In October 2009, my friend Anna and I decided to go to Dublin for a city break in the spring of 2010. The weekend that we chose seemed so far off at the time, but now it has already come and passed.

We flew to Dublin late Thursday afternoon and got on a bus from the airport to the city centre around 8 p.m. without knowing where to get off. During the bus ride I recalled the name of the stop that had been listed on the web site of our hotel, however, as the stops were not called out on the bus there was no way of keeping track of where we were. Luckily I overheard some other tourists talking about our bus stop so when they got ready to get off, so did Anna and I.

Managing to get off at the right stop didn’t mean that our problems were solved though since the map that was inside Anna’s Dublin guide proved to be quite inadequate when it came to displaying the street names. Again, we proved lucky as a local stopped to help us and pointed us in the right direction which saved us from spending too much time searching our hotel hungry and wet (being Ireland, of course it was raining!).

After checking in and finding that our hotel was way above the standard one is used to when staying at hotels abroad we headed back out again in the search of something to eat. Fortunately for me, Anna stumbled on to a pizza place on Wexford street which we decided to try out. The restaurant, that was called Hell, is a pizza serving chain originating from New Zeeland. In contrast to what the name of the place might suggest there was nothing hellish about it as far as the food was concerned. The pizza suggested to us by the very friendly Hell-boy was truly delicious as was the dessert – the Unearthly – a pizza with bananas, mixed berries, chocolate and custard. Strike one!

Friday morning we went looking for a breakfast place serving pancakes. The search brought us to the Temple Bar area where we finally decided to enter a place called the Brick Alley Café. Here we got ourselves some pancakes with maple syrup and a bagel, just what we needed to be well prepared for a long day of walking. We had a look at the castle, some old churches, located the Old Jameson Distillery which had been recommended to us by the Hell-boy and then found ourselves entering Henry Street a shopping Mecca. The first store that we came to was Pennies and when introducing this store to Anna I had no idea what I got myself into. We left the store about two hours later, each of us with a shopping bag and a little less money at hand. However, since I got a summer jacket, a t-shirt, a top and a pair of sunglasses for less than 28 euros the feeling wasn’t all that unpleasant.

We bought ourselves a cup cake each from Johnny’s Cupcakes at the ilac shopping centre and continued walking down to the inner dock where we enjoyed these yummie pastries before continuing our walk across the Liffey, via Trinity College and Grafton Street and last but not least back to our hotel. After getting changed we returned out on the streets of Dublin and walked down to Temple Bar where we had dinner at a five-storey party complex. The food was nothing out of the ordinary, but the music entertainment on the ground floor was very good. Unfortunately we got there just before they decided to go on a break so we only got to hear three or four songs before we headed out on the bar street in the search of some live music and Irish pub atmosphere. After entering and exiting a few bars we found this one place that was hidden in an alley and located on the second floor where three men in their 60ies were playing traditional music accompanied by a bunch of people of mixed ages. We stayed there and sang along for a song or two before moving on as the place was too crowded for us to find a seat.

Saturday morning we started the day by having breakfast at Keogh’s café. We had passed this café the day before and their scones had stayed with me since then. I ordered one walnut/apple scone and one mixed berries. The walnut/apple one was good, but not nearly as tasty as the one with mixed berries!

After finishing our breakfast we walked over to the Guinness Storehouse, something that kind of felt like an obligation when in Dublin. However, except for the exhibition showing how to make a Guinness and the part where we got to serve ourselves the perfect pint this visit was not that mind breaking. Straight after being done at the Guinness Storehouse we went over to the Old Jameson Distillery. Unfortunately the next guided tour was to start 40minutes after our arrival, which seemed like bad luck at first considering time was not something we had a lot of, but it turned out quite well as this pause gave us a good opportunity to have our first Dublin served Irish Coffee and I have to say that I have never had one as good as the one served there, but hey, where else to get a perfect Irish Coffee if not here!? As for the guided tour I found it to be very good in deed! If you decide to take it, make sure to seat yourself in the front of the movie theatre so that when the guide asks for eight volunteers you can make sure that you’re one of the lucky one’s to be chosen. Anna and I did this and it resulted in us getting to taste and to compare the Jameson whiskey with a Johnny Walker and a Jack Daniels. Even though Whiskey is not my favourite drink, I had to focus not to make a face when drinking, it was a nice experience!

