You know, that opening and the change in title has likely been lost on the lot of you, save maybe two people. Three tops. Well, if you're confused then so be it. It's staying.
I just got back from taking Pipo for a walk. Pipo is my couchsurfing host here in Helsinki, Maarit's, dog. Funny story about that another time. Right now I have some Stockholm to finish up.
I spent five days in Stockholm, the first two being about me wandering around, the last three being about me wandering around with my cousins. My Aunt Karen drove me in, and I think I mentioned that part already, and I stayed with Doris, a family friend who is super awesome and was willing to put me up. I think I mentioned Doris previously as well, but it's worth repeating.
Friday, yep, more than a week ago (I'm getting worse at this not better), I spent primarily wandering around Gamla Stan, which is the oldest part of the city, and is where, amongst other things, the royal palace is located. Also located on the island, I did mention Gamla Stan is an island, right? Stockholm is actually spreadout over several. Anyway, also located in Gamla Stan is the Swedish Academy, home to the Nobel Museum.
When I was here six years ago for my cousins wedding I just by chance wandered into the square where it was located. It was closed at the time but I vowed that I would check it out when next in Stockholm. Well, once again, I vow that next time I'm in Stockholm I will go to the Nobel Museum. That's right, didn't get there. Kinda like the castle in Orebro.
This is one of the lion's by the palace.
And this is one of the entrances to said palace. Here I did go, and spent a lovely close to four hours, first wandering alone, then as part of a tour where I learned all sorts of neat stuff, and then again on my own, where I learned more neat stuff.
Pictures were not allowed to be taken inside though, so aside from a couple other exterior shots further down, that's what you get. Oh, neat stuff. Well, I've got two questions outstanding from my trip to the palace. The first is why did a french monarch give the swedish monarch a series of tapestries depicted scenes from Don Quixote. I asked the guide, which sparked up a fun conversation about all sorts of stuff for about twenty minutes, but alas, he didn't know. I mean perhaps there is nothing to it, but if I'm a king, and another king gives me Don Quixote tapestries to hang on my walls, I start to wonder about what kind of message is being sent. Waiting rooms in palaces, heck, any room in a palace that's been decorated with paintings or tapestries has got some kind of purpose. People sat in some of these rooms for a long time, and needed something to kill the time. So, in the waiting room just before the throne room, and hoping to see the King? Here's an excellent time to depict major heroes and stories from Greek myths that have you leave thinking that the monarch you're about to go and see is powerful, wise, and just.
So what the heck is it with Don Quixote? I still don't know, but I do have it on the list to research.
The second neat one was visiting a museum beneath the palace that gives the history of the site, the previous castle, this one being built, fires (there are always fires), and other such stuff. In this particular museum there is a piece of masonry from the castle that used to sit here that has a Tudor rose on it. You may remember the Tudor rose from my entry on our time in Canterbury. Or you may know it for other reasons. Quick review. Henry VII of England wins the war of the roses and created a new emblem by combining the red rose and white rose of the two warring families. That starts the Tudors, of which Henry VIII was one, and Queen Elizabeth I was the last. 'Virgin Queen' as you may recall. So what the heck is a Tudor rose doing carved into a piece of stone in a castle in Sweden. I looked, I read. I found a lovely, totally fictional account of a Swedish/English princess, but yeah, I don't have a clue. And no one was around to ask.
This is another lovely square, but this time with an obelisk. Bernini was not to be found anywhere might I add.
This is Stockholm Cathedral. Don't drive your motorcyle or car into it.
This is the interior of Stockholm Cathedral.
This is King George slaying the dragon. Now, you may ask yourself once again, why is it that this story winds up in a cathedral in Stockholm. Answer: Same principle as what was painted on the walls at the palace. And far less confusing than the Man of La Mancha.
This is the organ at the cathedral.
You may or may not have noticed by this point, but I tend to have a set pattern when it comes to cathedrals. Get an outside shot. Get as close to a full interior shot as I can. And get a pick of the organ. Everything else is gravy.
In this case the gravy is this lovely little painting depicting an actual moment in 1535. It's called Sun Dog, and depicts a parhelia, which is essentially something that makes it look like there are multiple suns.
