I, Robot with Will Smith and Bridget Moynahan. A fairly entertaining movie, though not necessarily a powerful or award winning one. I was already familiar with Isaac Asimov's story so the plot twists weren't as effective as perhaps they should have been. I did find it odd that the main character is obsessed with vintage items and is supposed to come across as cool. I dunno, maybe since retro is more cool now it will be even more so in the future. Or maybe someone wearing shoes from 2005 will be cooler in 2035 than someone wearing shoes from 1975 would be today. Avoiding the obvious analysis of how 2035 will probably look nothing like how it's portrayed in the movie, I have to wonder about those robots. The obsolete models were pretty cool looking, the new ones were just plain creepy, what kind of product design idea is that? And it would have been nice to see how the military made use of robot technology; if the civilian models can be powerful killing machines what would an actual killing robot be like?

Aeon Flux with Charlize Theron and Marton Csokas. I suspected that the confusion I felt while watching this movie stemmed from the fact that I knew nothing about the animated series that it was based upon. But after a quick investigation I learned that in the series the main character dies in half the episodes so there probably isn't anything I would have learned from it that would have shed light on the movie. I guess it's a pretty good film, all things considered. They weren't pretentious enough to think that the plot was substantial enough to make it a long movie. They went in, told the story and ended it with not much fluff or filler to bog it down. There were a lot of futuristic items and weapons that were just...weird. It's almost refreshing to see sci-fi movies that don't even care whether the technology they depict is possible or not. One thing I have to point out, though, why is it that in dystopian societies the police are always outfitted with armor that appears to made of glass? Come to think of it, if they had stayed true to the animated series and had Flux die at the end it would have made the movie that much better. The sheer novelty of the main character dying in an action movie would have made it much more note worthy, but I guess there are some things Hollywood movies just can't do. Oh, and Charlize Theron looks infinitely better than the drawn version of Aeon Flux.

Finally, a good reason to know art history:
Cute Dutch Girl: "Hi, I'm Saskia."
me: "Saskia. Wasn't that the name of Rembrandt's wife?"
CDG: "Yes! Wow. You're the first person to know that."

I've been noticing a lot of phrases in English are often pointed out as odd or improper despite their frequent use. For example, when someone tells us about some misfortune that has befallen them we say, "I'm sorry." But we (presumably) are not responsible for this event. Why should we apologize for something we didn't do? In Swedish, the reaction to bad news is "Jag är ledsen" or "I'm sad"; which makes more sense because the news is sad, but it isn't your fault.
Also, in English you say you know someone, which might give rise to the rhetorical question "How well can anyone truly know another?" In Swedish, the verb for knowing a person is "känner" which also means to sense or feel. It has less of an objective connotation; less of an implication that if you know someone you know all about them. Whereas if you "känner" someone you perceive them through your own senses, so one person might be perceived in many different ways. Though I suppose if you've "known" the person long enough and have spent a lot of time together, you might eventually actually start to know them. So maybe with that in mind, people a long time ago, back when Swedish and English were more closely related, decided that they would "know" everyone to make it sound more loving and friendly than "sensing" them.

And when I was at a corridor party last week, I met an American from Minnesota. He's a bit more like what a typical American college student is like and it turns out I have a class with him, so I'll be able to make some more observations. But the thing that got me was that he always says he's from America Not the US, or the States, or simply which state he's from. I find this a bit strange because hardly anyone calls it America without a pejorative connotation here. On several occasions I've heard it used as a synonym for stupid. Even the Americans seem to have an aversion to the word "America". I myself have avoided saying it because that instantly triggers the attack mechanism I mentioned before. I don't know if I've developed this on my own or absorbed it though the mental vibes of Europeans, but I now consider saying "America" to be like saying "I'm better than you." So it always slightly irks me when he declares he's from America (he also has a habit of speaking loudly, which might also be why it comes across in an obnoxious way. Europeans claim speaking loudly is typical of Americans, though I find the dumber Swedes do it too). Though there is something to be said for this connotation, namely you can tell off snotty Europeans by simply stating you are American in such a way that says, "Yes, in fact, I am better than you."

