Recently I participated in a panel debate on Entrepreneurship. The panel consisted of respresentatives from business, NGOs and government. Now, what was most interesting to me was not what was said about entrepreneurship itself. Most of the panelists agreed that we needed to develop more of an entrepreneurial society, and that certain structures in Swedish society needs to change radically. What was most interesting to me was how the panelists and the audience viewed the migration from the rigid society of today to the entrepreneurial society of tomorrow. There are two points to this;

First, most Swedish people don't seem to be willing to make any fundamental changes in the way our society works. To me it seems obvious that fundamental structures of Swedish society needs to shift before any lasting change can be created. Information campaigns and media initiatives are just make up to me. Nothing is going to change through information and education alone.

Secondly, the view of education and learning is still very rigid. The very thought that people might learn on their own, outside of our educational factories seem to be a distant thought to most. Why is state-sanctioned education the only possible way to go? Why can't the individual drive important part of his or her own learnign? From my vantage point it seems obvious that people cannot become entrepreneurs if they have never been individually responsible for any part of their own learning.

I believe that AIESEC has an important role to play here. The platform can equip people with skills which we are never taught. Pretty simple things when you come to think of it, but yet the educational system have failed to equip Swedish citizens with these skills.

Hopefully, a deep shift is somewhere around the corner.

ScaLDS, Oh, ScaLDS!

5 amazing days in Norway. All of Scandinavia crammed into an old armybase. What a party! Interesting sessions, and great folks! And again, what a party! It becomes kind of special with only board members represented; everybody's into the culture, everyone is committed. So, basically the OC had to shove us all off the dancefloor at 5 in the morning, every morning!

Driving there and back again however, wasn't as much fun. Norway is a lot richer than Sweden is, and in comparison Sweden is the land of freedom and irresponsibility. In Norway, the speed limits are painfully low, and there seems to be speedcams every five meters along the roads. All in all, our average speed between Gothenburg and Haslemoen, 450 km away, was 67 km/h. Can you believe that!?

Oh, another thing; Danish girls, Danish girls!

I've just finished a lazy day's work, and I'm sitting with my Ibook in my lap. My little sis is watching the tellie and I'm listening to 50 cent's "Gatman and Robbin". That song always make me laugh! Hip Hop is definitely more humurous and high-spirited than Rock and..eh white music in general I guess. Black Eyed Peas is another band that makes me smile and feel all good about myself. Just check out their "Don't funk with my heart". These guys are just outta their minds!

Today I have been doing some serious studying. It takes a while to get up to speed again, but now I feel it coming! Accounting and tax law can defeat any good man, but I won't let it conquer me! Anyway, it's useful knowledge, and once I've pounded it through the bone of my skull, I guess I'll be happy about it. Also, I want to perform well on this exam, so I can maintain those straight A's!

At last, a note on London 7/7. I bow my head in silence for those who were murdered. It makes me sad to see evil at large in our society. I can only pray silently that the West can maintain the open, free society. The prospects for this however, looks dark. Moving towards a more closed society, with ID cards, body scanners and constant surveillance would be tragic. If this is the direction western society moves in, we will start to lose the core of Western society; freedom and individual rights, and I don't want to see that happen.

But until then, let's stand tall, let's stand together; We're all Londoners now.

Woke up in Emanuel's sofa, wrapped in a sleeping bag (yes, not IN the sleeping bag, but wrapped in it). Shock my head and said to myself "Wow. That was one hell of a party." Then I fell asleep again for an hour or so.

Actually, the preparty was one of the craziest and most amazing preparties I have ever been two. Me, Emanuel and Carl started out at Emanuel's place. We drank some Whiskey and while leaving the apartment we started to open up Carl's beers. We went to grab a Pizza, and at that point we were already getting drunk, so we ventured into the restuarant with our beers in our hands. We were quickly ushered back on the street again, and before we could order we finished our beers.

When we arrived to the preparty at Johans place it was already getting crazy. Johan was emptying his bar, so there were a dozen bottles of booze already on the table. I put my bottle of Polish Zubrowka on the table, and we started drinking.

Oh boy!

We emptied 8 bottles of booze, we had screaming competitions out the window, I threw tomatoes out the window, people were shouting and screaming. It was just CRAZY! The transition party was supposed to start at 8 PM but we didn't arrive there until 10 PM. But it didn't matter, we WERE the party!

It was really good to get up here to meet all my fellow @ buddies. Today we're gonna have some kind of picnic in a park near to where Emanuel lives. I really look forward to it. Relaxing with your best mates is always really, really good.

This morning I stepped of the ferry in Karlskrona after a really bad night's sleep. Two Polish construction workers snored their way through the night, and if it hadn't been for a healthy dose of Zubrowka, I wouldn't have managed to sleep at all. The disturbing thing about snoring is it's irregularity. On the ferry you can constantly hear the engines pounding, but their sound is constant and regular, which makes it more soothing than disturbing. The snoring of Polish construction workers though, is highly irregular. Sometimes it stops, and you start hoping that you might be able to fall asleep. You feel safe and warm. And then...SNOOOOOOOORE! Your fully awake and ready to kill something or somebody.

