Stockholm

A burger too far

Paddy K Ranting, Sweden , , , ,

An article in this free Stockholm newspaper informs us that the gourmet burger, at least in Stockholm, is no longer trendy. Count me unsurprised. I mean, it was only a matter of time before we realised the emperor had no buns, lettuce or cheese. “But he’s just a piece of burnt meat!” the villagers all shouted, pointing and laughing, before they headed off for a poké bowl and a tasty spirulina shake.

This whole burgers-are-fancy thing kicked off about ten years ago in Stockholm, or at least that’s when I started noticing it. I assume some Swede had been to New York and got the idea there, since that’s where most Stockholm trends tend to come from (bonus points if it was stolen from a cool area like Brooklyn). One of Stockholm’s loudest gourmet burger chains (yes, we’re now using the words “gourmet” and “chain” in the same sentence) slammed open their doors in Stockholm in 2018. These people with the name “Bastard Burgers” – oh dear – had an extremely tiring “We’re no-nonsense proper men from the north of Sweden!” aesthetic. They’ve also used a slogan which said, in English, “Treat yo’self like a bastard” the stupidness of which still boggles my mind. 

Since then, more chains have followed, so many more, with different (but aggressively cool) names. If you ask me, all of them could have the same name: Overpriced Burger. Because that’s what they did – taking something that we’ve all agreed is cheap and trashy, then making it “gourmet” and charging twice as much for it is little more than a cynical marketing ploy, and is not going to last.

And, according to the article above, it hasn’t. Bastard Burgers and others are closing many of their Stockholm outlets. They’re all blaming the pandemic, inflation and changed food habits, but to me it’s pretty obvious the burger bubble has just burst. We’ve done this, we’re bored with it, we’re moving on.

I’m not that sorry to see it go. Besides being food for children, and horrendous for the environment at a time when keeping our gasping planet alive needs to be our primary focus, burgers just aren’t my thing. Not for any health reasons, I’ve just never liked them. Too much meat, too much grease, the whole eating-with-your-hands thing, all the slopping … I just find them kind of gross. And whenever I’ve convinced myself to have one, I always feel a bit ill and bloated afterwards. Added to this is the requirement to add fries so it feels somewhat like a meal, further caking my arteries. Hey, I’m old, I have to think about shit like this. Don’t worry, you’ll get there too, trust me.

If you like a burger, good for you, don’t let my whining put you off. Keep on doing your thing and be happy. In fact I’ve heard the Bastard people are quite approachable and friendly. Good for them. But for the rest of us, it can’t be denied that the gourmet burger is on the way out. We’ve all seen through the ruse — paying twice as much for impractical, slightly more cool and manly junk food — and we’re done with it. Or, more likely, we’re all just jaded and are moving on to Stockholm’s next food trend. And whatever that is, I can predict the following: it will be stolen from New York, it will be marketed to us in some embarrassing way, and it’ll be horribly destructive to the environment. I’m thinking rhino-horn flapjacks. Or amazon rainforest deep fried parrots. Or maybe New York pizza rat pizza, with extra whale liver and panda fries.

And trendsetters, if you need a sad slogan in English for your new Stockholm eating experience, do call me. I’m cheap* and very, very good at bullshit. 

/ Paddy

*Actually, I’m not that cheap…

Stockholm terror

Paddy K Ireland, Sweden , , , ,

Today an article turned up in a Swedish newspaper about a group of Christians taking confirmation (yes, that happens in Sweden) who normally went to Stockholm for their post-ritual celebration trip. But this year, because of the increased terror level in Stockholm, and very likely the increasing gang activity too, they decided to go abroad instead. To Oslo, a place where there famously is no violence at all and children never die in large numbers due to terror-related things. 

The terror level stuff, sure, that’s something to consider, I get it. But the thing about terror attacks is their unpredictability. Who would have guessed that a white Christian neo-nazi would slaughter dozens of kids in Oslo twelve years ago? Or that Swedish football fans would be murdered because of the jersey they were wearing in Belgium, of all places? Terrorism, by its nature, is extremely random. 

