Thailand - Before And After

Being an Australian there is a tendency to sometimes poo poo Thailand. So many long haul flights go through Bangkok, which turns it into to an annoying pitstop rather than a gourmet option for fun times.  Therefore, when faced with the possibility of hanging out a bit longer in Thailand, my first reaction was ‘Meh’.  What a spoilt cunt.  Millions of people dream of a Thailand escape – I had a hairdresser in Tel Aviv who was literally weeping (all over my fresh hair) one afternoon telling much she longed to visit Thailand (ok, so she was Thai herself and all her family was there, and her shitty wage meant she had Buckley’s of affording an air ticket all the way from Tel Aviv but still…..it’s a beloved place among many).  Luckily I took my head out of my own vagina and came to my senses.  Thailand is awesome.  Of COURSE I would stay there, and of COURSE I would be in absolute heaven and have the time of my life.  It matters not that I’ve been there 20 times - when I told someone this once they gave me a withering look that translated as ‘I want you dead’  and I immediately regretted sharing that information, just as I do now.

Its bloody gorgeous - what was I thinking?

On the way to the airport here

My very first trip to Thailand was in 1997.  I had just turned 22 and it was the first stop on a round the world ticket I had saved up for by waitressing at a disgusting little French café in Hobart called La Cuisine – run by a disgusting little mean French man and his equally disgusting little mean French wife.  I’m not being particularly mean myself – they were the WORST.  You always imagine French people to be cool, and attractive and stylish.  They basically destroyed this extremely positive stereotype for their entire country.  They were so cold of heart you could imagine them torturing baby animals for pleasure in their leisure time.  The only positive thing I took away from this experience (apart from my round the world ticket) was the realization of how much butter actually went into croissants (basically they are 90% butter – keep that in mind when you help yourself to three still warm ones from a hotel breakfast buffet).

Oh dear

Anyway, these were the days when your multi-trip tickets were printed on booklets, and those things were thick.  The internet didn’t exist – so you couldn’t print another one if you fucked up, and mobile phones were the size of bricks and definitely not part of any 20 year old backpacker’s agenda – so no ringing your Mummy to cry about it – that took a 20 buck phone card and a phone box.  I have no idea how I met up with friends, separated from them, and then met up with them months later. I had a credit card – but for emergencies only, as getting yourself a great stack of travellers cheques was the norm.  I still can’t believe I didn’t lose either the ticket book or the cheques in that year – however, I remember being terrified I would and I think I slept with them strapped to my body the entire time.  Looking back, I was so young.  And might I add fairly naïve.  A private school education and a sheltered life in Tasmania doesn’t really prepare you for the big wide world.  It was a shock, and Thailand was a steep learning curve.  Before I knew it, I was sitting in a hammock on Koh Phangan off my tits after ingesting shitloads of LSD.  I remained pretty much in the same position for 6 weeks. 

Me in my hermit crab days

Shit sure is different these days.  The old family travel situation has altered the stakes a little.  I can’t even eat a sneaky chocolate bar without one of them sniffing it out and hassling me, let alone roll in the sand in a bikini top with no bottoms chanting “I’m a hermit crab”.  When I order a cocktail my daughters will get excited by the umbrella and pineapple on the side and then ask accusingly “Is that ALCOHOL?, Are you going to get drunk?  Oh MUM’.  They are relentless, and far far worse than my parents ever were.  It’s strange how you spend the first 20 years of life hiding shit from your parents.  You then have a few years of freedom, and then your kids come along and you have to hide shit from them all over again – only it’s much worse.  You do NOT want your kids to catch you smoking anything of any kind.  They are cruel and harsh masters, and they have us all by the nuts.

7.5 Years A Slave

I was therefore inspired to reflect on the differences between my first trip to Thailand and my most recent one; here they are:

Then	Now
Stayed in a bungalow with no windows	The house came with servants
Wore belly tops	Did everything possible to cover belly
Said things like; “Did you ever think that           maybe the earth is a microscopic atom  floating in the blood plasma of a  intergalactic giant”	Said things like ‘Is that chocolate or poo?’
Hung out with Sanchez, Driftwood and Papillion	Hung out with Princess Kitty, Twilight Sparkle and Miss Moo Moo
Ate Pad Thai and banana fritters	Ate Pad Thai and banana fritters
Tried not to eat Mars Bars	Didn’t give a fuck and ate 20 Mars Bars
Went to Full Moon Parties	Went to bed
Stayed up until sunrise	Woke up at sunrise by being poked in the face
Spent almost no money	Spent a fucking fortune, but compared to life in Israel it felt like no money
Lay in the sun all day and went a delightful golden shade	Lay in the sun one day, got burnt to shit, spent the rest of the time feeling stupid and regretful
Had to fend off sleazy shaman types and horny Japanese bongo players	Made attempt to look attractive for husband, gave up and grew pubes
Felt invincible, like I was going to change          the world, and everything was new	Picked up the flu on the plane felt like I was going to die and hoped I would

