October 11th, 2011 by Boston Blatte
Personally, I love mushrooms but my Swedish husband hates them.
In his own words, “You can’t find a menu in Stockholm these days that aren’t contaminated by mushrooms”. He was out to dinner with his company last night at Rolf’s Kök and 2 of the 3 dishes had mushrooms in them. He’s a good sport and gets by picking them out. (Though he’s not really impressed that for a party of 8+ you have to preorder your menu and everyone has to eat the exact same dishes –another entry, another day.)
It’s also tough for the hubby as his family are mushroom fans. I am pretty sure my mother-in-law suffers from some sort of mushroom-picking disorder. Literally, she is out every day roaming the nearby forest and gathering basket-loads of mushrooms (mostly trattkantarell or funnel chanterelles in English.) She told me that today she only stopped when she physically couldn’t carry more. Her neighbors love her as she gives most of them away (she knows mushrooms are forbidden in her son’s home –not fair really.)
My own harvest (though dutifully turned over to my MIL)
This evening at a parent-teacher meeting, our 7-year old’s teacher filled us in on the latest project the kids have been working on. Yep, you guessed it…mushrooms. They designed them, drew them, used them for counting, learned about them and read stories about them.
The look the husband gave me was of despair as if being outnumbered, outgunned and defeated.
“It’s brainwashing” he muttered.
Perhaps it is. Swedes love their mushrooms (and no, not the funny ones;-)
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Tags: chanterelles, mushrooms, rolfs kök, stockholm, sweden, swedes
Posted in Swedish culture | 1 comment »
October 3rd, 2011 by Boston Blatte
My list of nevers include a growing number of events which have evolved to “did that, seen that and doing it again tomorrow”.
The trampoline (or known in our home as the ‘jumpoline’, coined of childish Swenglish) was a former “never” and current “got that”. The jumpoline takes up a prime location on the front lawn. Though, I feel modest comfort knowing, we’re not alone.
Views of greater from Google Earth demonstrate that there are a great number of circular objects adorning the grass gardens of many a plot of greater Stockholm.
Which is why finding this ad up at the Karlberg station tickled me.
Loosely translated: “Garden sculpture: The most common ornament of Stockholm outside the city center of the 2000s.” “The new DN, with its eyes on Stockholm.”
I must review the remaining nevers on my list.
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Tags: DN, stockholm, studsmatta, trampoline
Posted in stockholm | 1 comment »
September 29th, 2011 by Boston Blatte
The American Club of Sweden just held its first of a series of Intercultural forums. This evening’s topic was “America, Sweden and Violent Extremism.”
It was a very interesting panel (the link above lists the participants) and a great number of interesting elements around how to prevent the existence, rise and spread violent extremism (right, left and Islamic) in our societies (both the US and Sweden). Without trying to summarize the panelists’ viewpoint, one common point of agreement they all shared was the importance of the open dialog.
During the Q&A follow up, an audience member opened up what became an opinion floodgate. He pointed out that open dialog requires that the speaker can say whatever is on her mind without fear of retribution. He reminded us all that in Sweden, Swedish anti-hate laws (hets mot folkgrupp) curtail the individual’s opportunity to, and he pardoned his language, “be an asshole in public.” In less colorful words, it’s against Swedish law to express hateful opinions about specific groupings of people.
It triggered a flurry of eager participation to join a collective dialog (ironically).
The event was unfortunately limited in time so the discussions perhaps didn’t satisfy many people’s interest in the contradiction of Sweden’s strong belief in opening a dialog to prevent the rise of violent extremism while simultaneously restricting the same extent of free speech extended to citizens of the US.
Many people thanked the audience member who highlighted the contradiction to which he replied “I never imagined I would ever receive so much praise for saying that people should be allowed to be more racist.”
It’s not exactly what he meant, but it is one way to boil it down.
There’s a difference between hate speech intended to incite violence and expression of hate in its ugliest form. Sweden needs very seriously to review its current laws restricting expression of opinions even when they are disgustingly racist or hateful. It is only when we are allowed a dialog can we refute and hopefully, persuade.
You can’t open a dialog if you won’t let people speak.
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Tags: acs intercultural forum, american club sweden, violent extremism
Posted in Swedish politics | 3 comments »
September 27th, 2011 by Boston Blatte
When I first got to Stockholm each of the kind friends who gave me “tours” of the city called the five buildings at Hötorget “skyscrapers.” They’re 19 stories and 72 meters/235ft tall. (The high rise dormitories at UMass Amherst are taller.)
In other words, there’s not much height to the Stockholm skyline.
But that’s changing. Well, a bit. There’s still nothing really scraping the Stockholm sky but a few towers have risen above its lush treeline.
