Walking Stockholm
Pics & Captions from Sweden, Pt. 1
Brian suggested a buddy trip. Bon Iver was playing Dalhalla, an amphitheater built in a decommissioned quarry in the Swedish countryside. He’d always wanted to see the venue, and Justin is Brian’s favorite artist. He presented a tight itinerary, in and out for the show, just a few days gone from home.
I’ve been talking about visiting Sweden for ages. When my son was a few years old, my ex- and I got him a passport in anticipation of a family trip there, but it never materialized. We got busy, got divorced, and more than a decade has gone by.
I suggested we see more than a concert and the inside of airplanes, that we also spend time in Stockholm, and go visit my friend Niclas in Karlstad, a town I had imagined a hundred times. Brian agreed, and so the Bon Iver gig became one of three stops on our Swedish tour.
Meet Brian. His sister’s dog took a bite from his face a few days before we left. That bandage in a foreign land made him look badass. I appreciate his complete lack of self-consciousness as I snapped a bazillion pics.
We landed in Stockholm in the early afternoon, and for four days we walked around that fucker endlessly. We clocked 8 to 12 miles each day; mostly aimless, not overly adventurous, but we saw a lot of the city.
The stylish Lydmar Hotel was the perfect home base, situated on the postcard-ready harbor where those commuter boats dock, and walkable to everything. The rooms at the Lydmar are spacious and expensive, each floor uniquely decorated with killer photos, art, furniture, and fabrics. The room keys are hefty, attached to a round metal tag engraved with the room number. The folks working the front desk suggest you leave your key with them as you come and go given their weight, their size. There’s a custom set of drawers to hold them all. They never once asked for ID, and always knew our room numbers just by our dumb, smiling faces each time we returned.
The sun stays up so long in the summer, you can keep going and going. We criss-crossed the city several times, visiting museums, eating, and shopping. We’d pop back to the hotel every few hours to rest for a few, charge our phones, and grab a drink on the hotel’s front patio.
At the end of the first day, sitting in the restaurant for a night cap, William from the front desk—off work now, in short sleeves, tattoos on his arms—asked about our day, and about my camera. “The x100? They're hard to find,” he said. I told him I got lucky and happened upon mine used in a quiet camera shop in Indiana. He’d found and flipped two for a profit recently and upgraded to a Leica.
Our second day in Stockholm was Sveriges Nationaldag, National Day of Sweden. I caught up with Niclas on the phone that morning to finalize our plans to meet up later in the week. I asked what to expect from the holiday. “Norway’s got the real independence celebration,” he said.
I filled him in on what we’d done our first day, and the two new pieces of Swedish clothing I bought, winding him up, knowing he’d be annoyed.
“Oh my god, no. The worst possible thing! The Grandpa checked lumberjack shirt?”
“Wait. Wait. There’s another one,” I said. “I was cold sitting outside at an Indian restaurant, so between ordering our dinner and the food arriving, I jumped up and into the Nudie shop on the block…”
“Oh no, come on! The two worst ones?” he cried.
“… and I tried on a blue chore coat which fit very nicely.”
“Oh yes, I’m sure that it did.”
“And the soft-spoken, giantly-bearded dude behind the counter, who was hand stitching something, told me it’s one of their best selling items.”
“Oh, I have no doubt,” Niclas said.
“Called it a fine choice.”
I felt like a mark when I was in there, had pre-imagined this conversation with Niclas while checking out. He can dog on my obvious purchases all day; he’d probably spend $1,000 on a weird coffee bean.
That afternoon, a tame and manageable crowd gathered outside along the road, and William from the front desk called out as I walked through the lobby: “Adam, the King is going to emerge from the palace. It’s a big day in Sweden. We’re celebrating 500 years of liberation.”
Outside, the King rolled by in an open carriage accompanied by horses with riders in traditional military outfits. There was hardly even cheering, just calm chattering and cameras clicking. Civilized as hell.
Several times during our trip, I became suddenly aware of how loud Brian and I were talking or laughing.
I’d recently gone to Fotografiska in New York to see a fantastic hip hop exhibit. At the flagship location of the museum in Stockholm, I was happy to discover the photographs of Cig Harvey and Diana Markosian.
Niclas recommended a spot for ice cream and coffee just up the hill from Fotografiska. The café was unassuming, with a gorgeous view. I got the chocolate, and had a few bites of Brian’s lemon curd. I’m not exaggerating when I say both were the best ice creams I’ve ever tasted. They put a traditional Swedish gumdrop on top, and you can go ahead and put that thing on the best ever candy list, too.
Brian is using what he thinks is a Swedish accent when he’s speaking English. It’s 0% on point. I’m an asshole and point it out. He says he’s just over annunciating since everyone’s having to listen to us in a second language.