                                                                

So that pretty much sums it up – before and after.  A shitload has changed in 20 years, but I guess if it hadn’t I’d be a little concerned - wouldn’t you? I do know one thing though, if I had to go back to living in on a hill in that $3 a night bungalow with snakes in the shower room, see people meditating in the nude with their nutsack hanging out everytime I went for a swim, and listen to everyone calling me ‘Sister’, I would stab someone in the eye with a satay stick.  In fact I should have done it 20 years ago.  If there’s one thing I’ve learned since then, is that you should always be yourself - even if you are a bitch in the mornings with a low tolerance for stupidity (and the hairy testicles of strangers).  Anyway, to cut a long story short - Thailand rules.

The Kingdom of Bhutan - Save up And Splash Out

These teenagers certainly aren't stealing money from their Mum's purses and buying cheap vodka

Bhutan is not for peasants.  Well Bhutanese peasants already living there - sure, keep on toiling those paddies, but foreign peasants?  Well don't even bother to set a toenail in the country.  Nobody wants you, you bloody tight arse paupers.  Piss off and spend your measly coins on chai teas in India.  It doesn't matter how spiritual you are or how much you'd like a gawk at the Tigers Nest monastery you ain't ever gunna get there, so suck it up and weep like a baby over the pretty Internet photos.  I've just come back from there everyone, so suck shit.  Am I a bloody little poor person?  Well considering I haven't had a job for quite some time the answer would be a resounding "I don't have a cent to my name".  I do however have friends in high places, and when I say I have friends, I actually mean my husband has friends, and I tag along like little a hideous little leech.

The Enabler and The Leech

We're blocking The Tigers Nest in this shot 

Personally if I was going to sponsor a gang of freeloaders to come and celebrate a half century of life with me I would get them along to take part in the laziest thing possible (I'm not though, and never will, so starting to be extra nice to me 8 years in advance is a useless endeavour).  That desire to infect others with my own apathy is probably a reflection of the type of layabout I really am - slackness loves other slackers. I'd almost describe myself as a motivation assassin.  However, the man of honour spurring this adventure on had other ideas in mind, aiming (and succeeding, god damn it) to take us all 'out of our comfort zones' and drag us up to 4000 metres above sea level in one of the most isolated, difficult-to-get-to countries in the world.

10 hours of work in this bad boy

I didn't even know where Bhutan was a year ago, and let me tell you I wasn't the only one.  The best I could do was "Himalayas somewhere", which is pretty accurate considering.  Now I can, of course, do better - Bhutan is a landlocked country in the eastern Himalayas and shares a northern border with Tibet (let's not pretend though - it's bloody China isn't it, sorry Dalai Lama, and good luck with getting your country back and everything....), and the rest of the borders with India. It's a bit over half the size of Tassie for spatial enthusiasts.   Bhutan is quite a bit more fond of India than they are of China - on account of China openly wanting to 'bring them under the thumb of communism".  Unlikely now though, China should have just snuck up on them rather than shouted it from the mountain tops in order to have a decent shot at invasion.  

Freakiest Landing Ever - be drunk or drugged

Luckily the Himalayas are a bit of deterrence for hostile take overs.  In fact they are a bit of a deterrent for friendly visits too.  To get here we took a four hour flight from Bangkok, landed in Calcutta and then we took a 55 minute flight through the Himalayas to Paro.  This leg of the journey is so fucking treacherous to fly, and the landing is so complicated to execute, that only 5 pilots in the world fly this leg.  I overheard the trip planner excitedly telling someone that there once used to be 8 capable pilots, and I just didn't dare to ask what happened to the other 3. The pilots are not flying a small plane either - it is a large passenger jet.  They have to bank round the sides of high mountains on the descent, and steer the plane through a winding valley, only to emerge out of it at exactly the right height to pull off a landing on a shorter-than-normal runway.  It was intense.  I popped a Xanax at Bangkok airport in preparation, but it was a bit of a preemptive strike and I subsequently had to be helped onto the plane.  I then passed out in a extremely awkward position and woke up four hours later with a really sore neck for the last 55 minutes of crucial sedation flying.  I did somewhat enjoy it though, so perhaps there was still some residue left from my little purple friends.

