I've always wanted to come to Stockholm, for the stupidest reason. My mom was a big watcher of the soap opera "General Hospital" when I was a kid, and one of the most popular characters was a bad-boy-gone-good, Luke. Luke came to the town after a stint in the merchant marines, in Stockholm.
Stockholm just sounded... Cool. And really, for no other reason.
All these years and all these travels later, I still really didn't have a viable reason to want to come to Scandinavia, but it was a layover on the way to the Baltic states, where Justin and I are spending the majority of our three week adventure.
I had applied for Global entry for Justin and myself, which a couple of friends swear is a wonderful luxury. And after a 2-hour wait to leave the country that I had to endure this past February, the $100 per person just to apply, even if you don't get accepted, somehow seemed reasonable. Global entry gets you into the super-fast customs entry kiosk when you return to the United states, but it also enrolls you In TSA pre-check, which is the super-fast way to get INTO the airport. Also gets you into the fast-lane going to Canada, another nice perk. I excitedly paid our $200 and learned that that interview, that could be scheduled locally only at Bowling Green, JFK, or Newark, wasn't available for 2 MONTHS. Shenanigans.
My friend Lauren tells me to try to walk in. The meetings are scheduled about 20 minutes apart, but only take 5 minutes. So I bike to Bowling green, and the global entry office is hidden inconspicuously in some museum that no one goes to. I look at the guard, and ask him where global entry is, and he rolls his eyes and points to an unmarked bench where three people are sitting. NYC, always so helpful. One of the guys drove down the night before, from Delaware, and paid for a Manhattan hotel just to get it. He swears to me there are appointments available. Ok dude, whatever.
The lady comes out and says "1 o'clock appointments!" And I ask her if I can walk in. Absolutely not. I go home and learn that there are appointments for July 1 and 2, at Newark airport. Justin begrudgingly allows me to drag his ass out to Newark the day before our flight. Round-trip tickets for us to go to Newark airport: $52. This better be worth it. 5 minutes later, and we're trusted travelers.
It turns out that Norwegian airlines is one of the airlines that doesn't recognize TSA pre-check. But we tell the lady anyway, and she somehow manages to figure out how to put it on the ticket, which takes forever. I AM A TRUSTED TRAVELER DAMMIT. RECOGNIZE ME!!
Of course there's NO ONE ON LINE TO GO TO THE GATES AT ALL. GODDAMMIT. I've gotten away with nothing!
Our flight was stupidly easy. Less than 7 hours, and the only thing that sucked was that the man sitting in the aisle seat was disabled, and the cranky old coot let me know really early, in no uncertain terms, that getting up and down was really difficult for him. Dad always jokes with me about wearing depends underwear on long journeys and Friday afternoon traffic. I should have listened to him. I was afraid to drink anything on the flight. I also slept like shit, because I gave Justin the window seat. But we arrive at Arlanda airport, and Justin easily and successfully executes the directions our Airbnb host gave us. Take the Arlanda express train from the airport, and take the metro three stops.
Sweden is the only country we're going to that's not on the euro. The Arlanda express tickets cost 280 Swedish kroner each. Justin says, "what do you think the conversion rate is? How much do you think that costs?" I knew that Stockholm was going to be the most expensive place we were to visit, but I figured the ticket probably costs about $12. That seems reasonable, right?!
$34. Per person. Each way. Holy shit!! Well, we really didn't have a choice, right?
It wasn't until the middle of my jet-lagged slumber that night where i remembered that there was a companion tickets for the Arlanda express in the summer time.
Oops. In my defense, we bought the tickets from the machine in English and it said nothing. Stupid American tax, I call that.
Despite being a math teacher, conversions always prove really difficult for me, and for Justin, well, he really has no idea. It's 8.5 SEK to the dollar, and dividing by 8.5 isn't the easiest thing to do. So the only option is just to start thinking in local currency. Like, maybe we shouldn't pay more than 150 SEK for lunch, or coffee costs about 30 SEK, and that's all you can do if you want to eat lunch or drink coffee.
Our Airbnb host's name is Magnus and when having a conversation with Justin music industry, he used ABBA as an example. We are getting the true Swedish experience.