There’s no Diet Coke anywhere in the country. Illegal. The sane Swedes have deemed some ingredient poison. It was Coke Zero everywhere for the sugar-free option, a wildly inferior drink. Got so stoked on the flight home when they had my silver cans on board.
Stockholm’s not busy, not crowded, not ever. We didn’t wait for anything, anywhere. I’m sure there are fucked up hidden things in neighborhoods we didn't see, but days walking all over the city, we saw only 2 or maybe 3 folks living on the streets in dire straights. The cops don't have guns, and I barely saw the cops anyway. You can sense the safety net, and after a little decompressing, you can feel an unAmerican ease. I don’t want to do too much comparative lit about USA vs High Functioning Socialist Country, but let me say simply that we could learn some goddamn things.
We had perfect weather. Even the locals were talking about it.
And I swear to god, there’s no athleisure to be seen. The women of Stockholm are understated. They’re leaving lines loose, and minds to wonder.
We went to Pelikan for the meatballs, as advised.
Only a few American brands. McDonald’s here and there, a couple Burger Kings, and 7-Eleven stores (superior to ours).
We walked to a mall in the suburbs. It was miles away, but the map routed us through a nice park and when we had to walk along the freeway, there was a wide and well maintained path. We had decent lunches in the food court, bought nothing, learned a mall is a mall is a mall, even when it’s socialized.
The lady who owned the unorganized antique and record shop told us about a recent customer from Los Angeles who bought something from her—I can’t remember what, a statue?—and spent a lot of money. She kept saying a lot, over and over. So much money. I mean, this was a crazy amount. He must have been very rich. I couldn’t believe how much he spent.
Brian was flipping through used records crammed into a few crates among all manner of other shit in the little store. “There are more records in the basement,” the woman told him.
Then this other guy’s sterile store. He’s in the pic below, sitting at a table behind the window of his shop with headphones on, probably grading an LP to be listed later for sale online.
There was a second room in his store, too. You could see in the back through an open door, a library of ordered LPs, but Brian was stopped when he tried to step back there. “That’s not public,” he was told.
The dude did invent some clever genres for his austere display shelves.
We loved the light lasting so long. Still dusk after 11pm. A lot of my favorite pictures were taken late.
In some photos, it looks darker than I remember it actually getting. They must have been taken super late, in those few hours when it got close to actual night.
While lingering outside the hotel, waiting for Brian and taking pictures, I heard hoopla and cheering across the water. I saw what looked to be another parade snaking along the waterfront road. This time instead of classy carriages and horses, it was a caravan of three European semis hauling loads of young people with banners, flags, and navel hats. Behind the caravan, a few cars packed with kids followed, blowing their horns. A girl, parade marshall, leaned out the back window of a white sedan huffing into a silver whistle on a rope.
I grabbed a coffee at the ice cream stand by the boats and asked the girl working there if she knew what was happening. “It’s the graduates. It’s a tradition when they finish school.”
As they roll past me, I’m thrilled to see two of the vehicles are straight up dump trucks stuffed with kids, no matter. The third, a more dignified box truck modified for partying, is blasting the music.
They passed and turned down the road away from the hotel, and eventuallly Brian popped out from the lobby. “Damn, you might have missed the best thing to see in Stockholm,” I said. “It’s graduation week, and the kids are out raging on the backs of trucks.” But then, I heard the whistle and the music and the cheering again. “Oh dude, they’re coming back around. It’s the greatest. Wait until you see this.” Brian watching them go by, smiling, but notably less psyched than me.
“The most random thing!?” I beamed.
“Totally,” he said. “I just had a weird one, too. I ran into Patti Smith in the lobby.” A fairly good one-up, I had to admit.
Brian didn’t know about two iPhone things. The first was the blue dot’s shadow on Maps showing the direction you’re facing. After a day and a half of walking directions, I intervened. He called it a game-changer. The second was Portrait Mode, which he'd never tried. Below, find one of his first results and a Top 5 Happiest Adams ever captured in a photograph. Also, the coat looks good, goddammit.
William Front Desk gave us one last tip as we were checking out. “You’ve got to go to Max when you’re on your way to Rättvik,” he said.
“Oh, I saw a Max last night wandering around late. The grads were all ordering stuff,” I said.
“We’re putting McDonald’s out of business over here, Adam.”
“Are you talking about Max?” asked a woman waiting to check in behind us. “You have to go. We’re Swedish, we’ve been living in London, but when we come back home it’s always a first stop.”
“Believe me when I say, get the chicken burger,” said William behind the counter.
They're proud of their national fast food chain. Can you imagine? Or maybe you can remember? I can confirm, the chicken sandwich is a revelation. It tasted like 1987. The ice maker is so quiet. It plops a small amount of ice into your reasonably-sized cup. You have to push the button again to be an American water hog.
Pt. 2: Dalhalla with Bon Iver, soon!
Might need to borrow that blue coat!