Two weeks being a tourist in Stockholm

So for the past two weeks I've had an American friend from Discord visit Sweden and I've been taking him around Stockholm. So here's a post about what we did!

July 15th: I had just come off a week of night shift and he had just arrived in Sweden the day before, so we were both jetlagged. We took a walk around the Old Town. I showed him the tiniest alley, then we walked to Kungsträdgården and had ice cream before going to have dinner. I then took him to a rooftop bar to get an overview of the city and have some drinks. 

July 16th: We started early and went to the Palace to do all the things. We got there just as it opened at 10am and we did all the things I had previously done, but I love history so who cares. We started in the Palace basement where they have the foundation and surviving walls from the old palace that burned down in the 17th century. Having gone through that we went to the Treasury which is very small, before heading outside into the scorching sun to watch the guard change. Once that was over we went into the Royal Apartments where they held court in the 18th century. And lastly to one of my favourite spots: the Royal Armoury. We then had a very late lunch at 3:30pm, took a boat around the city, walked around some more in the Old Town, and then called it a day.

July 17th: We went to the Vasa Museum to look at the massive 17th century warship that was an embarrassment that sank 20 minutes into its maiden voyage, but survived on the bottom of the Baltic sea for 250 years and when brought up became an item of national pride instead due to now being the only surviving 17th century warship in the world. It's hard to not be awestruck when you enter the museum and see it for the first time. We had lunch at the museum restaurant and then turned to the Viking Museum close by, which is pretty small, so once we finished there we went to the Museum of Wrecks next door. Thanks to its brackish water the Baltic sea is great at preserving wrecks and the museum was dedicated to the very many wrecks found on the bottom of the sea while also explaining the process of discovery and recovery with many interactive elements. After this we returned to the city and had dinner before calling it a day.

July 18th: We were pretty tired of reading at museums at this point so we decided to go to Skansen and look at the animals (and have ice cream and lunch). When we felt done there just after lunch we decided to head out to a suburb where they had the butterfly house and aquarium. It was a lot smaller than I expected so we finished in there in less than an hour, but it was still pretty cool.

July 19th: We headed out to the archipelago and its closest islands called Fjäderholmarna. We started out with lunch and then took a walk around the island, including dipping our feet in the water :3 We then got on the boat back and finished the day with a trip to the Hallwyl Museum, which is an old mansion from the late 19th and early 20th century donated as was to be a museum. We also visited the Nobel Prize Museum, which ended up being not at all what we expected.

July 20th: Easily the hottest day of these two weeks. We headed out to Drottningholm palace, which is where the king and queen live, but parts of the palace and the grounds are open to the public. After walking around there and having lunch we were both beat from the heat and decided to call it a day. 

July 22nd: After a day of rest we started up again with a trip to the Army Museum, which was all about Swedish military history from the Swedish Empire of the 16th and 17th century all the way to modern day. We then had lunch and called it a day.

Jul 23rd: He took the bus out to my city instead of me going to Stockholm and we spent the day first visiting Tom Tits science park, which was honestly way too hot and filled with kids, so after ice cream and drinks we took the bus up to Torekällberget for a walk among historical buildings and watching some more animals. It's basically a mini Skansen. Due to it being so hot we were beat after all this time outside and we ended the day there.

July 25th: This day was spent at Gröna Lund amusement park and we went on all of the rollercoasters. Including the ones that go upside-down which I had never been on before because I can never find anyone who wants to go with me xD

July 28th: Last day together and we started out with Sweden's Museum about the Holocaust, which was mainly about Sweden duiring WW2 as well as the fates of seven people who survived the Holocaust in different ways and made it to Sweden. A separate exhibit told the story of Raoul Wallenberg who saved thousands of Jews in Hungary, before he was taken by the Soviets and vanished. What ultimately happened to him is still unknown. After lunch we headed to the Museum of Meditterranean and Near Eastern Antiquities and took a walk through ancient Egypt, Cyprus, Greece and Roman Empire. 

I've been around, part 2

I've been thinking a lot about travelling for the past few months. I miss it. A lot. Not travelling because you're not financially able versus not travelling because the world is closed, are two very different things. And before the pandemic hit I was finally getting to a place to be able to afford travelling on a more regular basis. The state of the world put a firm stop on that idea...

At the end of 2012 I made a post about all my previous travels, and I figured that now it's been nine years (and I'm unlikely to travel anywhere this year too so it will be ten years since that post) it's time to update it and add to it, because I have been to a few more places since I made that post.

