Sweden, The Bizarro Russia

Dear Readers,
I am back from Sweden and packing up to go to Siberia. I would be a bit more excited about my trip if planes didn't keep falling out of the sky in Russia. Russian fatalism is well-founded. Anyway to take my mind of my impending flight (hopefully successfully round-trip), I will regal you with tales of the secret gem of a country known as Sweden.

I had a fantastic time in Sweden. I knew the trip was off to a good start when I saw Ice-T (Detective Tutuolla for the SVU fans in the mix) in the airport at 7 am on Wednesday morning. I actually spoke to him and conversation was scintillating. Here it is verbatim Me "Hi, were you on the New York Flight?" Ice "Yeah", Me "Was it Flight 68? ", Ice " I don't know flight numbers". The end. How great a country is this?

Anyway, my travel-beleaguered, delayed but still smiling family showed up about 20 minutes later. And as tough as I like to believe that I am, I cried. I was just so overwhelmingly happy to see them that I could not help myself. They all looked great. The girls looked taller, Mark never looked more handsome and everybody was smiling. We bundled the family into the nearest taxi and we were off on our Sweden adventure. I should scroll back and say that I got to Sweden the day before and stayed with our friend Micke H, a native Swede. He is a super class guy and a great friend. He is renting a place that was built in the 1700, the place was extraordinarily charming and I loved it. It had wood floors and two working wood stove/chimneys. There were wild English gardens in both the back and the sides of place and a gravelly front court-yard. It was truly beautiful. Micke and I went to dinner in the trendy Sodermalm district and then walked down by the water. Water is not hard to find in Stockholm because the city is located in archipelago of 24,000 islands, between Lake Malaren and the Baltic Sea. I believe that the city itself is build on 5 or so big islands. I took lots of pictures, but unfortunately, have no idea what the buildings are, just that they are beautiful.

Stockholm City is a small, big city with a compact center. It is very beautiful and has all kinds of interesting architecture, sculpture and landscape/seascape scenes. It is pretty easy to navigate. But the absolute best part about the city is the people. The people are so nice, polite and Sweden is one of the last places on God's green earth where Americans are still liked. Everyone was so helpful to us and interested in talking with us because we were Americans. Sweden is family-friendly in word and deed. Children are welcome at restaurants of all price levels. Buses accommodate strollers-- in Russia, the buses don't even accommodate people.

Sweden completely disconcerted me. Everything there was the total opposite of Russia -- hence the "Bizarro" reference. The people were genuinely nice and helpful and it took a bit of time to adjust to that. In Sweden, I felt none of the tension and hostility on the streets and from the people that is a matter of course in Russia. Stockholm is a really cosmopolitan city with all shades of brown mixed into to the dominate blond/blue eyed palette. As a indication of how diverse Sweden is, there was a black hair care product store on the main street in downtown Stockholm. I was so geeked about this discovery, that Mark thought I was a bit nuts.

I look at Sweden and really wonder how they got it so right and Russia veered so badly off course. The Swedes can and do complain loud and long, righteously, about the high tax rate -- as high as 62% real tax rate. However, I would trade off that high tax rate for the high life expectancy, low infant mortality, high literacy, low crime, low pollution that Swede enjoy. Russians flat 13% tax rate seems a small, cold comfort in light of the fact that men only have 59 years to spend the other 87%.

I, too joined the chorus of tax complaints because Sweden imposes a 25% (yes you read it right 1/4 of the value of the purchase) tax on all goods (restaurants, shops etc) sold. The tax is called "moms" in Swedish. I am not sure if that is a linguistic in-joke or an unfortunately quirk of acronyms, but I wondered for many days, just who's mom was she and why the hell weren't her own children taking care of her.

The family had a great time. The first day we went to Grona Lund (Tivoli Gardens) -- the Swedish equivalent of Six Flags. Our hotel provided us with these cards called the Stockholm card. These cards entitled us to free public transportation, including boat trips, and free entrance into over 70 museums and attractions. Grona Lund was one. The girls really enjoyed the place, the rides, the entertainment and especially the ice cream. We spent our first full afternoon there. As the girls tired, we took a boat tour out to a near island in the archipelago. The girls slept the entire ride. On our second day, we toured Skansen, which is the worlds largest open air museum. We spent almost the entire day at Skansen; they have a zoo, kids activities, bakery, stables and an aquarium. At the aquarium, the girls just had to pet the snake and tartantula on display. Yecch.
Friday, we returned to the center of the city and took a bus tour. Mark met up with Micke and had a "boys night out". Let me just take moment to send a huge shout out to my husband. From the beginning, he has been an unwavering bastion of support for me and my desire to do this program. He is doing a yeoman's job of raising our two girls alone. He never, ever complains and is running the household at high efficiency. His sacrifice, and it is an enormous sacrifice, drives me to succeed in this program. He is an amazing individual and the best husband in the world. After 10 years of marriage, I am blessed, blessed to have him as a life-partner.
Okay, okay enough mushy stuff.
On Friday, the girls and I went to see Garfield 2 or (Gustav 2 in Swedish). Sweden does not dub TV shows, but they do dub movies, so you have to check which language a US movie is playing in. I fell asleep during the movie, but the girls liked it.

On Sunday, we did some souvenir shopping and took Micke out to dinner as a thank you.
Monday, we packed the family and headed back to our respective and temporary homes.

Our visit reminded me of how many fellow travelers I have on this journey, including you dear reader. I would love to come back. Sweden is now my favorite country in Europe. I would highly recommend Sweden to any traveler.