Moving right along on that note, my Swedish Society and Everyday Life class has a large number of Americans, more so than in any of my previous classes. During my stay in Sweden I've found it easy to go up to people in class or in clubs and strike up a conversation, something that would be very difficult for me to do back home. I thought that this was part of me growing and becoming more confident and comfortable around others. But no, it's not me. It's them. Trying to strike up a conversation with this group of Americans was just like trying to talk to frat boys and sorority girls back at the U of A. I might be from the same country, but I'm not one of them. This realization also put their choice of nations into perspective, they joined Värmlands and Stockholms, meat markets with the latter also known for being rather elitist. Sound like any college institutions we know? But I'm sure this reverse culture shock will be beneficial to my observations since now I can directly compare and contrast Swedish and American college life.

And finally, Word of the Day: stymied-An obstacle or obstruction. Also a verb: stymie-To thwart; stump.

BloodRayne with Kristanna Loken and Matthew Davis. It's a movie based on a video game, what do you expect? They really tried hard to put all the elements of a good movie into it but they didn't have the focus to pick just one, so it ended up failing at all of them. Good plot? Not so much; evil vampire lord must be killed by a society of vampire hunters. Good fight scenes? Would be if they didn't zoom in in a panicky kind of way every time she killed someone, I understand that her trademark is pouncing on them and biting their neck but I was kinda hoping for a nice fight scene with those giant sword/tonfas she has. The dialog was equally uninspiring, not quite the worst I've heard, but close. Not surprisingly, the only thing the movie has going for it is Kristanna Loken herself (she shows a lot more skin in this movie but I still think she was hotter in Terminator 3) and consequently one of the few notable parts in the movie is the rather abrupt sex scene between the two main characters which served as the only way to tell that there was supposed to be a romance between them. The ending was kind of sudden too; had kind of a Chronicles of Riddick feel to it, which didn't really make much sense. I've never played the games, so maybe it makes sense in that context, but I somehow doubt it. About all I can say is that I'm sure the game is much more fun than the movie but, honestly, that doesn't seem hard to do.

Equilibrium with Christian Bale and Sean Bean. I remember seeing this movie a few years ago and finding it so stupid that I walked out of the room. Later it seemed that everyone who had seen the movie loved it, so I decided to sit down and watch the whole thing through to see what was so great about it. And I want that hour and 45 minutes of my life back. It's an unoriginal dystopian plot where people take drugs to suppress emotion and anyone who doesn't comply with the totalitarian dictates of the society are hunted down and executed. 1984, Brave New World, Fahrenheit 451 are but a few of the stories that this movie is influenced by. But I shouldn't be too harsh on unoriginality since sometimes people can take an old story and make it better, but sadly this was not so. The inconsistencies were just too big, they suppress emotions, then why do the people panic and shout and deliver speeches full of emotion? These people should be the easiest to spot but the elite agents sent to hunt down those with emotion don't seem to notice. The martial arts in this movie would be good if it wasn't just Christian Bale hitting and shooting people who don't fight back. The thing that makes these agents so deadly are their proficiency in martial arts, including gun kata, where one can learn to shoot everyone in a dark room because they know the statistically probable location of where everyone in that room is. Now if you go into a dark room and you know there's someone in there that you're going to shoot isn't there about a 1 in 180 chance (assuming this is only 2 dimensional and you're standing in the doorway) you'll hit them? Isn't that why the term "a shot in the dark" has meaning? They also know the probable trajectory of bullets and can dodge them using the powerful but effective technique of standing in the exact same spot while muzzle flash reveals your location. But the true strength of these agents lies not in their own training but the incorrect training of those they fight. Bale can kill an entire room full of snipers because rather than shooting him from a distance, they try to snipe him from an arms length away. And when the regular soldiers are smart enough to team up on him they surround him and let themselves get pistol whipped for a good minute without so much as throwing a punch.
To conclude, what the hell is wrong with you people? This is a bad movie, why do you watch it?

