Surviving the Arctic Winter in Sweden
The Vietnamese family who run the extremely well-stocked grocery store adjacent to the square, however, was open as usual. When the charming older woman at the register met my gaze as I stomped in wearing heavy winter boots, I could see the question in her resigned eyes: What am I doing here, really? Hoi An is pretty nice this time of year…
The store was out of tempeh, so I had to settle for a couple of packs of fried tofu. I also picked up a jar of sesame oil, some soba noodles, and hoisin before biking over to Moderna Museet to see the exhibition by Albanian painter Edi Hila. Interesting motifs from early-1990s Tirana – though perhaps not quite as remarkable as the sheer number of his works might suggest.
https://www.modernamuseet.se/…/sv/utstallningar/edi-hila/
On the ride home to Västra Hamnen, I listened to the latest episode of Philosophers’ Room, where a panel of know-it-alls discussed “the law of the strong.
https://www.sverigesradio.se/avsnitt/den-starkes-ratt-har-den-inte-alltid-gallt
Plenty of interesting perspectives, and of course a lot of focus on Putin and Trump, but also on whether we’ll ever be rid of power-drunk old men and their questionably motivated wars of aggression. The conversation also drifted toward whether those of us living in smaller countries simply have to accept reality and make peace with an existence as a vassal state.
On the way home, I biked over to one of our grocery stores to pick up a few dinner ingredients and caught myself, once again, studying what the customer ahead of me in the checkout line was putting on the conveyor belt. Nearly wiped out when a sudden gust of wind and a patch of ice conspired along the bike path on the way home.
It’ll take a lot for me to head back out today.
I’ll now put on my headphones, cue up the radio station Drone Zone, and keep writing in the book Before I Forget until my stomach starts growling and it’s time to get dinner on the table.
