The Final Resting Place of Screen Legend Ingrid Bergman
Shot of the Landscape at Norrabegravningsplatsen
Another View of Norrabegravningsplatsen
Tomb Stone of Ted Gärdestad
The Tumba Railway Station Where Part of the Video for ABBA's "The Day Before You Came" Was Filmed
Kroppkakor, on a City Park Bench, Near the Saluhall.
The Bartender Getting My Drink at the Ice Bar in Stockholm. (Even the Glasses Are Made Of Ice.)
Me and My Absolut Archipelago Cocktail at the Ice BarI've got a lot to write, so I had better get to it!
I woke up at 8:00 a.m. this morning, feeling completely rested. I hadn't felt so good in a very long time. Ten hours' sleep really does a body good! I watched a bit of TV this morning, "Everybody Loves Raymond" and "According to Jim", and then I got ready for breakfast. My stomach was feeling perfectly fine, but I still wanted to be careful. I had pancakes with maple syrup and a few minimuffins. Then, I checked my e-mails and was thrilled to have news from both my folks and from Troy. I am happy to learn that everyone is OK and that my cats say hello. Troy, I miss you very much. Having a lengthy e-mail message from you was a great way to start the day...
I got my stuff together to leave the hotel this morning, and on my way out I asked the hotel staff about museums. As I suspected, museums here, as elsewhere in the world, are closed on Mondays, so I had to come up with an alternate plan for the day. I noticed that the sky was really overcast, so I didn't want to spend the day on Djurgården if it wasn't going to be sunny. I decided that I would finally spend some time exploring the cemeteries in the suburbs of Stockholm. I began by getting information on how to get to Norrabegravningplatsen, the largest cemetery in Stockholm, located in the suburb of Solna. I took a subway from Skanstull station all the way out to Solna, and from there, then a bus to the cemetery. Before leaving Canada, I had done my research online and come up with the references to the grave placement in the cemetery for all four celebrities I wanted to see. When I arrived at the cemetery, I was pleased to see that it was laid out very neatly by kvarter (quarters), and then the graves within each quarter were numbered sequentially. There was no map of the cemetery near the gate, but to be honest, I managed a lot better without the map, knowing there was a system in place. In fact, it felt like being in a huge library with the dead catalogued in a giant Dewey-decimal system-like plan. Even though there appear to be thousands of people buried here, I came to the first grave I was looking for within minutes. It was the grave of Vilhelm Moberg, author of the Emigrants series of novels which inspired Benny and Björn to write their musical "Kristina från Duvemåla" (Kristina from Duvemåla) in 1996. I was fortunate enough to be at the world-premiere of the English-language version of this musical with my friend Neil in New York City last fall. And Neil was right about one thing: getting an iPod changed my life. I enjoy it so much, and it allows me to carry close to 8,000 of my favourite songs everywhere I go. In this situation, I was able to listen to a song from Kristina as I stood over Moberg's grave: the very moving "Du måste finnas" (You Have To Be There), sung by Kristina herself when she has a crisis of faith and is no longer sure that God exists. It seemed like a good song choice.
From quarter 12 B, grave 147, it was easy enough to locate quarter 11F, grave 228, the grave site of Ingrid Bergman. She had a wonderful performance as the self-absorbed mother in my favourite Ingmar Bergman film, "Höstsonaten" (Autumn Sonata). As I stood near her grave I listened to Julia Migenes on my iPod singing "As Time Goes By", the theme song from "Casablanca". It seemed very appropriate. When the song ended, I had to laugh. I had found the song by flitting alphabetically by song title, so the next one that came up alphabetically was morbidly appropriate too... David Bowie's "Ashes to Ashes"...
The cemetery was absolutely stunning. I can't believe it, but Swedish cemeteries seem to be the most beautiful of all cemeteries I have been in in the world. The amazing lushness of the bushes, and the distinctive colouring of the trees, especially the bark, was reminiscent of Disney animation, particularly the work on "Sleeping Beauty". The landscape looked way too stylized to be real!! Needless to say, I took several photos.
