ThePartyBus

Keanu Reeves had a bus that couldn't go below 50mph.

Harry Potter had the Knight Bus.

In Gothenburg, they have ThePartyBus.

Gotland and Zandra

Saturday night saw us venture out to the neighbouring island of Hisingen for a party on a mountaintop at Håberg (Sounds a bit like “whore-bare-yeah” ) for my friend Zandra, who is the partner of my friend known only by his place of birth, “Gotland” (his real name remains a State Secret).

After once again being forced to drink many shots and beers while being held captive by my Swedish inebriators, it was decided that we should move on to Gothenburg’s nightclubs.  But how to move a party off Hå-mountain and into the city? Does public transport even run at that hour? How much will taxis cost?  How many will we have to order?

“No, we’ll get ThePartyBus Jamie!”

Now in Australia, we have The Beer Bus. It’s the bus that gets you home at the end of the night when you are so heavily intoxicated that you cannot remember how you got home the next morning. How the hell did I get home last night? Hmmm…must have taken the beer bus. Rides on the beer bus are often followed by stints driving the porcelain bus, if you get what I mean.

But what the hell is ThePartyBus?

After being led by a friend who knew “a shortcut” which involved stumbling down the mountain through long grass and undergrowth and over rocky declines to the roadside, our group of 30 or so gathered together. 

“JurgenjurgenborkThePartyBus! BorkborkborkThePartyBus!” they discuss excitedly.

I ask Maria and her friend Sandra what the hell ThePartyBus is and whether it’s something well-known in Sweden.

“No idea” they tell me.

The answer soon reverberates over the horizon. As the bass lines break through the crisp Scandinavian air, the nearing sounds of electro house music behold the arrival of a London-style, red double-decker bus lit up in flashing neon.

“BORK BORK BOOOORKKK!!!! PARTYBUSSEN!!!!” exclaim the fever-pitched partygoers.

Pulling up alongside us, as I am about to board I ready my wallet to pay for my PartyBusFARE.

“No cost on ThePartyBus! Just paaaaartaaay bork bork!”

Climbing on to the upper level, beers are handed out, the beats encourage dancing in the aisles, pole dancing ensues, it’s mayhem. Laughter and smiles flood the deck as blonde hair is whipped back and forth and champagne flows.

THIS is ThePartyBus. 

...Better value than the Route 291 bus I used to take to school, I never once got a champagne on that for my $2.70 concession fare.  

Can Elks Play Footy? Aussie Football in Sweden.

Johan Lantz, Captain of the Swedish Elks

Australian Rules Football is probably one of the last things you'd expect to find in Sweden. But all over Sweden, in Stockholm, Karlstad, Skåne, Malmö, right here in Göteborg and even into Oslo in Norway, the great Aussie game is played with passion.

Nic, Joel, Kalle and Christoffer from the Göteborg Berserkers

When I came to Sweden a number of years ago, I brought an Aussie football with me. A pretty distinctive signifier of meat-pie eatin', VB drinkin', fair dinkum oi-oi-oi shouter. Or in 'strine (Aussie-speak), we'd probably say it was an indicator that I was a "bloody bogan". But the thing was, holding my footy in a Malmö train station led to an Aussie ex-pat coming up to me and asking if I wanted to play footy for the local side. A bit astounded, I explained I was just on holidays,but this guy was insistent that I play even as I was jumping on my train to Gothenburg.

Berserkers Joel, Lars and Alan come off the field following a game.

So when I came back here for the best part of 2010, I got in touch with the local team, the Gothenburg Berserkers via their website.  My inquiry was met with a very enthusiastic response from a guy named Joel Språng (Yoo-el Sprawng) who invited me down to training. From the first night I was made to feel part of it and after a season in which we won the Sweden-West Championship and had a huge end of season trip to Dublin (which included playing Aussie Rules Football and International Rules Football for Oxford University), I made some amazing friends.

So it was a no-brainer that I wanted to catch up with the boys again this year, but due to the ankle surgery I had in December that has curtailed my career, this year I've been handed the coaching clipboard.

The thing that you have to get used to in coaching here is the need for bilingual addresses or having guys translate what you're saying after you've said it. The first time I ever explained Aussie footy in Swedish I made a bit of a blue. I was describing the large goal posts and using my forearm to visually demonstrate the tall vertical posts in our game.

Skåne, Stockholm and Göteborg combined sides after a closely fought game, won by a kick on the siren

"Vi har två stora stomparna..." I said, explaining that we had two large goal posts.

"...och två lite stomparna." adding that we have two little posts.

After my talk, I asked one of the more outgoing Swedes if my Swedish had been comprehensible, as the blank, expressionless faces of a Swedish audience gives little away.

"Yes, it was very interesting, but we didn't quite understand one bit. You said you kick the ball through two big amputated limbs?"

Apparently the word I was looking for was stolperna, not stomperna.

From such things we learn.

A BBQ between hosts Karlstad and Göteborg players

Well the games I've coached over here have unfortunately not gone our way, with the most recent game on the weekend being lost by less than a goal with the opposition scoring a goal on the final siren. They have however been terrific to watch, with the physicality very impressive, particularly from some recent ice-hockey converts who won't let the Aussie ex-pats side step them.