Anna and I were recommended to visit the Distillery in order to get a good view of the city from above, apparently the view was to be better from there than from the Gravity Bar at the Guinness Storehouse. When heading towards the shopping street after finishing our tour and having picked up a souvenir bottle each from the gift shop, it suddenly hit me – we had actually FORGOTTEN the reason for which we had visited the Distillery and left the place WITHOUT checking out the view!!!! Well done…

After visiting some more stores we walked around a bit in the city, and when walking along Nassau Street we stumbled on to a restaurant called the Pig’s ear. I still don’t know what it was that made us stop at their sign but for some reason we did and we ended up reserving a table for later that night. The dinner turned out very well and best of all was the dessert, – the “Pig’s Ear’s own vanilla cheesecake with mixed berries and crumble” – it was heavenly and a good ending to a great trip.

I know that this entry is a little bit too long by now so I will try to rap it up. However, I’d like to finish off by saying that I really do recommend a visit to Dublin. The size of the city makes it perfect for a city break as you quickly learn how to navigate the streets without a map and finding your own favourite spots will definitely not be difficult. Next time I will make sure to check out the view from the Distillery and have after noon tea at the Shelbourne Hotel, two things that weren’t done this time…

Ps. don’t forget to bring your charger for the camera battery, having a low battery day 1 is not too enjoyable. Also, if flying with Ryanair and not planning on checking in any luggage – don’t bother packing any clothes, there’s plenty of that in Dublin and the prices are dangerously low Ds.

Most people tend to forget taking the time to appreciate what is just around the corner from where they live. Even though I am aware of this flaw in most people’s character I am sad to say that 99,9% of the time I am no better myself. This is one of the reasons for which I really appreciated the weekend spent in Stockholm with my dear friend Cecilia a few weeks ago.

In stead of spending Saturday shopping in the Galleria or on Drottninggatan we took a nice and relaxed walk along the north bank of Mälaren, arriving at the entry to Stockholm’s old quarters where we entered a cosy little café at the beginning of the main street. It was far nicer than I had expected from a café lying in the most touristic area of all, and their caffe latte will definitely go to history as one of the most memorable ones! After this nice little stop we looked into some of the shops along the street and ended up buying one watch each before exiting the old quarter and moving via Kungsträdgården and the medieval fair that took place there this Saturday on to Östermalm where we had lunch at a random café. This particular day the café was also visited by local celebrity Carin Da Silva, famous from Let’s dance (AKA Dance with the stars). After our little lunch stop we headed back home to my place, had dinner, watched some tv, had some wine and then travelled across the city to Söder where the goal was Kvarnen, a pub/bar/nightclub. Before leaving Kvarnen about two hours later Cecilia had named their Chili nuts the world’s best tasting Chili nuts. So, folks, if you like spicy nuts, do not miss out on the ones served at Kvarnen…

Sunday morning we packed our picnic-basket and took the bus to Skansen, which is a park full of wild animals and old houses and other historic objects from the Swedish country side We spent the whole day looking at the animals and the scenery in general. As the hours passed the weather improved and when we sat down at a café after lunch it was a lovely spring day, as can be seen on the photo above! Sitting there by the house wall in the sun, sipping our coffees and eating sweets – could life get any better? Unfortunately we didn’t get to sit there for too long as we had a train to catch that was to take Cecilia back to Gothenburg.

Even though time passed too fast, as usual, I really enjoyed her visit and am looking forward to hosting her for the Royal wedding in June!

The 19th of February was not just another Friday in the life of this travelling Swede, on the contrary there was something very special about this day. Not only due to it being the day I was to fly to Frankfurt with a ticket that I paid 7 euros for, but rather due to it being the day that I was to step into a time bubble and return to 2006. You see, after more than three years me and my best friend from my Erasmus in Lille had finally managed to find a date and a time to meet again! I could hardly believe that it was true and to be honest I didn’t really let myself get too excited about the trip in advance, the idea was to believe it when I saw it and be happy about it then in order to save myself from getting to disappointed in case something fell through.

The journey from my door to the hotel in Heidelberg literally took me all day. I started early in the morning and arrived at the hotel at around 6 p.m. When I checked in (speaking GERMAN) the person at the front desk was unable to find my reservation, BAD omen, but then it all worked out when we realised that the person taking the order had misheard the name, big relief. About fifteen minutes after I opened the door to my room there was a knock on the door and within seconds I had been thrown from the 19th of February 2010 back to mid-December 2006, a time I then spend about 40 hours in.

After a couple of minutes of starring at each other while having our jaws down by our knees things were right back to what they used to be like. Conversation ran smoothly, laughter came within short intervals and the atmosphere was just very friendly.

