Last weekend I joined a group of ladies celebrating a friend's last hurray as a single women - the Swedish version of our bachelorette party. Their tradition for the bride-to-be (and groom-to-be) is to completely surprise the guest of honor. Karin, our friend had been told a myriad of lies to get her to the start of her party and she even had an overnight bag conveniently packed!
As I side note, the stories I heard about the guys version of "surprised" is a bit more harsh. The "best men" usually go to elaborate schemes to throw the groom off by giving them instructions and an embarrassing costume to wear on a bus and sit in a bar only to wait for for no one show up! Then days or weeks later, the real "kidnapping" occurs.
I was on the team to shop for the food for the overnight. We had a detailed list from the team that was cooking the dinner. Did I forget to mention all 8 gals were Swedish...thus the list was in their mother language. I was just given an assignment and off I went in the grocery store. You can imagine my surprise when I was saw that the 8 Sea Breem fish still had scales, fins and eyes that were staring past me.
After the shopping we headed outside of Stockholm to a country club wardhus (restaurant/gathering place) where we SURPRISED Karin and had a wonderful lunch. We then traveled more into the forest to a summer house on the archipelago where we started with the wine and Karin's pampering. We had hired a skin therapist to give her a pedicure and facial. The food was wonderful even if a bunch of ladies cooked whole fish on a charcoal BBQ. I was so impressed with the "chef" and even tried replicated the fish and sauce when I got home. (OK - I admit is when I serve it for Dwight and me I bought the fish filleted already.)
As the night got later we enjoyed sitting by the water and telling stories. One of the girls had a relationship quiz that Jesper (the groom-to-be) had answered so we asked the same questions (again - all in Swedish so I just listened) to see if Karin could guess what her sambo (serious boyfriend) had said.
Several of us woke in the morning for a brisk walk in the forest and then a quick dip in the sea! I was surprise to see that I was the only one to swim in a bathing suit! The water was cold and very invigorating. With the body soap that was a staple on the dock, it turned out to be our bath for the day. We all had bread and veggies for breakfast and then headed back home to our families. Dwight, William and Davis had a fun guy's night.
