Yesterday I went native and rode my bike in the snow covered streets. I'm sure it's old hat to the Swedes, but it was invigorating for me. There I was, making good time to campus, the freezing wind in my face and I was thinking "I'm biking...in snow. I was always told this was impractical!" But it is, in fact, very practical. All the Swedes do it. I saw an old lady who must have been in her 70s biking on the white sidewalk.

I met with my class discussion group. There are four of us, including two Swedes and a Frenchwoman. One of the Swedes, Peter, went to undergrad at UCLA and his English and accent are impeccable. It was really fun to discuss the readings because they really did have different perspectives. A lot of the reading dealt with "ius Commune" which is the the common Roman law which the Continental countries all used up to the French Revolution. I of course live in a country descendent from the English system, which is not a ius commune country. The discussion eventually broke down to talking about whether Europe had an "identity" or not, with them bringing up such examples as some weird Europe wide TV show which I guess is like American Idle, only much older and much more cheesy.

I finally ran into Kim Allen, the third law student from the U of Minnesota here. She arrived late and is now trying to catch up.

OH! The big news is that the Ekeby first years are planning a trip to the Lapplands in a few weeks. We'll go up north, see the northern lights, ride a dog sled, etc, etc. (the Lapplands are the far northern area of Norway, Sweden, and Finland, where an indigenous group (the Sami) live.)

-The Wandering Norseman-