Quarter 13A, grave 101 was a little harder to find, but I eventually did. It was the final resting place of August Strindberg, a Swedish novelist and playwright whose play "Miss Julie" ("Fröken Julie") I studied in undergrad in 1992. I had no music associated to him, so I decided to listen to Pergolesi's Stabat Mater for the rest of my tour of the cemetery.
The last grave was the hardest one to find, because it was nowhere near the other three. The final one was located in quarter 4A, grave 170. This was the grave site of Alfred Nobel, inventor of dynamite and founder of the Nobel prizes that bear his name. What was truly ironic is that as I exited the cemetery, after spending an hour there with no map whatsoever, I found the map to the cemetery right beside Alfred Nobel's grave. I had to laugh. But I know that maps aren't that helpful to me anyway... Just give me something like the Dewey decimal system any day!
I walked back to the bus station from there and made my way back to Solna. When I got there, it was 12:30, so I decided to break for lunch. I was still not feeling too adventurous with food, so I stuck to pasta for lunch and had a rather nondescript lasagna at a cafeteria-type cafe. I figured if I still had no problems with that, I could get something heavier for dinner.
Since I was already all this way out, and Sollentuna was just a little further afield from here, I decided to enquire about going there. I was truly amazed at my abilities all this time. Out in the suburbs of Stockholm, no one here speaks English (believe me, I asked). So, I asked for directions to all these places in Swedish, and made due with what I could understand, which, surprisingly, allowed me to get to where I wanted to go without once making a mistake! A feather in my cap indeed!
The other cemetery I wanted to see today was Silverdals griftegård, near Sollentuna. I took the pendeltåg (train) to Sollentuna -- my first time on a Swedish train, but very similar to the subway -- and then a bus to Silverdalskappella (Silverdals chapel). Unfortunately, I didn't have the reference for the grave I wanted to see, but I asked a kind groundskeeper where Ted Gärdestad was buried, and she was kind enough to lead me to his grave. She talked a lot as she did so, and I am afraid I didn't catch much of what she said.
Poor Ted... Ted Gärdestad was discovered in the late sixties by Stig Andersson, ABBA's manager. Ted was referred to then as "The Wonder Kid", because he was still a teenager but composing and singing his own songs. Benny and Björn helped produce his first record when he was just 15 years old in 1971. He had a great career in his native Sweden -- the other night, for instance, they played part of his song "Satellit" before Nanne Grönvall's show, and at the bear bar they played his song "Sol, land och vatten" (Sun, Land and Water). I remember seeing him in the ABBA in Switzerland special in 1979, because ABBA wanted to give him exposure to an international audience, and he performed his song "Take Me Back to Hollywood" on that special. But his career never really took off. My understanding is that in the 80s he started suffering from manic depression, and what really didn't help matters at all is when the Swedish press started printing rumours that Ted was the crazy person who had murdered Swedish prime minister Olof Palme in 1986. Ted never really recovered from this slander. And in 1997, at the age of 41, he committed suicide by jumping in front of a train. Ted Gärdestad is buried in a family grave in Silverdals griftegård, alongside those I presume to be his father, Edla (1900-1969), his mother, Margrit (1921-2008), and his brother Kjell (1944-2000). I don't have any Ted Gärdestad on my iPod... yet. One of the first purchases I made here in Sweden was the complete works of his in one box set. It was quite a coincidence, but I got to see his grave on the eve of the 13th anniversary of his death.
I made my way all the way back to the city, and when I looked at a map, I realized that I just happened to be on the same train that goes to Tumba station, well to the southern suburbs of Stockholm, so I decided to stay on the train all the way there. The attraction of Tumba is that this was the train station that ABBA used to film part of their last official video, "The Day Before You Came" in 1982. I took a few pictures of this station where Agnetha meets a stranger and flirts with him on the platform while awaiting her train. I couldn't see the China theatre where they filmed the stage shots, but at least I could see the train station!
