Old friends

Snowy road near Smedstorp

Smedstorp

At Smedstorp

Spelmanstamma music

Swedish dancers in traditional dress

L to R: Kjell, Mari-Ann, Eva, Leif and Yngve

Poster for Eva and band

Smedstorp

We hired a car on Friday to visit some old (as in long-standing) Swedish friends.  Per Olov and Mai live in the countryside near Smedstorp, the magical little house where our dear friend, Janne, lived till he passed away just over two years ago.  PO and Mai came to Australia some years ago with Janne and still rhapsodise about it, especially in the middle of the Swedish winter!  They entertained us with some of the video they took when visiting me. We had a challenging drive to reach their house on snow-covered country roads after leaving the cleared freeway. However, it was also a winter wonderland with snow piled on trees and making even thin branches look as if they were covered in white blossom. It was -7 degrees but, as always, very warm and cosy inside.  PO hunts the numerous deer in the nearby forest and we had delicious venison for dinner (except for vegetarian Bob!)  We also saw and had a drive of the car we are buying from PO’s son – a nice sedate Volvo sedan.  Michael is a mechanic so we can trust that it is in good order, plus all Swedish cars have to have annual roadworthy inspections as well as a full set of both winter and summer tyres.  We will return in a few weeks to collect the car before we move into the country house.

Next morning we drove to near Stockholm to catch up with more friends – Eva and Kjell – talented musicians who were performing at a spelmanstamma, a kind of folk festival for anyone who plays music or wishes to listen.  Eva and her group were the star attraction as Bob captured in the photo of the poster. We enjoyed some hours of various kinds of traditional music, singing and some dancing with instruments such as violins and nyckelharpas ( traditional Swedish keyed fiddle). Eva has a fabulous clear voice and holds singing workshops, while Kjell plays nyckelharpa, accordion, banjo, bass and others.  The others in their band are similarly talented.  It was a pleasure to enjoy the performances on the main stage and to also wander around the bigger venue where small groups had gathered to play together either spontaneously or in a semi-planned situation.  A winter spelmanstamma is unusual – they are more commonly held throughout the summer months in the open air, so we can look forward to more in the warmer weather.

Our drive back to Linkoping was a challenge with snow seeming to fly out of the dark towards us as we drove along the freeway at a cautious 80kms an hour.  I am not keen to repeat that effort.

Since I talked about my Swedish dream being to live here for some time, Bob is now reminding me that we are in fact living the Swedish dream – at times like the drive or when we are slipping along the street with hoods up, gloves on and our faces feeling the chill!

Today we had hoped to meet our new landlords at the country house but they are away on a skiiing trip.  Nevertheless, while we had the hire car we decided to find the house using google map directions. It is indeed in the country and down 6 kms of snowy roads off the main road where there is a small village and one shop, altogether 30kms from Linkoping.  I may need more reminders about living the Swedish dream – at least until the spring!

In the meantime we are planning a trip to the far north in hopes of seeing the Northern Lights – more on that later.