B-Day

Now I am Grandfather to a boy!

B-Day

It is close now, maybe three hours

The wildlife in Haparanda

I read in Haparandabladet this morning that a woman had seen a bear when she was jogging outside central Haparanda, only 3 km from our house. I have seen tracks every time when we have been in the forest to pick berries. I have liked to walk in the forest before, but now it doesn't feel good, especially as I have a dog, which can make them more aggressive. I have seen lynx tracks too, only 200 m from the house, it had chased a hare. The most worrying animal here is the raccoon dog, it looks like a fat fox or a mix between raccoon and dog. It spreads diseases, you can get sick if you go somewhere where it has been, and here in Haparanda it is the biggest population in Sweden. IKEA's closest neighbours are the musk rats, very aggressive if you piss them off, they jump towards the neck, I saw one just 2 m from me when I was walking to the shop, the tail was thick as a cycle handlebar.We have also hedgehogs right behind the house, they have a grumpy sound. There are beavers in the county, I haven't seen anyone here, but when I was young, I saw one beside the canoe when I was paddling. When we are driving on E4, we always have too look for moose, if you hit one in 100 you are dead. I have hit one once, and have been close several times. There are also two kinds of seals here. There is always a risk to hit a reindeer too when you are driving, but they are so small so you don't end up dead. Every reindeer has an owner, so they are not wildlife. This was just a little information, maybe someone finds it interesting.

Some like it hot

The title refers to the first movie allowed from 15 I saw, I think it was 1960. My dad was the cinema operator, so I saw it from the projector room. It is about two musicians, Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon who happens to see the Valentine's Day massacre 1929 and is chased by the maffia. They dress themselves in ladies clothes and hide in a ladies orchestra, there they meet the sexy Sugar, Marilyn Monroe. A millionaire, Joe E. Brown , known in the filmhistory for the biggest laugh, is in love with Jack Lemmon as he thinks he is a woman, in the end when Jack says that he is a man, Joe says; Nobody is perfect. It is a very funny film, and also a musical,Sugar.
I saw almost all films when I was young,except for in Summer when we lived in our Summerhouse on an island. There were no age limits, I saw everything, the only limit was if the film was very long, it was only wooden chairs, so I left after half the film, Dr Zhivago with Omar Sharif is one example. We sometimes ate plums and brown beans before so we could fart during the film. Mostly the film wasn't the most important, it was the talking before it started and in the pause in the middle when he changed film in the projector. It was an important meetingplace in the village.

The Day B

We were in Kalix today, it was very hot there on the sunny side of the street. I have been eating painkillers for the last days and put ice from the freezer to the chin, but nothing has helped. I was hungry so I bought Thai food down the street, and believe it or not, the pain vanished at once. I have a little hobby; I look for lookalikes, and today I saw Victoria Silvstedt and Willie Nelson. Bluto from Popeye lives here. The title The Day B refers to the day I have been waiting for the last nine months, the Baby Day, I will be Grandfather in a very near future. Lill-Babs says it very well in the song 'Välkommen till världen',(Welcome to the world).Youtube is very good, you can look at a video and understand the meaning of a song without understanding the lyrics.

Bror The Porcupineman

I was in Kalix yesterday with my wife at the Kalixdays. We were selling bling bling at Mainstreet there. I met Bror there, he owns two secondhand stores, and he had a table outside his store with stuff that all were 10 SEK. He sold clothes in the fifties,and used to come to my village and sell in Folkets Hus. My dad bought all clothes from him. It was cheap, it was always possible to get a lower prize from him.
I remember when we bought gloves, I had a pair, very warm of catskin, I don't think the sell catskin gloves today. Once he showed us a pair of gloves, this is porcupine (Sw.piggsvin)he said. He showed the text inside, Pigskin. I always think of porcupine when I see him. English isn't easy. We shall go there today too, I hope I can manage it, I have a toothproblem so I have to eat painkillers. Yesterday they gave klådda to all there, it is a Kalix dish, bread, fish and potatoes. It gives me another memory, when I was a little child I said to my dad that a little old lady looked like a klådda. He said that I shall say Aunt, so I said Aunt Klådda next time we saw her

Ingemar Johansson vs Floyd Patterson

It is 50 years today since the heavyweight match between Ingemar Johansson and Floyd Patterson when Ingemar became Champion. No white man has become champion after that.
Ingemar and Floyd were very good friends, and Floyd was very popular in Sweden.
I heard the match on the radio, and later there was a film about a lazy boxer who didn't like the training, Swedish Floyd. My Aunt Karin's husband Åke was a big man with hands like toilet seats. A journalist at the magazine 'Se' was in their house, I was there too and the journalist, Gits Olsson made him 'Sweden's most man'. He got a small role in the film as a boxer who was carried out. It was exciting when he was filming, one of Sweden's most popular artists, Lill-Babs was in the film too. When Beatles came to Sweden the first time, she gave them autographs,and they warmed up the audience for her. When we saw the movie at the cinema we looked for Åke, I think I missed him. Lill-Babs is still very popular, now mostly called by her real name Barbro Svensson. They show the match on TV tonight.