From here, I figured I could take the train back into the city and, since it was getting close to dinner time by then, and since I knew the Saluhall was open until 6:00, I decided to take the subway back to Östermalm and see if they have kroppkakor here today (kroppkaka is singular, kroppkakor, plural). Stepping out of the subway station at Karlaplan, I figured I would just check a street address before going to the food halls. And I found what I was looking for at Karlavägen 83, the old flat that Swedish director Lasse Halström used to live in. He is the director of such films as "Ciderhouse Rules" and "Chocolat", and it was in his apartment in 1980-1981 that he shot the ABBA videos "Happy New Year" and "One of Us".
I finally got to the Saluhall around 5:35 p.m., well before it closed. And I finally found the kroppkakor. The man asked how many I wanted, and I ordered two, which were served with a pat of smår (butter) and lingonsylt (lingonberry jam). There are apparently dozens of varieties of kroppkakor in Sweden and I think the kind I got was the least similar to Acadian poutines râpees. Instead of using equal parts of raw, grated potatoes and boiled, mashed potatoes, I think they only used the mashed potatoes. So the consistency was more rubbery than what I know. Also, there was much more meat inside, and it was flavoured with cloves. All in all, not a bad dish, but nothing like what I knew. I had my meal on the same church bench I did when I last ordered from the Saluhall.
After dinner, I wondered how I could get to see the bridge that appeared in the video for "The Day Before You Came". The original bridge, the Årstabron, is no longer as visible throughout the city as it once was, because they have since built a new bridge that runs alongside it and obstructs the view. However, one can still catch a glimpse of the original structure from Liljeholmsbron, so I took the subway to this southern part of the city and snapped some shots of the bridge.
Instead of taking the subway back, I opted to walk back to Slussen, a three kilometer walk. I was sort of hoping that somewhere along the way I could find a public toilet because I really needed to pee! But I walked, and walked, and walked, all the way back to Gamla Stan with no toilet in sight. From Gamla Stan, I took the subway back to the Central station and -- thank heaven! -- found a pay toilet. My decision to go to Central Station was no fluke: I had decided beforehand that I would try my luck at going to the ice bar tonight. The ice bar, located in the lobby of the Nordic Sea Hotel on Vasaplan, near Central Station, is a Swedish institution. The staff tells us (thankfully in English) that it was the very first of its kind to open in the world, and since then (in 2002), many others have opened, notably in England, in Oslo and even in Tokyo. The bar is kept at a chilly -5C all-year-round, and the entire bar is demolished and resculpted out of fresh ice every 6 months. Before stepping into the bar, we each buy our ticket for admission, which also includes one drink. So, I paid my 160 SEK (around 23 dollars), and was outfitted with a winter parka with a fur-lined hood and mittens. They then opened the doors and we were admitted inside. Everything, except for the ceiling (and perhaps the floor, I didn't look) was made of ice. The counter, the glasses, the walls, the sculptures. It was an enchanting experience. The played loud electro-dance music, and the bar-tender handed us the drinks menu. I opted for the Absolut Archipelego: Mango-flavoured Absolut vodka with orange juice and pineapple juice. When the bar-tender was not busy, I asked him to take a picture of me, which I think really turned out well. (I don't have too many pictures of me on my trip: the only other one I can think of is me all dolled-up for the opera. But I was so focussed on sucking in my gut that I forgot to smile on that picture... LOL)
After that delicious drink, I was tempted to have another, but I abstained. Instead, I took the subway back to the hotel where I got in a little after 9:00. I am thinking that tomorrow I may try to go to the museum. They are calling for absolutely gorgeous weather for the rest of my time here in Stockholm: 23C tomorrow and 25C on Wednesday, with plenty of sunshine. If it does turn out to be so nice, I might want to just laze around all day on Djurgården, and maybe go to Gröna Lund amusement park... We shall see...
