17 July 2021
The night has been rather short – I have had a long and wine-y conversation with my neighbour, Michael, who tells me he works as a pedagogic kindergarten councellor in København, looking after families with family problems, divorce, ADHD, kids with any kind of displaying behavourial problems. He knows quite a lot about psychology and it’s interesting to be talking with him. He very quickly finds out that I’m on a ‚trip to find myself‘. Yet, I cannot share some of his convictions. He seems to have had times where he was foreseeing things, and he’s actually getting the more foreseeing the longer the evening and the more wine he has drunk. He strangely enough reminds me of Pascal, a Frenchman, who I met in Sénégal, Africa in 1995. I travelled back to Dakar with him and later visited him in Paris twice. His girlfriend was South Korean. Michaels wife is South Korean, too, he has got somehow the same shape, beard and even moves similarly. Funny.
I have difficulties deciding what to do in the morning: Shall I try to get into København and spend the afternoon in the citycenter because the weather is so nice? Should I go over to Sweden – if yes, take Oresundbridge or by ferry? In the end I decide to get over to Sweden. But before that I want to have a look at the Roskilde, the red church in Roskilde – it’s a place listed as World Heritage site. Unfortunately, there’s a funeral, so we can’t get in. We – yes, the French couple from La Rochelle (my favourite town in France!) is there again. I met them when checking in at Roskilde campsite last night.
Driving over Oresundbridge is special after I have enjoyed the Netflix series ‚Bron‘ with Saga Norén from Kripo Malmö. Fortunately, I don’t find any female body on the bridge, neither is there a handsome Danish inspector waiting for me – huu! The bridge is impressive all right – 8 km long and before you get onto the bridge you have to pass a 4 km long tunnel. On top the whole thing is costly! I pay 67 Euros – one way. Yet, driving on motorways is free both in Denmark and Sweden. That’s ok then, I think.
And then I’m in Sweden. And Sweden is different. While Denmark is all hyggelig, Sweden is … Sweden is … what is my first impression of Sweden? Ok, let’s put it these ways:
- motorway service stations are a cluster of McDonald, KFC and Burger Mac. Another one consisted of a fish smoke house, where you actually could buy smoked fish rather than coffee and cake.
- when I want to go to the bathroom there’s a young father with his two small daughters. He has long, blond hair, is wearing a beard and a jeans skirt! Yes. LGBTQ.
- the sign ‚Empty your car yourself!‘ makes me feel slightly nervous.
- and then there is this wonderful Chevrolet – well, actually there ’s not only one, there are so many wonderful old cars. Within the four hours driving through almost no-man’s land I see a bundle of at least 5 of them – one more beautiful than the other. The Swedes seem to have a soft spot for old, big American cars.
- have you ever seen a bus-stop on the motorway in Switzerland?
- the sign ‚elk crossing‘ made me slightly nervous, as well. I think of what my Swedish friend told me about bears and wolves and other wild animals on the road.
- there is a motor-cyclist standing in the middle of the motorway, turning around ?!?
I’m driving through endless forest, the street fenced off so that these wild animals are not able to get onto the road and cause accidents. Maximum speed is 120km/h, 110km/h on most roads – which I find very pleasing. I pass through small villages with those typical red or differently coloured houses and realise – this looks like Sweden. I stop in one small marketplace, buy tasty strawberries from an Arabic speaking imigrant – and think of my Swedish friend, who told me so much about all this. Funnily, I have been listening to the first of Henning Mankell’s Kurt Wallander ‚who did it?‘ story ‚Before the Frost‘, which takes place in 1995, and yet describes exactly Sweden’s current problems as if Mankell had mistaken the year. According to what my Swedish friend has told me this story could take place today.
After a four-hour drive I reach my destination, Eksjö, a small marketplace in the middle of forest. Driving towards it, there’s a nice motorbike, a Harley, taking over – for a fraction of a second this ever so famous last scene of Easy-Rider shows mentally up. Where am I? The states? Alaska? – Sweden!
While I’m waiting at the reception of the campsite a few minutes later, there’re two more motorcycling guys driving up. One is stepping off a wonderful Yamaha Enduro 350, old model, and both also look like the Easy-Rider guys I have just thought of . When I’m cycling into town a bit later that afternoon three young guys drive past me at high speed, helmet and T-shirt, their 125 engines revving up with each gear – this high pitched sound of a 125. I remember the old 1980s Yamaha DTs – and I suddenly understand that in a place like this a motorbike must be much more than a means of transport to move from A to B for a young adult. It must be the equivalent of freedom: it’s passion, it’s style, it’s self-esteem, it’s the colourful vibrant against a dark and empty void. – Now I fully understand.
So far, my idea of Sweden has been reduced to Astrid Lindgren’s Emil (Michel) Löneberga and Pippi, and IKEA. That picture has definitely to change now.
