk hooligans already.

Anyway, I was lucky to see that the snow gradually disappeared as the hours ticked away. I headed for the stadium where I was to meet 2 of my old friends. We had lunch and and went directly to the notorious north stand of Råsunda stadium.




Don't get me wrong. We never intended to watch the game with the fanatics of Black Army, we were heading for the upper parts of the stand where sophisticated people attend the games. Alright, not everyone is sophisticated up there. Some asshole kicked 3 chairs loose during the game when AIK missed an opportunity to score or when the referee misjudged different situations in the game. We also found 2 teenager lovers with tongues as long as my arms. They weren't there for the game as far as I could see. The lowlives were making out constantly (while standing up and blocking my view every other minute). It was somehow relieving to see that Firman Boys turned up at their traditional section of the east stand. There's no giving up from those guys.


The view was great from our seats and I am already counting the days to my next visit!






So what about the game? Well, AIK lost to the great wall of Kalmar. They did a great job in killing the game with boring and destructive football. I guess they earned their points because our players sucked anyway.

This was a little about my weekend which all in all was OK. I spent one night at the club with some friends (thank you for that pleasant evening) and I spent a few hours with Dalia in order to convince her of my crazy and odd talents.

Other than that I've been cracking the books most of the time and right now I'm really fed up with it. I need summer and I need some time off from this and from everyone else.