It’s been too long!

I am the least reliable bloggist ever. Apologies. Here is a lovely photo of the bridge from Hornstull to Liljeholmen. Guess what time it is…

 

 

…about 4pm at the latest!! It’s so dark here these days. It’s dark when I go to work and dark when I leave the gym (sometimes it’s even dark when I get to the gym)

Here’s a couple more look-how-dark-it-is photos:

 

 

Sadly darkness also means blurriness, but you get the idea! Personally I rather like the dark, I find it quite exciting and (for the time-being at least) Christmassy. I’ve been running in the dark each evening and it’s a lot more enjoyable than you might think. Living in a big city means there’s always plenty of lights shining in the darkness and I’m told that when it snows it’ll brighten up the nights. Should be awesome!

 

Now, to make up for lost time, here is a lovely list of exciting things that I have done in the past few weeks:

- I went to work at a Grundskola for a week (well, 3 days of a week). The students were between 12 and 15 years old and totally adorable! It was so much fun working there, the students were all really interested in why I was there and asked me loads of questions about the UK and about me personally. They also taught me some stuff about Sweden and were generally super nice. And one evening while I was there the teachers had a wine evening which I joined in on. It was lovely! The journey to work in the mornings was about 45mins which was less fun, but I got a lot of time to read and it was worth it once I got to school because they made me feel so welcome. Hopefully I’ll be able to go back to that school again next semester – they’ve invited me to go skiing with them!

- Last weekend I took myself to Moderna Museet to see the Monet, Turner and Twombly exhibition. I bloody love Monet – his paintings remind me of living in France – and it turns out I rather like Turner and Twombly too. I think it’s my favourite gallery in Stockholm so I will have to go back, even if it did cost 100kr!

- I’ve finally been able to apply for an identity number! It’s been a lot of stress and confusion and annoyance and I’m still not actually eligible for the Personnummer but I have applied for some sort of ID number and will be able to get paid and open a bank account and start my Swedish lesssons! Thank God! This is what I’ve been looking forward to, especially since Stockholm can be a rather lonely place and I hopefully will meet some new people at Swedish lessons. Fingers crossed. At the very least I will learn a new skill to put on my CV.

- I was at Systembolaget just before closing time on a Saturday (it closes at 3pm and then isn’t open again until Monday morning) and there was a queue outside the door of at least thirty people. It was mental. Luckily I’d got there just before the crazy queues!

- The Christmas markets are open and they have tombola stalls!

- I learnt a new sentence: jag jobbar som en lärare

Darn it, I’m having a mental blank…that’ll have to do as a list and I will attempt to update more regularly in the future!

A free trip to Stadshuset (yes, FREE!)

I am currently in England. Just so you know. It isn’t relevant to this post, but just in case I start talking about “here” then I’m probably referring to the UK. Unless I’ve forgotten where I am again. This post is just me “checking in” so I don’t seem lazy. 

 

Last Thursday and Friday I attended an induction meeting for Comenius assistant across Sweden. There were 40ish of us – 3 English assistants and a lot of other nationalities including Polish, Austrian, Finnish and lots of Germans. It was pretty cool, we all complained about how laid-back Swedish teenagers are and compared notes on how to get teenagers to turn up to class on time.

Annoyingly nobody else is working in Stockholm so, although I live in the capital city, I still feel a bit alone. I felt silly empathising with other assistants who are living in middle-of-nowhere towns and feeling lonely because obviously my situation is a bit better – I have plenty of things to do even if I don’t have plenty of people to do them with – but I do think that the downside of being a Comenius assistant is obviously the large amount of time spent in your own company.

On Thursday afternoon we were taken on a tour of Stadshuset; the Stockholm City Hall. Being the massive geek that I quite obviously am, I was excited. I hadn’t got round to visiting the City Hall on any of my tourist days so it was another thing to tick off my list, but even better our tour was free! “Free” isn’t something you hear much of in Stockholm so my excitement levels were pretty high.

Since we were in a big group my photos are a bit rubbish. I know that sounds like a stupid excuse, but somehow I take better photographs when I’m on my own and don’t feel self-conscious about trying to find a good angle. Anyway, excuses out of the way, I’d like to share my photos of my new favourite building in the world. Seriously, it’s that cool.

This is where the city council sort out how to run Stockholm, they have a female majority and a female chair. Stockholm is a true feminist city! Also, I really like how it looks like there’s a four-poster bed in the room, very fancy!

