Swedish names and pronunciation

We haven't encountered that many bizar names... I think the strangest one around here is 'Per'. There's also a Kennert (but they pronounce it Kenneth anyway!). What I really want to talk about today is the strange manner in which Swedish people pronounce their names. Sometimes so different from the spelling that there's not even the slightest bit of the name recognisable.
So, you've got the simple things like vowels changing in pronunciation, which is quite common, because it also happens in English or French. In that fashion the a is pronounced as a double o. So David becomes Doovid en Jan Joon.
Stranger though, and I cannot imagine what the rule is behind this, the pronounce Per as Pelle. And now the really amazing part: there's this guy Gert and they say Jek to him. Seriously...

David's fun stories

Here's some things that happened to David while I was away

Explode
Last week David was hard at work when suddenly he heard a loud buzzing noise. He assumed something was wrong with his installation and started looking for a problem. While he was searching, he heard and felt a loud explosion and dropped to the ground, thinking that one of the machines had exploded. When nothing else happened, he got up from the floor to go into the office. Only to find out noone else was as shook up as he. During conversation, he found out the explosion was nothing more than the builders blasting away the rock to clear the area for the new construction. He tought to himself that he was very lucky that nobody saw him duck in fear of world war three.

The dissapearance of mr. wallet
Another story David told me.
Sometime last week, he suddenly couldn't find his wallet anymore. Since this is something that happens regularly, he didn't panic and assumed the thing was still sitting in his car. When he got to check the car, it wasn't there. He drove to work only to find out it wasn't here either. So he went back home and went trough the whole appartment again. No wallet. He decided to call cardblock the next day, that the thing was definately stolen or lost. When he got in his car the next day to drive to work, he noticed something lying on the ground next to his door.
Off course this was his wallet, that had been lying in the parking lot for two days. When he went through it he noticed there wasn't anything missing from it. Not even the money.
We're wondering if something like this is possible in Belgium.

The attack of the invisible door
This is something that happend a while ago, but we still have such a laugh about it that I decided to share it, eventhough David will kill me for it. He wanted to go from the office space to the factory which is separated with a door. He walked straight into the door, eyes open... How do you do that? Since then his glasses are totally crooked off course and he took quite a bump to the head.
When he told the story to Christian, one off the chemical engineers here, Christian said he too had done that several times? So what? They can construct bridges and planes and stuff, but they don't know you have to open a door before you can walk through it? Maybe that's something they should include in the university courses then...

Some pics from the blue cruise

I can only post some pics I took the first day of the cruise, cause I took these with my camera. The rest of the trip I fooled around with my parent's camera and my father didn't succeed in putting their pictures on a cd - what should I say: middleaged people and technology don't mix! My brother didn't get the time to get some of his pictures my way, so you'll have to do with these.

Bodrum harbour, where we started off. (and ended also) A very loud and busy place where the water smells awfull, quite the opposite of the rest of our trip.

Le grand blue.

My parents and Shakir (the man who arranged all this).

Blue Cruise

Hi everybody!!! I just got back from the blue cruise in Turkey, where I spent one week floating on the Egean sea with my brother and parents. I'll upload some pictures later tonight.
The cruise was really relax. We didn't do much more than swim, go snorkling, eat delightful Turkish food, sleep, play games and read books. The weather was really good, so we all managed to get a tan. Still, the last day the weather turned, so we went at the right time.
We also managed to learn some Turkish, since we were on the boat with Turkish friends of my parents. Turkish is really hard and it bares no resemblance to anything we know, but it's fun.

So, iyi geceler and I'll try to get those pictures on as quickly as possible.

So, I'm back in Belgium since two days ago. First I want to say happy birthday to my dear hubbie again, I'm really sorry I can't be there.
I'll be leaving for Turkey tomorrow night. We'll be doing a Blue Cruise, starting off from Bodrum. So I won't be able to write all off next week. I will be able to get a tan and rest before the big wedding event!
Anyhow, I promise to post some pictures after I get back.

David and the media
After winning over the Indonesian television, and having his self-made video on how to make biodiesel in laboratory condition, David has taken another step and will soon be in the Swedish newspaper, picture and all.
The company was visited by the Swedish minister of Environment today. She showed up with two police escort cars and her own bodyguard (who was also a women - in her sixties, we think, can you imagine). Some journalists were here too, and they showed quite some interest in David taking the machine to Afrika. So tomorrow David's face will be printed. Off course he failed to ask which newspaper it was, so we might have some problems finding the right one. Maybe we'll find out later today.

First of all I would like to apologize for not writing anything this weekend. This again was due to our computer's unwillingness to connect to the internet. We've fixed that problem, again, so we're back online for the time it will last.
We didn't go to Stockholm in the end. David is having some trouble with his machine, so he had to come to work on Saturday. So we bought a game and spend the rest of our off time playing it.

Swedish Fun facts
There's a refund for recycling plastic bottles and metal cans, about the same as we get in Belgium for glass.
Swedish people warm their houses and water with the heat they retreive from burning trash.
Passports and ID need to be picked up at the bank.

The lit sky I talked about in one of my earliest posts is no more. It gets pitchblack at night now. It even gets dark as early as eight PM.
David's machine is finally finished. Four days after the planned date. So work really starts now for him. We're still going to try to get the weekend off and visit Stockholm. Otherwise we won't have seen much of Sweden during the length of our stay.

There's not much else to talk about really. Life's quietly drifting further. I read a lot lately. Most of the things we still had to plan for the wedding party are coming together, mainly thanks to my mum.

So we're back in Sweden. All the good intentions about keeping up the blog when in Belgium went down the drain. We were so busy back in Belgium that there was little time to write, with the last preperations for the wedding party and all. But we managed to do all we had planned, so I'm quite happy with that.
I've noticed there's some misunderstandings about our whereabouts. We were in Belgium all of last week and are now back here. I'll be here until the thirteenth or fourteenth of september, then I'll get back to go to Turkey. It's quite stunning the amount of planes I will have taken this year, I wonder if it's not even more than all the planes I had taken in my life before this time put together.
It's still bright and sunny here, but there's a strong northern wind that makes putting on a sweater mandatory. Everything is the same over here. they're still putting David's machine together (even though it had to be finished yesterday), which makes the time frame we're on rather narrow. But we'll have to manage, because we definitely need to get back home the first of october.