City streets

What a place. It seriously looks like somewhere from the reasonably distant past - apart from the cars....and the planes.  Bhutan only got TV in the 90s, thats only 20 years ago - can you believe the poor fucks missed out on Alf? - I feel their pain.    It is a naturally stunning place as well.  A fertile green valley surrounded by mountain peaks.  The river that runs through the valley next to Paro is as clear as bathwater. It's actually weird.  You forget how much we are used to seeing rivers the colour of shit flowing through our towns and cities. But in Bhutan it was so pure - everything was.  Driving through the town was just as amazing.  All the buildings in the country have to be constructed and painted in the traditional way, so every building - no matter if it was a hovel or a souvenir store or the airport - looked like a temple.  All the people were out cruising round in traditional dress looking fucking awesome.  Men in dresses rock.  A friend once told me that the first time he slipped on a ladies skirt it was so incredibly freeing for his nut sack that he didn't know how he'd ever go back to pants.  He should move to Bhutan.  

If in doubt just get around in national dress

Listen - they didn't even get one outside foreign visitor until 1974, and the government  has restricted visitor numbers and tourist infrastructure ever since.  It's hard to believe, but they just don't want us, any of us really, but especially the povo backpacker types.  To the Bhutanese, a set of dreadlocks, a jambe and a pair of fisherman's pants equals 'fuck off loser'.  They don't even want too many of the money splashers either - getting a visa is not cheap, and it's not easy.  This place is just not interested in making the tourist bucks at the expense of their country's natural environment.  That kind of shit has got to be respected, and seeing as they were the world's first negative carbon country, they are actually leading the way worldwide with all things environmental - Bhutan is aiming for zero net greenhouse gas emissions, zero-waste by 2030 and to grow 100 percent organic food by 2020.  Export logging is banned.  It's a pity they are sandwiched next to possibly the world's worst environmental polluter....but far be it from me to point out the negatives in their plan.

Smokin' (not literally, that would be illegal)

Bhutan is actually a kingdom, and the current King and Queen are hot stuff.  He is called King Jigme Wangchuck and she is Queen Jetsun Pema, which you have to admit are awesome names. Not only are they young and good looking with  fabulous names, but they are also officially known as the Dragon King and the Dragon Queen - and they are the real thing, so shove it Khaleesi (no, I still love you, I take that back - you'll always be the Queen and Mother of Dragons).  The King's father (who abdicated early to give his son a crack at ruling), was the man responsible for introducing the measure of the Gross Domestic Happiness (GDH) in the 1970s, after he pledged to build an economy based upon Buddhist spiritual values rather than money; ie. rather than the boring Gross Domestic Product (GDP) that all the other world suckers use.  The GDH is not just hippy shit, it is a real and tangible measurement.  Hats off Former King, hats off.

Rake that gunja my dress wearing friend

That's not to say that it's a perfect paradise in Bhutan - they have their issues.  And they are there despite the fact that marijuana grows wild EVERYWHERE (seriously - it pushes up through the cracks in the city streets).  What a land of plenty - who cares about poverty when the green gear grows wild! Wooo hooo - we're jammin'.....Unfortunately you'd have to smoke a few pounds of the wild Bhutanese strain to get a mild tingle - there wasn't a single bud to be seen.  And I looked, oh god I looked.   Smoking anything isn't really kosher there anyway, and tobacco is definitely illegal (as it really should be) - so pack that bong away.  Killing animals is also against the law - which just makes me feel so good - I can finally look chickens in the eye, although their eyes are still definitely beady and just as evasive.  It's not easy to hold eye contact with a chicken - apparently it's worth it though.  It's how you make inter-species friends according to vegans.  The Bhutanese don't euthanise any of the stray dogs either, and there are tons of them around - all looking totally healthy and relaxed, safe in the knowledge that they don't have the hangman's noose around their filthy matted necks.  However, meat to eat is available, but it's brought over the border from India so that the animals don't actually have to have their throats cut in the country - all the Bhutanese cows can therefore pretend like they aren't future hamburgers.