In the first evening we took a stroll towards the old city centre and it didn’t take long until it , once AGAIN, was clear whom of us is equipped with the best inner-GPS. Without even having been in the city before I managed to point out the right direction, whereas my friend, who had actually been in Heidelberg before wanted to walk in the other direction. However, after having asked a friendly local we ended up heading the direction that I had suggested in the first place and a while later we came to the old city. This turned out to be the easy part though as finding a restaurant took about the same time. I must say that it ended well though as we picked one that served traditional German food and beer!

After dinner we went to the pub street where we found a cozy bar and I was so happy to be catching up with my friend that I didn’t even notice that people were smoking inside the bar until I had my second drink in my hand! I would have thought smoking in-doors was banned all through Europe by now, but apparently this particular bar had missed out on the passing of this law. Eventually we left the bar with the good music, funny drinks and disgusting smokers and tried our luck with finding another bar in the area. They all seemed pretty packed though so we ended up walking up and down the same street until I finally found an empty pub. I felt so sorry for the guy working in there, being all alone while all the other bars were packed, that I forced my friend to join me in there. It turned out that the pub being empty had nothing to do with it being unpopular, it was more of a result of it being a “TO GO”-bar. So, we bought ourselves some beers and then headed out in the cold again where we found ourselves emptying the beers in the middle of the street like two teens not allowed to drink alcohol. After this incident we found what was soon to be our favourite bar/restaurant: Schmidts situated at Hauptstraße 187. At Schmidts I got to taste the bananenweizen, a beer mixed with banana-lemonade. Despite what it might sound like it actually tasted ok. After this evening of experiencing the local culture we returned to the hotel, played some cards, ate candy and reminisced about the good old days before finally passing out after a very long day.

Saturday morning started with a coffee-to-go at the McDonalds next to the hotel. With the coffee in hand we had a stroll along the river until we arrived at the old parts of the city where we had breakfast at Schmidts before heading up the hill to the castle. Apparently Heidelberg is world famous for their Castle ruin, parts of which can be seen on the image connected to this post. I don’t think that I had heard of it before though. Being the tourists that we were we had the audio tour, which is actually quite fun with the right attitude – at least until it gets freezing and starts to rain. We took off from the castle in a rush once the bad weather started and traded freezing our fingers off for having coffee at a chocolate bar in the city. After this we returned to the hotel, had a nap and then got ready for this evenings dinner in the old city. Having learned from the mistake from the day before where almost an hour was spent finding a restaurant we had already picked a restaurant for this evening during our walk in the city the same day. It turned out to be far better than we had expected! Great food, wine and setting! (Despite all this I was not clever enough to memorize the name of the restaurant and Google proved to be of no help at all..) Unfortunately, the fact that this was already the last night of the mini-reunion put a little shadow over the evening but it was still a very good one.

Sunday morning we had breakfast at McDonalds next to the hotel and then took a short walk around the corner to the station where I bought some bread (I ordered in German!!!) and then finished off with a coffee at the station before I entered the bus that was to take me to the airport and back to February 2010.

This year I did something a little bit different for my mum’s birthday. I brought her to London!

We flew from different airports in Sweden but arrived at Stansted at approximately the same time and from there we found our way pretty easilty to our hotel, Caring Hotel, in Bayswater. After checking in we took a walk over to Madame Tussaud’s which I must say was a lot more enjoyable this time than last time I was there, maybe due to my expectations being lower this time. After Madame Tussaud’s we walked to Tottenham Court Road and down to Oxford Street where we turned right heading towards Hyde Park. We didn’t get to Hyde Park right away though as we found this little alley that lured us in with its neon lights. The alley lead to a court yard with restaurants all around, we didn’t pick one of these though. Instead we walked around a bit before we decided to have dinner at an Italian restaurant, which didn’t really make that much of an impression on the outside but which surprised us immensely all through our dinner.

Friday was a walking day. Due to it having been rather warm on thursday when we walked around I made the HUGE mistake of not putting on a thick sweater the next day, which lead to me freeeeeezing for most of the day. We started off crossing Hyde Park and walked via Royal Albert Hall to Harrods and from there we continued our walk passed Buckingham Palace down to Big Ben and the houses of Parliament. From there we continued on to the river bank on the Tate Modern side of the Thames, and finally stopped for lunch at Tate before continuing over Millenium Bridge. We passed St Paul’s Cathedral and headed up towards Trafalgar Sqaure with a little detour at Somerset House where we stopped for a while to watch the ice skaters trying their luck on the rink. We continued our walk through Covent Garden to Leicester Square and on to Picadilly Circus before heading up to our restaurant for the evening, a Thai restaurant close to the theater at which we were going to watch Hairspray later on the same evening. I finally got my temperature up half way through the musical, after having spent about an hour with both my and my mum’s coat on me. After the musical, which was very good, we walked back to the hotel via Oxford Street.

