The same familiar airplane surroundings, the screen now tells me I am over Göteborg, my home town. What bothers me is not the effort I spent the last two days to get to Stockholm via my parents house just to be back so suddenly; neither is it the rather soggy excuse of a sandwich they have provided me with. No, what bothers me is why they provided a packet of skimmed milk, some sugar and a small – in lack of a better word – spoon with my sandwich. What also bothers me is why they decided to make a … Read the rest
In front of me, the blue leather back of a seat and a bland gray piece of plastic euphemistically called a table with the words “Fasten seatbelt while seated” and “Lifejacket under your seat” printed on it. To my left, an incredibly bright sky, white clouds and wing of an aircraft. Up and to the right is a small screen with a rather grainy graphic showing me that I am over Örebro, my parents home town. I left here for Stockholm a little over five hours ago and now I am back. Was it worth all that trouble? Wouldn’t it … Read the rest
I am standing in the clinically efficient bathroom of a German sleeper train. The floor is gray, the walls have bland white nuance and here and there clean gray aluminium panels with painfully clear symbols on them let you operate the bathroom fittings such as toilet flushing and the tap. The only splash of color is a turquoise toilet seat cover and even that is washed out. Everything is so much better, so much more efficient, so much more comfortable than the Czech sleeper train that brought us to Budapest but that one made up for it by having so … Read the rest
I am walking home, tired from the exercise, the mild air is no longer cool enough and the street lights have been turned off. In just one hour the sky has turned from a deep blue to a bland light grey, but at the edge to the east, the band of yellow and orange has shifted to a dodgy shade of pink that gradually thickens to a powerful red. I can draw two conclusions at this moment. One is that there are few better ways to spend the early hours of the morning than skateboarding down traffic free roads and … Read the rest
The world in front of me is bathed in orange, where I stand, the shadow of a summer night prevails. The boundary: the sharp edge of the hills crest. Not ten meters above street level the sounds of passing trams and buses are somewhat muffled and from this rather small, secluded park one of Gothenburg’s most notorious crossroads seems almost peaceful. A series of streetlights and illuminated signs scattered about seemingly at random and the slowly turning wings of the amusement park windmill even hint that this place has beauty. But the thought that strikes me is that I can … Read the rest
It is a rainy and rather cold summer day. All around me are yellow brick buildings and the sky is grey, not a day of celebration at all. No, not a day of celebration, except for the 50 or so white caps bobbing around on the square. Boys in black suits and girls in pretty white dresses are celebrating with vigor, shouting, blowing whistles, dancing and swimming in the fountain. They are all overjoyed to have graduated from highschool and are partying like it is the most important day in their lives. Later on some of them they might realize … Read the rest
The grass is just a shady green and the trees are almost black, forming silhouettes against the night sky. A sky that, despite that it is almost midnight, is light blue. There is something fairy-taleish about that sky because that blue color is one that only appears on endless summer nights like this one. All around are darkened houses with a few yellow rectangles cutting holes in the dark facade. In the middle of the park, just visible through some low branches is the bright globe of a street light that illuminates a small playground. A sandbox with a red … Read the rest
Beautiful but deadly is a phrase that is all too common when describing snow-clad mountains but it feels appropriate here. On this lightly sloping plain the wind has pushed the snow into drifts and ridges and the sun shines out of a cloudy sky on the frozen landscape. Fine snow flows like smoke over the hard surface and glitters in the sun rays. The scene has that kind of barren beauty of an arctic landscape and it has the same kind of deadliness. For although civilization is nearby, the cold is substantial. The wind tears at any exposed skin with … Read the rest
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