There’s also the current “violence wave” in Stockholm, which I’m sure came into their calculation. Yes, Stockholm has more murders, shootings and explosions that the confirmants’ little town, and the number’s been going up. That is undeniable. But it’s also a hundred, a thousand times bigger. The vast, vast majority of the people living here can go about their daily lives and never encounter any of it. Oh we HEAR about it, sure. If there’s one thing newspapers are good at, it’s spreading fear and worry. How about the million people who DIDN’T have the front door of their building taken out with a home-made explosive, or shots fired over their heads in a public place, eh? Nope, we never get a mention.

An AI’s view of gang war in Stockholm.

It reminds me of when I came to Sweden in the 90s. I was an English teacher at Berlitz, a private language school, and when I’d mention to students that I was from Ireland, they’d often go a little pale. “I would like to go,” they’d say, “but I am afraid of getting killed in the war.” I would stare at them. The war? What war? Oh right, they’re referring to Northern Ireland. A place, admittedly, where terror attacks occasionally happened, but also a place many hundred miles from where I grew up, that I basically never thought about in my day-to-day life (admittedly because I was too busy thinking of Strawberry Switchblade and Princess Leia in that gold bikini). That the fear of terrorists in Belfast would stop someone from going to, let’s say, Ballyhahill, I found really hard to grasp.

But just wait, because the current right-wing Swedish government got into power (with the support of a populist far-right party founded by and still containing neo-nazis) on the promise of “doing something about it”. And after one year in power, have they done something about it? Hahaha no. They’ve been far too busy cutting tax for the rich, slashing the budgets for culture and public education, making life harder for all immigrants, and burning to the ground Sweden’s progress in climate issues. They’ll need some time to get around to all the stuff they actually promised to do. Like, let’s say, another term or two. 

I’m not holding my breath.

So come to Stockholm, people. Yes. There’s crime, although hilariously less than other cities I’ve lived in. Criminals have guns, sure. There’s some terror, yes. But the chances of getting messily murdered are probably about equal to the current government caring about something apart from money and/or doing what they promised to do when getting people to elect them. Meaning, very low indeed.

/ Paddy

In Defence of Nothing

Paddy K Culture, Ranting, Sweden , ,

There’s a leaning — it’s too small to be called a movement — in Stockholm towards putting amateur art into places considered “ugly”. Common targets of this reverse vandalism are the structures holding up bridges, and those tunnels that pass under roads. Often it’ll be a gang of enthusiastic kids roped in from a local school, or a clutch of youngsters doing a summer work program, who are send out with buckets, paintbrushes and a naive but heartfelt desire to make the world a nicer place.

The articles in the local paper that inevitably cover this happening will enthuse about how some grey and boring (it’s important to use the word “boring” often) surface has now become colourful and exciting and will have art on it. Golly! And I find myself (and if you’ve followed me on any forum you’ll probably have seen this coming) in a pose of leaning back, arms crossed, bearing a surly middle-aged frown, saying, “hmm”. Because I do not agree. And I will now proceed to tell you why.

See, I don’t think the “art” made by clearly enthusiastic but not necessarily talented young people is better than a bare wall. A bare wall under a bridge has a sort of brutal majesty to it. It’s gritty and pure and serene, and it’s saying something: here is the city, here is how it works, warts and all. An underpass is the same. Even if the tiles are grimy, the lights flickering in a manner dangerous to epileptics, the piss pooling in stains on the ground, it’s still sort of beautiful. Grim and timeless.

What neither needs is badly daubed illustrations informing us of how awesome peace is, or how we are all the same inside, or how we should look after the Earth and all the cute pandas on it. Great messages, I agree, but also trite. Just because people want a thing to be “art” does not make it so.

This belief that something is always better than nothing is reflected in other ways in the flaming slow-motion train wreck of a civilisation we currently cling to. There is the issue of silence, for example. Once I was at the Stockholm Central Library to study. However, finding a silent place to do this proved difficult. I finally found a small room where several people sat, silently working. Beautiful, I thought, and joined them. I was not there long when a man and a women popped their heads in, saw how quiet it was, then came in and proceeded to have a meeting. They chose our room because it was quite, but did not consider that their chatting was now destroying that silence. And no amount of glowering or annoyed page turning on my part could get that message across. So I had to find another room.

