The flight from Kiruna to Stockholm is only 1 ½ hours – about the same from San Diego to San Francisco, and I think the length of Sweden may be about the same as California. Compared to its neighbors (Norway and Finland), so many Swedish brands have been a big hit in the US, including IKEA, Volvo, Saab, and H&M. Swedish fish, Swedish meatballs, Swedish massage – I tried all of these while in Sweden. Unfortunately, I learned that the planned ABBA museum never materialized, so I didn’t get to sample that famous Swedish export.
Arriving back in Stockholm was coming back to spring that sprung while we were in the north. Sidewalk cafes have appeared, and pots of daffodils are everywhere. The ice on the lake is breaking up and rapidly disappearing. It’s brisk but comfortable walking weather and I went all over town looking for good food, coffee and chocolate.
I also visited 3 more of the many museums in the city: the Vasa Museum, the Nordic Museum and the Museum of Modern Art. I can highly recommend the first two. The Vasa Museum houses a nearly intact wooden ship that sunk in Stockholm harbor in 1628, together with around 12,000 objects found with it. The wood-boring worms that usually destroy wood don’t like the low salt content of the Baltic and as a result the ship was incredibly preserved in the clay bottom of the harbor. A massive effort from 1957-1961 raised the ship and now it sits in a custom built museum dedicated to the history of the ship and the period of its construction.
The size of the Vasa is simply stunning: 62 meters long and several stories high. It sunk just setting sail and it is now believed that the ships design of being too tall and narrow caused it to capsize.
Almost next door to the Vasa Museum is the Nordic Museum in a grandiose purpose-built building that I first mistook for a cathedral. It houses interesting exhibits on the history of Scandinavian design, 300 years of clothing (quite different that American clothing), Scandinavian traditions, and had a temporary exhibit on the history of “Men in Bathing Suits”, which was just hilarious, although presented in a completely serious manner.
Last night in Stockholm, and I am on an overnight ferry bound for Helsinki.
1 comment:
A school building was fenced off with barbed wire in Espoo, Finland in 1908. Swedes fenced off the school building with barbed wire, in order to ban children the access to a school. (see the picture in the link)
The Swedish government was responsible for the most iron ore the Nazis received. Kiruna-Gällivare ore fields in Northern Sweden were all important to Nazi Germany.
These massive deliveries of iron ore and military facilities from Sweden to Nazi Germany lengthened World War II. Casualties of the war have been estimated at 20 million killed in Europe. How many of them died due to Sweden's material support to Nazi Germany, is not known.
http://www.thoughts.com/raimo/case-sweden
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