Penis Framed

Another endearing feature??? Sure, why not - Bhutan is a country of dick pics.  And who doesn't love a dick pic?  Personally I just like saying 'dick pic', as I really feel that the penis is the least photogenic subject for wider distribution.  However, the Bhutanese are not with me on this.  Come to mention it, neither are the Japanese.  Over there you can go to a festival especially to carry a giant dick and wear dick hats, help yourself to a dick lollypop - whatever takes your fancy.  It looks awesome.  I would go 100%.  In fact I might put that on my 'To Do' list; #28 Wear Pink Dick Hat.  I'm not even joking, I think it's an essential life experience.   Historically, in Bhutan anyway, there was some sort of mystic penis-loving fellow that's inspired the countrywide dick pic trend - a Tibetan Buddhist monk named Drukpa Kunley (1455–1529) who used sexual intercourse, alcohol and dirty poetry to spread Buddhist teachings - The world's first Sleazy Shaman....Whatever is the case, penises are everywhere.  Some are actually painted in mid spoof, and most of the ball sacks are painted with hairs.  Enjoy.

Just one from Japan - cheer up love, you're wearing a pink penis on your head

  

My face kind of says it all in this picture

Trekking in the mountains is another experience altogether.  Apart from revelling in my first ever trip to the highest mountain range in the world (you can see Everest from the plane on the journey from North India to Bhutan), I learnt an important thing.  I'm just not built for altitude.  Despite training hard for a month before the trip, doing an acclimatisation walk, drinking 25 litres of ginger tea, having awesome hiking poles, and sucking on oxygen canisters, I was forced to accept that I'm just not a mountain person.  I somehow suspected this after my unfortunate performance in the French Alps a couple of years back when I lost the PLOT at 3800 metres and basically disgraced myself with terror induced paralysis on a rock mounted platform.  I didn't fair much better on the overnight trek to a similar altitude in Bhutan.  I was pretty useless and spent quite sometime cocooned in blankets around the fire sucking on oxygen.  Luckily I managed to narrowly avoid having to walk 3 hours down off the mountain in the pitch black at 2am to sleep at a monastery below to recover. My relief at not having to be evacuated was tenfold when I later found out there were tigers and bears roaming the mountains around us all night....excellent news not to share.     

The greatest camp ever - at almost 4000 metres in the Himalayas.....

If I had had to be evacuated that evening, I wouldn't have seen the Tigers Nest Monastery the following day and that would have sucked big time.  Yep, it was insanely good, and obviously the highlight of any trip to Bhutan.  Though it's a funny thing;  when you actually lay eyes on these beautiful and familiar world sights; sights you have seen in countless photographs, you can't really process that it's the real thing that you're looking at initially.  It still looked like a picture to me - Later on, when I looked back on my snaps, it's as though I expected the feeling of actually being there to come across in my photographs.  No, they just looked like regular photographs - the specialness comes only from the memory. To actually go inside and hear the stories about the legends of Paro Taktsang (Tigers Nest) was fascinating - and we also learnt that despite being nearly 400 years old, it had to be rebuilt in 2005 after disaster struck and the entire place burnt down in 1998 thanks to a rogue candle.  Nice one to whoever REALLY fucked up there - probably a trainee monk sneaking out in the middle of the night to grab a midnight snack from the food offerings bowl.  One thing that the monks really need to sort out though are the boggers.  I have never seen worse toilets than those in a Bhutanese monastery (and I visited 4).  Sort it out fellas - crack open the money donations box and get a cleaner or something.  I'm thinking about the monks even more than myself here; negotiating robes through that kind of filth must be highly awkward.

In all it's glory

It was an incredible trip.  So many good things happened that there's no way I cannot properly explain it all (I tried, but my husband said it was a boring as batshit so I deleted most of it).  The country is stunning, and you honestly feel like you are having an authentic cultural experience - whatever that really is.....We spent hours climbing Himalayan peaks, and were invited into nunneries and monasteries along the way and allowed to observe ancient traditions, and hear the stories behind the temples and places of religious importance. That kind of privilege is so rare these days as the world gets more and more accessible.  Rites and rituals are often played out for gawkers purely for monetary gain - not that is something wrong with this - people have to earn a living, but you can feel when something isn't genuine.  Bhutan actually feels completely 'real', a tiny peek into a world you know you'll never see again, and if you do again, it won't be the same.  I would love to go back and stay longer, see more, try to somehow become a part of this amazing place on a non superficial level.  But that's how I feel about everywhere I go really - I want to know what it's really like to be from there - an impossible  dream I know.  But I guess for now, it's goodbye privileged tranquil spirituality, and back to the land of filth, noise and scumbag peasants.  We were off to the Aussie bogan's second Asian home after Kuta Beach - Fucken Phuket mate.     

