From March 17-18,
I was in Stockholm! I visited some family friends that live there. When
I was about 5 years old, I met a Swede named Rickard, who himself was only
about 12 years old then. He had accompanied his mother Hui, a good friend of my
Mom’s, to Boston. Fifteen years later, Rickard and I were reunited on Friday
night at Stockholm’s bus terminal. Luckily, we recognized each other right away
from our Facebook photos. The next day, Rickard and his girlfriend Anna gave me
a tour of Gamla Stan, the oldest part of Stockholm. All of the old buildings
were really cool to see and apparently, they actually pose a fire hazard to all
of the people that live in them. One small fire could quickly spread and
destroy everything. As a result, there are some tight regulations that have
kept the structures in pretty good shape up to now. The first thing that popped
out at me as we were walking along was the German church. I was really excited
to be able to translate all the inscriptions surrounding the church for Rickard
and Anna. Next, we visited the square that was the site of the famous Stockholm
Bloodbath in 1520. Anna said that there was apparently so much blood, that it
flowed downhill like a river. Now
that’s a nice mental image. Not too far from the square, there was a
street on which I could touch buildings on both sides simultaneously! The
street was called Mårten Trotzigs Gränd and
in reality it is more like an alleyway, but so what. I am a giant! Afterward, we went to Kåkbrinken street to see a rune stone. It
was in the corner of a building and interestingly there was a cannon put right
next to it that had really nothing to do with the rune stone. Wait, I know-
they are both tourist attractions! :) Since everyone knows that Sweden is
neutral in pretty much every world conflict, what I saw next was kind of
surprising. Sweden actually has a fairly powerful army and one can see that
even in Gamla Stan. As we were walking we stopped in our tracks as we suddenly
saw a regiment of soldiers with machine guns! As they walked by, everyone
stopped and starred. There was also a quite serious looking soldier in front of
the Stockholm Palace, our last stop before we met up with Hui and the rest of
the family for lunch. From the palace one had a very nice view of the whole
city.
After lunch, Anna, Rickard, and I went to a birthday party
for one of their friends. On the way, we stopped by City Hall, where the Nobel
Prizes are awarded every year. That is, all of the Nobel Prizes except the
Nobel Peace Prize. That happens of
course in Oslo, Norway. I asked Anna and Rickard why this is. They
explained that Norway was still a part of Sweden when Alfred Nobel was alive. Therefore,
he wanted to give the Norwegians something too. Today that means that a
committee of Norwegians is responsible for deciding who gets the Peace Prize
every year. The Swedes aren’t always happy about this, such as the decision for
2009, but it is what it is. Shortly afterward, we made it to the party. The
girl who threw the party had decided on a St. Patrick’s Day theme with her
parents (aka lots of green stuff and beer). The best part though was that
everyone spoke English since I was there. It was really no problem for them. I
couldn’t even recognize an accent when most people there spoke. How did they
all learn such good English I asked? Of all things, the Swedes tend to speak
good English because they watch tons of American television! That evening, we
went to another party at Rickard’s university. There, I spoke with a Swede that
spoke with the accent of your average African-American. I could have closed my
eyes and thought I was talking to Will Smith. I kid you not! Go to Sweden and see for yourself ;). The party went
pretty late, so Rickard, Anna and I all slept in the next day.
On Sunday, Rickard and I headed to lunch at his mother’s
house in Järfälla, a suburb outside of Stockholm. Before lunch, Rickard and I
walked about five minutes from the house in order to see Lake Mälaren, which
was huge! I thought by lake Hui meant some tiny pond, but it was really quite
nice to check out. Then, we headed back to the house and had a delicious lunch
that Hui had prepared. For the next few hours, Rickard and I had a chance to
relax before heading to lunch at another family’s house. I had the chance to
try on a piece of chainmail that Rickard actually made from scratch! The
process of making took forever, Rickard said, but it was actually not that
difficult to do, since all one has to do is follow a pretty simple pattern.
I will now end with a funny story and a coincidence. Once I managed to get the chain mail off (I have sympathy for the knights that had to wear this stuff), Patrik (Hui’s husband), Rickard and I went to visit a German couple that lived nearby. The husband and wife were happy to meet me and the wife was especially happy, that I could speak German. She stammered that her German was not very good at the moment, since she has been speaking so much Swedish. Her German was completely fine though. Then, she stuffed two giant boxes of cookies in my hands. “Zu viel, zu viel” (too much, too much) I said, but she insisted that I take them. Then, she went upstairs while her husband and the rest of us went back to speaking in English, since Patrik and Rickard do not speak German. Right before we left though, the wife returned with this large shopping bag that was covered on all sides by an American flag. I thanked her once again, but I knew that I could never use such a bag in Germany. Already because of the clothes I wear it is probably pretty clear that I am no German, but if you add the bag to that, then everyone can be 100% sure that I am indeed an American! Now for the coincidence. Once Rickard and I got back to his apartment at the end of the night, Anna found Terminator: Salvation on TV. The movie had already started, but we watched it anyway. It was really easy for me to fill in any gaps for Rickard and Anna since I had just watched the same exact movie with Ben last week in Oxford. Pretty crazy right?
So that was my
experience in Stockholm in a nutshell. Next time, I’ll write about
Berlin, stay tuned! Thanks for reading and until next time!
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