Why did I take a picture of this? Well, in high school I wrote a paper on a section of the Book of Ezekiel from the bible that some (well, Erich von Daniken) suggested was a recording of a close encounted with aliens. So, UFO's in the Bible. One of the books I read on the subject suggested that what was being witnessed was actually a natural phenomenon (doo doo do do do) called parhelia. You can also go with it being God, but I'm not about to start that discussion here. I didn't do it in Grade 12 when I wrote the paper, so why start now.
Anyway, my Dad, as always, did an amazing job of finding me way too many books to read on the topic of UFO's in the bible. And even if he doesn't remember the whole parhelia thingy, I just wanted to include it here so I could tell that story.
This is the altar. It's pretty much solid ebony.
Paul McCartney was not to be seen.
This is one of the streets on Gamla Stan. They wind nicely, are cobbled, meander a bit, kinda narrow. Everything a street in the oldest part of an old city should have or do.
This is the fifth shot of these streetlamps, and the only one where I got them lined up correctly.
Which is why I didn't take a sixth.
Another street.
This is the outdoor version of the St. George statue in the cathedral. I saw this one six years ago that same morning I found the Nobel Museum. Not that it was missing.
And as promised, here is another shot of the palace.
This is one of the many harbour areas. Lots of islands equals lots of places for boats.
These next two shots are of the subway system. There are several stations where they didn't smooth it all out, so it remains cavernous. Yes, a vividly painted cavern, but cave-like nonetheless.
I am curious if it is less expensive to build and maintain them this way? Something for subway subway subway guy to consider perhaps.
This as you may have guessed is a fountain. It is in a park at Kungsgatan (King Street) across from the opera.
It's also right behing St. Jacob's. No showing of an exterior on this one folk. And no explanation for why. Here's a lovely interior.
The person you can barely see up on the right - you can make out her back and head - is Doris. We met up to attend a organ recital.
The recital was played on this beast.
I'm here to tell folk that size does matter. This organ recital was primarily late 19th/early 20th century French work, but it started with Bach's good 'ol D minor. An odd choice given the rest of the programme, but certainly a crowd pleaser. Now I say size matters because I had heard the D minor played in Orebro at the recital that I previously wrote about. The organ in Orebro's largest pipes are 16 ft. St. Jacob's has got the 32 ft ones. And I'm telling you, they make a difference. As my friend Mark would say - Not a dry seat in the house.
Back outside Doris and I went off after the recital to find some dinner, and walked through this park that runs along Kungsgatan.
Until we got to this square, which is right in the middle of the big shopping district and beside the Kulturhuset, which is an arts space in Stockholm with theatres, shops, exhibits, and other things promoting culture. Chicago was opening that night, in Swedish. Oh, and I mean the musical, not Peter Cetera and friends.
Du ar inneborden in mitt liv, du ar inspirationen...
Never mind.
This is the next day, taken from Sodermalm, the island directly south of Gamla Stan, or at least I think it's south. I suck at that sort of thing.
It's a building.
This is City Hall.
It's an old building.
And this, this little fellow is where I had a queue of russian tourists waiting for me to take photos of them. Seriously. I did it for one couple and then they just queued up. I wanted to then take a picture of all of them for me to have.
As you can see, the little fellow is alone. So you can imagine how that went.
This is Sodermalm.
As is this, and a whole lot of the next shots, so I'll just hush.
Except to mention that the following triptych is of Maria Magdelena.
And this is some cool fountain in a park that I walked through. I went to read a plaque nearby in hopes of finding out what it was about, but it was all worn away, and in Swedish.
Up high view of Sodermalm, and no, not from a church tower this time, but from an actual tower thingy built for people to come and take a look out over the city.
There are some lovely old houses in parts of Sodermalm as well. These are two of them.
And this is a bicycle. This shot is for James, in case he ever reads this. I thought you might like this one.
This is out Saturday night at Bar Carmen, renowned for inexpensive beer, and therefore host to a regular weekly couch surfers get together that I had looked up and decided to attend.
The guy on the right in the top, or left on the bottom (I don't know why he's in both actually, but there you go) is named Carlos. Carlos is a software developer and works on Candy Crush. Seriously! Candy Crush. We talked about addiction.
