Another drunken spiral through Europe, North Sea edition!

[albadger]

Here I am in Sweden! And I know I'm in a foreign country because I've already pissed off a convenience store clerk, which I never do in the United States.

The impetus for the trip was my wonderful friend hantsbear, who wanted to show me Scotland, and the clincher was the newish airline Norwegian Air Shuttle, which flies direct to Europe from Oakland airport at insanely low prices. I booked with some anxiety, but the flight was good; I paid extra to get the exit row seat, which had ample leg room but (because TV and tray were in the armrest instead of the non-extant seat in front) were narrow. Opera upper balcony narrow. I fit but nobody bigger than me would. The entire cabin crew was of east Asian origin, and spoke as little as possible.

Now at the ominously-named Hotel Terminus, across the street from the Central Station. I did try to walk about a bit, but so creaky from the 10-hour plane ride that I moved slowly & didn't get far, but got to see why it's compared to Amsterdam - water everywhere, though the architecture is more monolithic. This has obviously been a center of power for centuries. Tomorrow I will be riding the "hop on hop off" bus to the various sights, in particular the ABBA Museum. Then I have a ticket to see Moliere's "the Miser" performed in Swedish. When everybody else laughs, I'll laugh.

Comments

[danthered.livejournal.com]

I've already pissed off a convenience store clerk

Oh, come on, then, tell us a story!

[albadger.livejournal.com]

I grabbed some of the crap I usually buy when I'm travelling (soda pop and gummi bears), and took it up to the, well, twinkie clerk, who said "hursk fenur den billog ballen farge noop" and rang it up. I thought the display said 34 kroner and gave him 2 20 kroner bills. He said "iske flensk og lutefisk inter molle droop" and stood there bouncing his head back and forth as if he were listening to Wham! on his Walkman. Confused and frightened, I said, "I'm sorry, I don't understand," and he explained in English that it was actually 54 kroner.

He thought I was a mentally challenged local instead of an American! It's something of a compliment.