Sweden. Denmark next.
Not quite three Scandihoovian countries in three days, unless you count surface transits, but still...
Sweden, though, is big. I had forgotten how big. And has changed in an interestingly subtle way.
So I am enjoying the hospitality of Lund observatory, but had to make a quick jaunt to Uppsala.
Some things just have to be done in person.
My flight, coming back, was (scheduled) very late. In fact arrived after the last bus for town was supposed to have left, according to the schedule. So, I was pondering having to book a taxi, and possibly pay more for a 10 mile20 km taxi ride than a 400 mile600 km flight.
However, I realised that the flight I was on appeared to be newly scheduled - SAS had, I inferred, added a late scheduled flight on that route, evidently in response to demand (and if you didn't experience Scandinavia in Ye Olde Days, then you can't understand how profoundly strange that is, in and of itself).
Further, the bus schedule apparently expired the day before.
So... it seemed like the rational thing to happen, if in fact a new late arrival flight route was added, would be to add late buses. So, I decided to take it on faith that this in fact would happen.
And there is was, waiting outside the terminal for the late flight. Rationality triumphs.
But, and here is where it gets Really Strange.
As I boarded, I saw someone come up to the bus and explain that their luggage hadn't come through yet, could the driver just wait a minute.
"sure", he said, in fact he would wait for everyone to be out of the terminal in case they were looking for a bus! And then he went in to the terminal to check if anyone was looking to head that way!!!
He didn't just leave on the dot when his new schedule said he should. (He did make up the lost time by speeding ever so slightly...).
This is shockingly strange. And good. And I think it means Scandinavia will Rule the World now. Or it will if the Danes ever get their butts into gear and the Norwegians stop being so damn provincial... ;-)
I have not been shown the novelty ashtray, sadly. Maybe it is in Stockholm...
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I also like the Swedish bus drivers. When I was in Lund last December, I took the bus not realizing that the route changed after 8pm on Sundays. The driver, who barely spoke any English, saw that I wasn't getting off at the end of the line and decided to help me. He diverted the bus, gave me a map and a schedule, and took three or four minutes to explain in broken English which way to walk. Luckily, it was only 1-2 km and fairly warm for December.
In the US that would absolutely never have happened, and if you got into the spot of assuming a bus would show up like that you'd be regarded with idle contempt and probably locked out of the terminal at midnight in a blizzard.
well, now to be fair, in the US what would happen would depend on where you were;
possible outcomes would range from someone giving you a lift, through to buses always running all night; via options ranging from someone doing it for enough money, through you can sleep on this bench, to the one where you were shot and your luggage stolen.
But country the US.