January 30, 2011

My team won our game last night 8-3 against Vallentuna. The makeup of my team has changed in the past week. Our head coach has been in the hospital for the past week, which has forced our oft absent assistant coach to fill his spot. However, he let our manager know on Thursday that he was going on a vacation this weekend for his anniversary. To make it even worse, we lost our starting goalie to Djurgarden IF, a SuperElite team in Stockholm. Finally, some of our players are sick and missed the game. So all these losses left our team shorthanded and coach-less. Thankfully, two coaches who coach younger Nacka teams volunteered to fill in. Our team had a fresh look and it showed on the ice. We scored 3 goals in the first 6 minutes. We dominated the entire game and played with a new intensity. Unfortunately, our team lost another player in the beginning of the third period. Victor Gortz was hit hard into the boards while skating the puck up the left side. The hit was not huge, but Victor appeared to be in excruciating pain as he was screaming and rolling around on the ice. To make a long story short, an ambulance came an hour after the hit and the game finally resumed play after the 90 minute delay. Victor was hospitalized with back pains. Our team hopes that Victor will be back on the ice soon, as he is one of our leading scorers.

Victor's injury was another example of how Swedes treat injuries and sickness. I do not mean to sound insensitive because I luckily haven't experienced either since being in Sweden, but I am used to a different mentality at home. When I played for Delbarton, the only thing that kept one off of the ice was any form of serious injury or sickness. We didn't let the minor injuries or the occasional cold keep us off the ice. If we did miss some time, we were itching to get back on the ice and doing everything we could to get healthy. Here, however, players and parents are much more sensitive to sickness or injury. For example, a player will rehab 'not feeling well' for a week. Other times, players will be out for a couple weeks for injuries that I never saw happen or heard about. This may have to do with the fact that health care is entirely government funded and that everyone has access to it. Yet, I see this careful attitude also parallel the soft-spoken, reserved, non-confrontational behavior that most Swedes possess. They are extremely organized and punctual and they do not like when things go off course. Americans tend to be less proficient in that area.

We have 5 games left and still hope to finish in second place. Sean's dad arrives on February 12th, just in time for Sean's birthday, which is on the 13th.

I have a game at home on Wednesday against Trangsund.

January 16, 2011

I arrived in Stockholm on January 7th for the second half of my season. The weather is a bit warmer, but there is more snow and ice on the ground. They barely salt the sidewalks and roads, so most of the city is covered in ice. Sean had arrived January 5th. His team is in a new division so they play games more frequently and their games are farther away. My team is in 3rd place, but is too far behind the 1st place team to have a chance to win the league. Our goal is to finish in 2nd place. We have played in 3 games since I have been back. We won the first, lost the second in the shoot out, and won the third game. I have 3 points over that stretch (1 goal, 2 assists).

Its been nice to finally be settled in one place. Over Christmas break, I was in New Jersey for just over a week and in the Bahamas for 5 days. In 17 days, I spent around 40 hours traveling on big planes, small planes, and boats. The blizzard at home made my trip south stressful, as my original flight was canceled, but somehow I got on a 6 am flight to Fort Lauderdale. The vacation was really nice, a harsh contrast from the weather I was used to in Sweden. Now that I am back, adjusting from 70 degree beach days to consistent 15 degree dark snow days has been tough. Yet, I'm glad to be back here in Stockholm.

Last night I got home from my game at around 9:30. I took a shower, ate dinner, cleaned up the apartment, but I still had 4 hours until the Packers game began. As a loyal and dedicated fan, I had to stay up and watch them play. They ended up beating up on the Falcons and I was in my bed at 6 am. I was probably the only person in Sweden that watched the entire game. Sean is sitting on a bus coming from a game in Furudal (4 hours north) right now as his beloved Patriots start their game against the Jets. I am instructed to give him text updates until he comes home.

Sean and I are planning a trip to Gothenburg next week for a concert. Its a 3 hour train ride, which Sean isn't that keen about, but its going to be the only chance we'll be able to see the rest of Sweden. Then in February, we are going to take an overnight cruise to Helsinki.