Stockholm views

I often spend time with my friend Ronnie in Stockholm and surroundings. He is an interior designer who turned into a boat mechanic, event rider and farrier. If I help him pull off some horse shoes, he drives us around to nice places and events between jobs. This means I save his back while I ruin mine, but that's what you do for friends(?).




One day we took the ferry over to an island called Ornö in the archipelago and had lunch at a beautiful harbour.







The Swedish shrimp and egg sandwich with mayo are not to be found anywhere elsese in the world and I had to have one. After luch we were picked upby a horse owner in her small boat to go to a remote island called Kymendö (the Swedish word for island is "Ö"). Most days with Ronnie I also get to meet my lovely god son Victor (named after me off course) and his little sausage dog "Bettan".



While Ronnie was trimming hoves, me and Victor looked at the sheep, the cows and the amazing seaview around the island.
Almost all houses and farm buildings here and in Sweden in general are red, painted with a by-product from the copper mines in the city of Falun. Hundreds of years ago the Swedish king decided to inspect his entire country. All farmers were ordered to renovate and repair their buildings and the only paint they could afford was"Falu red paint".

The only question mark with my relationship with Ronnie is that when he drives us around he also manage to talk on the phone, eat, check his calender and adjusting the stereo at the same time. I, on the other hand am off course an excellent driver...the fact that my rap sheet of traffic offences i Sweden was 1.2 m long and the Australian one is probably the same does not change anything..And Ronnie has actually had a traffic offence in his 30 years as a driver.

The other day I had lunch with Sara, who you may have met during her visit in Australia last christmas. We off course went to a fancy juice bar in the city centre with outdoor tables.
Lately the Swedes have become so desperate to become "International" or perhaps the word is "continental", that everybody has to sit outside and drink Latte and look like some mediterranian "Guido" or "Bella" or any young rich italian yuppie in designer clothes.
The problem is that it is normally far too cold so now all chairs have blankets for teh customers to use, so they stay for more than five minutes. I think his kind of defeats the purpose a bit.
This fenomenon gets worse at night, outside the discos. Owerwhelmed by the arrival of spring after seven months of ice, all the young girls queue up by the bars and discos in high heels, short skirts and lace tops. Some even smoke just to tighten their capillary veins further and really secure their annual urinary tract infection. This is off course great for all us boys but I wonder what it does to some of our muslim citizens, at least those with a different view on women.

This was the last day at high school for most Swedish kids. By tradition hte y rent a large horse carriage or a truck to take them around the city as they drink, scream and throw beer on everybody. This is what´s left of an old tradition of students marching through town after passing their very diffiult "Student Exams". At the time, if a student failed the exam no kids were allowed to throw their characteristic white student hats out the windows before thy ran out of the school building cheering and singing. I can not imagine the pressure on those failed students and their families who most likely had to vontinue their lives in a small village or so and face everybody else after for years. The student exams were removed in 1968.