With height of buildings, and more importantly, building sites and respective cranes, come BASE jumpers. (BASE stands for building, antennas, spans (bridges) and earth (cliffs)).
Early this month a BASE jumper was charged for trespassing at the still erect building crane polishing off the newly completed Scandic Victoria Tower. The new hotel in Kista is 117m and 34 stories tall. 
(article in Swedish including video footage of the actual jump here)
The new tower is only the 4th of the total structures over 100m in Sweden today. (Any structure over 100m makes for BASE potential.) The tallest is Malmö’s Turning Torso 190m followed by Kaknäs Tower, 155m (Gärdet, Stockholm) and Kista Science Center 117m.
It’s still not illegal to BASE off of any structure in Sweden yet. As a fellow skydiver who is also a BASE jumper put it, “We only want to borrow altitude”.
Looking up Boston’s tallest structures out of curiosity, it seems Boston has altitude to spare. To date there are 27 structures in Boston over 400ft (120m).
It’s still a bit early to say that Stockholm has skyscrapers. But they will come and they will lend altitude.
Edit: Add on photo. Here is a picture of one of the 30-40 active BASE jumpers of Sweden (not the one charged in the above story.) He’s currently in Kuala Lumpur and has just jumped off a tall building there. He just posted this picture on Facebook. I think he’s having fun.
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Tags: base jumping, Kista, scandic victoria towers, stockholm, victoria tower
Posted in stockholm | Leave a comment »
September 9th, 2011 by Boston Blatte
Nine bucks. That’s what my first pint of beer cost me during the summer of 1992.
A popular CNN article, “What’s wrong with Stockholm“, spreading fast via social media, paints a wonderful view of Stockholm. According to its author the only downside was an expensive and pathetic martini.
It’s nice to read about a first experience account of this glorious city which includes generosity and hospitality by Stockholmers (fondly nicknamed The Viking and The Joker).
My first evening in Stockholm that June of 1992 also involved kind and welcoming Stockholmers. A group of them I met in Ivar Lo Park on the heights of Söder (while watching the balloons hover over
Riddarfjärden took me under their wings and invited me along to the Black and Brown
just down the hill.
The Black and Brown is still a lovely place for a pint (still around nine bucks, a bargain if you consider inflation). The US dollar was crap that summer (only 5.5kr/USD and later during my return in August it dropped to 5.0).
I nearly choked on the $9 price tag of that beer. But I was grateful they took credit cards.
That evening transpired into the first day of the rest of my life in Stockholm. CNN is right; life in Stockholm is pretty great.
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Tags: black and brown, CNN, ivar lo, riddarfjärden, stockholm
Posted in Swedish culture, stockholm | Leave a comment »
September 2nd, 2011 by Boston Blatte
Stockholmers like playing with balls. Particularly bocce or boules balls in combination with a bar and some friends on a late summer’s eve.
A favorite combo of boules and bar drinks is Boulebar. While at the location at Rållis (aka Rålambsholvs Park) and a few bar beverages into the game I giggled at the toilet signs.
The image led to a humorous discussion. I’ll leave it to you own imaginations to interpret and discuss.
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Tags: boulebar, boules, rålambshovsparken, rållis, stockholm, toilet humor
Posted in stockholm | Leave a comment »
September 1st, 2011 by Boston Blatte
It’s not wise to mess with an Italian from Palermo, Sicily.
The closest Stockholm gets to a little Italy is crammed into a cafe at Hornstull on Södermalm. At least when it comes to Italian soccer football fans. Especially if you support Palermo’s team,.
The locals know it as “Dellos” from its original name, “Cafe dello Sport” but passing by the other day I discovered that a little tiff between the Dellos gang and the pizza man around the corner has changed the face of Hornstull’s Little Italy.
Dello’s has now renamed itself
VIP or Very Italian Pizza
But why?
Long story short. The pizza place around the corner tried to jump on the Dello gravy train which wasn’t very popular with the real McCoy-ianos.
So they fought back and opened a corner of the café as a pizza place, reinvented themselves and re-signed
They weren’t open for pizza when I was there. I must stop by again and sample that pizza. Though probably still not on par with Varasano’s 
little known fact: The owner of Varasano’s, Jeff Varasano, scouted and imported his pizza oven from Borås, Sweden. He is also a pretty fast Rubik’s cubist, 19 seconds!
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Tags: cafe dello sport, dellos, hornstull, jeff varasano, stockholm, stockholm pizza, varasano's pizza, varasanos, VIP stockholm pizza
Posted in Swedish products, stockholm | Leave a comment »
August 24th, 2011 by Boston Blatte
When homosexual wedding greeting cards are unceremoniously displayed in mainstream shops we’ve shaken the “alternative lifestyle” label tagged on to gay marriage. At least in Sweden.
