Monday, October 03, 2005

Stockholm baby!

If you want to indulge yourself in a place that's more expensive than London, then go to Stockholm! But that wasn't something I or Roberto suspected when we set off for Stockholm on friday at 3am, just in time to catch a night bus to Victoria, hop on a coach to Luton and onto the cheap Ryanair flight to the capital of Scandinavia! And it's not something you care about if you're drunk on top of it. Yeap folks, the rumours are true, I was drunk at 3am with a portion of lousy chips tasting like half baked flour and swearing at the night bus not being there in time. It wouldn't be the first time I missed the coach to Luton because of the night bus.
But it must have been all Ali and Lilian's fault. I invited them to my place and we stayed up late, talking, laughing and gossiping like old ladies over a cup of tea. Just that it was wine and we aren't old! Sic!
I told Lilian and Ali that they can spend the weekend at my place as I'm off to Stockholm anyway, so instead of packing I was hoovering at 9 o'clock in the evening. I packed while my mind was still groggy from the vapours of alcohol still fresh in my nostrils. And I packed at 3 am, it took me 5 mins and I whooshed on the door, hoping I wouldn't miss the night bus.

I didn't and the coach was in the station, me and Roberto the last customers to board it, just before it left Victoria, sighs of relief from its most drunk customer. One trick I need to share with you ... whenever you take Green Line to Luton, say you travel by EasyJet, they will ask you and if you say EasyJet the ticket is cheaper as EJ sponsors its customers. Isn't it nice? It's even nicer as they have no way of checking if you're telling the truth. Information is power folks!

Stockholm is a nice place, spread on a set of islands, a sort of Venice of the north ... maybe I'm too generous here as I've never been to Venice. But I'm sure they pray global warming is just a fairy tale to bully the gullible into signing the Kyoto treaty. Damn you Bush!
Nothing out of ordinary though in Stockholm, I found the architecture to be dull, nothing that would catch your eye and stick on your retina for a long time, no single imposing landmark to associate Stockholm with and make it stand out in your plethora of memories.

The wind was a bitch, we were swearing at it like old sailors with wrinkled foreheads and calloused hands. If the sailors were used to it, we weren't and for us it was blistering cold. However, even the sailors would have appreciated the nice open air markets where they had these sailors' delicacies: salmon pate and salmon cheese. We bought it on sunday after we tried it on saturday and we were impressed. It was good and we had a nice ad-hoc lunch in a beautiful square with no name. Of course it had a name, it was just difficult to learn it, difficult to pronounce and impossible to remember. Swedish is an unfamiliar language for the latins that we are, nothing to relate to, nothing that even remotely and en sourdine rings a bell.

The hostel was a very pragmatic dwelling as if they experimentally tried to see how many beds they can pack in the same small room. It was no problem for me as I matured in a student dormitory anyway, it was a trip back in the past. Actually it wasn't even that, as soon as I put my head down and rolled myself in the thick sleeping bag, I hit hyperspace, no sound ever disturbed me, no light could bring me back, it was a speedy unconscious worm hole, morning at the other end. Roberto on the other hand suffered. Unlike me, he didn't spend 48 hours awake, so he was visibly upset in the morning when he complained about a guy in the next bed snoring like a fastuous military fanfare.

We took a mini cruise around Stockholm by boat, nothing really impressive as it was too cold to think. However we listened to the commentary in English and we learnt more about Sweden and Stockholm. I was surprised to learn for instance that the term Scandinavia refers only to Sweden, Denmark and Norway. No Finland.

We did a lot of walking, that was the whole experience actually ... Stockholm by foot. We saw a free style snowboarding competition in the middle of Stockholm where they brought some snow especially for it. We also bought the most expensive bottle of water EVER, at 25 koronas, it works out to be almost 2 pounds. We browsed through a flea market which gave you a strong community feeling. We also had lunch outside in the cold, it's very interesting how most restaurants provide blankets for their customers that stay at the tables outside. And there were many places with tables outside, it came as a surprise, for such a cold country, they were very outdoorsy. We also had very nice cakes ... I don't have a sweet tooth, but I thought the cakes were very good and they have them in almost every restaurant and coffee shop. Yummy!

The girls are beautiful, most of them blonde and slim ... what can I say, we were two single guys so you can excuse the head turning ... which happened a lot by the way. Most of it was accompanied by frustration as we realised they're too tall for us. Or we're too short for that country! Whatever! I don't wanna talk about it! :-)

We drank too in our little expedition, mostly Guinness, on saturday night in a pub called the Londoner ... simply couldn't resist. And we talked too, it was quite good as if you're with a single friend rather than a group, you tend to open up more and share more. It was good!
Same night, before hitting the bed, we went to another pub closer to the hostel where we watched a football game between GET and VAL. We couldn't work out what the abbreviations actually stand for. VAL probably being Valencia, with GET remaining in the annals as a total mystery.
The second night, just before heading home, we stopped in a nameless pub (read: we can't remember the name, nor do we care) where we watched the football game Chelsea vs. Liverpool. It was with great pleasure to watch Chelsea hammering Liverpool, us being the only people there shouting out loud YES with each goal. 4-1 and I was thinking of my triumphal march in the office on monday, two of my colleagues being passionate Liverpool fans. I'll have my hour of glory soon, during lunch.

Needless to say we missed our bus to the airport. Well, we were there in time but the bus was full. We had to wait for another one, taking the time to shop for postcards and water with our last koronas. I also gave my last 3 koronas to the shop assistant telling her I don't need them anymore, I'm going home. She said Ok, with a smile. It's amazing how many people speak English in Stockholm, everyone I would say. And they speak it very well. And they're trying to be helpful too. Very nice people, I would say warm people in a cold country but that's just a 2 days trip impression. I'm sure they have their fair share of arseholes too! :-)

We returned to a cold London, knackered but in good spirits. It was a good experience, a chilling experience in both senses of the word. Stockholm is much more relaxed, laid back than London. All in all, it was a good weekend and I hope this little story will be a good incentive for you folks to travel more!

1 Comments:

At Tuesday, October 04, 2005 2:21:00 pm, Blogger Carmen said...

Great! Looks like you're totally on the COOL side of things...I love the idea of the blankets, unexpected and nice, with a bottle of wine, some cheese or cake...yum...:)

 

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