The ceiling is meant to resemble a Viking longboat. And the very top of the ceiling is painted to look like the sky, which makes it an indoor-outdoor sort of deal. I like this a lot, no need to go out into the cold to see a nice blue sky!

The guy on the horse is meant to be Saint George – the princess Saint George rescues from the dragon represents Sweden and the dragon represents Denmark, the opposing army. I didn’t want to sound like a self-righteous Brit and tell them that Saint George actually belongs to the English…not that I’m all that fussed about him, I prefer Saint Patrick and the snakes or Saint David and wearing daffodils.

My photos of the next few rooms are rubbish. I refuse to share poor work with you so please feel free to imagine lots of mirrors and a full wall mural of the exact scene outside the window opposite. Exciting stuff. There was also a wonderful room that I didn’t take any photos of because I didn’t think I’d be able to catch the superness. It was a room designed to house a few lovely French tapestries – the room was the perfect shape for the tapestries and imagery from the tapestries was mirrored in the room – the same colours and shapes and loveliness. It’s the room where they perform marriage ceremonies; 38 weddings every Saturday from 2pm to 6pm (if my memory is correct). You can have a 30 second service or push the boat out and spend a whole 3 minutes professing your love for each other – anyone is welcome, gay or straight, so long as you don’t mind the 6 month waiting list. I’m almost tempted…all I need is a nice man to marry…

Another room that would be pretty cool for a wedding (although you can’t actually get married in it) is the gold hall; a massive hall that is literally papered in gold. Super ostentatious. I loved it!

The guide pointed out a few mistakes in the decor, including a headless Saint George (the artist insisted in was on purpose; the artist sounds like my kind of guy!)

I’m not sure whether I like this woman or find her disturbing (terrible framing in this photo, apologies):

And finally, I just can’t escape from France! :

A lovely lake

Tomorrow and Friday I am going to an induction meeting thingy for Comenius Assistants. This means two days off work (woop!) and spending time with other people experiencing the madness of being a Comenius Assistant (double woop!). Then I am going home for ten days (triple woop).

In case I forget/can’t be bothered to post for a while, here are a few photos of a lake and foresty park to tide you over with Swedish goodness:

[Insert fire-related football pun here]

Yesterday my friend took me to my first ever Swedish football match. I have been a Huddersfield Town supporter since I was about 5 years old and have travelled to such where-the-hell-is-that-? places as Kidderminster and Scunthorpe to watch them play (note I said “play” rather than “win”…in recent years Huddersfield have not been known for winning). I haven’t been to see a football match in months and I’ve been itching to see how the Swedes rate as football fans so I was super excited for the match.

The match in question was Djurgården vs Gefle; Djurgården being the home side. I did a bit of Wikipedia-based research before the match and discovered that I had never heard of any of their players. And that only the goalkeeper (who was playing his last ever match for them) played internationally. My hopes were not particularly high that the Allsvenskan league would match up to the Premiership (or the Championship for that matter…)

Djurgården play at Stockholms Stadion (and no, I haven’t forgotten the apostrophe, that’s how the Swedish spell it) which was built for the 1912 Olympic Games. I’ve never seen a football stadium like it – it reminded me of a castle, or maybe a brick version of the Colosseum (I visited Rome over the summer, it evidently had more of an effect on me that I realised!).

None of the photos I took show the stadium off to it’s full glory so I’ve Google-imaged a Colosseumy picture to illustrate my point:

Of course, it is still a football stadium so there was still a nice long queue for hot dogs and beer (which you can drink on the stands instead of being instructed by your dad to drink a whole pint as fast as possible so that you don’t miss any of the game)

The match itself was OK, not a very good standard of football if I’m perfectly honest. I reckon Huddersfield could beat either team easily. The end score was 1-1, which seemed pretty fair to me. The main difference between these top division Swedish teams and my usual third-tier English football appeared to be that the Swedish players were more attractive!

I love the steward’s face in that second photo – proving that all over the world being a steward at a football match is not a fun job!

The most interesting thing about the match for me, rather than the football itself, was the fans. We were in a standing section of the stadium (although it seemed to me that most areas were standing, and the standing area did have wooden benches…I found this quite perplexing) and the fans were so rowdy! I mean that in a nice way, they were signing and chanting and having a great time – far happier than English fans who like to grumble and moan about So-and-so missing a sitter or what’s-his-face looking like he went on a bender last night. From what I could understand (which was quite a lot to be honest, Swedish football fans have very good enunciation) the chants weren’t particularly insulting; they were all quite positive towards the home team rather than accusing the away team of being interbred or overweight as our football fans are want to do.

