Quick snapshot of the City Hall after a lunch with the Mayor of Stockholm. Although I must confess I did not know she was the Mayor until much later – this due to the confusing title she has in Swedish (I just thought she was a senior council member). And I sat opposite to her. Oops.

Usually I don’t make such a miss because I depend on my excellent governmental affairs colleagues who brief me before every meeting. I am terrible at trying to follow the politics of any of the Nordic countries I work in – including my own. Instead of being thankful that I live in a democracy and actively participating, I try to exclude politics from my life. How very privileged and ungrateful.

(Stockholm, Sweden; April 2017)