Sunday, July 6, 2014

The First Swedish Word I learned - Fika

Hej hej!

Fika - a small coffee break usually accompanied by a small pastry or piece of fruit

One of the first things I was told when I arrived at lab was that there was fika at 10 am and 3 pm every day. My professor explained to me that this was a social break where people talk about work, food, traveling, and other things. So far, it's been my favorite Swedish custom. It's great to take a break in the middle of the day, recharge, and then get back to work. The best part about fika is that professors, graduate students, and staff alike all take a break and chat together. There really aren't any "clicks" in the room. The only problem with fika is that the Swedes are making me addicted to caffeine (according to Wikipedia the average Swede has over 3.2 cups of coffee a day). To help combat this problem I've started bringing in decaffeinated tea which was hard to find at the supermarket here.

Friday Fika is a special fika where the person in charge of making coffee for the week brings in a treat to share. Even though I wasn't in charge of coffee, I wanted to share "American" desserts. Last week I made rice krispie treats and then I made vanilla cupcakes with chocolate chip cookie dough on the inside for the 4th of July! I couldn't figure out a way to make the cupcakes more patriotic, but everyone in the lab did wish me a happy independence day :)


My next blog post will probably be on Thursday - it will be pretty exciting!

Until then, 
Dilpreet! 

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