I don’t usually sit in the rowdy section when I go to football matches. Chanting tends to be reserved to away matches when the Towns fans are all in higher spirits and the boys need your support (this is where the whole fans-being-the-12th-man malarkey comes into play I think, when you have 3 sides of a stadium chanting against you then you need your own fans to be a bit rowdier) and I felt like a bit of an intruder being with “proper” fans. I do think it’s nice for football fans to chant but I sometimes feel that you miss some of the actual football if you’re jumping up and down singing about how much you love the team.

Here’s a photo of some fans, they were pretty much all blokes:

Now, onto the thing I really wasn’t expecting. Let’s start with a photo and move onto what the hell was actually happening:

Scary, right?! Just before the second half started the fans stood at the front of my stand all lit flares (or whatever they’re called). It just looked so dangerous – the benches in the stand were wooden! There weren’t that many exits! We could have all burned to death (or been crushed in an attempt to flee the flames)! Seriously though, when the flares lit up I was very shocked. How can such a “sensible” nation think that fire in a football crowd (a probably slightly drunk football crowd) is a good idea? A bit of Googling on the subject has proved me right, there have been injuries at matches. Yet they still practice this dangerous “celebration” technique. Mental. Plus the smoke impaired vision of the match for about 5mins:

And finally, it was the last ever match for the goalie and another player was receiving his Player of the Year award. These players were both presented with large bouquets of flowers. Yes, flowers. They gave beautiful flowers to macho footballers!

Hopefully you can see in this photo a big, manly footballer holding a lovely bouquet and giving another man a friendly hug. I do love the Swedes, even if they are pyromaniacs.

Bits and bobs that don’t warrant a post of their own

I like to have photos on my posts so, since I didn’t have any to go with this “bits and bobs” post, I decided to take a couple of autumnal photos to add a bit of colour. Weirdly the photos aren’t exactly what I was expecting (I took them on a digital camera, I should have checked them when I took them) as the sky has decided not to be blue like it actually was but instead is freakily white. I still think photos make posts more exciting though so please enjoy the freaky white sky.

Note, in this photo the sky manages to be both blue and white. It did not look this odd in real life, honest. Sweden is not another planet.

 

Moving on to the “bits and bobs” I thought would be nice to talk about but probably don’t warrant proper posts of their own:

 

- according to the French teacher at my school (the teacher that I spend the most time with since I am mainly a French assistant) the Swedes really love to queue and are very good at it. Her and her class would not believe me that it is in fact the British who are the best queuers in the world, if queuing was an Olympic sport we would win it etc. I tried to explain that in the UK if you see a queue you must join it and then, once firmly ensconced in said queue, complain about it with your fellow queuers. As far as I can tell Swedes do not complain when they are in a queue, they don’t necessarily look happy but they don’t verbalise their annoyance either. This takes a lot of the fun out of queuing and therefore proves that they aren’t as good at queuing at we Brits: they have not evolved the act of queuing any further than simply standing in a line. But I do like that queue-jumping is just as frowned on here as back home; when I lived in France little old ladies would reguarly push in front of me, usually while I was buying an inordinate amount of bread just for myself (and I wondered why France made me chubby!)

 

- today I took myself on a hunt to check out if I had a good local cafe. I pass one that looked pretty nice when I walk to and from work so I figured I would give it a go. I got there at quarter to four in the afternoon (I hadn’t just woken up, I had already done plenty with my day including going to the gym and baking gingerbread to negate all the good work done at the gym) which I thought was a usual sort of time to go for coffee but it turned out the cafe would only be open for another fifteen minutes. Obviously I still had a coffee – I love a good soya latte! – and it was a nice place with a lovely owner but surely she’s missing out on trade by closing so early. Plus the cafe is closed on Sundays! (and Mondays but I don’t think there’s quite as much missed trade there.)

 

- before I arrived in Sweden I had complete faith in the Swedes as a whole being a very organised bunch of people. And the important stuff like the Tax Office and Immigration and all that boring stuff being really, really organised. About a month and a half after applying for my identity number (which is meant to arrive about a fortnight after you apply) and I am still waiting…this means I can’t start my Swedish for Immigrants lessons…this means I can’t really speak much Swedish yet (although I do understand a lot more than people think I can, after 3 months here there are still certain people who like to inform me that “tack” means “thanks”) and I REALLY want to be able to speak Swedish. I have Monday and Tuesday off work (and Thursday and Friday for that matter…but for a different reason that I might go into at a later date… intrigue…it’s really not that exciting actually!) and while I was planning some Ciara-relaxing-time I think I might have to head to the Tax Office or Immigration Office or whatever the hell it’s called and ask them where my Identity Number is. Should be super fun…

 

That’s all the bits and bobs I have for you right now, apologies for my last point turning into a mini-rant.

