UPPSALA! Woke up earlier in the morning so that we can exploit more of the pathetically short daylight, and met up at T-centralen. Spent 75SEK after much contemplation and it turns out to be the best decision ever cos the best case scenario between not buying a ticket and getting caught (fine of almost S$300), and buying a ticket and getting checked happened (ok, actually not buying a ticket and not getting checked is the best case, but I value the peace of mind more than 75KR, as did more of us eventually, evidently). So we reached the fourth largest city in Sweden after a 50 minute train ride (excluding transit time). Uppsala also has the oldest university in Scandinavia and guess who else is very into university ranking and stuff here in Sweden as well? Yep, Lund. And the rival is so strong we even felt it in the tourist info centre (of course, the dude is probably very into the whole Uppsala culture thingy to be working in the tourist info centre).
Headed out to the largest cathedral in Scandinavia which was really quite big. Nothing compared to the one in Milan of course, and this one is less grand with its
red-bricks and simple design; typical of the Northern Europeans. Went into the cathedral and there was a carol practicing! Really reminded me of my choir days when I just stare blankly at the conductor's hands waving in the air...
red-bricks and simple design; typical of the Northern Europeans. Went into the cathedral and there was a carol practicing! Really reminded me of my choir days when I just stare blankly at the conductor's hands waving in the air...
Went to a castle that looks too modern and walked past the university that we almost missed. I have no idea why but we stopped by Stadium to do some (window) shopping, before we finally settled down for lunch. CHINESE BUFFET! It's my second Chinese buffet in two weeks and I'm not complaining (ok now that I seem to have gained about 1kg... It doesn't seem so appealing anymore). Well as human we always value losses more than gains of the same amount isn't it? Which is also why we decided to go against our instinct and "lose" the amount we saved from the fine to gain a reward in a form of a good meal! No prize for guessing that we sat down for a pretty long while... Sun knocked off, lights came on, and even the waiter had to come over and tell us the table's reserved in an hour's time. But you probably missed the most important thing about the previous sentence: the lights came on!
Oh, my bad for not mentioning it: we're lucky cos for about 20 days in November it's Allr ljus på Uppsala, or "All Lights on Uppsala"! They have all these fancy lights of different themes going on at each of the 15 locations, the most memorable one was the one with a large box of projector screen and it started to showcase some of the quotes of freedom fighters from Thomas Jefferson to Nelson Mandela, Aung San Suu Kyi to Malala (went to research on her and found that "Malala" meant "grieve-stricken").
This is not one of the 15 but it's still pretty isn't it?!
Highlight, however, was checkpoint 8 where there's this laser beam that looks like alien invasion from afar; and physics at it's best, it looks like it's bent when seen directly below it. Cool or cool?! When the dude at the info center told us about it we were like "meh" but when we really saw it, it turns out to be pretty darn impressive.
Laser shooting down the streets looking like some alien invasion!
Backdrop to the source of the laser; not sure if there's anything to do with LGBTQ but rainbows are pretty no matter. And look, the laser shot through my head!
Then just before we left, we all shared a "first kiss" together XD
Got on the train after some grocery shopping (what else do you expect of us...). Weren't so "lucky" this time round; no one checked us for our tickets on our way back... Still, safe and sound, and about $100 richer than if we've gotten the fine! So I guess it was a good day, haha!