A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again by David Foster Wallace. From the title and cover illustration I thought this might be some autobiographical account of college life, I was quite mistaken and pleasantly so. I really like this guy's style, and his observations are quite astute, shame he isn't an anthropologist. Given the depth with which he analyzes things I feel almost obligated to watch David Lynch's movies just so Wallace didn't write about him in vain. Maybe the title essay about Wallace's ocean cruise actually was the best or maybe I identified with it since I've been on a cruise myself. Also props to him for describing a person's voice as post-coital, an adjective I've never heard anyone else use and have been too afraid of misinterpretation to use it myself. I'd say that is the best part about Wallace, he describes things in a way you wouldn't have thought of, and in doing so describes them perfectly. You don't even have to have any experience with what he's talking about to get exactly the right feeling from his writing, but a common point of reference improves the reading experience infinitely.

The day before I went to Kiruna I went to Stockholm with Feifei to see a Rembrandt exhibition at the museum. Pretty cool stuff, it was interesting picking out the different translations to certain paintings or slogans. i.e. Memento mori was translated in Swedish as "Remember that you are mortal" the English translation was "Don't forget you must die."
We also went to the American Food Store to get some root beer, but all they had was diet root beer. It was vastly inadequate and a poor introduction for someone who's never tasted it before. Afterwards we had homemade Chinese dumplings with garlic sauce. Apparently they cut down on the garlic for me since Swedes cannot stand garlic at all. I impressed them by eating garlic at their level and they were in actual disbelief that I could handle it. I would likely not do that again however as it took a full 24 hours to get rid of my garlic breath (morning breath+garlic breath=ew²) I also impressed them with the correct use of chopsticks, yet another remarkable trait that I owe to my family. Excellent.

Kiruna was pretty cool, though not as frigidly cold as I had been warned. It was above freezing most of the time and I actually regarded it as pleasantly brisk. I went on a Northern Lights tour out to the forest many kilometers outside of Kiruna. We went by dog sled, which was pretty interesting, though the guy in charge of getting us to the campsite was not exactly the cheerful type and often got upset at us for not doing what he didn't tell us to do. The guy who was in charge of the campsite was friendly as can be, though. He prepared some tasty dishes of reindeer meat seasoned with none other than garlic,apparently the Norrlanders can handle the stuff a lot more than the rest of the Swedes. We went into the sauna a few hours later, the old-fashioned wood fire kind with no safety limit on the temperature. That was intense. I also tried the common Swedish practice of running out of the sauna and into the snow. I thought the severe temperature difference would be quite painful, similar to running out of a spa and jumping into a swimming pool, but it was quite pleasant. I was so hot I was literally steaming, (picture the Terminator when he first arrives).
After few more hours the once cloudy sky became completely clear and far from city lights the sky was full of stars. Around midnight the Northern Light appeared, and I have to say that it is one of the most underwhelming things I've ever seen. I'll post pics of it on Flickr. I checked the "fore"casts for the Northern Light and they said it was a pretty quiet time with little solar activity. Of course, by the laws of the Universe now that I'm gone there will be a magnificent Northern Lights display the likes of which will be talked about for years. I guess it's not fair to judge the Northern Lights on the crappy specimens I saw, just like it would be wrong to judge root beer by only tasting the diet version.
The trip back to Kiruna was interesting, sledding in the dark as part of a convoy of inexperienced sledders is quite a feat. And it was there I learned the difference between feeling numb and feeling like an amputee.