(Sweden, incidentally, is a place where you don’t have to be silent in libraries. It probably come from their fear of conflict. In fact, a library I went to when I studied 20 years ago had a silent section. In a library. Where people would usually, but not always, keep it to a harsh yet deeply annoying whisper.)

You’ll see the same effect on the subway. I go on, find a seat where people are not nattering or looking at youtube without headphones (a curse upon then) or having a loud phone call on speakerphone. I sit there, relieved, and pull out my book. Making this the perfect quiet spot for the next idiot passing who wants to make a loud phone call. And he will sit there and he will do that. Because it can’t be that the people in those seats want silence, oh no. Silence is only ever a placeholder for noise.

This goes further. Cafés, bars and restaurants are huge culprits. If I go to one of these by myself, I will want to peer at my phone or read a book or just stare at the wall. If I go with other people, I will want to talk to these people. In neither of these two scenarios does music help me reach my goal. I really don’t know what it’s for. Unasked-for music distracts me hugely. If it’s there, I have to focus on it. In a nightclub, sure, it serves a function. But in a restaurant, where people are talking? Is it to mask the chewing? Or maybe to make us all feel like we’re in a film?

I select the café, bar or restaurant I want to be in based on how low (or lacking) the music is. Which leaves me with very few choices. I know about the thing where people apparently eat up and get the hell out faster if loud music is playing, like in McDonalds, but this can’t account for all of it. I think it just comes from the average person’s horrible fear of silence. It is why small-talk exists, after all. Silence to many means that something has gone wrong. Noise must exist, either pointless babble that the other person is not remotely interested in, or the background dirge of random, grating music.

(If someone knows an actual reason for this music in cafés etc, do let me know.)

I have, in fact, gotten into the habit of asking the staff to lower the music. They look at me oddly, but usually they will. One time, I was forced to do this when me and my partner went into a restaurant and sat in their empty basement room because it was silent, at which point they turned the music on there. Because of course two people eating dinner need noise blared at them.

So our society seems to have a deep-seated belief that something — no matter what it is — is always better than nothing. A doodle will always trump a grey wall. A noise will always improve on a silence. An activity is considered superior to a quiet night sitting at home. Which is why I’ve started to appreciate churches. You can sit there, in gorgeous echoing silence, and just drift off with your thoughts. Until, of course, the church staff come in to do some job and talk to each other at normal volume. Because, obviously, churches in Sweden aren’t quiet zones either.

Silence is golden, people. As is nothing. So let’s just leave them the fuck alone.

The Swedish Flag

Paddy K Sweden , , ,

This Friday there was an awful truck attack in Stockholm, where four people died. I wasn’t personally affected, even though it was just up the road from where I work, although I know several people who were scarily close to it. For the people who did lose somebody, it must be the worse thing in the world, and I can’t even grasp it.

A horrible situation, although on the day after I made damn sure to get into town and do the whole carry-on-as-normal thing. If life doesn’t go on, then we’ve lost.

2017-04-07 17.07.59
The view from my office after the attack

A few positive things came from the attack, though. One was the immediate and professional response from the police and emergency services, closing down the city and catching the guy a few hours later. The police were getting hugs and flowers from people all weekend, which was great to see in usually-reserved Stockholm.

Another was on social media, where the hashtag #openstockholm took off. People were offering accommodation and help and car rides and company to people stuck in town as a result of the attack and subsequent shutdown. It brought a tear to the eye, this random kindness on a massive level. Stockholmers, it turns out, have a great ability to react to crises, and will throw their doors wide open when needed.

Then people started putting Swedish flags on their Facebook profile pics, as one does after something like this. That’s when it got a bit strange for the Swedes.

flagHere’s the thing. Swedes are often embarrassed to fly their flag. They are generally damn proud of their country, but they don’t show it much. My Swedish workmates are much happier flying an Irish flag on St. Patrick’s day than flying a Swedish flag on any day, ever. It’s part of their “no boasting” mentality, but also because the far right have mostly claimed the Swedish flag, and the average person doesn’t want to be seen as a neo-nazi. You might see the blue and yellow on a bus on Sweden’s national day, or at a sporting event, or fluttering over a summer house, but that’s it.

It’s something that immigrants like myself find very odd. But after this attack, maybe it will change. I do love my adopted country and I hate to see them squirm and not show that love too. You’re awesome, Sweden, so go get your flag back. Remove it from the grubby hands of nationalists and “patriots” and fly it high and proud.