After a couple of buses and trains I managed to reach Vaxjo where my father picked me up and drove me home. We had some late breakfast and I discovered that I didn't have much to tell him about my trip. He had already read all of it on this blog. Is blogging really a good idea? Will people tell me, "Sorry, not interestedI, already read that." every time I try to tell them something exciting from my life? Let's hope not. =)

At my desk and in my computer loads of work awaited me. During my trip I had managed to sort out a few things via email, but the most important things actually requires talking (not that talking is a bad thing, I enjoy it very much!). Basically I just sat down, started emailing and calling people. Being president could be compared to the job of a mechanic who constantly repairs a machine which constantly breaks or threatens to break.

Last and least, a note on returning to Sweden. It's an extremely structured and ordered country. I really notice this every time I return from aborad. People really know their place and authority is hot around here. I read this funny book the other day; "For Mr. Bachmanns brochure" by Carl-Johan Vallgren. He claimed that if the Swedish government wished the Swedish people to collectively commit suicide on the national day, we would gladly accomodate such a wish. Satirical exaggerations aside, I think this guy is pretty close to the mark, unfortunately.

Yesterday I left Warsaw after visiting the Jewish Cemetary and the Warsaw Holocaust Memorial. It was a very moving sight and I keep asking myself how this could happen, and why it is happening again in other places. The cemetary itself was a labyrinth of gravestones huddled together in what seemed to be an unkept forest/garden. At times there was a stoneladen path through the cemetary and at other times there was just a faintly visible path. I was scratching my kippah-clad head trying to decipher the Hebrew signs, but in the end I resorted to reading donation plaques written in English, e.g.

"This walkway was donated by the Goldberg family. In loving memory of those who perished at the hands of the Nazis. George and Mary Goldberg, Massachusetts, USA."

My fellow @ers helped me to buy my ticket in the last minute, Maciek exchanged my Euroes into Slotyz at the local Kantor, and off I went to Gdansk! I had emailed my old trainee Adam Sikorski, but he had not yet responded. That meant I was heading off for a city I didn't know, with a contact whom I did not know how to reach. Fortunately, once I got hold of an internet cafe in Gdansk, I saw the email he had written while I was on the train, and I could get hold of him.

The acrchitecture of Gdansk seems very old, but in reality most of it was rebuilt after WWII. Gdansk was almost totally anhiliated and reconstruction was still going on in the early 90's. Most of the city was rebuilt from historical blueprints, and therefore it has retained it's old-fashioned aura. It's market square and main street are fascinating trips into the past.

While Gdansk is nice and beautiful it obviously lacks the flair and excitement of Warsaw. This bring me to an interesting point. In most of Poland there seems to be feelings of resentment towards Warsaw. Many Poles say that it is dirty, dangerous, unfriendly etc. I tend to disagree, I think it was a wonderful, cosmopolitan, melting pot kind of city! Maybe it's just a classic country vs city thing. I guess we have something similar in Sweden when it comes to Stockholm vs the rest, so to speak.

Tomorrow I will be back in Sweden. After a brief visit at my Parents' I will head of for Stockholm to attend the transition party. It's going to rock!

I just woke up in a Warzaw apartment on the 11th floor. I'm staying with Maciek and Justena, two EB members from the Warzaw school of Economics. We have been partying all night, and we're all sufficiently hung over. People around here have been astonishingly hospitable and friendly. I spent all of yesterday sightseeing with Maciek, or Mack as I call him. You know, Polish names are really difficult to pronounce and remember.

Try this:

Malgorzata, is pronounced maui-go-SHATA.
Lodz, is pronounced WHUDCH.

Also, there are numerous of strange shortenings of names, e.g:

Joanna becomes Asia (ASHA)
Gosia becomes Gosiek (go-SHEK)

Gosiek however, seems to be a sweet-sounding dimminuitive, something the Polish language is full of.

Anyways, Warzaw is an amazing city. Back in Poznan most people told me that there wasn't much to see in Warzaw and that the city was ugly. Don't listen to them, Poland's capital has definitely proved them wrong. Me and Maciek saw some amazing stuff yesterday. We went to the Jewish Ghetto which has been saved and protected. The alleys are narrow and you can still see the bullet holes in the wall. All the painful history was permeating the air.

After strolling around for a while we reached the Nozyk Synagogue. Both me and Maciek put kippahs on our heads and entered the building. I have never seen a synagogue before so for me it was really exciting. In the synagogue an old man speaking a mix of English, German and Polish approaches us. He tells us about the synagogue and his own strange fate. Being born in Poland he was exiled and spent time in prison in America, Germany and Israel. The fate of the synagogue itself is as strange as anything. When the Nazis took Warzaw they turned the synagogue into a stable. I was standing there, looking at the huge David's star on the wall and it struck what an evil thing it is to turn a religious place into a stable. The symbolism of doing that is just plain evil.

Because of Warzaw's eventful history, the purpose and content of many buildings have been changed and with that the symbolism exuded. The old Communist party HQ has now been replaced witht the Warzaw Stock Exchange. The symbolism of that is just mind-blowing! In your face commies! Free markets are here to save the day!

However, all the different episodes of Warzaw history is still clearly visible in the city landscape. Not everything was remade every time the city was invaded or destroyed. All in all the city is a mix between communist boxes, postmodern glass scyscrapers and old classical buildings. And the whole picture is just very exhalirating

Warzaw, I love you!