Sweden is often regarded as being somewhat of a liberal country; many people think that blonde, tanned Swedes cavort naked in forest lakes all summer long before retreating into their saunas for the duration of the long and cold winter. …
Miss(ing) Saigon
I was inspired by a post about Saigon that I read on another travel blog recently. So here is my very own tribute to the place that I once called home. These are some of the things that I loved, …
The Arctic Journals #4 Aurora Borealis
“The Aurora blazed all of a sudden into brilliant life… a thousand miles high and ten thousand miles long: dipping, soaring, undulating, glowing, a cataract of glory.”
This is Philip Pullman’s description of the Aurora Borealis in ‘Northern Lights’, the …
The Arctic Journals #3 Cross-Country Skiing
There are two things that I have always disliked: sport and being cold. For this reason I have never understood why people want to go skiing. Skiing holidays baffle me, why would anybody pay a lot of money to go …
The Arctic Journals #2 Northern Lights Apartments
We were met on the road by Patricia Cowern, owner of the Northern Lights Apartments and Arctic-Color gallery in Porjus, who greeted us warmly and led the way to our cabin. The complex comprises of 4 wooden cabins aptly named: …
The Arctic Journals #1 A Long Journey
At 19.22 the train pulled out of Stockholm’s Central Station and our 17 hour journey into Swedish Lapland began. Our destination: Porjus, a small village approximately 100km north of the Polar Circle, and our mission: to seek the enigmatic Aurora …
Stockholm on a Budget
‘Stockholm’ and ‘cheap’. Two words that you don’t often hear uttered in the same sentence. It is common knowledge that tourists’ hard-earned cash doesn’t stretch that far in the Scandinavian countries, making visiting them an expensive …
Snow Days
Anybody who has attended or worked in a school in the UK will know how exciting it is when the winter brings the first snow, not so much because we love snow but because of the prospect of a Snow …
Fika Fridays – Swedish Cake Break!
Anybody who knows me will know that Fridays are my favourite day of the week. I love Fridays. Not because the weekend begins or even that I only work for 2 hours, but because Friday is cake day or as …
Beating the January Blues
Christmas is over, the New Year’s resolutions have already been broken, and the beautifully glistening snow had turned to brown mulch – January has well and truly set in but things are not all bad. We are now embarking on …
2010s Best Bits
What an awesome year this year was. In honour of a great year this blog post recalls some of my favourite moments of 2010
January
We welcomed in the New Year with elated cries of Chúc Mung Nam Moi on …
God Jul – A Swedish Christmas
The festive season has definitely taken hold and I am familiarising myself with Swedish Christmas, although this is not my first encounter with Swedish Yuletide traditions. Two years ago Nicklas and I spent Christmas on Koh Phi Phi in Thailand …
Visiting Friends
This weekend Rhoda—my very good friend from college—came to visit me in Sweden. It is always great to see a familiar face from home when you are living in a foreign country; over the 4 ½ years that I have …
Lest We Forget – Remembering The Fallen
“Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn. At the going down of the sun and in the morning, We will remember them.”
Today is Remembrance Day: a day which many countries have adopted as a day to reflect …
The Baltic Journals #4. Tallinn’s Turrets and Towers
On Thursday we said goodbye to Riga and headed to Tallinn, capital of Estonia. The journey took 4 ½ hours on a nice warm and comfortable bus. We arrived at our hostel which is right in the heart of the …
The Baltic Journals #3. Amber
I have to confess that my knowledge of the Baltic countries is pretty limited. Embarrassingly it’s probably fair to say that if it wasn’t for the Eurovision Song Contest then I would never have even heard of them – didn’t …
The Baltic Journals #2. A-ha
I was a bridesmaid 3 times during the decade of blue eyeliner, crimped hair and legwarmers and have already blogged about the numerous 80s wedding discos that I attended throughout that decade (http://elainethatcher.wordpress.com/2010/09/18/the-final-countdown-to-a-night-in-the-cells/). The 80s may well be …
The Baltic Journals #1. Arrival.
It’s been a really long half term and I am absolutely exhausted. I am totally ready for a holiday and have been looking forward to my break in Riga for weeks. The ferry from Stockholm to Riga was a much …
Hazy Shade of Winter
But look around, leaves are brown
And the sky is a hazy shade of winter
Apologies for my second seasonal post following so quickly after Autumn Daze but little did I know last week when I was walking through piles …
Autumn Daze
As I walked home from school the other day, the trees shedding their leaves like confetti around me, I looked down to see something that I haven’t seen for over three years. Lying at my feet was a small but …