Saturday morning we walked over to Notting Hill as my mum wanted to see the Portobello Market, unfortunately she wasn’t very impressed by it so we left it pretty early in favor of the area around Towern and London Bridge. From there we walked back with quite a few stops in different shops. I found these GORGEOUS shoes. They weren’t really my size but hey, I couldn’t keep myself from buying them just because they were a little bit too big. After a few hours of shopping we returned to the Hotel and dropped our purchases off before walking over to Queensway where we had dinner at yet another Italian restaurant.

Sunday meant checking out from Caring Hotel. As our flights were not until later in the afternoon I decided to take mum to Camden Lock Market. The day before I had given her the option between Notting Hill and Camden and she had chosen the first of the two, but having a little bit of time on our hands before our departure I figured we might as well check Camden off the list as well. I have been to Camden quite a few times before and I remember it as being a little bit of a shady place, but there had been some serious cleaning up in the area since my last visit and I was actually very positively surprised by what I saw. Had it not been for us carrying around our luggage I think that the visit to Camden would have been quite costly, as it was now the only thing purchased was a coffee and a chocolate covered marshmallow stick.

After four very intense days with good food, good shopping, long walks and lots of sightseeing me and my mum returned to Sweden very content with our stay in England’s capital. I am pretty sure we will both return to this city at some point.

Saturday morning I got on a train heading towards the west coast and around three in the afternoon I arrived in Hällevadsholm, the small metropole in which my grand father lives. Me and my cousin Sandra were both spending the night there and in order to celebrate this special occassion we had decided to cook for our grand father and his “girlfriend”, curious as we were to who this mysterious woman was that had turned our grand father into something that very much ressembled a teenager in love. When our grand father talked about this woman he went on and on about what a down to earth and hard working woman she is and how her time spent working on the farm has left traces. However, none of this was visible to me or Sandra, instead we met a very healthy and youthful 76 year-old whom, and this was obvious to both me and Sandra, had our grand father spellbound. It was so nice to see him glow when he looked at her!

The next day it was time for my nephew’s baptism, something that took place in Uddevalla and was attended by the closest relatives, which means about 20 people were there… The ceremony was pretty short and William behaved well through the whole thing. All the screaming came afterwards as you can see on the photo, although to be honest, this was one of few times that he cried this sunday in the beginning of december.

I just came back to Stockholm after having spent a lovely weekend in Paris with my dear friend Clémentine. I flew down friday morning and arrived at Palais des Congrès in the centre of Paris around mid-day. Walking towards the Arc de Triomphe I stopped at the first Boulangerie I found and bought some french delicacies such as a butter croissant and a pain au chocolat – sweeeeet!

Clémentine met up with me at the arch and then we went to her place to drop my things off. It fascinates me every time I go abroad how different the living standard is at different places around the world, especially compared to what I am used to in Sweden. On the other hand, I would think that a big explanation to why we have the standard that we do is due to our climate. We need to have well insulated houses as it gets REALLY cold here during the winter, but that doesn’t really apply to for example the south of Europe… Anyways, visiting Clémentine in her 9 square metre appartment, my 25 square metres in Stockholm suddenly seemed very spacious. However, there is a saying in sweden that is suitable for Clémentine’s appartment – “where there is place for a heart, there’s place for a bum”.

The weekend was very intense and included, amongst other things, the obligatory walk around Mont Martre accompanied by Clém and Sébastien (both former exchange students from Gothenburg), apéro with Carl (a co-student from my time at Azurlingua in Nice) in the Bastille area, traditional french dinner with Cléms friends at the restaurant Les Sans Culottes, walks in the city centre, shopping at Les Halles, numerous visits to the Disney Store at Champs Elysées, crêpes at the Eiffeltour, sunday brunch at Mont Martre with Clém and Séb and more pain au chocolate than I wish to admit.

I really did get a lot done in the about 60 hours spent away from home and I must say that weekends like this one are really good for recharging ones batteries. There’s something special about Paris, each area of the city has its charme, even though I do of course have my favories such as Mont Martre and the area around St Germaine. Visiting Paris is always a little bit bitter sweet though, I feel so at home there and most of the time it feels like such a waste leaving the city instead of just moving there for a few years. Dreams, sweet dreams..

After years of lobbying I can finally add the title “Aunt” to my CV.

At 01.09am on the 13th of october 2009, Mr William Drottz saw his first beam of light as he exited the safety of his mother’s womb and entered the world outside. He measured 52 cm and weighed 3470grams, a little miracle to say the least.

Welcome nephew, I’m sure you and I will have a lot of fun together in the years to come.

