Walpurgis night

Certain European countries celebrate, in different ways, the Walpurgis Night, April 30. In Sweden it’s today rather a way to welcome the spring. It involves some singing, drinking… and watching a fire.

It’s celebrated each year at the Swedish House, one of the 37 international houses in the Cité Universitaire – the Paris University Campus (I wrote about it here).

We were welcomed by the director of the Swedish House, Åsa Ekwall. The Swedish Ambassador, Veronika Wand-Danielsson welcomed the spring and we also made a hurrah for the 70^th birthday of the Swedish King.

The crowd had the pleasure of listening to a couple of spring songs…

… awaiting the daylight to fade... and the fire.  

Santa Lucia

I already posted about the Swedish Santa Lucia tradition in a post three years ago, so if you wish to know something more about it you can go here. I went again, yesterday evening, to listen to the Paris Swedish Church choir. They performed this time at the “Cité International Unviersitaire”, some kind of a Paris University Campus, on which I also already posted.

You should normally be greeted in the early morning December 13 by some nice, singing, young ladies, but to see them and listen to them the night before was quite OK.

I was impressed by the very good singing of a number of traditional songs, including of course the Santa Lucia song (you can listen to it here by some other performers). A Swedish Lucia and her colleagues should obviously still be blond.  

There was a nice crowd of students from all countries listening to them (and also some ex-students). The traditional “glögg” (vin chaud, Glühwein, mulled wine) was served to the audience.

Paris University Campus

Some almost 6000 students of some 130 nationalities live on this University Campus, La Cité Iternationale Universitaire de Paris, created in the 20’s in a pacific context, after WW I. The goal was to promote peace, exchange and friendship among nationalities.

It’s a large area, very calm and peaceful, although surrounded by important traffic, including the former ring road, the “Boulevards des Maréchaux”, today with its new tram, and a later one, the “Périphérique”.

Large greens and park like areas give a lot of place for students to make some sporting activities …and to rest.

Private money and different French or foreign foundations have contributed in creating decent lodging for the students. We can see examples of many different types of architecture, going from very traditional (somehow Oxfordian) style in some of the first buildings to very modern, in the more recent creations.

Many nations have created their own residences. Here you can see what the Swiss and Brazilian residences look like, with Le Corbusier as co-architect. … and a number of other examples. Finally, some other buildings and residences including the one originally built for French students. In reality, different nationalities are mixed; there may be some 130 nationalities here, but not yet 130 residences.

You can find most of these pictures on my photo-blog.