Good morning Stockholm! It is a cold one, but a golden one. The sun will not help much; today many warm hearts are needed to thaw up this city.
(Skeppsholmen, Stockholm, Sweden; November 2015)
Category Archives: Travel
In München steht ein Hofbräuhaus…
Beer, pringles, sausages, and sauerkraut. Accompanied with musicians in suspenders and/or lederhosen and happy schlager music. Indeed, what a cliché. And what an unashamed reality at Hofbräuhaus in Munich.
I do not like beer. There was no wine. The beer came in one-liter pints. In order not to shame the hallowed halls of the Hofbräuhaus I had to buy a one-liter pint of beer, one of the handful portions of beer I have ever purchased myself in my life. It was actually surprisingly tasty. There is a photograph as evidence but do not think I will share it here. Eins, zwei, g’suffa.
(Hofbräuhaus, Munich, Germany; November 2015)
Grüss Gott Munich!
Sunday in Munich. The church bells toll as the ceremony is over and people flood out into the crisp November air. Inside the air is hazy from incense and candle smoke. The choir finish off their last hymn.
It is Sunday lunch time and no shops are open in Munich. Yet people stroll around on the streets. The thing to do after church in Munich is apparently coffee or lunch in the few rays shining over the rooftops before the sun sinks too low.
I join the crowd milling down towards the city gates and into little Platzl place. I am not a Municher but Schuhbeck’s bistro has a spot just for me. In the sun. Beginning with a mouthwatering risotto and ending with a steaming mug of hot chocolate.
Life could be worse on a Sunday.
Munich, Germany; November 2015)
3 good things in 24 hours
One dark, cold night in Copenhagen there was a spur-of-the-moment reunion. Indian takeaway, memories of days in Cambridge, and touching base after 4 years.
Right afterwards there was another spur-of-the-moment crazy craving resulting in Belgian waffles with hot dripping chocolate fresh from a street stall at Stroget.
And finally, after a busy day in Lund and an adventurous train ride to the airport, there was a brand-spanking new Finnair Airbus A350 and an upgrade to business class. Champagne all around. I was not the only one taking photos – and some had brought proper equipment, too.
I could choose to remember only the hurry trying to catch the train, or the business meetings and endless powerpoint slides. Or I could choose to remember these 3 good, refreshing things in 24 hours. And the glass of champagne on the way home, under a fancy “Aurora” cabin light show.
Reality is never objective; it is always what we choose to perceive. And this starry night at 33,000 feet I chose to perceive my bubbly champagne very carefully and let everything else fade away, if just for a moment.
(Copenhagen, Denmark; October 2015)
Good morning Skåne!
Down below the people and animals of Skåne must still be sleeping. Look what a golden moment they are missing!
(Above Scania, Sweden; October 2015)
In the Crown Princess’s backyard
This is the front yard of my Stockholm crib. It also happens to be the backyard of the Crown Princess of Sweden and her prince consort and children. Catching the last daylight and some fresh air between office and dinner, it is surprisingly easy to get lost in the park. The English-style landscaping is from the mid-18th century when even a park did ideally not look like any human hand had shaped it – only God’s hand.
Take one wrong turn and you may be faced with a Chinese pagoda. Get lost in the squirming lanes again and you come face to face with a Roman tent -looking pavilion. Or a round royal lunch pavilion. Or the ruins of a castle. Or the royal castle of the Crown Princess and her family.
As I circled around the Chinese pagoda and turned back towards candlelight, tinkling cutlery, and a cozy evening meal, I thought of how lucky I was to have this place as my front yard if only for one day a week.
(Hotel Stallmästaregården in Hagaparken, Stockholm, Sweden; October 2015)
Takeoff
Another early morning takeoff. Cannot remember where I was going. Perhaps Stockholm. Helsinki airport bathed in the morning sunlight and mist lay over the fields. I cannot remember what I was thinking. Probably nothing. Probably something. But I probably was not thinking that “this is a beautiful moment and it will never, ever, return again. Because one second later, the world will have shifted, if ever so slightly.”
Live today. I probably wasn’t. My loss.
(Helsinki, Finland; October 2015)
A modern monkey
After browsing the free-time activities during a work retreat, I signed up for a canopy tour. I thought it would be like the canopy tours I did in the past: walking on planks and suspension bridges in trees. How wrong I was. Read the small print they say – but who ever does?
Instead we were whisked up on top of a mountain in a ski lift, trussed and clamped into a harness, and sent down the mountain on ziplines, toes skimming the treetops. Hanging from a wire, wind in my eyes, speeding towards a huge tree, I had to learn to brake with my glove on the wire before hitting it full speed. That’s what the helmets were for – or against.
As I stood under the apex of a lark tree, enjoying the sunlight and hum of the wind in the branches, squirrels scattered in all directions with angry complaints: humans don’t belong in the trees anymore. “Have not done so for quite a while so Go Away!”
Yet I could not help but think of John Muir’s tale about when he rode out a storm in the top of a douglas fir in Yosemite. And I thought of redwood arborists who spend days harnessed and hanging from trees, studying the animals and trees that grow from compost deposited on a redwood branch – and even sleeping suspended in the trees.
And I realized I just may have missed a second calling as an arborist, spending my days up in the trees, researching the microecosystem of a single tree branch. I may have missed a chance for happiness by reverting into a modern monkey.
(Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, USA; October 2015)
New Hampshire ruska
Is it a 19th century landscape with oil on canvas? No, it is real: the backyard of our lovely hotel in Bretton Woods. Ruska is Finnish for fall foliage and this is ruska at its best. But what Scandinavia misses is the maple that, when it sucks back the life from its leaves, turns them a dark-blue-blood-red against its light gray trunk. The New England ruska is tinted by royal blood.
(Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, USA; October 2015)
The haunted hotel
Imagine a white, long, stately grand hotel. With miles of corridors, white doors, and old Persian rugs. With hidden rooms and the scent of old age, and a bar with an age-old bartender. With guest rooms in which good things have happened – and horrible things, too. With REDRUM spelled on the door.
Yes. REDRUM. The Shining. “Honey, I’m home!” Jack Nicholson’s character going into serial-killer-mode. Except for that the location was changed to another hotel in Colorado just before filming began. Yet sometimes truth is stranger than fiction. The Omni Mount Washington resort in New Hampshire looks like the hotel from the movie. Only the haunted hedge maze is missing.
What a relief, then, that only room 314 is haunted. It is only at night when the hotel creaks and sighs. On a clear day you can see Mount Washington in the distance. And no REDRUM MURDER happened on our watch.
(Omni Mount Washington Resort, Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, USA; October 2015)
This blue marble 