The unfinished symphony...

...I mean blog post.
Written after our return from Riga, this was all I managed to write down. Better late than never, and better something than nothing.

So Amit and I boarded the M/S Cinderella and set sail for Riga, Latvia. A quick look around the terminal told us that this wasn't a popular destination among young people - we were the only two people between 15 and 55. We ended up doing quite a bit of walking around the ship just to make sure we didn't miss anything that was going on. But we could rest assured... nothing was happening. We did spend quite a bit of time at the casino, watching people throw away tons of money at roulette and blackjack. We tried to figure out how we could beat the system, but as hard as we tried, we just couldn't do it. We did play a little ourselves, too. I put in 1 Crown into a slot machine, and got 4 back. I decided my luck was up and cashed out. Later, Amit put in a 20, and a few pulls later, ended up with 46. We re-invested 6 of those, and promptly lost them, so figured we should stop. Amit thought he had roulette figured out, so he put 5 SEK on red. But the croupier told him there was a 20 Crown minimum, so he put another 15 down. Black 22. Later we saw a machine that had 1 credit left on it. Amit pushed the button, won 5 SEK, cashed out, and we quit, happy to be 8 crowns ahead.

Stockholm

We visited Drottningholm, the residential palace surrounded by English and French gardens.













We took a pretty touristy photo...

















On Monday morning, we decided we were going to take the 10am English tour of the City Hall. We got off the train at 9:50 and hurried.

This is where the Nobel Prize dinner is held each year, in the Blue Hall. The architect, Ragnar Östberg (our guide said his name about one hundred times, so we'll never forget it) originally wanted to paint the bricks blue, but decided it looked better as a copy of an NC State building. Ragnar Östberg wanted a glass roof, but contemporary construction methods didn't allow it. So he decided to place windows at the top. Our guide, not quite familiar with idioms in the English language referred to Östberg's compromise as a "final solution". I suppose we should have told her that it might be a good idea to rephrase that before the next tour.

A wood carving of Nobel found on an armoire in City Hall.

















The tour ended at 10:50. And we wanted to make it to the 11:15 tour of the Nobel Museum in the Old Town. So once again, we started running. We ducked into some back alleys to try to find a short cut.

And miraculously, we popped up in the large square, right across from the museum.

We got a very interesting tour, including a history of Nobel himself, as well as the prizes. We learned that while he was most famous for inventing dynamite, he made most of his money from smokeless gunpowder. Nobel's will and death mask are shown to the left.

Each Nobel Prize winner receives an equal share of the interest generated by the Nobel foundation that year. The graph to the left shows the real value of the prize from 1901 - 2001. Nobel was hesitant to invest in Stocks and Real Estate, and so explicitly prohibited this in his will. But the foundation decided in the 1950s to overturn this decision. The prize has been worth 10m Swedish Crowns for the past few years.

And the gold medal itself, this the last prize awarded posthumously.

The prize diploma, seen at the bottom of the picture on the left, is hand drawn for each winner, and reflects the winner's specific research. Each of the five Nobel Prizes are awarded yearly, four in Stockholm, and the Peace Prize in Oslo. Contrary to popular belief, there is no Nobel Prize in Economics. (Though you could win the Sveriges Riksbankens Prize for Economics in Memory of Alfred Nobel)

Below is a picture of an oar that represents several of Cambridge's Nobel Prize winners. The oar is in the style of those awarded to the winners of the May Bumps races held on the River Cam each June. Below would be the Nobel 8+. Although the 11 oarsmen they try to cram in might be a bit unsportsmanlike (Watson & Crick sharing 4 seat).

This is where Amit and I stayed while we were in Stockholm.

...NOT. But the Grand Hotel is where we will stay when we recieve our Nobel Prizes some day.

We also saw the changing of the guard ceremony at the Royal Palace in Stockholm. Actually, we heard the parade from inside the Nobel museum and ran outside to see what was going on.

Then came the real adventure.

We went to pick up our tickets for the cruise. We were told they only accepted cash. So we went and withdrew several thousand Crowns. Then we tried again to pick up our tickets. There was nothing in the system that corresponded to our booking number. So we called Silja line. "Oh, they were unbooked because you didn't pick them up." Little did we know, that we were only allowed to pick them up on the day that we ordered them. But alas, we were on an island in the middle of the Baltic Sea. So the representative said she would try to rebook. Meanwhile, we walked up to the Viking Line office. While waiting our turn, we called Viking Line, and got a quote for a trip to Riga at about 700SEK. Just as we hung up the phone, we got up to the counter, asked about various options, including the trip to Riga, which we were told now cost 1500SEK. We asked about the discrepancy, and she said there were no more 'last minute' trips left. Well...seems to me that we were trying to purchase even more 'last minute' tickets than whoever redeemed the last actual 'last minute' fares. So we called Viking Line back, and sure enough, they still had the 700 price. So we went ahead and booked it, and they told us to pay at the office. Fortunately, we were still standing right outside the Viking Quest office, so we walked right in, slapped our 700 down on the table...VICTORY!!!. I'm sure they didn't really care, but it felt like we had stuck it to the man.

