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Yikes!

My last day in Stockholm was a typical Swedish day — rainy and grey. I was able to fully explore the Royal Palace, including seeing the ridiculously spectacular changing of the guard. Check out the video to get a general gist of this daily occurrence. 

 

Stockholm: Changing of the Guard from Keely Johnson on Vimeo.
  

After walking over a mile in the pouring rain, I arrived at the Nordiska Museet, which covers Swedish culture and life from beginning times to present. It was pretty fascinating, minus the creepy fake people that were everywhere and the weird section on funerals in Sweden.

My attempt at a rainy self-shot at the Nordiska Museet

Other than that, I did a lot of walking around and getting to know the beautiful city. I have to say for the country that gave me three of my most favorite things (IKEA, H&M and most importantly the Shout Out Louds), I have walked away wanting more, and will definitely be back soon!

After, Stockholm I headed to Berlin for a night pit stop before taking a train to Prague. The hostel I stayed in, The Circus, was very nice, clean and extremely cool. And since I have basically resigned myself to my hot dog fate, I was not surprised to find out the hostel offered a special at the New Hot Dog World restaurant next door. I took a pic to add to my “hot dogs around the world” collection.

Unfortunately, it was closed when I was in Berlin

Amazing Swedish delicacy

I have compiled a menagerie (if you will) of highlights from Stockholm to give a nice sense of the sights. Enjoy!

The Best of… Stockholm from Keely Johnson on Vimeo.

Here is a brief video with my take on the city and a side note on the Royal Palace’s Museum of Antiquities.

 

My View of Stockholm from Keely Johnson on Vimeo.
 

The Swedish hipster prototype

If hipsters had a Mecca, Stockholm would be it. Forget Gangsta’s Paradise, this is Hipster’s Paradise. I attribute it to the fact that you combine a group of depressed people (the guy at the music store told me all Swedes are depressed, hence their music), a love of simple aesthetics, and the prevalence of H&Ms (no kidding, in the one shopping district they have four separate stores all in one each corner of the street, and that is only a smattering of the more than 30 stores they have in the city), and you have the perfect hipster world.

 
Sweden: Hipster Heaven from Keely Johnson on Vimeo.

Well, my Swedish experience is half way through, and has been pretty great so far. I took the cheap flight route, which meant waking up at 4 am in Frankfurt, taking a 2 hour bus ride to the Hahn airport, then flying Ryanair to Skavsta, which is a 1h40m bus ride from Stockholm. But a flight for 30 dollars total is hard to beat!

After arriving in Stockholm, I checked into my hostel, City Backpackers, which is about a ten minute walk from the center of town. The hostel is average as they go, I am sharing a room with two Taiwanese girls, and a Dutch boy who are all here together. Also good to note, the hostel should be called Stadtwanderer since it is overrun by German visitors. 

The hostel held a mini-walking tour in which our enthusiastic tour guide (a staffer of the hostel) showed us all things cool in our neighborhood and shared her passion for Astrid Lindgren (who all Swedes seem mildly obsessed with). Videos of the tour are coming (video takes a lot longer to get up than I originally thought). Video added below!

Mini-Tour of Stockholm from Keely Johnson on Vimeo. 

In general, I have learned what all Swedes know, that everything good in this world was really a Swedish creation. Take my note in the Frankfurt post about how American hot dogs come from Frankfurt. That, I have learned, is so wrong, as hot dogs are from Sweden. Who would have thunk?? Katie asked me what my theme for this trip is, and sadly hot dogs seem to be reoccurring, ironic since I don’t even like them that much. I will try to change that to ice cream as soon as possible.

I had two things I wanted to do while in Stockholm, to do a tour of the archipelago and to visit the Royal Palace. Well, the archipelago ferry captains went on strike yesterday, and the main parts of the Royal Palace are closed due to a state visit from the Greek prime minister. Sigh. Regardless, I have done a lot of walking around the city and Stockholm is much what I expected, which is great because I had very high expectations. I have met several really cool people at the hostel, as well as in day to day interactions, and had some very interesting conversations. More on all that later.