A belated Happy Easter! Glad Påsk! as they say here.
I’ve been at home with a cold for the past few days, but I was able to make it to a Good Friday (Long Friday) service.
The past few days have been full of dissertation revisions. I made it through the entire 100,000 words by the end of Monday with an initial overview. There are some notes and additional comments to review, but nothing of content that will be major redevelopment. I have to get through the formatting requirements, including bibliographic references at the end of each chapter.
Anya’s Easter basket
I repurposed my one basket that seems the right shape for an Easter basket. It is actually black, and was part of the Christmas gift basket that we all got at work. So, perhaps it represents the goodies coming out of the tomb—and ties in Christmas and Easter! Fortunately, the Easter candy here is Lindt! None of the yucky, waxy cheap chocolate eggs.
I was in pretty good shape at the end of my cold to enjoy a very nice Easter worship in the morning. I didn’t sing much in order to not provoke coughing, but that meant it was easier to hear my coworker, Maria, singing behind me. She is in one of the elite choirs, which I think sang at an early service at the cathedral.
One highlight of the service was at the end of the sermon, the pastor asked anyone who had a different mother tongue to come up and write on a streamer of paper and then say “Jesus is risen.” “Jesus är uppstånden” in Swedish. There were about 20 different languages, including Chinese, Arabic, Farsi, Icelandic, Romanian, Spanish, Greek, Amharic, Oromifa (last two from Ethiopia), Afrikaans, one I never heard of, and English (not me, as I understood the basics of the instruction, but not the details). It was a wonderful celebration of voices from around the world!
After the service, I made a new connection with some women at the coffee hour. One woman, Anna, teaches in the computer science department at the University of Uppsala, and she has collaborated on a project with a woman who teaches at UW Bothell. I guess the research is looking at data to understand why we learn better as active learners–or something like that. She was amazingly animated for a Swede in expressing her love of the Seattle area! She’ll be visiting again in August!
Anya and I had an Easter dinner of favorites, as Anya is not a big fan of ham. She requested chicken pot pie, and I made deviled eggs. We had tapioca, that I found on Tuesday in Stockholm. So, a bit of a strange meal in the same color palate but all favorite comfort foods. So, perhaps comfort foods are a good theme for the ultimate comfort that comes with the good news of Easter!
With blessings
Beth
2 thoughts on “2017.04.08: Easter Comfort”
I like the way you express your self in your blog. Makes me smile. If your friend coming to Seattle needs other connections here let Jean or I know. And what a great idea for different languages and “Jesus is Risen” – We will do that next year – maybe even contact the folks ahead of time in case they won’t be in church that day. Even a couple languages helps speak to our diversity in community (138 languages in Kent school district). What did they do with the streamers?
Much love to you, Jane
Hi Jane! I’ll pass on the welcome to Anna for her August visit. The streamers are now posted on the front doors that enter into the sanctuary. I’ll take a picture and post them. Also, the main sermon was also inclusive of the children. Pretty cool!
I like the way you express your self in your blog. Makes me smile. If your friend coming to Seattle needs other connections here let Jean or I know. And what a great idea for different languages and “Jesus is Risen” – We will do that next year – maybe even contact the folks ahead of time in case they won’t be in church that day. Even a couple languages helps speak to our diversity in community (138 languages in Kent school district). What did they do with the streamers?
Much love to you, Jane
Hi Jane! I’ll pass on the welcome to Anna for her August visit. The streamers are now posted on the front doors that enter into the sanctuary. I’ll take a picture and post them. Also, the main sermon was also inclusive of the children. Pretty cool!