We woke up wonderfully late to be greeted by a beautiful clear day and ice everywhere. Hisham's sister graciously prepared a tasty Syrian breakfast to fuel us for the activity of the afternoon: shopping!
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| The level of deliciousness has remained consistently high throughout our time staying here. |
On the trip out to the shopping centre I was obtusely astonished to discover that the ice was everywhere. The roads, the medians, the fences, the houses, the trees, the grass, the paths: everything was completely frozen. We passed by a lake and it took me a while to realise that the reason the reflections of the trees in the water were kind of blurry was because I was actually looking at ice! I felt like perhaps I had walked through a wardrobe overnight. I tried and miserably failed to take photos of the all-encompassing ice so sadly this is the best of my attempts:
That photo was taken at 2:30 pm and as you can see the sun has well and truly gone down already. I guess it's not surprising though considering how far north Härnösand is:
It's on the same line as Greenland, which is always covered with ... you guessed it ... ice! I bet the Swedes are hanging out for the days to start getting longer in a couple of weeks. Anyway, we arrived at our destination just before 3pm and discovered where everybody was:
"Bishta" City; the local mall - only a 45 minute drive 'down the road' to the next town. It looked unsurprisingly (in hindsight) exactly like any other mall I've ever been in and even had some shops which were carbon copies of the NZ versions. Swedish Specsavers? Identical. Body Shop? Identical. It was a weird juxtaposition with my wardrobe experience from a few minutes ago.
So we shopped and we wandered and we browsed and we enjoyed the warmth and we got some sweet threads for the little dude and we took the boys to the playground and we headed out to a cafe and then I discovered I didn't have my bag. I tried to contain the panic while waiting for Hisham to catch up but soon found out that he didn't have it either and then we panicked together about both of our credit cards and all three passports. I walked as fast as I could back to the playground, holding out a shred of hope that it would be on the floor where I left it, but it was gone. My sister-in-law reassured me that Swedes are honest and I tried to remember my faith in humanity but it was almost swamped by the thoughts which were crowding my mind about how impossible it would be to replace our passports without ID or means of payment before our big expensive flights to the US in two days. And then we arrived at the information desk and, like the grand prize in a game show illuminated by flashing neon lights and dancing elves, there it was! I sobbed into Hisham's shoulder for way too long - I'm blaming that on jetlag - and offered up some prayers of eternal providence for the kind soul(s) who proved once again that good will always prevail.
Back at the casa we hung out, ate some tasty food, enjoyed each other's company and generally wound down from the day. Adam had a great time playing with his newest cousin in his fancy clothes and then we all slept the peaceful sleep of people with bags and passports and credit cards safely stored under their pillows.
It's on the same line as Greenland, which is always covered with ... you guessed it ... ice! I bet the Swedes are hanging out for the days to start getting longer in a couple of weeks. Anyway, we arrived at our destination just before 3pm and discovered where everybody was:
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| How cool is that reindeer?! |
So we shopped and we wandered and we browsed and we enjoyed the warmth and we got some sweet threads for the little dude and we took the boys to the playground and we headed out to a cafe and then I discovered I didn't have my bag. I tried to contain the panic while waiting for Hisham to catch up but soon found out that he didn't have it either and then we panicked together about both of our credit cards and all three passports. I walked as fast as I could back to the playground, holding out a shred of hope that it would be on the floor where I left it, but it was gone. My sister-in-law reassured me that Swedes are honest and I tried to remember my faith in humanity but it was almost swamped by the thoughts which were crowding my mind about how impossible it would be to replace our passports without ID or means of payment before our big expensive flights to the US in two days. And then we arrived at the information desk and, like the grand prize in a game show illuminated by flashing neon lights and dancing elves, there it was! I sobbed into Hisham's shoulder for way too long - I'm blaming that on jetlag - and offered up some prayers of eternal providence for the kind soul(s) who proved once again that good will always prevail.
Back at the casa we hung out, ate some tasty food, enjoyed each other's company and generally wound down from the day. Adam had a great time playing with his newest cousin in his fancy clothes and then we all slept the peaceful sleep of people with bags and passports and credit cards safely stored under their pillows.
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| Fancy new clothes from his aunty, and finally a warm hat and gloves! |
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| Cousin time |
Yay for cousins :) Yay for people as honest as us. :)
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