Six Scandinavian Satisfying Situations

Lofoten Islands - go there

I didn't quite round up our final days in Norway - shit happened dawgs, and it's a tad on the tricky side to punch a keyboard when your drive sharing your way around 300 bloody fjords.  Don't even talk to me about tunnels, they can get fucked too, as can ferries.  When it wasn't my turn behind the wheel I took up knitting.  As you can imagine my woollen green scarf is really coming in handy in Thailand at present (as if I've finished it though - old khaki green wouldn't even make it round a teddy bear's neck right now).

Home sweet Home

Final Norwegian highlights included;

1. Staying in a Fisherman's cottage in the Lofoten Islands.

They are all the go here.  You have to rent a Fisherman’s house - all the cool kids are doing it.  They have them sticking out over the water, and inside they’re all wooden and cosy.  Vali and Cordi really took a fisherman's life to heart, and became obsessed with fishing.  They basically spent every spare second out on the dock.  Things didn’t go well initially – there were snagged lines, broken rods, seaweed clumps and a starfish.  But at last a little fishy was caught.  And that's when reality crept in.  The poor little bastard bled and flapped, and my daughter screamed and cried.  When we finally got the hook out of it’s mouth and then tossed the poor little flapper back in, it had snuffed it.  It floated on top of the water while we stood in the pools of blood all over the dock.  We all hoped for a resurrection, but it wasn’t to be.   My daughter watched it float for a while and then decided that fishing was cruel and that she was now a vegetarian.  She didn’t last a meal. 

"Is it dead Mum?" "No, I think it's just relaxing"

Come to me, my one true love...

2. Eating my body weight in liquorice daily;

This was the main highlight of the trip hands down.  God damn it the Scandi's have a large array of liquorice, and I just worked my way through it all. Sweet; salty; long sticks filled with white, pink and orange sugar stuff; allsorts; chocolate - covered and stuffed; soft; hard; chewy toffee.....you name it. My favourite variety ended up being some mini liquorice balls dipped in milk chocolate and rolled in some liquorice powder.  This variety was from Iceland.  I am planning a trip purely to go buy a crate of them. Jesus I love lickie.
“Liquorice fucks your brain up”  my husband informed me on about day 10 of non stop feasting.  “What??” I replied with black juice spilling out my mouth.  It was true.  Apparently it really does bad things everyone. Brain swelling, general puffiness, all things bad.  I couldn’t believe it.  Not only does the world take away booze, drugs, ciggies and coffees but now LICKIE?????  I’m basically wounded.  Apparently any over 40's shouldn’t have more than 2 ounces of it a day (that’s only 56 grams - I'd been having about half a kilo a day).  That knowledge was a horrible reality so I basically pretended that I never heard the rumours and continued on with my feast.  Even though I’ve been looking a bit puffy around the eyes and my teeth remain tinged black, I'm sure it's only temporary....I’ll be fine.

It's worth it, it really is

Oh Ragner, I'm lost in those eyes

3. All Most Things Viking  

I'd had a Viking fascination since Miss Clements set the entire grade four class a special Viking project over a couple of weeks, which culminated in a feast day and some special outfits.  My Viking name was Ingrid, and I took it all pretty seriously. I never quite believed they were a bunch of pillaging rapists though (not my flesh and blood, my tribesmen), and low and behold this was the case.  They were farmers god damn it; farmers with a 300 year period of sea faring which basically set the tone for their entire history. Give a fuck about the specifics though - the show Vikings is awesome, and getting an Aussie ex St Kilda player and former underwear model (apparently he was the inspiration for Smith Jerry from SITC - go and immediately google "Travis Fimmel underwear model' - you will not be sorry) to play the main character makes it all the more pleasant.  All the same, across Norway when trying to lure tourists to come and pay 30 bucks to look at their dug up "Viking" hall they emphasise heavily on the 'Viking' part - well, it certainly packs a bit more punch than "Farmers" Hall.   The display I dragged the family to looked good, until you realised that all they found were a couple of beads, and a few rocks.  Yes, they were mounted in giant glass cases in an impressive room with seal skins on the wall and a special fictional movie about the inhabitants - but beads are beads dudes.

Val slaying a sea monster was more convincing than the Viking display

This was not a real throne,  I repeat NOT a real throne

I was so excited abut the giant hall - the last stage of the tour .... until I realised it had been reconstructed - don't you hate that?  It happens all the time - what is real anymore, what is REAL???? There were all these dudes doing special craft work wearing animal skin outfits inside.  I talked to one of them doing some weaving.  He was Scottish, and he didn’t have dreads or beads in his beard, and was far, far too clean.  I was like “Get into character dude, you’re meant to be a warrior, stop prancing around with your loom for fucks sake and axe something”.  He just kept on looming. The highlight of the day was a pig lying on the ground outside.

Yep, this was as good as it got 

4.  Bergen and Trondheim

See where I'm going with the toilet seat thing?

While  a small part of me is tempted to label Bergen a rainy hole, I cannot really be so cruel.  Yes, it rains here a lot, a LOT, and most of the locals I chatted with expressed a kind of despair at living all year round in the soaking wet - in particular 2 very drunk 50 year old women with a penchant for plastic surgery, whom we met at a late night burger place when we got lost and were trying to look for food.  But it is really beautiful - in particular, the old part of the city is quainter than a country grandmother's crocheted toilet seat cover.  What also made us love Bergen (at least at first) was that our Air BnB for the two nights we stayed there was a boat docked at the marina. That was a novelty.  The marina is definitely where I like my boats.  For example, just before we left Israel, I had the idea of celebrating a friends birthday on a sailing boat.  We'd only been battling the waves for about 15 mins when I lost my shit and begged to go back to the port - it's true the large joint we blew before we dropped anchor didn't help my insistence that we were about to sink.  But still, it was undoubtedly a 'roll around' situation and I just can't have it.  If the sea isn't flat, I'm not interested. Two stationary nights on the boat in Bergen was also enough for moi - it was fun and everything but boats just get grimy and grotty.  I think I like the idea of it more than the reality.

Doing it for the kids, yeah

Someone else is boat-suss

Taken with my own lily white hands

Trondheim was a really cool city.  Despite being the capital of Norway during the Viking Age over a thousand years ago, in comparison to Bergen, this city felt young and vibrant.  Although, to be fair on Bergen, it is a university town and we were there during Orientation Week.  Our first sight of Trondheim was basically a human sized chicken, 8 people chained together, drunk teenagers floating in rubber dinghies down the river, and a large group of people taking a swim in the nuddie.  My husband got lost on a jog one evening and ended up in the middle of a toga party.  He said out of a thousand people he was the only one not wearing a toga - to be expected really, he was out jogging.

'There's grown ups in the nuuuudddeeeee aaahhhhhh'

There's my husband in the top left corner

 5. Geiranger Fjord

As good as it looks

As far as fjords go, this is the cream of the fjord crop.  I'm not sure how I rate on fjord expertise to be honest, but I declare this reasonably pronounceable fjord the Shit Hottest Fjord Ever.  Take another fucken a delightful ferry ride with a giant bunch of tourists straight up the guts of 'er and prepare to be marvelled.  The only downer was lack of porpoises.  I'd heard porpoise rumours and I was all set to be porpoised.  There were no porpoises.  Even leading the kids in a chant of 'Porpoise Porpoise Porpoise" failed to materialise anything but death stares from those tourists in close proximity.  Maybe they were also spewing about the porpoise free experience. Once you start a chant though it's hard to quell the beast.  I had to send the girls inside along with promises that I would come running if porpoises were spotted.  Of course I wouldn't have - I would have been too busy looking at the porpoises and taking porpoise photos for Instagram.  Perhaps then it was karma for my pre-meditated porpoise selfishness.

Reality was way better

From above

6. Shopping in Stockholm

Oooooh yeah

I wanted a piece of that Scandinavian style, and by god I was going to get it.  Unfortunately it don't come cheap.  I deliberately blocked out the currency exchange rate when it came time to hand over the card, and it wasn't until the statement rolled in that I had a little dry retch.  I tried to shop in H&M thinking that the flagship store was going to be way better than the shit they try and peddle in H&M in Israel.  Seriously, I don't know what they're playing at there but they are only inches away of having all the stock in the Tel Aviv stores in a big pile in the middle of the floor and having the customers just wade in and hope for the best.  Sadly though the Stockholm flagship store didn't do it for me.  H&M really lost it's appeal after I saw that documentary The True Cost - that was one of the most depressing things I have ever seen.  I'm not going to go into too much detail but the worst bit was the camera cutting between scenes of human misery and despair in Bangladesh and Cambodia and switching to footage of fat American women fighting over bags and knitwear in the Black Friday sales.  H&M looked pretty guilty, but they weren't the only ones.  The solution =  buy nothing ever again, or check the labels and prepare to spend a bundle.  I was heading for  the flagship Acne Studios store.  And not just because Acne is fucking awesome but because the main store is inside an old bank building.  And it's not just any old bank building, it's the bank where the robbery took place that was responsible for the capture-bonding incident forever known as "The Stockholm Syndrome". This syndrome is a psychological disorder, where captives show positive feelings toward their captors. In this first instance, several bank employees were kept hostage in the bank vaults and became emotionally attached to their captors, not wanting to be rescued.  Anyway the bank vaults are still there in the store.....they are now the jeans rack.

Vaults

In conclusion......Scandinavia (especially Norway) was great.  It was really really great.   If I can cover the down points I would have to mention firstly the food.  Motherfuckers are obsessed with burgers and hot dogs.  Every single bloody place in the entire region - whether the fanciest restaurant in town or the shittiest ferry slops shop, all had either a burger or a hotdog up for eats, and most of the time they had both.  Also, enough with the meatballs for fucks sake - branch out a little.  The seafood is good, but to be honest I've had better.   My second criticism, which is also incidentally a tip - I would be saving hard if you intend to spend a chunk of time here.  She ain't cheap.  Apart from that - enjoy, because it's bloody awesome in this part of the world.  We'll be back for the Northern Lights this winter - and they better not pull a Geiranger Fjord porpoise on me.

Looking for a porpoise in life

Arctic Living

They make freezing hell look so good

Rocky beach combing

This whole country is fucking bullshit gorgeous.  Top to bottom.  It's phenomenal.  Our first stop in Norway was right up the very top in a place called the Lyngen Alps.  We were 70 degrees latitude north.  That is very far into the Arctic Circle - I think the mainland of Antarctica is 70 degrees south.  Northern Norway is wild and completely stunningly beautiful.  So beautiful that you just can’t believe your eyes.  Incredible jagged mountains with glaciers spilling out of carved rock bowls right on the wild and rocky coast of the Norwegian Sea.  We travelled specifically to stay in a random little sea house with a grass roof.  How can you not love a house with a grass roof?  They seem to be a thing here too, everyone is digging the shit out of having a lawn planted on top of their houses.  

Chilly

Sometimes I like to just randomly select a location without knowing jack about it – just Air BnB search an entire country (within the narrow perimeters of your available budget) and go to the best one you can find.   This one really was the best.  As we arrived, the sun was low in the sky at 10pm at night and was slowly sinking into the sea right in front of the house.  It sat alone sticking out on the coast, perched on the edge of a pointed rock beach.  The inside smelt like wood, and all the chairs were covered in fluffy white sheepskins, plus there were a couple of reindeer hides tossed casually over seats (they actually shed a lot of hair, I'm still picking it off my clothes).  There was a wooden pine-smelling sauna downstairs, and  a fireplace in the lounge room with piles of chopped wood.  The kids basically spent 3 days feeding the fire and blowing it non stop with bellows - having a fire in the house was a totally new experience for these winter deprived youngsters, and I've since discovered that they are definitely pyromaniacs.  But by far the highlight was the view from the lounge room.  After looking at the rooves of other apartments for the last 3 years it was kicking goals for Africa. 

Arctic Summer Living

The pyros with their new favourite toy - the bellows

My 3am face says it all

90 days of weird unsettling twilight

The sunset was meant to be about 11pm (according to the weather app), but it never really moved on from dusk. It was literally Dusk to Dawn in about 10 minutes.  The bedrooms had bloody skylights so they never got dark either.  At first we were really excited about constant light, but after days of body clock confusion we felt really seedy.  It was like when you’ve been at a dance party all night long and try to go to sleep the following morning, but your head is all over the place.  The midnight sun messes with you.  Even when we had dark curtains in th next Air BnB, somehow the light gets inside your brain.  

Imagine the opposite though - The Polar Night.  Some of the locals told us that it’s constantly dark for 3 months - December, January, February.  Imagine that – not seeing the sun at all for 90 days.  Apparently when the faintest glow of sunlight appears on the horizon again some time in February everyone breaks into wild celebration (as you would)  They have festivals in the streets with everyone going bananas.  There is one Norwegian town, Rjukan (in the south), that because of it's location in a deep valley, it doesn't see the sun from mid September until late March (WTF??).  However, in true Norwegian 'shit-together style' they constructed a giant mirror on top of a hill to reflect sun into the valley.  Everyone was super stoked, as you would be I guess.  Fascinating shit.  Don't forget though, that the Norwegians have the northern lights to get them through the winter.  Lots of them sit around in outside hot tubs and watch the sky show.  Sometimes the lights come every single night in the Arctic Circle.

