Pictures: Copenhagen, Reboot 10 & Flash Party

This is my complete set of photos (I posted a subset and of the pictures and pretty much all of my comments here (on The BuzzPal Blog). Video clip of the Flash Party is here.

The guys you see at the bottom of this blog (because the pics are in chronological order) are two cool Norwegian brothers we met at the bus back to Sweden for us and Norway for them. They were coming back from a 3-week trip in Italy, Greece, and Hungry. They turned us on to the biggest blues festival in Europe, which is in August in the town where they live. Susanne and I hope to go, but need to make sure the timing doesn’t conflict with our trip to Gotland, which starts August 9th.

PS: I put larger sizes of a couple of the black-and-whites plus a few of the other cool pics (if you liked the abstract effects) up at buzzpal.com/reboot10.

Mom Visit #3: Styrso Island

Midsummer Night Festivities

Mom Visits #2: Midsummer Day

The Midsummer holiday is the biggest holiday of the summer here in Sweden. We started the day with a traditional lunch at Birgitta and Roy’s, with Susanne’s Godmother (Kirsten) also attending. After that, we went to Gunnebo Slott, before heading back home for a power nap to get ready for the evening’s festivities (pics to follow).

Mom Visits #1: Botanical Gardens and Dinner

A few photos from the Göteborg Botanical Garden, one of the places we took my Mom while she was visiting for a few days on her way to Vienna (Dad stayed home this time). The botanical garden has a beautiful park plus multiple indoor exhibits, including the largest Orchid collection in Sweden.

Who Will Tell the People?

Who Will Tell the People?
By Thomas Friedman
2008-5-4
New York Times

Traveling the country these past five months while writing a book, I’ve had my own opportunity to take the pulse, far from the campaign crowds. My own totally unscientific polling has left me feeling that if there is one overwhelming hunger in our country today it’s this: People want to do nation-building. They really do. But they want to do nation-building in America.

They are not only tired of nation-building in Iraq and in Afghanistan, with so little to show for it. They sense something deeper — that we’re just not that strong anymore. We’re borrowing money to shore up our banks from city-states called Dubai and Singapore. Our generals regularly tell us that Iran is subverting our efforts in Iraq, but they do nothing about it because we have no leverage — as long as our forces are pinned down in Baghdad and our economy is pinned to Middle East oil.

Canoing at Stora Delsjön Lake

First time canoing at Delsjön, the lake we walk to from our apartment. The snake you see is a Huggorm.