I was unable to go to the other two cities I wanted to visit due to a couple of factors: one, I couldn't visit two cities in opposite directions from Kiruna in the time allotted and two, the Norwegian transportation system sucks. I had always thought that Zeno's Paradox was something cooked up by an idiot trying to sound profound and had no practical application, but as it turns out this is the principle behind Norwegian buses. In order to get to Hammerfest, Norway from Kiruna I need to take the train to Narvik. Fair enough. To get from Narvik to Hammerfest I need to take a bus which can only take me halfway, to Tromsø. From there I must take another bus which can only take me to Alta, halfway in between. Unfortunately, I cannot take that bus, I must take the bus to Storslett, which is (surprise!) halfway in between. Each one of these towns will take a day, since starting traveling before 4PM is just plain silly, so I realized I couldn't possibly make it to Hammerfest in time, stayed in Tromsø awhile then began my trip home. Shame too, I was really looking forward to getting a Hammerfest T shirt.

My last day in Kiruna I visited the Icehotel, which was pretty impressive, despite my very incorrect mental image of it being a multi-story glimmering spire adorned with icicles. The inside is reminiscent of the Fortress of Solitude, or if real life had the obligatory ice level in video games. The chairs were pretty comfortable, amazingly enough.

Some other observations I made: -as pretty as Sweden is, geographically Norway kicks the crap out of Sweden. One word: fjords.
-Either red hair dye is really popular up north or there are a hell of a lot of redheads living there, like maybe every 9th person.
-I'm either going to continuously be bugged by people's views on the US or will have to learn to accept incredibly backhanded compliments. I'm still trying to define the look that people give me when they find out I'm American; perhaps one of surprise that I'm not Yosemite Sam, perhaps one of dismay as if I told them I was an assassin, perhaps one of disgust since they're assholes. I dunno, maybe all of the above.

Words of the Day: sylph-A slim, graceful woman or girl.
sunroll-(word invented by me) the phenomenon observable above the Arctic Circle during winter where the sun does not rise in the sky as it does elsewhere in the world but rolls across the horizon for a few hours producing what appears to be an incredibly long lasting sunset.

**And a small addendum that I promised myself I would mention: in Kiruna I stayed in the most awesomely named hostel ever: the STF Youth Hostel.

I can't make this post too long since I'm heading to Kiruna soon but I wanted to report on Lund and Malmö before I forget. Lund is Uppsala's main university rival, how this is possible is beyond me because Lund sucks big time. Could be because I was there when everything was closed and in the middle of a blizzard which cut down on my sight-seeing fun, but the town was just dull. I stayed one night then went to Malmö, which despite the blizzard was much more fun than Lund. People had told me that Malmö and Copenhagen are much colder than Uppsala, I figured they were just being babies since it shouldn't be colder in southern Sweden. But hoo boy it was, that coastal air made the cold wet and the wind cuts through you like a knife. I caught a cold from that damn place. Grr.
I was sadly unable to find Gunther's nightclub, so my tra-la-la remained untouched. The real nightclubs won't let you in unless you're 24 so I doubt I would've gotten in anyway.
I did learn something interesting in my travels though: I can safely say I'm from Arizona and people are intrigued and will have a nice chat with me but as soon as the words "The States" "America" or "The US" exit my mouth it triggers an attack mechanism in Europeans. They become haughty little bitches and make snide remarks like "American huh? So you like hamburgers then?" WTF mate? Everyone loves hamburgers. The Swedes, and other Europeans as well, eat their hamburgers with a knife and fork though. Losers.
In other news I failed the listening and writing Swedish tests which sucks immensely. It's a pass/fail system so I don't know how I did, just that it wasn't good enough. I get a massive sense of inferiority from this cuz all the Swedes speak perfect English (except in Göteborg where their English is merely really good) and the Germans pick up Swedish easily. My only solace is that I can still speak reasonably good Spanish even after years without practice. Which gives me a realization that that damn Swedish final wants me to be nearly fluent in Swedish after 4 months, I don't think it can be done.

Anyway I'll be back in a week, cross your fingers and hope there are some huge solar flares to make the Northern Lights spectacular.