Long, long ago, before Christ, before the Romans and Greeks, and before yo' mama, there was a little girl named Sumer. Born in the lush Fertile Crescent in the present-day Middle East, Sumer was little more than a collection of people who lived together, farmed and believed some strange stuff about the origins of their seemingly tiny little world. Throughout the years, Sumer gradually learned about what things comprised a civilization: law, war, agriculture, economics, culture, religion, and government, and was conquered by Akkadians and reborn into Babylonia. She helped feed and educate her many people. She clashed with the Hebrews and her fellow-countries. She oversaw many clashes amongst her various city-states. One day, she looked around, and saw that she wasn't as alone as she initially thought she was. New nations were sprouting up and blooming like pretty flowers all around her. City-states, provinces and capitals sprung from the ground like saplings. Some were quick to go, others stayed a while…
Mr. Oxenstierna switched off the projector. It beeped before the film gradually faded from the screen. He turned to his oddly fascinated students, all the spoiled children of various Swedish government officials. (Mr. Oxenstierna was proud to be Princess Estelle's instructor at one point before he was given a big class.) Despite his location, the personification of Sweden felt like an American schoolteacher. Berwald spent most of his days lecturing, correcting, reprimanding, and questioning- questioning the U.N.'s decision to greenlight the Nation-Integration Project-an initiative to get the relatively secretive Hetalians "out into the world they personify!" as Toomas Hendrik Ilves, the Estonian president, wrote. Originally a push to get his country's Hetalian, Eduard von Bock, off of his laptop, the Nation-Integration Project quickly became a full-fledged U.N. project.
Sweden remembered the day the European Hetalians signed the document. He remembered the conservative Switzerland, Vash Zwingli, scowling upon seeing his occupation, "Nurse," in big Arial font, mumbling about how stupid the E.U. members were. He remembered how Belgium's and Estonia's faces lit up when they saw they would be running a café and an IT services place respectively (nice job, Ilves). But, most of all, he remembered Finland, his dear Finland, giving him a dejected look as he was told to go back to Helsinki and leave the Stockholm Nordic home. God, he missed Finland…
"Teacher, could you please teach us something?" Out rang a shrill voice from the multitude of desk-ridden brats.
The Swede internally groaned as he powered up the projector again and scrawled the words "Sumer: The First Nation" on the smart board.