Good night all!
I woke up at 8:00 a.m. this morning, feeling completely rested. I hadn't felt so good in a very long time. Ten hours' sleep really does a body good! I watched a bit of TV this morning, "Everybody Loves Raymond" and "According to Jim", and then I got ready for breakfast. My stomach was feeling perfectly fine, but I still wanted to be careful. I had pancakes with maple syrup and a few minimuffins. Then, I checked my e-mails and was thrilled to have news from both my folks and from Troy. I am happy to learn that everyone is OK and that my cats say hello. Troy, I miss you very much. Having a lengthy e-mail message from you was a great way to start the day...
I got my stuff together to leave the hotel this morning, and on my way out I asked the hotel staff about museums. As I suspected, museums here, as elsewhere in the world, are closed on Mondays, so I had to come up with an alternate plan for the day. I noticed that the sky was really overcast, so I didn't want to spend the day on Djurgården if it wasn't going to be sunny. I decided that I would finally spend some time exploring the cemeteries in the suburbs of Stockholm. I began by getting information on how to get to Norrabegravningplatsen, the largest cemetery in Stockholm, located in the suburb of Solna. I took a subway from Skanstull station all the way out to Solna, and from there, then a bus to the cemetery. Before leaving Canada, I had done my research online and come up with the references to the grave placement in the cemetery for all four celebrities I wanted to see. When I arrived at the cemetery, I was pleased to see that it was laid out very neatly by kvarter (quarters), and then the graves within each quarter were numbered sequentially. There was no map of the cemetery near the gate, but to be honest, I managed a lot better without the map, knowing there was a system in place. In fact, it felt like being in a huge library with the dead catalogued in a giant Dewey-decimal system-like plan. Even though there appear to be thousands of people buried here, I came to the first grave I was looking for within minutes. It was the grave of Vilhelm Moberg, author of the Emigrants series of novels which inspired Benny and Björn to write their musical "Kristina från Duvemåla" (Kristina from Duvemåla) in 1996. I was fortunate enough to be at the world-premiere of the English-language version of this musical with my friend Neil in New York City last fall. And Neil was right about one thing: getting an iPod changed my life. I enjoy it so much, and it allows me to carry close to 8,000 of my favourite songs everywhere I go. In this situation, I was able to listen to a song from Kristina as I stood over Moberg's grave: the very moving "Du måste finnas" (You Have To Be There), sung by Kristina herself when she has a crisis of faith and is no longer sure that God exists. It seemed like a good song choice.
From quarter 12 B, grave 147, it was easy enough to locate quarter 11F, grave 228, the grave site of Ingrid Bergman. She had a wonderful performance as the self-absorbed mother in my favourite Ingmar Bergman film, "Höstsonaten" (Autumn Sonata). As I stood near her grave I listened to Julia Migenes on my iPod singing "As Time Goes By", the theme song from "Casablanca". It seemed very appropriate. When the song ended, I had to laugh. I had found the song by flitting alphabetically by song title, so the next one that came up alphabetically was morbidly appropriate too... David Bowie's "Ashes to Ashes"...
The cemetery was absolutely stunning. I can't believe it, but Swedish cemeteries seem to be the most beautiful of all cemeteries I have been in in the world. The amazing lushness of the bushes, and the distinctive colouring of the trees, especially the bark, was reminiscent of Disney animation, particularly the work on "Sleeping Beauty". The landscape looked way too stylized to be real!! Needless to say, I took several photos.
Quarter 13A, grave 101 was a little harder to find, but I eventually did. It was the final resting place of August Strindberg, a Swedish novelist and playwright whose play "Miss Julie" ("Fröken Julie") I studied in undergrad in 1992. I had no music associated to him, so I decided to listen to Pergolesi's Stabat Mater for the rest of my tour of the cemetery.