 

 

 

Overpriced Art

I like to have at least one “touristy day” each week. Last week my designated tourist time was Sunday. Originally my plan was to go the The Royal Palace and have a gander at the Royals’ expensive trinkets but due to a confusion about where the actual entrance was and the news that some rooms were closed I ended up changing my plans (I didn’t want to pay the entrance fee if I wouldn’t be able to see everything, I’m from Yorkshire, we like to get our money’s worth!).

I formed Plan B very quickly while moseying along in the cold-but-sunny weather: a trip to the National Museum. (N.B. for “National Museum” read “National Art Gallery”)

I think it’s a really beautiful building, especially if you’re viewing it from Gamla Stan across the water. And also especially on such a clear, sunny day – note the blue cloud-free sky. I can cope with the cold if the city still looks so attractive. The interior of the museum is just as attractive as the outside but as I’m not a fan of taking photos in art galleries you’ll have to imagine this or come to Stockholm and see it for yourself (taking pictures of pictures seems somehow wrong).

Now, here is my gripe with Swedish museums: they charge for entry! The National Museum cost me 120kr, which I found rather steep. Especially since I’m used to popping into the National Gallery in Edinburgh for a quick gander at my favourite paintings. Still, I like to support the arts so paying for museums annoys me less than the ridiculous price of beer.

I don’t really know anything about Swedish art so I found the museum quite illuminating. There was a lovely exhibition entitled “The Four Seasons” which featured some gorgeous wintery Swedish landscapes. And also lots of paintings of foxes (the Swedish for fox is räv, this is one of the few words I know…still waiting on my Personnummer so I can start those lovely and free Swedish lessons!). There was also a Russian exhibition which wasn’t quite up my street; still interesting but I’m quite particular with my art.

The permanent exhibitions were a bit less exciting; they had a couple of rooms dedicated to French art work including one Monet (not one of his best) that made me feel slightly more at home, but after being spoilt by the Louve and the Musée d’Orsay over the summer (and even the art gallery in Le Havre, where I used to live in France, which had a permanent collection with many beautiful paintings by Monet, Boudin and Pissarro to name but three) I found it to be a bit of a let-down. There were some fantastic portraits of rich Swedes from the 18th century, but as a National Trust member I have seen plenty of portraits in my time!

I’m glad I took the time to visit the National Museum but I’m not sure I’ll be going back any time soon – if it was free I’d be back in a flash every time they got a new exhibition (or even to just stare at that Monet when I get homesick for France) but I can’t bring myself to spend 120kr on an OK gallery.

I don’t want to complain too much though, it was an enjoyable excursion and the walk there in the lovely autumnal weather was super:

 

 

 

 

And finally, where else can you find people kayaking in a city centre?!

My obsession with Swedish dogs continues

Today I saw some professional dog-walkers. They were walking the dogs in groups according to size! See photographic proof:

This amused me greatly. Upon further reflection I realised this was a very sensible way to walk dogs, but I still find it funny!

Hösten är här!

After a few lovely sunny weekends in a row I was starting to think that this whole Stockholm-is-a-cold-cold-place was a bit of an exaggeration, however the autumn weather has now well and truly set in and I even need to wear the lovely chunky mittens I bought myself from Monki last month.

Let me be clear, I’m not complaining. On the contrary, I like the cold. I like jumpers (I bought a rather fetching grey number today), scarves and hats. I like it when the leaves turn orange in autumn and I even quite like it when the trees are barren in the depths of winter. I like mulled wine and winter Pimms (and I really like the Fire Punch they sell at Edinburgh’s German Winter Market). I like watching bad weather out of the window while drinking a nice cup of Yorkshire tea. I like stodgy cold-weather meals like mince and dumplings and Irish stew. I like the BBC’s obligatory autumnal period drama and proper family Saturday night TV like Strictly Come Dancing. I even quite like it getting dark early. (And I especially like December, but that’s a whole different matter.)

