Denmark Diaries: A Sunday in Sweden

This article should have been published a fortnight ago - because this is when I took advantage of the glorious sunny autumn weather to travel to Sweden. From Copenhagen, it’s just a short train journey over the Øresund Bridge - a short stopover at the airport and shortly afterwards all you can see is water on both sides of the train. (Of course, it is much more spectacular to see the illuminated bridge and fat tankers as small toy ships when approaching Copenhagen by aeroplane at night. Especially because almost all aeroplanes fly once around the bridge and you have a good view from all sides.)

My first stop in Sweden was Malmö. As an old harbour city with a distinct working-class culture and today a relatively high proportion of immigrants, it immediately reminded me of Mannheim. I enjoyed simply strolling through the streets and looking at the mixture of old houses in crooked alleyways and the newly built glass shopping centres.

In the afternoon, I drove on to Lund, where E. from my Master’s programme is currently on an Erasmus semester. Compared to Copenhagen, Lund is tiny: all the houses have a maximum of two storeys, whereas in Copenhagen there are always four or five. The whole town is a maze of old alleyways and small houses, with new buildings clearly in the minority. After coffee and cake (“fika”) we walk through the streets and E. shows me the university, the rector’s “white house” (where a chamber orchestra is currently playing/rehearsing) and the numerous buildings of the various student associations (called “nations”). On the way home, I buy some Swedish liquorice and a marzipan variety, both of which turn out to be damn tasty.