We're in Södermalm, often referred to the "Brooklyn of Stockholm." We tend to stay in the "Brooklyn" of wherever we go. It's absolutely gorgeous. There are vintage shops and adorable cafés. In general, Stockholm is beautiful, The architecture is clean and crisp. Much-used bike paths all over the place, everyone speaks English, coffee culture is strong, teak furniture everywhere. We find a reasonably priced Czech pub for dinner, and Justin and I eat pork, sauerkraut, dumplings, more pork, potato pancakes, and lingonberry sauce. Really delicious, but that combined with jet-lag knocks us both out at 9pm.
We wake up to bright light and birds chirping and a crisp breeze coming through our window. Justin rolls over and smiles, feeling more rested than he usually does, and says, almost cheerfully, "good morning! What time is it?"
It was 10 minutes to 4 in the morning. This time of year, the sun sets at about 10:30 and rises at about 4am. Later on, a guy at the airport us tells us Ramadan in Sweden is hell for his Muslim friend, because you're not allowed to eat from sunrise to sunset.
So we decided to suck it up and go to Gamla Stan, the old town. Something I've learned about "old towns" everywhere... I don't like them. They're all beautiful, in their cobblestoned ancient glory, but it's usually packed full of tourists and the charming ass buildings' ground floors are Zara's, H&Ms, Ben and Jerry's, and souvenir shops. Overpriced restaurants.
NOT AT 5am, though! We walked the streets, admired the beauty and solitude, and promptly walked back to the apartment.
We figure out really quickly that Stockholm is stupidly expensive. Like, New York expensive and then some. Justin decided that he's ready for Swedish meatballs. I'm thinking that this is one of these things that we think that is popular somewhere, but really isn't. Like French fries in France. So I protest and tease a bit, and Justin says, " I've traveled 6000 miles; there's no way I'm not eating some meatballs."
So we look it up, and it turns out that there's a number of restaurants that preserve the authentic Swedish meal called husmanskost, and sure as shit they serve meatballs. There's a place just down the road from us called "meatball," and they're closed.
One of Justin's main gripes in life is that the shit he really likes closes. Like, if Justin goes somewhere and raves about it, that's the death knell. Usually, it's a thrift store. Today, meatballs.
So, we wander a bit, and happened upon a place called Urban Deli, and the place is packed with normal-looking folks at lunchtime. Not dudes in suits, or dress shirts, but young couples, families with kids. I'm thinking, ok, family friendly, full of local people casually eating lunch. This seems ok. Well, two mains, one beer, and an order of fries was $80.
80 FUCKING DOLLARS.
It was good. Really nice. Not 80 dollars nice. And that's with a sub-par tip because I still can't figure out this tipping situation here. Justin is incredulous. I whip out the calculator and divide by 8.5 and prove it to him. It was sandwiches from the grocery store pretty much from then on out. Not that I really care; Swedish cuisine doesn't particularly excite me... Smörrebröd is an open-faced sandwich...like Shrimp salad on toast. For $13, give me the other slice of fucking bread. Fuck Swedish food.
Is this why ikea exists and is so popular? Cheap furniture so people can afford to eat?
But there was no way in hell Justin was leaving Stockholm without Swedish meatballs. Even though the well-regarded traditional restaurant "pelican" down the block had them, he wasn't going to pay over $20 for them. He was going to figure it out, somehow.
So we basically just spent two days trying our best to recover from jet-lag in a place with 4 hours of night, alternately sleeping, drinking coffee and red bull, and enjoying walking around this absolutely lovely city. It's gorgeous and completely calm. It's lovely and charming without being overly kitschy and cutesy. Everyone also, calm and collected. We heard no one raising their voice. Justin and I, two people who really find the sounds of other people really fucking annoying, found that we weren't annoyed by anyone. We were at a bar where 8 pretty blond Swedish frat boys were playing some drinking game, shots lines up, smacking the table lightly... Even THEY were quiet about it.
We walked, and we walked, and Justin was sad to discover that his magic touch for destroying business just by getting excited about them extended not only to the meatball shop, but to at least two thrift stores and an old café he was interested in.
It seems as though Södermalm is suffering the same fate as Williamsburg, bushwick, et al... The cool, bohemian vibe is being bought and taken over by rich people who run the cool, affordable, and old right out of the neighborhood. In a country where such a large percentage of their income goes to (awesome) social services, how do people afford all this? We spent a lot of time pondering this.
He did get those meatballs, even though they were in the frozen dinner section of the supermarket, complete with mashed potatoes and lingonberry sauce. He said they were delicious.
First stop when we get home: ikea. That is, if the Brooklyn one isn't out of business by the time we get there.
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