At our age, we realize we cannot go charging around like we did in our 50's and 60's. We can't leave our Airbnb after breakfast and spend all morning sightseeing - then lunch out and more sightseeing all afternoon until late when we head back to collapse and eat something.
Now we leave our Airbnb after breakfast - taking our time. We spend 2 -3 hours on our feet an then - at least here in Sweden - stop for Fika. (More about that later) As it is very early in the tourist season we can hang out as long as we wish as there is no one waiting for our table. After that we can wander around some more or head for the tram station and to home. Here in Gothenburg - our tram shop is at the local mall. It has two grocery stores - the Lidl and the Hemkop. There are many restaurants in the area. And lots of other stores, like clothing, shoes and the state run liquor store.
The Lidl does not have a deli or any prepared foods, but the Hemkop does. We have gotten a roast chicken here as well as sides. I must say they like their mayonnaise here - both the coleslaw and the potato salads were heavily endowed with mayonnaise. Way too much for me - so that the next time I got a side I opted for the roasted potato slices which were great as we could refry them at home so they were toasty hot and tasty.
Next we decided to try Swedish sausages. Early on we were shy to try the hot sausages and opted for the "everyday sausages", turns out they are very bland. Being from New Mexico - I think the spicy sausage would have been fine for us. We brought some ketchup packages we gathered from Spain and bought some mustard at the Hepkop - Johnnies Senap (mustard) the original.
So it is very popular to stop for Fika (sounds like FeeKuh!) at mid-morning or afternoon - or whenever. Apparently you can have a Fika multiple times a day. I thought it meant - coffee and a sweet, but after some research it is more of a social gathering with whatever you want to drink and maybe food. Many Swedish business have a Fika culture where important decisions are made. If you don't go you may end up doing the job that they discussed at Fika that no one else wanted to do!
I had a Bounty cake yesterday, which was a very rich chocolate/coconut desert that was very tasty and very rich. I ordered a diet coke with it - which did not work at all. So instead I drank a glass of water with it - and then finished the diet coke after I finished the cake. It worked well as an excuse to make rest time longer! The area we plan to go to tomorrow is known as the Haga. They are known for their plate sized cinnamon rolls. I'm afraid that fika could turn out to be just like gelato in Italy - something I enjoy so much that I won't be able to button my jeans by the end of this vacation!
I want to mention one more thing that has taken some getting used to. The lack of darkness! We are pretty far north. When we went to Norway to see the northern lights we had 15 minutes of daylight - that was the end of December. Sunrise this morning was at 4:28am and sunset will be at 9:50pm. This is skewed by the fact that this apartment complex has bright lights on all night. And that most of the days are cloudy and gray so there is not much difference between day and night. I can fall asleep just fine. The problem starts when I wake around 2 -3am and think it is 7am!
As it turns out, we are every bit as tired just doing the amount we do now, as we were in our earlier days going twice as much. So at least in that respect our experience is the same! :)
ReplyDeleteI didn't realize that fika played such an important role in business life. The Spanish enjoy lingering over coffee, but I don't have a sense of how if that's strictly "off the clock" or not.
ReplyDeletefika is not a big part of culture at my employer but I'm sure there are grades of how Swedish a company is and mine is more mixed
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