2013: London. I returned with Toni. First time for him. Third time for me and this time with the purpose to visit the Harry Potter Studio Tour, which was a magical experience. We did a whole bunch of other things as well. 

2015: Murcia/Archena/Cartagena. For my mum's 50th my dad brought the whole family to Spain for a week. It's an area of Spain that he visits frequently due to having business contacts in the region, but for the rest of us it was the first time there. My favourite memory is probably the Roman remains in Cartagena. 

2016: Köln. My first time in this beautiful, brilliant city in Germany. My dad goes every year to one of the big fairs organized in the city and this year his business contact brought me along as a kind of interpreter to help with English and French. I even got to use some Japanese when I got some time to myself and headed off to explore the Asian sector of the fair. Seeing the cathedral in Köln never gets old.

2018 + 2019: Köln. Back again, but these two times as a guest of my dad's. I spent most of my time during these two visits to follow him around and offer some input here and there. An idea or two. Mostly I just enjoy tagging along to the fair because it's a lot of fun. After every successful day at the fair we and the other Swedes usually went out having beers (Kölsch!) and dinner and always at the same handful of places. 

2019: Edinburgh. Went back to Edinburgh with Toni. First time for him. Second time for me. It had been 11 years since my last visit and there was so much nostalgia involved for me. This time I did all the tourist-y stuff properly.

2020: Edinburgh. Went back as a sort of mini-getaway for myself after a stressful period at work. I had some paid vacation left over and figured why not. Met up with a friend and also followed in Rowling's footsteps and did some writing at the Elephant Café.

I also did go to Copenhagen with Toni back in 2012 on a day-trip, but I can't count that as travelling since I lived 30 minutes away from Copenhagen at the time. 

I miss travelling. I miss airplanes. Before covid hit we talked about Ireland as our next destination. Let's hope it won't be too long now until we get to travel around again :3

Ten years since Japan

It's been 10½ years since I was in Japan and I somehow can't believe it. I really believed that I'd find my way back there before a decade had passed. But life got in the way and here we are ten years later and I've been nowhere near Asia in that time. 

Going to Japan was my big coming-of-age adventure. I was 19 years old and I left for Tokyo in the last days of February 2010. 

The first day of March was my first day of class and the first half of March was spent just getting the hang of things and getting to know the classmates and going on adventures with them. I still remember the first morning I squeezed myself onto one of the metro trains in rush hour traffic. I've never experienced another rush hour like the one in Tokyo anywhere ever again. The sheer amount of people was daunting, almost terrifying, but unlike other places there was as little pushing and discomfort as possible because people subconsciously knew how to take up as little room as possible and how to stay out of each other's way as much as possible. The Tokyo rush hour is a great machinery working very smoothly. No other country can compare. 

March was when we went on several afternoon adventures and weekend day-trips. I especially remember when we took a trip to Kawagoe. It was also when two of us went on a weekend trip to Kyoto via Shinkansen. And it was the time for hanami. So much hanami. 

April was the time of Tokyo Tower, Odaiba, FujiQ and Disneyland. There was always something going on. Somewhere to go, something to see. Food to experience. Karaoke and purikura and Sweets Paradise and melon soda. 

I started off May in Seoul. During Japan's Golden Week when we had time off school I took a little sidetrip to Seoul, just three days. I figured that Korea and Japan would be similar enough. Kind of like Sweden and Germany or something like that. But Korea was like a whole 'nother world. I took the time to visit an aquarium, some historical sights, and I also took a trip up to Namsan, the mountain close-by the city.

May and June was when the activity tapered out. We still did things together, but it was less sightseeing and more hanging out in familiar spots. One highlight of May was the wedding of our host family's daughter. And I also really loved the exploration of Meiji Jingu Shrine that I did on my own one weekend, which coincided with the first time I dared to traverese the shockingly crowded Takeshita Doori on my own. 

I was only in Japan for two weeks of June. June was mostly a lot of dinners with friends I had made during my almost four months in Tokyo. But it was also the month when we discovered Shakey's pizza and had a great laugh about it. 

For months after I returned to Sweden I missed Japan. I would dream about Tokyo every night and the stillness of my hometown was seemingly driving me insane. Imagine going from one of the biggest bustling cities in the world to living on the edge of a village with farmland across the road? The silence was deafening, the stillness crushing. Going back to uni definitely helped me adjust back to life in smalltown Sweden, but I've never stopped missing Japan. Which is why this guy is great: