the only kind of dignity which is genuine is that which is not diminished by the indifference of others

 

On our last day in Sweden, we took the tunnelbana out to Drottningholm Palace, one of the residences of the royal family.

It was the first cloudy day we had in Stockholm.  It had snowed during the night.

The palace didn't open until noon, and by the time we got there it was already getting dark.  We bought tickets for the last tour, at two in the afternoon.

I love to refer to the concept of "unintended consequences", which I believe is the reason that we can only really be judged by our intentions.  The idea that we should be judged by our intentions was seen as reactionary and racist at my college, where people were expected to be held responsible for the consequences of their actions and their role in perpetuating systems of oppression and exploitation, etc.

In any case, the fact that noble and royal estates are now used as large public parks in much of Europe is sometimes given as an example of unintended consequences.

 

We wandered around the grounds until it was time for our tour.  There were many attractive statues.

The gardens were beautiful in the snow, although everyone told us that we need to go back in the summer.

 

The snow had an odd look to it, I thought.  Maybe because it fell upon the hoar.

 

Drottning means "queen".  I remembered the Danish word dronning.

 

There were some whimsical buildings.

 

I imagined that this building, the Kina slott, would be considered racist by some, or, at best, orientalist.  But I'm sure the architect had the best intentions, or den goda viljan.

 

Despite the cold temperatures and few visitors, I used a warm and immaculately clean restroom.  I thought of how all of the public restrooms in Central Park close for the winter in late September and reopen in June.

There were people skating on a frozen canal.  It was beautiful.  I thought of the skating scene in the movie Orlando, where Orlando and Sasha skate over people frozen in the Thames.

"Do not fade, do not wither, do not grow old," said Queen Elizabeth I to Orlando.  A nice fantasy.

Then I was reminded of Bruegel's Massacre of the Innocents.

 

Later I realized I was confusing it with another Bruegel, since there's no skating in the Massacre of the Innocents.

Faruq likes to bring up the story of the Massacre of the Innocents, usually in reference to Israel, or "how those people tried to kill Baby Jesus", and also the Flight into Egypt, to remind me how great Egypt is, or was.  Faruq thinks Egypt has been going downhill since Cleopatra killed herself.

Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale her infinite variety. Other women cloy the appetites they feed, but she makes hungry where most she satisfies.

Of course, she died before age could wither her.  Egypt wasn't so lucky.

In any case, the scene didn't even really resemble a Bruegel painting; it was just a frozen canal.  But I think of Bruegel because of this line from the opera Nixon in China, where Richard Nixon sings:

On our flight over from Shanghai -- the countryside looked drab and grey. "Brueghel," Pat said. "We came in peace for all mankind" I said, and I was put in mind of our Apollo astronauts.

The sky cleared up a bit.

 

We went in for our tour.  Our guide was an old man.  He led us from room to room, making absolutely no sense whatsoever.  Asaph and I had to stifle our laughter.  We were the only native English speakers (or I guess I was the only native English speaker) in the large group, and everyone else just nodded along with his incomprehensible statements.  At one point he gestured towards a large painting and said, "I will tell you about that the next time you come here."

  

I guess I will have to go back.  But I don't really like Baroque palaces so much, so I will stick to the unintended consequence of the gardens.

We went back to Stockholm and had dinner, for Asaph, at a vegetarian buffet restaurant.

As my dearly departed Grandma Hazel said when given some Japanese food: "Well, if you were hungry, you'd eat it." 

I ate it.

We sat next to a group of young, Green Europeans who were speaking in English, although none appeared to be from an Anglophone country.  A German girl scandalized a young man by telling him that she had eaten meat served to her when she was a guest in someone's home while biking across Lesotho.  She seemed proud to demonstrate her open-mindedness; he was horrified.  Later we heard that he had only become a vegetarian two years earlier, to make himself more attractive to a girl he liked.