So the adventure wasn't over there. Our big goal for the day was to get the pictures off Amit's camera so that we could put them on the blog. I guess you know the end of the story, since the pictures are here, but I hope you will all appreciate the lengths to which we went to provide them.

We couldn't find a single internet cafe in the whole city, so our next option was to find an electronics store that had computers on display. We'd simply put the memory stick in the computer, drag the files onto Amit's USB-key, and we'd be done. Well, we go to the store ONOFF, we find the display computers and ... all of them are locked. We find a salesman who unlocks it, and we get to work. We copy the pictures from the memory card onto the desktop. Pretty simple so we think we're home free. Then Amit pulls out his brand new USB-key, one of two hundred that he was personally responsible for ordering and had distributed to the participants of a conference last week. As soon as we put the drive in, the computer went haywire, popping up new Microsoft Vista windows left and right, until it ultimately shut itself down. We called up my cousin Johan, who helped us get the pictures onto a CD. But not before that same USB drive had crashed his Mac twice.

So in the end, we got our pictures, and we went out to dinner with Johan and Anna Pia, then for a walk to the highest point in Stockholm.

Amit and Ben play checkers...to a stalemate.

Pictures from the island

We began our adventure by taking a boat over to the island.














































Our friend, the lamb, came along for the ride.

















Then we set up camp. With nearly 30 people, there weren't enough indoor beds for everyone.

The first midsummer festivity was setting up the midsummer pole.

The symbolism it holds is hotly contested, but suffice it to say that it represents fertility.

As a Swedish holiday, midsummer is centered around the food. First up was the sill and nubbe lunch.

Then later it was time for the lamb, which Johan and Ludvig roasted all day.

The Sauna

And the cold swim after the sauna...

The tale of the green tent -

So we needed an extra tent to cover more tables from the rain.

In typical Tegin fashion, it took about 20 minutes to finally set it up.

But eventually, it was up.

But after a big gust of wind...

And the tragic end of the tale...

Leisure-time activities included

Kubb - this is the one team that we played well against the whole time.

How we won the never-ending game against Johan and Thomas...

Badminton....

....is "we put the 'bad' in badminton" too corny?

Fishing...

...the big catch.

and a canoe trip around the islands...

We were all constantly entertained by Cornelea, the newest addition to our ever growing ranks.

...I guess you can tell the bright ones right from the start.

And last but not least, an amazing view from the dock...

Midsummer

Midsummer at the island was as enjoyable as ever. We left on Thursday morning, to a slightly cloudy sky, but with promises of sun all weekend according to the newspaper meteorologists. Nearly as soon as we arrived at Ramsen, my aunt and uncle's island, (map at right) it started drizzling. Nevertheless, we set up camp and by the end of the day there were more than twenty of us there. Amit got to enjoy several firsts, including the real Swedish sauna experience, complete several chilling dips, as well as a canoeing adventure around the island. While we were on the other side of the island we could see the large trans-baltic cruise ships...then we saw them get swallowed by the pea-soup fog. So we sped up our pace to make sure we could find our way back.
The weather on midsummer itself (well, technically Friday is midsummer eve, but that's when the fun happens) was beautiful. We woke up to rain falling on the tents, but only a short while later the sun burst through the clouds and graced us with its presence all day. Amit enjoyed the sill (pickled herring, another first) and got to sing Helan Går in the appropriate setting with the appropriate imbibement. I heard some new nubbevisor myself, so hopefully I can pass those along.
The centerpiece of the day was surely the roasted lamb. We brought our 15kg friend with us all the way from Ängby, and as the pictures will (soon) show, even on the boat ride over. After some initial trouble getting the fire started, our grillmasters Johan and Ludvig grilled the meat to perfection.
Of course, no Swedish midsummer (or any other day, for that matter) would be complete without a game of Kubb. Or several. We did play one that made us quite ashamed to call ourselves founding members of the NC State Kubb Team; an hour and a half later, the game ended when Johan knocked down the king prematurely.

We have plenty of pictures of the weekend, but we don't have a way to get them off the camera. We tried though, we found an old sony handicam that would accept sony memory cards, but we think it was incompatible with this newer card. So part of our mission for tomorrow is to find an internet cafe where we can upload them. We'll also be sure to update you about our adventures in Stockholm over the next few days, until we leave for Helsinki and Tallinn on Tuesday. Yes, we did manage to get tickets, and yes, we learned nothing about "voting with out wallets" and went with the company that gave us such poor service.

