RoyII

Well...I made it there and back!

Skansen girl in National costume

To be honest, I wasn't really anticipating any problems for my Stockholm trip - the only real concern I had was whether I would ever see my luggage again after trustingly handing it over to the airport staff at Heathrow Terminal 5. As it turned out, the only irritation was the two hour delay on the outbound flight to Arlanda Airport, caused by too much air traffic - Sweden was proving to be a very popular destination! Apart from obtaining the autograph of Tennis legend Bjorn Borg at the Arlanda Luggage Reclaim, the rest of the trip down was without incident, and I was at my hotel at approximately 10:30pm Stockholm time.

I was based in a place called Gamla Stan, an island roughly at the centre of Stockholm. Forming the 'Old Town' of the city, it truly was a lovely place with cobbled roads and medieval looking streets. It also had some great pubs. One I frequented regularly was called 'Stampen', which had live music every night. Even though it billed itself as a Jazz Pub, a lot of the music played was of the R & B styli played by the likes of Eric Clapton. All of it was good stuff though. The barmaid was also very attractive - she was part of the unusually high proportion of stunning blonde girls that the Swedes have in an endless supply. There seemed to be at least one of them in every cafe or restaurant I was in. At times it seemed unreal!

I didn't spend the whole time eating and drinking though. Getting around was made very easy by something called a Stockholm Card. This was a pass that could be picked up from the Tourist Office for about £40.00, that allowed you free public transport and admission for Museums and events over a period of forty eight hours after the card was first activated. I used it on the tubes and the trams, and I used it to go to a Midsummer's Festival in a place called Skansen, which is where the picture above was taken. In my travels I quickly recovered the cost of the pass.

The only minor gripe I had was the living costs - with beer and food prices being a little above the level here in London, I found my money went fast - a round of drinks would not get much change from SEK200, or just under twenty pounds. It was the same storey for coffees and meals.

Despite the above whinge - I thoroughly enjoyed my time there. I would love to go again...though I will have to quite a bit of saving first!

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Posted by: Roy2    in: My entries

If you want to pick up a DVD, CD, or even the odd bit of foodstuff, this place is really hard to beat in terms of venue, especially if you're from my part of SW London:

I find myself making the short drive from New Malden to Kingston-Upon-Thames most Saturday afternoons, and after a whistle stop tour of the stores (I am not a huge fan of shopping), I usually treat myself to a cup of coffee.

Being very much a creature of habit, I tend to stick to the same coffee shop, and for ages frequented a well known coffee vendor in the Bentals Centre. Over time, I got used to the taste and strength of the coffee, but after they employed a barista with a particularly disgusting and repellent manner, decided that it was time for a change.

Switching my custom to a cafe in the Eden Walk Parade turned out to be a good move - the Eastern European ladies that work there are a very pleasant contrast to the Neanderthal twat in the other place, though the coffee turned out to be a bit of a revelation. It's not that it tasted particularly unpleasant, but I found it to be incredibly strong - I was only half way through my Latte when I needed to get a cup of water to help me to finish it! It was only when I enquired at the counter afterwards that I found out that they use two shots of espresso in all of the coffee drinks, but, luckily for me, you can specify for only one to be used.

I am sure there's a moral in there somewhere.

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Posted by: Roy2    in: My entries

Modified on June 15, 2008 at 7:48 PM

You know it is truly the summer season when this returns:

 BB9

The mother of all reality shows, Big Brother has been back on our screens for nearly a week. Although in its ninth incarnation, the premise of the show is pretty much the same - a group of contestants compete to stay in the Big Brother House for as long as possible. Each week, they battle against the whims of their fellow house mates and the general public to survive being voted off, and the last person left in gets a cash prize of about £50,000.

From what I have heard so far, the prognosis for this series is not good - if the papers and radio talk shows are to be believed, some of the competitors are reputed to be the most obnoxious and irritating to date. The mix this year includes a man with a severe visual disability. Whilst the shows producers will undoubtedly claim that they are raising public awareness of this condition, my uneasy feeling is that his disablement is being exploited for entertainment value.

The above situation highlights why the Big Brother brand is in decline. To survive a reality show this tough you have to be a pretty extreme personality - the contestants picked tend to be a rag bag of misfits and egomaniacs, who when pushed together for twenty four hours will produce some video footage that can be usefully cobbled together into an hours show. This approach has had its successes. In Big Brother 1, the moment when 'Nasty' Nick was exposed as a liar and a cheat by his fellow house mates was riveting telly. The tension and hostility in the house that resulted in the infamous 'fight night' in Big Brother 5 was equally compelling viewing. The problem now is that that the contestants on the show are just too savvy about how the show works, and their over riding ambition is just to be seen on telly to get fame. When you get a collection of such individuals in a room, the end result tends to be more vacuous than entertaining.

If anyone can think of a good reason to tune into Big Brother 9 just let me know...

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Posted by: Roy2    in: My entries

Modified on June 12, 2008 at 5:36 PM