It was a fun evening with opportunities to meet folk, hear their stories, tell a little of mine, get tips on where and how to travel - including might I add an easy way to go to St. Petersburgh without needing a visa, which I'm not doing, but there you go - and chat about all sorts of fun topics ranging from Swedish history and politics, to Putin, to the already mentioned but so cool it is worth repeating Candy Crush.
My mom plays Candy Crush. Seriously.
I even met a Canadian - Jeremy. He is from Montreal and is spending a few months travelling Europe. He put me on to Credo, a choral festival in Estonia going on right now. I'm headed there tomorrow to catch a few concerts. Possibly even meeting up. So yes, CS (couchsurfing without all the extra letters) is being my friend right now.
Let's just say it was a long night. Very fun, but very long. This misty tower picture in Gamla Stan was taken around 4am or so I think.
And this is Central Station at about 8am.
And this is the map of Skansen, an outdoor museum in Stockholm that features buildings from different periods and regions of Sweden, and has a zoo. We missed the monkeys, but got some others for you.
Skansen was where I was spending Sunday with my cousin Tim and family, who had come into Stockholm for a few days to visit other family. and me. Yay me! We had agreed to meet up at Central Station for 11am, hence the earlier shot. Comfy benches I might add. Oh, and I met a guy who looked exactly like my Dad. I mean, exactly. Total doppleganger. He even moved the same way, and his hands were the same. I sat staring at him for several minutes before going and finding out that he was not my father but was named Jon and had once been to Manitoba to hunt bear.
Anyway, Skansen.
Now, I'm not posting family shots, and you all know why if you've been following along for a few weeks. So please content yourself with old buildings and fuzzy animals. If you want to see the many, many shots I took of family between Sunday and Tuesday, then you'll just have to come over some time.
Yep, that's it, they put all of Stockholm in Skansen, which is in Stockholm. How's that for a Star Trek plot? Actually I turned around at one point and thought it was a good view of the city. So, if you're looking for this particular view, now you know you'll need to go to Skansen.
These are reindeer. Given the distance between the one in the front and the rest of them, coupled with the forlorn look on it's face, we've got a pretty good idea who that one is.
Peacock. Every zoo has them. I don't know why. I mean, the zoo in High Park has them.
Oh look, another house.
Yes, rabbits. The reason I included this pic is because I saw them and I thought of Peanut. Some of you will know what that means. Others of you will not and likely do not care, so I'm just going to continue without further comment. If you really want to know, then comment on the blog darn it.
Bear. Which, when saving the picture, I spelled "beer". Duh.
Wolf. I got that one right when I saved the picture.
House. Now, the neat thing about this house in my opinion is the thingy on the chimney that let's you cap it.
This is us walking off the island where Skansen, embassies, and a whole lot of other museums are. I forget the name and don't want to look it up right now. Same goes for the neighbourhood we were walking in to.
I can tell you though that it is near the modern art museum. You can tell from the below.
We walked until we got to a Max, which is a burger chain in Sweden that Noah likened to Harvey's in terms of quality. I think I may dispute that, but not right now. And that was Sunday.
Monday and Tuesday were also full of fun kid cousin time except we added Jenn and her daughter Jocelyn into the mix. One day was the science museum, the next was the aquarium and dinner at Doris'. Lots of pictures, again, none to be shown here.
I'll admit that this was not what I had expected from my time in Stockholm. I knew I would get more time with family, but I hadn't expected the three days. And with little ones about, what you get up to is really about how you can best manage multiple points of chaos simultaneously. So do the kid friendly things, and hopefully have time to connect with them and with the adult cousins. And apparently the Strindberg museum was not one of those places. Like I said about Nobel. Next time.
I wouldn't change the Stockholm time one little bit. I am so fortunate to have this amazing family to spend time with, and to get to know my littler cousins a bit more. Sure, they all think I'm an idiot because we can't communicate. And I don't blame them, I felt like an idiot. I can however point and say "Nej!" so apparently I can be left alone with them for short periods of time.
Be prepared to modify your plan. That is even more true when it means getting to spend time with those you love.
So if you were one of the few that saw the first "photo only" posting of this blog entry then you may be wondering about what happened to the band, the archipelago, the singer who looks like he's from Great Big Sea, but he isn't, and the huge pink guy peeing.
I'll tell you about it later.
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