There’s is just one word to describe the sentiment: LOVE.

I’ve felt a bit tired lately so when I seemed to be the only one planning on going to the office today I decided to do as the others: work from home. Finished a bit earlier than a normal friday and took the bus out to IKEA where I bought some candlesticks, flower pots and other “homey”-stuff to make my apartment an even nicer place to spend the long, cold winter months a head. Must say I succeeded pretty well I’m quite happy with the result.

Just kind of left the purchases in the hall before running out again to go get some candy to celebrate the weekend, on my way to the supermarket I decided it was a good day for a little bit of Lille nostalgia in the form of Mouton Cadet, however, the Systembolag in my area didn’t seem to agree with this plan: they didn’t have the wine in their range of french wines. So, I picked up another bottle in stead, got my candy and returned home to my little apartment. I unpacked my IKEA-stuff, lit all the candles in the room, heated up the left overs from the day before, poured myself a glass of wine and sat down in front of the tv for some good Idol-entertainment.

I guess the news of the day isn’t really my cozy apartment though but the fact that Obama was given the Nobel Peace Prize. I don’t really know what to say about it. I think he has good intentions, I just hope that he can follow through on them as well. Having good intentions is not enough to make him worthy the prize, no matter how sympathetic he seems.

Love /M

The other week it was time for THE budget meeting in Göteborg, something that proved to be quite a nerve thrilling experience. However, I am glad to say that I survived it, as did the business area manager of my region. It looked bad for a while when the figures just wouldn’t add up, but in the end it all fell into place.

The reward of the the day was a very successful night out with my darlings. We started out with some free food and cheap drinks at Berså, working up the right mood before heading over to Palace where the main event of the night was to take place: a nostalgic return to the 90ies in the form of a Rock show with Arvingarna. Both me and Charlotte had spent most of our youths being in love with one or another of the band members so the expectations were high. However, to our great disappointment it turned out that we were 24 hours too late for!!! Arvingarna had been there the day before!! Imagine our disappointment! So, after having been very happy about getting in at all to a place referred to as Jurassic Park we found ourselves leaving it again after five minutes giggling like school girls about our own lack of luck.

We didn’t let this little obstacle keep us from making the most of our evening though so in stead of rocking the night away with Arvingarna we headed over to Excet for some strawberry dacquiris and innocent flirting with the door man. Having started at six we were good to go home at two again, happy about the evening which ended well despite the unfortunate mistake at Palace.

Saturday morning I picked up some bananas, nutella and strawberries and took a tram to Charlotte and Linus’ place where a lovely brunch was served. Yummiiiiieeeee! Felt like I was rolling out of their apartment a few hours later. The sun was shining, the sky was blue and after having sent an impulsuve text message I found myself going for a walk around Delsjön with an old acquaintance. Delsjön is paradise on earthm a beautiful place! The company was, as I said, an old acquaintance whom I hadn’t seen for quite a while and decided not to see for quite a while again, the 3 hours walking were well spent though.

I finished off the weekend in Göteborg the only way a weekend in Göteborg can be finished if wanting to be ranked as a success: I had brunch at Soho, probably the best brunch in town! Caught up with Miriam, an old co-worker from my days as an IKEA employee. It’s always nice to see her! I might not have stayed long at IKEA, but I have a feeling me and Miriam will last a lot longer

that’s it for now folks

I was really looking forward to having Sara come stay with me saturday-sunday and her 26 hours in Stockholm turned out to be just as fun as I had expected!

I picked her up at the bus stop at three in the afternoon and we went straight to a café in the galleria where we sat down for almost an hour, chatting away over coffee and a sandwich. However, talking was something we could do after shops had closed so after an hour we got up from where we were sitting and started our shopping spree. 90 minutes later we had bought one pair of jeans each, an autumn jacket each and a scarf for me and a top for Sara. Happy about our purchases we took the bus home, dumped off the bags at my place and went out for dinner and drinks at Pink Dreams, the nearby restaurant.

After dinner we went back to my place, put on some good music, had some more wine and got ready for a night out, and what a night we had! It’s been quite a while since I came back home at six in the morning after a night out, but it has its charm! There’s something special about being on one’s way home as the sun rises….

After four hours of sleep we got up again to go down town and continue our shopping, it turned out to be yet another well spent day

Sara was here for 26 hours and we were awake during 22 of them, talk about making the most of what one has! I really enjoyed having Sara here, just wish it wouldn’t have to happen so rarely. Although, I guess now the ball is back in my corner and it’s up to me when we see each other next… Will definitely try to make it down to visit her and her family before new year’s, shouldn’t be impossible..