Who needs the sun?

Look at their mirror inspired happiness!!

The next Air BnB - not bad

After leaving Lyngen and our little grass roofed dwelling, we drove 2 hours south, and stayed for 3 nights on a fjord just outside the most northern city in the world – Tromso.  Incidentally it is as cool as - Norwegian style, they can't bloody help it.  It has a full underground road system – roundabouts, lanes, carparks, all located below the city.  They also have full GPS satellite and Internet reception deep underground (told you - total shit together).  They must need it in winter - it gets well below zero (-10 degrees Celsius), and inland it can get as low as 30 degrees below.  It seems like theres a lot of snow as well, but no ski mountains - which means no resorts and no floodlights for day skiing during the pitch-black mid winter months.  Apparently when it gets a bit lighter, everyone just hikes up the mountains wherever they feel like it and skis down.  No cable cars, no lifts, no rope tows, no trails.  Just free style.  Theres no way I could ever do that.  I once hiked up a mountain in Japan when the lifts weren't working and dripped a river of sweat everywhere and had to faceplant the snow for an hour when I finally made it to the top.  I nearly called Search and Rescue just to massage my hammies.  The Norwegians do it for fun.

Sunset in front of our place

Stay back Fatty

There are also some pretty hefty Troll rumours up that way, and that's no wonder - they're just sitting up there in the dark for months freaking each other out.  Trolls or jötunn (*giants) feature widely in Scandinavian mythology  as do the Huldrefolk - hidden folk.  In some stories they are described as monsters with a particular fondness for human flesh (excellent!), while some stories describe them as not being particularly hideous but instead they are old and strong but kind of thickies (I'm going with these bad boys over the flesh eaters).  I don't think your average person on the streets believes in mythical creatures like the Icelanders do, but there are certain concessions to the widely held belief that Trolls live in a mountain behind Tromso.  Apparently the trolls turn to stone when the sunlight hits them, so they must really dig the winter up there.  Also lightening is said to kill them and people believe that the absence of trolls in this day and age is a reflection of the accuracy of lightening strikes.  Ok then.....  

Is that over 5% alcohol content my excited Viking reveller? 

Excessive drinking cannot explain these tendencies for fairy tales as Norwegians live in an alcohol prison.  You can’t drink publicly (except in bars obviously) – even drinking on your own balcony is a no no.  Buying alcohol from the shop is extremely complicated - basically you can only buy wine and spirits at special government owned shops before a certain time (6pm during the week, and 3pm on Saturdays, no buying in Sundays).  Beer has it's own set of rules again.  You have to plan your boozing in advance. Imagine needing a timetable and a list of instructions every time you felt like having a drink?  It would be so annoying.  And it’s expensive, really expensive.  My husband made the fatal error of drinking about 10 beers on a night out in Oslo a couple of years ago.  He neglected to realise before he got the bill that they were $25 a glass.

The marble penis equivalent of the natural world

It was time to head further south - goodbye to the eternal day, hello to more retina burning scenes of natural beauty.  The next stop was the Loftoten islands - an incredible archipelago connected by bridges and tunnels and stretching for hundreds of kilometres.  While still in the Arctic Circle these islands have a freakishly warm climate, and are without a doubt one of the most stunning places on the planet.  Your eyes get overwhelmed with the beauty of the place so that it becomes a bit much - sort of like when you’re at The Louvre in Paris or the Prado in Madrid.  You see so many incredible treasures that you become irritated by the over exposure to beauty.  You walk into another hall of treasures, and you’re like “Another fucking 10 foot ancient Greek statue of Neptune??  Seriously? - Carve something else - a giant frog,  a chicken nugget, anything....there's only so many carved marble penises you can handle in one afternoon.  Well, The Lofoten Islands are the natural version of that over exposure, as is Norway in general really.  It just keeps getting more beautiful.  My eyes can't take it - they need to be reset by seeing something trashy, like Kimmy K in a leopard skin latex bikini, or else something repulsive like a used bloody condom on the floor of a filthy public toilet.  Fjords get fucked! No more waterfalls, no more!  But of course there was more.....there's always more.

I'd rather see Kardashian snatch