Last Sunday one of the teachers from my school took me to Rosendals Trädgård, a kind of garden centre but posher than that sounds (terrible description, I know). It was a very nice and polite middle-class way to spend an afternoon. We had an over-priced sandwich while sitting outside (because the Swedes like to sit outside and enjoy the daylight as long as is physically possible) and bought some really super bread (a large amount of which was fed to some rather spoilt birds).

I’m starting to think maybe I take too many photos of food and beer…

Hopefully I can find other places to go to enjoy the lovely Stockholm autumn before it turns into a super-chilly Stockholm winter (which I will also definitely enjoy, however many times I’m told it will be FREEZING!)

 

16 Again

Last week I went on a residential trip with the science-stream first years to Saltsjöbaden, a coastal town with an observatory which dates back to 1931 (it was built to replace the original observatory from 1753, which is now used as museum). The observatory belongs to the company that owns my school and they run a residential week of science-related fun to help the students bond. My students were away from Tuesday to Friday but luckily my prior commitments (to French lessons) meant my presence was only required from Tuesday afternoon to Thursday morning.

Saltsjöbaden is completely gorgeous, it used to be the seaside destination of choice for the discerning Swedish Victorian (I’m not sure what they call people from the Victorian era here in Sweden so I am sticking with the British description) and is now the location of choice for a summer home of Stockholm’s rich. I was driven there on Tuesday but on Thursday morning I got to take the train back to Stockholm – the route is mostly unchanged since the early 1900s and it’s cool to think how the view has changed since then (I imagine the main difference is the influx of supermarkets by every station, big or small)

I bet the weather was similar back then though…

The town itself reminded me of Malahide in Ireland, it had the same feel of a home-away-from-home for the rich and privileged, same sort of view from the hotel across the harbour (complete with lots of fancy boats) and same big houses (although there is a slight difference in architectural design)

The actual place we stayed was pretty cool, not the bedrooms or the food (did you know that you’re expected to take your own bedding with you whenever you stay away from home in Sweden? slightly annoying. And the food was just more school food…great) but the observatory itself with its giant telescope. We got to look at the moon! I can confirm that it is not made from cheese.

As part of the residential I got to sit in on the science lessons all day Wednesday, this made me feel like a 16 year old back in a physics class (but minus my school physics teacher who was quite mad and, according to my friend, looked like Jesus). The icing on the cake was being accused of being one of the students by one of the teachers who worked at the observatory, he was quite rude to me about not speaking Swedish until I realised he thought I was a student and informed him I was actually a very young looking teacher. He didn’t apologise.

And finally, the view from my window in Saltsjöbaden:

Soligt Stockholm

I haven’t posted in so long! In all honesty I have been quite busy, especially since I’ve been able to enjoy the lovely autumn sun here in Stockholm.

It’s hard to complain about anything when you live somewhere so beautiful. As much as work sometimes gets on my nerves and it can be quite lonely here since I don’t know very many people, all I have to do to perk myself up is pop outside and see just how lovely Stockholm is. The teachers at my school keep warning me that winter is imminent so I’m making sure I enjoy the sun while it’s still here.

I like to make sure I do at visit at least one touristy place each week. Last week my chosen touristy venue was Millesgården, a lovely sculpture garden (it wasn’t quite big enough to be a sculpture park) a short bus ride from the end of the red T-Bana line (which just happens to be the line I live on). After getting the T-Bana in the direction of Ropsten every day I found it quite exciting to finally see Ropsten for myself (although the place itself wasn’t all that exciting…)

The sculpture garden itself was one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever been. It used to be the home of sculptor Carl Milles and his wife Olga and now even their house is open to the public and filled with lovely artwork – including a tapestry from Beauvais (a French town that is one of the locations in an epic personal story of mine involving, amongst other things, the largest glass of beer I’ve ever drunk). The house and garden look out over the water and across to the centre of Stockholm, there’s so much sky and water that you feel completely out in the open and away from the rat race. It’s really a super feeling, and a wonderful backdrop for the sculptures.

As well as a gorgeous garden full of sculptures, there was an interesting exhibition of glass art work including one of the best titled pieces I’ve ever encountered:

   

And, to end today’s post, my favourite teacher at my school took me out this weekend with her husband and stepson. Along with some wandering through lovely autumnal Stockholm scenery, drinking beer in the October sun and trying to spot a red squirrel, we visited a massive second-hand bookshop where I managed to find a Kurt Vonnegut book I’d never heard of – his first ever novel for that matter! There were also some rather marvellous science-fiction anthologies from the 1970s and 80s:

I do love a good bookshop – even though I am a reluctant Kindle user these days!