The last grave was the hardest one to find, because it was nowhere near the other three. The final one was located in quarter 4A, grave 170. This was the grave site of Alfred Nobel, inventor of dynamite and founder of the Nobel prizes that bear his name. What was truly ironic is that as I exited the cemetery, after spending an hour there with no map whatsoever, I found the map to the cemetery right beside Alfred Nobel's grave. I had to laugh. But I know that maps aren't that helpful to me anyway... Just give me something like the Dewey decimal system any day!
I walked back to the bus station from there and made my way back to Solna. When I got there, it was 12:30, so I decided to break for lunch. I was still not feeling too adventurous with food, so I stuck to pasta for lunch and had a rather nondescript lasagna at a cafeteria-type cafe. I figured if I still had no problems with that, I could get something heavier for dinner.
Since I was already all this way out, and Sollentuna was just a little further afield from here, I decided to enquire about going there. I was truly amazed at my abilities all this time. Out in the suburbs of Stockholm, no one here speaks English (believe me, I asked). So, I asked for directions to all these places in Swedish, and made due with what I could understand, which, surprisingly, allowed me to get to where I wanted to go without once making a mistake! A feather in my cap indeed!
The other cemetery I wanted to see today was Silverdals griftegård, near Sollentuna. I took the pendeltåg (train) to Sollentuna -- my first time on a Swedish train, but very similar to the subway -- and then a bus to Silverdalskappella (Silverdals chapel). Unfortunately, I didn't have the reference for the grave I wanted to see, but I asked a kind groundskeeper where Ted Gärdestad was buried, and she was kind enough to lead me to his grave. She talked a lot as she did so, and I am afraid I didn't catch much of what she said.
Poor Ted... Ted Gärdestad was discovered in the late sixties by Stig Andersson, ABBA's manager. Ted was referred to then as "The Wonder Kid", because he was still a teenager but composing and singing his own songs. Benny and Björn helped produce his first record when he was just 15 years old in 1971. He had a great career in his native Sweden -- the other night, for instance, they played part of his song "Satellit" before Nanne Grönvall's show, and at the bear bar they played his song "Sol, land och vatten" (Sun, Land and Water). I remember seeing him in the ABBA in Switzerland special in 1979, because ABBA wanted to give him exposure to an international audience, and he performed his song "Take Me Back to Hollywood" on that special. But his career never really took off. My understanding is that in the 80s he started suffering from manic depression, and what really didn't help matters at all is when the Swedish press started printing rumours that Ted was the crazy person who had murdered Swedish prime minister Olof Palme in 1986. Ted never really recovered from this slander. And in 1997, at the age of 41, he committed suicide by jumping in front of a train. Ted Gärdestad is buried in a family grave in Silverdals griftegård, alongside those I presume to be his father, Edla (1900-1969), his mother, Margrit (1921-2008), and his brother Kjell (1944-2000). I don't have any Ted Gärdestad on my iPod... yet. One of the first purchases I made here in Sweden was the complete works of his in one box set. It was quite a coincidence, but I got to see his grave on the eve of the 13th anniversary of his death.
I made my way all the way back to the city, and when I looked at a map, I realized that I just happened to be on the same train that goes to Tumba station, well to the southern suburbs of Stockholm, so I decided to stay on the train all the way there. The attraction of Tumba is that this was the train station that ABBA used to film part of their last official video, "The Day Before You Came" in 1982. I took a few pictures of this station where Agnetha meets a stranger and flirts with him on the platform while awaiting her train. I couldn't see the China theatre where they filmed the stage shots, but at least I could see the train station!
From here, I figured I could take the train back into the city and, since it was getting close to dinner time by then, and since I knew the Saluhall was open until 6:00, I decided to take the subway back to Östermalm and see if they have kroppkakor here today (kroppkaka is singular, kroppkakor, plural). Stepping out of the subway station at Karlaplan, I figured I would just check a street address before going to the food halls. And I found what I was looking for at Karlavägen 83, the old flat that Swedish director Lasse Halström used to live in. He is the director of such films as "Ciderhouse Rules" and "Chocolat", and it was in his apartment in 1980-1981 that he shot the ABBA videos "Happy New Year" and "One of Us".
