From Spokane to Sweden: The first week of school (for the 17th time)

I’m sorry, I have been remiss. There has been a serious lack of material on this blog recently, mostly stemming from my old habit of not carrying a camera with me frequently. But today, I was so proud of myself as I remembered to bring it as I left the house, thinking I could take some pictures of the beautiful marinas, islands, and other scenery on the walk to school. But the camera had other plans. After briefly lighting the screen, the camera refused to even turn on the blue LED power light. I did not have time to be frustrated with technology for long however, as cultural lesson number one for today was about to take place, and fear not, it was back in action later in the day (take a look farther down for some of todays shots).

To help organize the bike coop, I had set to meet another student, one from Germany, to get us set up for an afternoon of work. Our plan was to clean and organize the work room before class started. I, as usual, did not make it out of the house on time; anyone who knows my family knows we run somewhere around Island time, 20 minutes late is right about on time. I was on standard Goltz Larson time and made it to the coop 25 minutes after I had suggested we meet in the morning. Evidently, Germans are a notoriously punctual and organized people, and my late arrival for what I thought of as an informal meeting was a pretty serious misstep. To his credit, my German friend was quite friendly and understanding in informing me of this. But wow, this will be a growing experience for this time-relaxed and organization challenged individual. I can just now picture my mother reading this laughing and saying how she hopes I’ll pick up some German organizational skills.

Cultural lesson number two was an altogether wonderful experience. I had already noticed that what qualifies for a road worthy bike here is quite different from the States. As I mounted a steel steed I had borrowed from the coop today, I rode away on a squeaking, slightly wobbling, occasionally clanking chunk of metal. Mortified to find myself on such an antique meant for the scrap yard, I was careful to keep my eyes out for people staring at me as I passed by. Quite the opposite! No one ever thought twice. I was passed several times by bikes far squeakier, rustier, and clankier than my own. It’s changing my perspective of useable, and at the same time I got a good laugh out of my creative cycling technique to pedal such a monstrosity up the hill to the apartment.

So now to the heart of the issue, classes have been incredible. We started Monday with an opening lecture by Göran Broman, who cofounded this major. After hearing him speak, I’m can’t wait to see what kind of expertise the rest of the faculty brings. Beyond passion, these leaders have spent their lives, studying, applying, and teaching sustainability in all its forms, from theories, implementation, frameworks, to social planning, materials science, and engineering. I’m so excited for the learning that can take place that I can hardly choose a track to pursue. Product development sounds fascinating, and I would love to learn about sustainable products, manufacturing, and design. But at the same time, I am attracted to the leadership track, as it will offer more framework, integration and planning insight. Both are within the MSLS program, so who knows where I’ll end up!

Our next two days were spent in an Open Space meeting. For those not familiar with Open Space, it’s an incredible setting in which people are able to host a session on any topic they are inclined to discuss. There are 4 rules: Whoever comes up are the right people, Whatever happens is the only thing that could have, Whenever it starts is the right time, When it’s over, it’s over. There is also the law of two feet, which says that if you’re not interested in, engaged with, or contributing to the session you’re at, use your two feet and feel free to go somewhere else. While I was at first skeptical of what would come from such an open ended session (and indeed the topics people posted to discuss over the ensuing 2 days were diverse) I was incredibly surprised by the intensely positive, productive and meaningful dialogue that took place. It was an incredible opportunity to listen to others with expertise in areas of interest to me, to share my experience and learning, and to get to know so many of the people from so many different cultures in the program. Not only did I have a better connection with, and even more respect for many of the people in the program, my idea of my own mission here after the session has been shaped much more clearly for me. I cannot thank my colleagues here enough for their support, wisdom and insight.

We did get some great progress made today on the bikes for the bike coop. We have a great group of folks leading it, and we’re having a good time working hard to get the bikes up and running. What a fantastic idea this bike coop is, something schools in the US could really look into.

But don’t worry, it hasn’t been all work. Today we had a little get together at the park on one of the islands in Karlskrona. After some beach volleyball at the courts they have there, we got an incredible game of ultimate Frisbee going. And of course, we had to take the opportunity to swim in the Baltic Sea. It was a fun group we had, so we even headed to the store for some hot dogs and charcoal to end the night with a little cookout. It’s quite a scene watching the sun set over a little finger of the Sea, next time I’ll have to be more on the spot with the camera to capture it.