Matt and Janelle in Europe

April 30th and May 1st seem to be a important days around Europe. Before we left Amsterdam, a few people we talked to told us that we should have stayed for the Queen's Day celebration on the 30th. In Sweden, Jack informed us that April 30th is the day of an annual festival called Valborg. Lund, being primarily a university town, is home to one of the biggest Valborg celebrations in the country. All of the international students Jack lived with were very excited for the festival, but no one quite knew what to expect because no one had been there for over a year. We heard from the Swedish man on our overnight train that there were many bonfires and male choirs singing, but in Lund, many of the students heard it was just a day to hang around in the park. It was complete luck that our trip brought us to Sweden on April 30th and we were just excited to be there.

We woke up and had some of Jack's American coffee and a breakfast of cookies leftover from our picnic the day before, then got ready and headed to the grocery store to pick up some food for the day. We got more sandwich material and some chips, then headed to the park with the intent of finding some of Jack's friends.

The festival centered around the same park we'd had the picnic at the day before, but now everywhere you looked it was filled with people. Towards the center of the park, every patch of grass had people sitting on blankets or in lawn chairs. After fighting our way through the crowd, we found where Jack's friends were sitting, but the three of us thought it was much too crowded to try to deal with. Instead, we retraced our steps and found a nice clearing a little further from the center of the park.

While sitting in the park, we people-watched, observing the Swedish people's crazy styles which make even the most hipster of Americans look normal. Although there weren't many people around us in the beginning, people began to sit and the area around us eventually became quite crowded, and there was a bluegrass-ish group of musicians near us that played Seven Nation Army about twelve times. Meanwhile, we ate our picnic food and drank some beers, as public drinking is allowed in Sweden (and practically encouraged for Valborg). We didn't have much to drink (the liquor stores were closed), and, as the day progressed, we ran out. Fortunately, the Swedish people were kind and a few donated some extra beers to us.

Later in the evening, we returned to Jack's place and hung out there for a while. Eventually, we returned to the park at night to see if we could see any bonfires, but it wasn't anything special. Soon we returned home and went to sleep.