I finally got to the Saluhall around 5:35 p.m., well before it closed. And I finally found the kroppkakor. The man asked how many I wanted, and I ordered two, which were served with a pat of smår (butter) and lingonsylt (lingonberry jam). There are apparently dozens of varieties of kroppkakor in Sweden and I think the kind I got was the least similar to Acadian poutines râpees. Instead of using equal parts of raw, grated potatoes and boiled, mashed potatoes, I think they only used the mashed potatoes. So the consistency was more rubbery than what I know. Also, there was much more meat inside, and it was flavoured with cloves. All in all, not a bad dish, but nothing like what I knew. I had my meal on the same church bench I did when I last ordered from the Saluhall.
After dinner, I wondered how I could get to see the bridge that appeared in the video for "The Day Before You Came". The original bridge, the Årstabron, is no longer as visible throughout the city as it once was, because they have since built a new bridge that runs alongside it and obstructs the view. However, one can still catch a glimpse of the original structure from Liljeholmsbron, so I took the subway to this southern part of the city and snapped some shots of the bridge.
Instead of taking the subway back, I opted to walk back to Slussen, a three kilometer walk. I was sort of hoping that somewhere along the way I could find a public toilet because I really needed to pee! But I walked, and walked, and walked, all the way back to Gamla Stan with no toilet in sight. From Gamla Stan, I took the subway back to the Central station and -- thank heaven! -- found a pay toilet. My decision to go to Central Station was no fluke: I had decided beforehand that I would try my luck at going to the ice bar tonight. The ice bar, located in the lobby of the Nordic Sea Hotel on Vasaplan, near Central Station, is a Swedish institution. The staff tells us (thankfully in English) that it was the very first of its kind to open in the world, and since then (in 2002), many others have opened, notably in England, in Oslo and even in Tokyo. The bar is kept at a chilly -5C all-year-round, and the entire bar is demolished and resculpted out of fresh ice every 6 months. Before stepping into the bar, we each buy our ticket for admission, which also includes one drink. So, I paid my 160 SEK (around 23 dollars), and was outfitted with a winter parka with a fur-lined hood and mittens. They then opened the doors and we were admitted inside. Everything, except for the ceiling (and perhaps the floor, I didn't look) was made of ice. The counter, the glasses, the walls, the sculptures. It was an enchanting experience. The played loud electro-dance music, and the bar-tender handed us the drinks menu. I opted for the Absolut Archipelego: Mango-flavoured Absolut vodka with orange juice and pineapple juice. When the bar-tender was not busy, I asked him to take a picture of me, which I think really turned out well. (I don't have too many pictures of me on my trip: the only other one I can think of is me all dolled-up for the opera. But I was so focussed on sucking in my gut that I forgot to smile on that picture... LOL)
After that delicious drink, I was tempted to have another, but I abstained. Instead, I took the subway back to the hotel where I got in a little after 9:00. I am thinking that tomorrow I may try to go to the museum. They are calling for absolutely gorgeous weather for the rest of my time here in Stockholm: 23C tomorrow and 25C on Wednesday, with plenty of sunshine. If it does turn out to be so nice, I might want to just laze around all day on Djurgården, and maybe go to Gröna Lund amusement park... We shall see...
Good night all!
It is good to hear you are back to normal. Well if wandering around a graveyard and comparing the way the dead are catologed to the Dewey decimal system and marking your attendance at a grave site with a song on your ipod can be considered normal......only teasing sweetie. I am glad to hear the day was a wonderful adventure. Make the most of the great weather. Happy midsommer!! (not sure how that is said in Swedish) Miss ya.
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