Sweden – 12-13 May 2008

Monday it stayed sunny, but the temperatures dropped considerably, down to around 60 F/15 C. It was then a good day to go out to the Nordiska Museet (Nordic Museum) in a really impressive building with both permanent collections and temporary exhibits about Swedish history and life. Exhibits range from housing to clothes (lots of shoes, which didn’t interest my dad and me too much) to folk crafts. One temporary exhibit was on the Sami people (those formerly known as Lapplanders) and their lives—a very beautiful exhibit that shows that the Swedes weren’t much better than we were at dealing with native ethnic populations.

Tuesday we met Eva Wedin for lunch at Sturehof, a favorite restaurant that specializes in fish. Since Eva had been ill and wasn’t at the rehearsals for the Vårkonsert she hadn’t been able to meet my parents. We had a lovely time.

Eva and me:



Eva and Kathryn:



That evening we took the tunnelbana (subway) and a bus out to Birgit Hemberg’s new apartment, which is in the same building as her good friends, the Dimanders (Margareta and Bertil). Again, we had a lovely time and, as always at Birgit’s, wonderful food. Birgit was for many years the editor of Allt om mat (Everything about Food), Scandinavia’s leading food magazine. She also edited Bonniers Cookbook, which would be the equivalent of Joy of Cooking and a recent food lexicon—while she’s technically “retired,” it’s clear she’s not really!

Birgit, me, Dad, Margareta, Mom, & Bertil:



Birgit and the Dimanders have also established a foundation to keep Eskil Hemberg’s work in front of the public, and hold the Eskil Hemberg Days festival in Värmland, on their family farm, during the summer. They do an art exhibit during the festival and it may be that Kathryn will exhibit in 2009.

At any rate, we had a lovely time, not getting back home until nearly midnight. For my folks that meant a very short night, since they had a 6:45 AM flight. However, they got to the airport successfully and I think had a really wonderful two weeks in Sweden. It was great for us to have them there.