Asaph took note when a German guy said that porno was a new slang word in Germany for something good.  He vowed to introduce that expression to his friends and family in New York and Israel.

After a hearty dinner of pseudo-Asian vegetarian glop, we walked past the Katarina kyrka.

There was a graveyard in which all of the graves had little lights by them.  I looked closer and saw that they were candles.

I couldn't believe it.  I checked several times to make sure they weren't just battery-powered light bulbs.  They were candles.  Someone had gone to each grave to light them.

I then realized that we had not visited one church or other religious site during our entire trip.

We made our way to a club called SLM, which, to my surprise, did not stand for S-L-M, the triconsonantal root used in the Hebrew and Arabic words for "peace".

We had to become temporary members, as it was private club.  Asaph was immediately accosted by a man in his mid-50s wearing coveralls, who spent 30 or so minutes talking about how he had helped in the construction of the space, which had been a garage.  He said that the club was run cooperatively and not-for-profit.  He asked if we had ever heard of a non-profit bar before, and we said that we had.  We went to such a bar in Berlin, but of course a not-for-profit bar couldn't exist in New York, where people are money-grubbing vultures, mostly.

This man said that he had been a truck driver, but now he was a janitor.  The club started to fill up, and we managed to get away from him.  Everyone seemed to know one another, and they all stood in small groups talking.  No one was alone.  There was a large backroom complex, but I wondered if anyone ever used it, since the atmosphere was so familial.  I guess since the non-heterosexual community in New York is extremely incestuous despite its large size, the much smaller one in Stockholm would be too.

We left, after buying some SLM t-shirts for friends.  We had been told to go to a club called Lino, which made me think of the song "Poor Leno" by the Norwegian duo Röyksopp, a song I used to play over and over while sobbing uncontrollably.

 

For some reason.

The club was packed with young people, not all of them non-heterosexual, since Sweden is so tolerant that non-heterosexual bars and clubs quickly become infiltrated by non-homosexuals (except, evidently, for SLM).  There was a blackjack table, as if we were in a casino, near the restrooms.  Much of the bar smelled like hay.  One dance-floor was dedicated to schlager music, which is bad Northern European pop.  In the other they were playing dance versions of international pop hits, like Madonna and that young woman from the Bahamas.

I lost patience quickly.  Asaph had his fill after about four minutes, so we left.

We woke up around five to take the Arlanda Express to the airport.

I suddenly smelled something terrible.  "Did you burp?" I asked Asaph.  He had not.  Then I noticed that the man sitting behind me was vomiting quietly.  Virus particles were probably being aerosolized.  We moved to a new seat, as far away as possible but still with a view.  His beautiful and dignified-looking blond girlfriend was dabbing his forehead in an emotionless manner, her porcelain face remaining completely placid, like in a Renaissance painting (but not a Bruegel).  I realized that I would never love anyone enough to calmly take care of them while they were throwing up.

I ate a baguette sandwich in the airport, but despite having used alcohol-based hand sanitizer, I only handled the sandwich through the paper wrapper, pushing it up as I ate.  But the vomit particles were probably all over my face anyway.

I felt sad as our plane taxied out to the runway.  The sun began to rise.  I had succumbed to Jerusalem Syndrome while in Stockholm.  I loved Sweden!

 

Back in New York, the only thing I had to cheer me up was a pair of Swedish novelty boxer briefs.

 

I can't wait to go back.

Next year in Stockholm!

Comments

[The Gay Recluse]

I read this while feeling guilty (but not really) about skipping the inauguration speech on teevee with the hordes in the conference room where I work. But w/r/t the post, I'm kind of obsessed with how much more civilized bathrooms are in Europe, with the stalls that go to the ground for complete privacy, etc., but when I mentioned this (i.e., posted on my Twitter), one of my lady friends on FB commented that the short stalls in the U.S. encourage a "communal" environment where tp can be passed back and forth, and so on. This whole exchange made me very happy to be gay, needless to say!

