My First Meetup

Last night I attended my first meetup ever. Over the past two weeks, apart from our friend Ingrid of course, I have had only one conversation with an actual Swedish person (the guy who rented me his bass) and that was mainly about bass playing. I have asked directions on the local trails, bought things in stores, said hej to people on the street but, up until last night, that was about all.

The meetup was in a private room in the basement of Buddy's Irish Pub in downtown Uppsala. To get into the spirit of things, I ordered my first beer in years, a half pint of Guinness on tap. Over the next half hour or so, a total of twelve people showed up and quite an international group we were. There were three Swedes, and the rest were from all over Europe and beyond. New Zealand, France, Holland, England, Russia, Ireland, India, and Germany were all represented. And, of course, I was there, the token American. Most of the people at the meetup were associated with the University either as students, post-docs, or staff and almost everyone had a lot to say.

At my end of the table, a young Swedish woman sat across from me who was assumed by her neighbor (not me) to be an undergraduate. She set the record straight by saying she was older than she looks (she is 27) and that she is a doctoral student in Agronomy. I knew that Agronomy has something to do with agriculture but otherwise I was fairly hazy on the subject. I asked her for further illumination and she said something like "I'm surprised you don't know all about it, it is so wonderful!" I think she was joking but...  She did condescend to inform me of the basic themes of the subject: plant genetics and physiology, soil, etc. all with the goal of growing food. She had been to Peru and Ecuador a few years ago and had a lot to say about it. We got onto the subject of rain shadows (i.e. the climate zones in Washington state) and she said she had studied those recently and how the concept applies to the Atacama Desert in Chile. So, a good talk.

Another woman sitting nearby was Moroccan-Dutch and works as a life coach for physicians and medical/nursing students. She described her trip to the bottom of the Grand Canyon in August a few years ago. No surprise, it was real hot. She said they took two days to climb out of the canyon since, as she said, it is over 2500 meters deep. She also went to Iceland in February and it was real cold.

I found myself mentally translating feet and miles to meters and kilometers a lot last night since non-English Europeans often have no idea how long a foot or a mile is. Also, describing Seattle's climate using degrees Celsius can be a challenge (high temperatures in the summer can be in the upper 20s). Incidentally, Anders Celsius, he of the temperature scale, is buried in the church at Gamla Uppsala just north of town. I will make a pilgrimage there sometime soon.

An English woman from London was also sitting nearby and she regaled us with funny stories of her work with 6-16 year old kids who are on the autism spectrum. No one tells stories like the English, and hers were hilarious. She also went on a long rant against the Swedish government's policy to encourage people to reproduce, finding it unconscionable in a world of SEVEN BILLION PEOPLE, as she said repeatedly.

Later on, I went to the other end of the table and talked to a young Swedish fellow named Klaus. It turns out that he was in Vancouver B.C. for a few months recently and made a side trip to Seattle. He was very impressed with the natural beauty of the Northwest. I told him about the large Nordic population in Seattle and he said he was glad he didn't know that at the time. Apparently, he was looking for a non-Swedish experience while in North America.

I didn't know ahead of time whether this meetup thing would be a good idea or not. I ended up staying for four hours so I guess it was good. I may go again next Friday night.