Stockholm, capital of Scandinavia!

Stockholm has opened its cool ergonomic arms to me these past two days.  With my able guide and special lady friend by my side, I am starting to feel oriented to the capitol of Scandinavia.  A few facts on Stockholm, courtesy of my extensive experience (thank you Colbert).  Stockholm is high on most 'best city lists,' known for its parks, architecture, and water.  There is a lot of water which you can see on a map, or nearly any image of the city.  Corinne lives in the Sodermalm neighborhood/area/place.  We've spent most of our time in Sodermalm, Norrmalm, Ostermalm, and passing through Gamla Stan.  Corinne's school, the Royal Institute or KTH, is north of Ostermalm - you can see it on the map.  Sodermalm is a somewhat trendy area - lots of shops and cafes, not a lot of office or government buildings.  The city isn't all that big, and densely populated - 2 million in surrounding areas (209 square km or about 80 square miles - Mpls proper is 56 square miles).  Phew - enough numbers.  But there are a lot of people, nearly everyone in the ubiquitous five story apt buildings around town.  These buildings are shops first and sometimes second stories, and residences above that.  The buildings often face walkways off the main street, so they have building addresses off of a street, rather than a street address alone.

Everyone looks Swedish - well, not everyone, but most everyone.  It is a cinematic, Ingrid Bergman meets Bjork, sculpted kind of look, and while being white with blue eyes affords me Swedish greetings by shop attendants, there is a Swedish style and I'm not in it (that I know of).  Tight pants and a light, clear eyed directness with the world.  A lot of people smoke, or use snuice (tobacco in a little sack that I think is floating around the US), but the city is largely very clean - timely trains and buses, organized shops, and there isn't, that I have heard about, a 'bad side of town.'  Nearly everyone is fluent in English, but Swedish remains an impenetrable mess to me, and the few Swedish English cognates are not enough to feel competent navigating grocery stores or advertisements.

Stockholm streets are extremely bike and pedestrian friendly - nearly every street has dedicated bike lanes and even little bike traffic lights!  Many streets in the city center are full of spill over traffic from sidewalks and are rarely used by cars.  It feels very safe to walk around in the city, dramatically different from every other metropolis I've visited.  Streets are clearly marked with incomprehensible Swedish street names.  Here are a few Stockholm images from our walks around town.

bike lane, lots of pedestrians

Cars are very diligent about stopping for peds

cobblestone!

a city center area with a snowboarding event

Notice in the final image that the snowboarders would start at the top, ride the handrails down to a short snowy bottom - sans helmets - over stairs without any snow on them.  This was hard to watch, waiting as the old person I have become for someone to get hurt.

SO!  Yesterday was a big one for Corinne and I - she having her first choir concert with the choir she very bravely joined a few weeks ago, and me enjoying that concert and later spending time with her new friends on a boat in the Stockholm harbor!

Awwwwwww  :)

The concert was in a basement, and a full one!  They had to turn folks away!

Afternoon view from the boat

Nelson and Kyle, who lives in the cabin in the background

The concert was lovely - they served brunch-y food (which they called 'brunch') and sang songs from films (including uplifting English songs like Suicide is Painless, and It's A Wonderful World).  After the concert, we walked to the place Kyle is staying, a boat, and enjoyed drinks and conversation as the sun went down extremely slowly (60 degrees north).  Bam.  So that was fun.

Radiolab said sleeping in a new place is not a good nights sleep, as the body is in a state of alertness (for sabre tooth tigers and the like), and only after a night or two does a person sleep well.  I've had my two nights here, and am starting to fear the tigers less.  Ta ta for now!