A Night in Gothenburg

To break up our journey from Copenhagen to Oslo, we decided to do a stopover in Gothenburg, about 4 hours by train. Luckily Scoorge McScoorge (aka Jason McDonald) was letting the purse string loose a little and opted for the first class train ticket. Lucky because it was a full train headed to Gothenburg and we probably would have had to stand for some of the journey. McScoorge turned into the train inspector, interrogating whether each individual should be in first class or if they were plebs trying to live it up. I tried for the entire journey not to cough and bark like a dog. In this post(?)-Rona world, you can't sneeze or cough without getting treated like a leper. It's probably more socially acceptable to fart in public these days.

Fart became the first Swedish word that we learnt. It doesn't mean the same as in English. That was evident with the 5g fart (speed) mobile phone sale. Jason suddenly turned into the Swedish chef as we walked around Gothenburg, which in Sweden is actually the Finnish Chef (the Muppets changed it for the Swedish audience). They obviously can't understand the Finnish either! We even got to see IKEA in its native habitat. And how Swedish could it get, there was an ABBA special on TV. Swedish meatballs would have been the trifecta.

Gothenburg is the second largest city in Sweden, with a population of around 1.1 million, mostly students studying at the University of Gothenburg and Chalmers University of Technology. It seems to have a great public transport system with trams, trains and buses. Surprisingly, there are few traffic lights, and the car drivers seem quite relaxed. There wasn’t a fear of being run down by a speeding Sven in his Volvo, which was founded in the city in 1927.

With the presence of university students, there is a hip atmosphere, as Jason would like to call it. But the only thing hip is the hip replacement that we both will need after more than 20,000 steps. Book us in now! And I'm certain Jason is trying to stave me to death. Only dust and air is allowed. I mean the Scandinavian prices are criminal but a person needs to eat. Maybe just a little kebab will suffice to give us enough energy to stumble back to our hotel room.

When we got back to our room, we turned on the lights then all of a sudden we were sent into darkness. “what have you pressed, Jason?”, I yelled from the bathroom. Nothing was the reply. Yes, Touchy McTouchy had gone around touching all the buttons in the room. Normally, I’m accused of being Touchy McTouchy. Great, now we don't have power. So we called reception, and a few minutes later a Swedish Bob the Builder, Byggare Bob, or Sven with a Screwdriver as I called him, appeared at our door, chirping away in Swedish. He flicked a switch, which had been turned off, that controls the power. But McTouchy denies touching the button. It just miraculously turned off by itself when he flicked the light switch. To be sure that we knew how to turn on the lights, Sven/Bob gave us a tutorial. Now we’re certified to use the lights. Pity we're only staying one night.

Next destination: Oslo.

Swedish: Hej (Hello), Tack så mycket (Thanks so much), Hur mår du? (How are you?), Kyckling (Chicken), Skinka (Ham).Read more