Costomor Survise

....because they can't even spell "Customer Service"

Twas the morning before Midsummer and all through Sweden not a customer rep was available to answer any of our questions regarding boat rides from Stockholm to Helsinki and Tallin.

Amit made first contact with a costomor survise representative at about 10:30am. The first rep we spoke to was Martin. This guy was great. Amit asked about the pricing scheme for the night cruises to Heslingfors. What Amit did not realize was that the customer can only ask one question per phone call. Upon enquiring about further travel to Tallin, we were asked to hold so we could be transfered to the Estonian booking office. Amit interjected, "Excuse me, we have been transfered 4 times alrea..........beep" and was promptly interrupted by the lovely violin tunes of Sibelius. After a few minutes of being serenaded, a lovely Estonian man picked up our call. [Estonian man] provided us with a quote for travel from Stockholm to Tallin. He even checked for travel options between Tallin and Riga. Amit then asked about return cruises from Riga, but this required being transfered to a Latvian representative. Amit conveyed my dissatisfaction with the number of transfers required to gather these trivial pieces of information. Although [Estonian Man] empathized with our plight, he placed us on hold for a Latvian rep.

"[Random Latvian colloquial greeting]," said the pleasant sounding representative.

"Hi, Do you speak English?" Amit inquired to which the Latvian rep responded "Hai!"
"Yes, we would like more information about fares from Riga to Stockholm." "-Click". And we had been hung up on again.

We redailed the Swedish ticket office, were promtly transferred several times, and then placed on hold for ages. We concluded that the problem was that we were speaking English, so I called back and decided to use the Swedish menu options. But, alas, I was still transferred several times. I eventually did get a quote for our trip, 4082 SEK, so we'll see if we end up booking it.

Now we're on our way out to the island, hopefully we'll be able to send an update from there. And we'll look out for the Others.

The Derby

Johan G. informed us that there was going to be a 'Derby' on Tuesday. That is to say, an inter-city soccer match, in this case between Djurgården and Hammarby, two of Stockholm's biggest soccer clubs.

To sum up the contest, I'll put it like this: as soon as Thomas put on his Djurgården jersey, everyone we saw asked him earnestly if he really dared wear it. I assumed it was meant as a joke, but as I picked up the day's newspaper, I read about the most recent match between these two teams. Last year, at the Hammarby home stadium in southern Stockholm, Djurgården got out to a strong 3-0 lead, at which point angry 'Bajen' fans stormed the field. The Hammarby club was docked 3 points in the league standings, and as further punishment were forced to play the rest of their home 'Derby' games at Råsunda stadium, Sweden's national soccer stadium, and ideally a sort of neutral field. (picture at right courtesy aik.se)

The game was exciting to watch, we sat high up on the Djurgården-end of the field. It was interesting to compare it to the MLS game I watched recently. Here, the referee called virtually no fouls, which I found surprising, and those that he did call more often than not ended up being yellow cards. The Hammarby players seemed to spend more time lying on the ground whining than actually playing, but the ref bought it so I suppose it was the right strategy. Though I thought Djurgården was the stronger team, especially in the first half, they were unable to take the shots they needed. They were also missing their star defender, which showed clearly. Djurgården lost 0-2.

But the real excitement seemed to be outside the stadium. The daily Dagens Nyheter reported that the police suspected that Djurgården and Hammarby fans were going to have a planned fight, so when Hammarby supporters showed up enmasse to a region where the Djurgården fans usually congregate, police were on the scene and told them to leave. At about the same time, the pub 'The Londoner' was filled with Djurgården fans, preparing to leave for the game. When the police told them they would be escorted to the game, to prevent any altercations, they revolted and trashed the bar. 110 people were arrested at the bar. (picture at left courtesy dn.se)

Fortunately our experience was disturbance-free. Wednesday, my friend Amit will be flying in from Cambridge and we will go straight to Solvalla, the horse track to bet on my Uncle's horse, Tina Cape. Then Thursday we will be going out to Ramsen, the island where Åke and Helene have their incredible summer paradise.

Arrival in Sweden

So Thomas and I arrived in Sweden on Sunday morning. We had trouble sleeping on the flight, so we took a long nap, which meant that we couldn't sleep well that night. After trying to fall back asleep, we got up at 6 and played soccer for a while.
Sunday evening uncle Åke, aunt Helene, cousin Lars, and cousin Monika along with Johan and their adorable new baby, Cornelea all came over for dinner.
On Monday Thomas and I went downtown to the Royal Armoury, which is now a museum that holds weapons, suits of armor, clothes, various royal artifacts, as well as old state coaches that belonged to various kings. In the evening Johan T. had the cousins over for a nice dinner on his roof terrace. Incredibly, the sun came out for the first time since we had arrived.