Of Snow and Coleslaw

How Much Is Your Dollar Worth?

$1 = 7.7097 SEK

Sunset here in Uppsala, at 4:00

Winter is here! Winter is here! We had our first snow Friday afternoon. It was only a dusting and pretty wet stuff but it lasted a couple days in the shadows. I think it is now official that winter is here. Now is when Swedes like to get out of the country for awhile before the darkness and the rain sets in. Nice.

In other news I had an opportunity to work in a local Irish pub here in Uppsala on Thursday night. Long time readers might recognize it as the pub we celebrated St. Patrick's day in. I got to spend a shift in the kitchen that night to see if it would be a good fit. So this is an Irish bar, the owner is Syrian perhaps. The head chef might be as well and doesn't speak English, not a good sign for me, only Swedish and Farsi perhaps. My mentor for the night was born in Sweden and his family is Syrian. Other employees out front were from New Zealand, Ireland, Canada, and Sweden. A pretty global place to say the least.

My first task was to make coleslaw. I walked in the kitchen and the head chef had shredded up a couple heads of cabbage and a few bags of carrots into a large Rubbermaid-like storage container. Then he "added" a Costco size container of mayonnaise and a bottle of molasses or other syrup like substance. Then it was my time to shine. I got to mix it all up... with my hands. After scrubbing up of course. I dug in, elbow deep, pulling and mixing and squishing coleslaw. And let me tell you that stuff is cold after some time. My fingers were freezing and were getting a little numb. But I'm glad to know that I can make three or four days worth of coleslaw.

After that it was a brief tour of the kitchen and waiting for the first orders to come in. The first things I was shown how to make were burgers and club sandwiches, which they call "chicken bacons," to avoid confusion I suppose. Although its not really a club sandwich, I mean it does have the three pieces of bread and some chicken breast and bacon. But they don't cut into four pieces like they should. For shame. Well I'm sure you can tell where I'm going with this. It was fun for the first couple hours, but then it was slow, and then the dinner rush, and then then slow again. I must have made like 25 chicken bacons and well over a dozen burgers. Along with a couple orders of Guinness-battered fish and chips and nachos I think covered it. Six hours of that and then 20 minutes of cleaning. Not too bad.

I went in and talked to the owner at the end and he told me that if I wanted to come in a couple more times, work for food and drinks and tips (ha ha, people don't really tip in Sweden, and who ever tips the kitchen anyway) and then he'll decide if he wants to offer me a job. At that point I told him that I had to be honest and I didn't think it was the job for me. He asked if it was too hard and I said, "yeah, too hard... let's go with that." But he was cool about it and realized that not everyone likes that kind of stuff, so he told me the next time I came in, two beers on him.

And so the saga continues...

OH, AND DON'T FORGET TO VOTE TOMORROW!!