[TED]

Judging entirely by intentions is only practical if the judge is God. Otherwise, the error rate is very high, and you end up encouraging people not to consider the consequences of their actions.

[henry]

My first trip to Versailles was on a grey, frosty and foggy January day. We skipped the palace and only roamed through the gardens. It was quite magical.

How are the Swedes seen by their neighbors these days? When I went to school in the UK we had a couple of Danes & Norwegians in the class - especially the Norwegians were none too keen on Sweden. An unintentional consequence of Sweden as a semi-imperial power in Europe's history?

[R J Keefe]

Salem!

[homer]

I often photograph the back side of statues, the side that is never shown on photographs or in art books.

[Jérôme]

I don't think someone had light the candle. Probably each family came to "visit" its deads and light its candle (or so it is in Germany). It was really nice to read about your trip; I can understand why you liked Stockholm so much, you make it feel really livably.
Is it a good action if the intention is bad but the consequence good?

[Stan]

It is a custom in Sweden to put candles on graves at All Saints. Were you there during another holiday?

[Boomer]

Great post. Hopefully you will continue to find benefactors (or perhaps become one of those NY multi-millionaires on your own)to continue to underwrite your future travels. I love your take on the places you visit.

Also, please provide an example of how porno is to be used. For example...should it be..."Those boxer briefs are really porno"? One wants to strive for accuracy. We get so little that is fresh and not "all played out" here in the Midwest.

Finally, when you write about your college it sounds more like some kind of neo-fascist. ultra left, politically correct to the point of annoying, women's prison. I'm just sayin'. Didn't you like drink beer and smoke pot or anything? Was it all about destroying oppression where ever it existed?

[jason]

The architect for the Turkish tent and egg roll palace attempted at steadfastly celebrating the 18th Century admiration of the Oriental ruling class wisdom. Aesthetically maybe a bit naive and, well, gay, the intent was good.

I think pitfalls of Orientalism and further heart of darkness were later products of the 19th century European development. I remain an apologist for the Age of Enlightenment.

[Stan]

Regarding candles on the graves, I think you may have encountered a form of "holiday inflation." In this country, people who put tacky white dangly lights on their houses for Christmas often get inspired to put tacky orange dangly lights on their houses for Halloween (I've seen this!). Of course, in Sweden it is so much more tasteful and rather touching. I suggest you test this hypothesis with Francis Strand.

[Virgil]

I'm happy to see the outline of your cock.

[Mike L]

I'm glad you can see and appreciate the beauty in real winter, in having a fourth or third of the year as a counterpoint, in the breath-taking allowed when activity slows down, the lakes freeze, and the ground is covered for a while in a blanket of white.

The obsession most people have with thinking they need year-round warmth (and bragging about it if they live in it, as if living in a particular climate is a personal accomplishment akin to running a marathon), the current mode of freaking out when the tiniest bit of snow falls, the penchant for moving to some horrifying place like San Diego in order never to have to experience climatic variation, is all so unbecoming and disturbing. So I applaud you for finding the glory of wintertime in a place like Stockholm.

[Jeff]

LOL! Just found your blog. It's terrific. My partner and I had dinner chez Francis et husband in the summer of '07. What a great couple they make (and what a great apartment!).

I had to laugh out loud re your description of the guy throwing up on the Arlanda Express, the aerosolized virus particles, and the anti-bacterial handwipes! Right down to not touching the sandwich. I am exactly the same! And I even stock up on boxer briefs in Stockholm, too. Though none quite so patriotic as yours!

Cheers!

[Edgar]

I was in Sweden the week of Christmas. Cold but no snow.
Dark by 3:30 but I loved it.
I hope to go back to I'm studying Swedish now. Spent most of the time in Stockholm but a couple of days in Malmo in the south. I felt like you did about going someplace no one would go to at that time of year.
Almost every Swede I spoke with said the same thing 'you must come back in the summer it is very beautiful in Stockholm then'