/ paddy

Roller Coaster Gröna Lund Sunday Bonus Combo

Paddy K Life , , ,

On the last Sunday of September (yes, in the past) I managed to combine all four of my least favourite things. Being around lots of screaming people, standing in very long lines, being very high up and having my cash pulled out through my nose by professional money-extractors.

Yes, I went with the lad to Gröna Lund, Stockholm’s tivoli/amusement park place, where people scream with joy as they spin and gyrate and move up and down. Kind of like in my bedroom. Ahem. Anyway. I hadn’t been there for years and that Sunday was the last day of the 2012 season. And as the boy’s now 13 I figured maybe he wouldn’t want to be seen there with his old man in the future, so it could be my last chance to go with him.

And, what can I tell you, it was fun. I love a good roller-coaster, and we went on four different ones, several times on each. They had a wooden roller coaster called Twister with a near-vertical drop that was increbible. The “Blue Train”, basically a ghost-train, was also excellent. There was a few rides I wouldn’t dare to go on, and you wouldn’t get me anywhere near one of those free-fall towers. But thankfully the crowd was smallish and the number of squealing and identical teenagers (seriously, are they clones?) was quite low.

And now I’m on youtube looking at roller coaster point-of-view videos from all over the world. Which is as good as thumb-up as you’ll get.

/ paddy

Great Things To Do In Stockholm When Not Naked

Paddy K Life , , , , ,

Saturday was one of those gold-dust days where everything went right. It might have helped that it was the first day of my official holidays. And that I have a decent income, no diseases, and live in a first-world country. That never hurts either. Anyway.

The day started off with me dragging my reluctant arse to Bodypump. That’s an hour of lifting weights to ridiculously over-the-top music and an instructor who says things like “feel the burn” and means it. There’s also the added bonus of all the nicely toned bodies (both male and female) to check out from my position in the back row. And the marvellous high afterwards from sitting in the sauna. I can recommend it.

That done I wandered by a local bike shop and had a slight but niggling problem fixed on my bike, right there and then, for very little money. Nice. Visit these nice lads here.

Then I wandered into town. Some guys handed me a flier and, for once, I read the thing. It turned out to be for a shop around the corner that sold vintage suits and shoes, on the entirely unpronounceable Östgötagatan. Aha, I thought. I went there and discovered the owner was (mostly) an Irish guy. We had a nice chat about the old country and such, and he showed me his very fine selection of vintage suits, shoes, ties and jackets. Go there, and buy some excellent vintage things. Do it now!

Then I wandered on down to my favourite barbers, Salong Andreas, for a haircut. There are three seats in this barber shop, and seat number two is the guy I always want. I rarely get him, as it’s drop-in only and it is entirely up to chance which guy you get. But today, I got the right guy. And a rather spiffy summer haircut. So, you gentlemen requiring a haircut – away with you to Salong Andreas tout suite!

That done, I went to one of favourite eateries, Cafe Blå. This is a small cosy place run and owned by the lady who always takes the orders. There’s no fucking TV and no bloody radio. Wonderful. The owner will make you up an excellent fresh sandwich on the spot. I also enjoy this place as the owner does tarot card readings for people right there in front of you.

And much as I dislike pretty much anything new-age, I do have a soft spot for tarot. Mainly because I’m a sucker for symbols and it does seem very much like therapy. Slightly half-assed therapy, but still, she’s a nice lady. That’s Café Blå, for a quick bite. Just off Medborgarplatsen. Go on, dance with the devil.

I rounded off the evening with a concert in a park given by my friend Jessica. If this lady gets the right kind of luck, she’ll go far. She’s a singing-songwriting power to be reckoned with. I also, by an amazing co-incidence, built her website. Check it out. Awesome, I’m sure you’ll agree.

And that’s it for day uno of my holidays. This is looking like a mighty fine summer indeed.

/ paddy

Lazy Daze

Paddy K Life , , , ,

It’s time for one of my rare “stuff in my life” post. For no better reason than it was a nice day and I’m not that inclined to rant about much.