Same-sex marriages have been legal since May 1, 2009 and registered same-sex partnerships were recognized already from 1995.
I found these cards on display at one of my favorite stationery [chain] stores,
Ordning & Reda
.
Now you have all options covered for your next wedding invitation needs.
Just don’t drive yourself nuts by converting the 30kr cost of the card (OK, if you have to, it’s just under $5.)
Oh, and if you’re attending a gay wedding, I highly recommend buying the Leatherman Multitool for the happy couple. Especially if it’s already on their gift registration list.
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Tags: gay marriage, leatherman multitool, ordning & reda, ordning och reda, sweden, swedish gay marriage
Posted in Swedish culture, Swedish politics, Swedish products | Leave a comment »
August 18th, 2011 by Boston Blatte
I think I get Swedes. Sort of. Kind of. Still working on it, really.
I’ve been at it for nearly 2 decades and the learning curve has been tumultuous, but any good ride has its ups and down. However, it can be a hit or miss for most “newbies” to Sweden. And if you read the pages of The Local, you’ll find there is often “someone” with their knickers in a twist about Swedes. This popular article on TL comes first to mind.
Now it’s quite true that striking up conversation with the random Swede on the street is not always forthcoming. Swedes are a little skittish and they (particularly 08ers aka Stockholmers) are molded from that normal “big city aloofness” you find in any big city which does make them hard to reach. But reachable they are. Warm and loving too. But yes, also, terse, stoic and reserved.
I’m gregarious. I talk up everyone and anyone and it took me a long while to realize that I’m pretty odd in Boston too. New Yorkers and other Americans regularly complain about us Bostonians being uptight and unapproachable. When I first heard it, I was shocked. Taking a look at it with open eyes I realized that there’s truth to it. Your average Bostonian won’t strike up random conversation, not the kind of polite conversation the people in the article are talking about. BUT, if YOU strike up conversation with a Bostonian and work at it by all the unwritten social/cultural rules of Bostonianism, you can be chatting away for hours.
Stockholmers are like Bostonians: tough nuts to crack (and Swedes have slightly tougher outer shells.) But inside that outer crust it’s all warm and gooey.
I feel sorry for the couple in the above article. They think that because they were brown Swedes didn’t want to interact with them. I’m brown (more so now after a sunny summer) but I chat up Swedes regularly with the fitting success one can ascribe to chatting to Stockholmers.
But maybe I “hear” Swedes better. So much communication among Swedes is non-verbal: a nod of the head, a crook in their smile, a twinkle in their eye.
As for the staring, I have heard people complain of this, but in all honesty I’ve never felt it myself (do Bostonians stare a lot?).
So take heart. If you want to speak to Swedes. Make the first, gentle move. Wait. And then listen…they’re talking to you.
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Tags: non-verbal communication., Swedish culture, talking to swedes
Posted in Boston blend, Swedish culture | 14 comments »
August 18th, 2011 by Boston Blatte
Preggers, Up the Duff, Baking buns. Whichever colorful expression you fancy, Victoria, Crown Princess of Sweden, Duchess of Västergötland (my, that’s a mouthful to remember) will soon include “Mum”to her title.
The official announcementfrom the palace came on Wednesday and traditional and social media spread the news wildfire. I am sure loyal royalists are delighted by baby news (seeing as the last bit of Royal news was scandalous linking the King Grandpa to the criminal underground, sex parlors and brought speculation to his credibility.)
The baby-in-making is welcomed news since in that old-fashioned way, he/she assures the royal lineage. Baby bun will officially become 2nd in line to the Swedish throne after his/her mom.
But heirs to thrones tend to spark raised voices calling for a republic. Though I think, indifferent-to-the-monarchy Swedes, and even mildly motivated republicans are all closetly warmed by the creation of life and the prospects of baby photo ops.
The instigator inside me is hoping for a girl. It’s no secret that if the King had his way, his first-born son (second-born child) Prince Carl Philip, Duke of Värmland, (not quite as long as big sis’ name) would have remained Crown Prince. Calle was born Crown Prince and retained his title for 7 months until January 1, 1980 when Sweden adjusted its Act of Succession and snipped the bit of male preference primogeniture (first born heir-apparent status).
Good luck Vicky and Danny. We look forward to a bouncing baby come March 2012.
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Tags: pregnant., sweden, swedish crown princess pregant, swedish princess, swedish princess pregnant
Posted in Swedish culture | Leave a comment »