And of course Aussie rules is as much about the comradery off the field as on it. It's been great to enjoy BBQs and beers with teammates and oppositions alike following the games. Next games aren't til August, any coaching advice would be appreciated!

After match celebrations at Push : From left - Ylva, Trav, Jamie, Suzanne, Cam and a typically enthusiastic Joel

One of Sweden's Most Popular TV Programs

I'm not sure I want to know either.

A Recipe For Liquid Gold

Flädersaft (Elderflower Cordial, pronounced "flair-der-sahft" in Swedish) is one of Sweden's favourite beverages in the Summer. And in keeping with my foray into foraged foods, this past week has seen me produce my first batch of Swedish homebrew liquid gold flädersaft.

It's a simple recipe, so I thought I'd share it with you in case you have access to an Elderflower (Fläderblom) tree.



 
Ingredients:
30 pieces of Elderflower
3 large lemons
1.5 litres of water
1.5 kg caster sugar
50 g citric acid


The method goes that you need to first ensure any bugs are removed from your elderflowers by rinsing them under water. After you've done this you can dissolve the caster sugar and citric acid into a large pot using boiling water, adding the chopped lemons at the end. Be sure to cover the lemons with the sugary water mix, otherwise they can go mouldy in the ensuing days. Same thing with the elderflowers - mix them in there and cover them with the mix if you can. You should smell a nice aroma as they mix with the water.


Next bit is nice and easy: Cover the pot and let it sit for a few days in a cool place. 


After 2-3 days you should have a nice mix of saft almost ready to go. Discard the lemons being sure not to mix any mouldy bits of lemons into the drink and pick out the big stems of elderflower.


You can now drain the remaining elderflower out by running it through a fine cloth and into a new container. 


And voila! You have delicious, refreshing, flädersaft.


For those with curiosity but without access to Elderflowers, you can find an inferior version of my AWESOME flädersaft at most Ikea stores. Enjoy with ice, lemon slices or even a little splash of vodka!

Forests Foods and Firsts

I ate mushrooms.

 

No, that isn't a typo.

Anyone who knows me knows my hatred of mushrooms. Mushroomaphobia some have called it. I call it "a lack of enjoyment of eating fungus". But Sweden has somehow managed to compel me to sample that which I have spent many years avoiding.

More on that later...

As a kid, I remember watching Norsca ads, where moist towelettes, soaps and deodorants probably made in a factory in China using artificial scents were sold to us in Australia as "Scandinavian Freshness" with people running around naked in beautiful green forests of pine trees and bathing beneath waterfalls.

Well, after spending the week in the beautiful city of Skövde (pronounced something like "Hwh-erh-v-deh"), I can confirm that these beautiful forest areas actually exist in real life. The bad news is that there were no beautiful naked Swedes bathing beneath the waterfalls. Only Norwegians.

The Swedish Forest is an amazing place. With millions of shades of green and a serenity that rivals Bonnie Doon, it holds delights to please every sense. It also holds ticks which can potentially paralyze you, but I was thankful that my "tour guide" thought to check me for ticks and found one on my stomach. Apparently it was attracted by my Van Halen t-shirt.  Talking of ticks, a weird Swedish fact is that when Swedes are marking things like exams or quizzes, they use ticks to indicate which questions you got wrong. Guess you'd be ticked off if you weren't aware.

But back to the Swedish forest and it's aural sensations.  This time of year is a great one to be out in the forests, as it's the time when the water runs strong over falls like the Silver Falls at Skövde and the blueberries and chanterelle mushrooms emerge from the forest floor. Armed with our instincts alone, Maria, her mum and I set out in search of our dinner in much the same way a nightclub leaver at 5am instinctively seeks out a kebab shop, hotdog stand or McDonalds using their well-honed survival skills. It didn't take us long to find what we were looking for.



Chanterelles are famed the world over amongst culinary connoisseurs, yet Maria had a job ahead of me if she thought that my enthusiasm for picking the fungi would translate to enthusiasm for eating them.  But sometimes we just have to trust, and knowing that Maria also has an aversion to mushrooms, her offer to eat them with me left me with less room to move than her rook left my King to move in our recent game of chess. And besides, she told me "You've eaten surströmming before, so I'm sure you'll be able to man up enough to eat these - they're not that bad..." 

"...Plus you can eat blueberry pie after as a reward."

Checkmate. She's a smart girl.

So with our forest haul in hand, we returned to make dinner. Well ok, Maria's mum made the dinner, but I kind of found some of it and I'm sure I kept the snakes away or something in the forest. Hey, I'm Aussie, that makes me like Steve Irwin or Crocodile Dundee right? All those years of wrestling drop bears has to be for something so I'm claiming it.

First course. Chantarelles, served with a bacon and garlic cream sauce on toast with tomatoes.

Mustering what courage I could, I took a bite.

No vomiting.

No gag reflex.

Edible. Surprised.

Took another bite...

...actually not bad.

In fact I went on to eat the whole plate of them. Proudly, I can now say "Mushrooms, I have defeated you!"

But let's not have a rematch any time soon.

And now let's pause for a moment to see my reward:

Homemade, handpicked, fresh blueberry pie, tasted as good as it looks and sounds. The Swedes have a great name for a place that you love, your special place. Your "Smultron Ställe" ("Wild Strawberry Place"). I think Skövde might just at least go down as my new "Blåbär Ställe" ("Blueberry Place")...