No connection, but a great image

Far too early in the morning me and H11 went to meet some other members of his class, and a super-parent or two, to train for the upcoming kid’s mini-marathon. This is a 2km race for kids taking place in Stockholm in a month from now.

We all trotted through a beautiful area of Stockholm called Uggleviken (Owl Bay) where we didn’t see any owls but got some muscles burning. I am proud to report that I beat the 11-year olds up a steep hill at least twice. Thumbs up for pre-lunch exercise.

Next stop was the English Shop, where homesick treats were purchased. A Saturday in Stockholm without a visit to the English Shop is not a Saturday at all.

Then we ventured to the wonderful Muffin Factory, home of Stockholm’s biggest, fattest, tastiest muffins, where we enjoyed muffins and coffee and the company of fellow Stockholm blogger Melliferax.

After that H11 and I wandered around a few shops learning how to use my new toy, the TV-B-Gone universal remote that turns off every television known to man. TVs in public places bug the hell out of me; now I can fight back and stop the buggers in their tracks.

Then we wandered to the pet store, the excellent and cheap SoFo’r Pets, to fix some accessories for the wee critters, before heading home. And the plan now is to spend the rest of the day slouching about the flat, drinking tea, reading up on Java and watching the little degus as they continue their efforts to chew everything to splintery bits.

A good life is made up of sweet, calm days like this, and they should really be remembered. Let’s hope there’s many more of them.

/ paddy

Smart Card Fail

Paddy K Science, Sweden , , ,

The Stockholm local transit people (SL) introduced a so-called smart card over  a year ago, and called it SL Access. Now, usually anything that SL introduces costs a pile of money and doesn’t work. We kind of expect it to be that way.

And, true to form, as SL were about to introduce their expensive system it became clear that the technology used, the Mifare RFID card system, had been hacked. The details of this are all over the net now. “Mifare hack” will get you started. It’s fair to say that this is not a good system, and as leaky as a sieve full of sponges.


Still life with RFID chip

It works like this, for those who don’t know. You “load” your card (or more correctly you update a database somewhere using your cards ID) and then swipe your whole wallet, with the card inside, over the reader. It’s actually a nifty system, despite the whole not-secure aspect, as you avoid having to dig out the card every time.

I noticed, by turning the card a certain way, that you can see the chip. It was about 5 mm across which, for the Americans, just means very small.So I reasoned if it could be removed from the card, then it could be put into more interesting objects that one could swipe across the reader.

Such as a head. Or a banana. Or a Mars bar. You get the idea.

Unfortunately, once extracted, the chip doesn’t work. A quick googlement showed that there is a thin antenna wire connecting to the chip that circles the perimeter of the card. This interacts with a magnetic field over the reader using good old-fashioned induction and transfers the data required. No wire, no data.

So it’s back to the drawing board with that one. Would be nice however to get me some hardware and hack the thing properly. I figure, in the interests of helping SL improve their security, it’s the only kind thing to do.

/ paddy

Platform Pointers

Paddy K Life, Sweden , ,

At 7.30 in the morning I pass through the excruciatingly busy Gullmarsplan station just south of Stockholm.

Here people are channelled cattle-like through a very badly designed environment as they emerge from buses, subway and trams.

You would think that the staff might be doing something to alleviate the congestion, or open the barriers to allow people through, or help people with buggies up and down stairs. But no, they have more important things to be getting on with. And that is to stand around and point.

Yes for some reason three or four uniformed personnel stand around on the platform, at the peak of the morning rush hour, and simply point.

When they’re not pointing, they are chatting to each other. But usually they just stand there and they point.

The pointing appears to be a general “this way to the trains” which is interesting as they are standing right beside the trains, and the trains are large and blue and kind of hard to miss.

It might be a “Look, there is space available on this part of the platform” kind of thing except for the fact that they are pointing at the entirety of the platform where some space may always be found.

I was indeed puzzled for a long time. But I now think that the pointing means: “Keep on moving as you were, that’s it, you’re doing fine, everything is just hunky dory.”

It’s nice to see, after four years of advanced pointing in a university, that these people can get some work somewhere. And it’s also nice to know that I am paying 700 Swedish crowns a month so that they can be there and do what it is they love to do. Which is to point.

It just goes to show, you should always follow your dreams.

Wherever they might point.

/ paddy