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Anton Nilsson, the Amalthea man

There was a strike in Malmö 1908, and the company took British strikebreakers there on the ship Amalthea. Three youngsocialists, Anton Nilsson,Algot Rosberg and Alfred Stern decided to put a bomb on the ship to scare them. One was killed, 23 injured, Anton Nilsson was sentenced to death, but got prison instead. He was free during the First World War and went to Soviet and became a pilot in their Airforce. He came back to Sweden and lived in Tyresö outside Stockholm. My Grandmother was a friend to his wife, and she and my mother met them there in 1940. When he was almost 100 years old he was talking at Social Democratic electionmeetings

Loch Lomond

There is a very beautiful lake in Scotland, which I hope to see next month. It's called Loch Lomond. The song Loch Lomond was written by a dying soldier who knew that he should never see the lake again. It is about that his comrades take the high road, the ordinary roads there, and he takes the low road,the death road, "And I'll be in Scotland afore ye". He should be there first.
I mentioned earlier that I was teatching English in the evenings, one group was retired seniors. It was fun, much funnier than the other group with younger persons I had another evening that period. Anyway, It was ten evenings, three lessonhours an evening, and the last evening they had brought coffee and cookies. I had songbooks, and we should sing Loch Lomond, I said that they should sing it with Scottish accent, and they did. "By yon bonnie banks And by yon bonnie brraes Where the sun shines brright of Loch Lomond". They gave me a gift too.

Jim Reeves and Gunnar Wiklund

I looked at clips similar to my clip with William Clauson, and found Jim Reeves and Gunnar Wiklund. It gives me memories from my youth when I was at the movie twice a week. It was free for me because my dad was the cinema operator. He played a record before it started, and almost every time it was Jim Reeves with Adios amigo. Jim Reeves died in a planecrash in 1964. Gunnar Wiklund sang his songs in Swedish, he was from Luleå, and my mum said once that he was a distant relative to us. Once when I had walked up on a mountain and stood at the top, i came to think about that it was 500 miles to home, so I sang their song Away from home, away from home. I'm 500 miles away from home(Detroit City) Gunnar Wiklund had problems with oral galvanism in many years, I saw him perform at a market before he died.

The Vatican

I studied Latin seven hours a week in two years, humanistic half-classic, I still remember Caesar's speech; Cum tacent, clamant. cum quiescunt, probant. I dreamt about it, talked in the sleep. The teatcher wanted to go to the Vatican with us, but we never did, but I have in a way come there anyway. Authors sometimes ask people for help in their research, and Yours Truly is one of them. I have helped several authors, and one of them is an elderly man who has written a book about all Popes.
He thanked me personally in the book for the help and he was invited to the Pope Johannes Paulus II. The book is in the Vatican and so is my name.
It feels great.
By the way, Cum tacent, clamant means when they are quiet, they shout. I have forgot the translation of the rest.

The Stockholm Syndrome II

I was before my time when I wrote about the Stockholm Syndrome. I read today in www.aftonbladet.se that Janne Olsson is in Sweden to promote his book Stockholm Syndromet. He lives in Thailand and runs a little shop. He was in Court to see Clark Olofsson. He said I am free, he is not.

Languages

I have been interested in languages since I was a boy, when I was 10, I wrote frases in a book in different languages. Later I studied English, Latin, French, Spanish and I also like to speak the Kalix dialect which nobody in the Tornevalley understands. If I come to Piteå I fall into their intonation. Finnish is a natural part of my life as I live here in Tornevalley, but Meänkieli, Tornevalleyfinnish is mixed up with Swedish so I don't understand when it is OK to put in a Swedish word and just end it with an -i. Lastbil- Lastipiili, Buss-Bussi. It is fun to say something naughty in Kalix dialect here and nobody is offended because they don't understand what I say, for example, I must warn sensitive readers here, Kåål ne wo do wil,je kåål ne bolla. Call it what you want, I call it balls.
I have a special message to one of my readers, j'espe're vouz êtes en Caledonie quand le petit Ethan est ne'. I am also interested in dead languages, for example the Hettitians in Turkey were Indoeuropeans, 1300 BC, their word for water is watr.
Fascinating, and brother in Sanskrit is bratr. I have had some use this for as extra work in the evenings as a language teatcher. The different dialect variations here is a result of different colonisations here 700 years ago in the river valleys and isolation, no roads, only boats. I really like to understand languages, I am sorry that I don't understand Sami, I use to watch the Sami news on TV. I am the official flykiller at work, and I have a Latin sentence on my flyswatter, Nunc musca mortem occumberet, Now the fly meets a violent death. I try to find funny things in everything.

William Clauson

In the sixties I liked an artist very much, his name was William Clauson. He sang Latin-american songs, I still like them very much and I saw him once in Kalix. One guy shouted cocoroco to him. One of the most beautiful songs I have ever heard is Evert Taube's Min älskling du är som en ros. It is from a Scottish song by Robert Burns My love is a red red rose. I heard it with William Clauson in Spanish for more than 30 years ago on the radio and I have never heard it again until now. He has emigrated to America and I thought he was dead. I found it on youtube today, Mi amor tu es una rosa.

M.A. Numminen

Mauri Antero Numminen is a Finnish singer with a very special way of singing. He and his accordion companion Pedro Hietanen has been very poular in Sweden since the sixties. He sings covers of popular melodies in his very own way, he even sings texts by the German philosopher Wittgenstein. I use to sing like M.A. by myself; "Like a ball I come back to you" Gymmiboll (Rubberball).
As I said earlier, I worked two Summers, 1975 and 1976 at a camp for youth from Stockholm, it was hiking,waterskiing,paddling,bathing, activities that I like and it was well payed. One summer there was a boy who couldn't walk when we were hiking, I had to take him in my car and go to the hospital, they sent us to a bigger hospital to have an x-ray. I had the radio on in the car and suddenly we heard M.A. Numminen.
We sang Katten också, hon har vackra öökon (Cheepers creepers). The boy laughed,I think it was easier for him at that moment, because after the x-ray he was sent back to Stockholm in a taxi with a bed, 700 km. M.A. is the only one I know who plays with telephone catalogs.
He played at Skansen, Stockholm 2007, do I need to say that I was walking outside and heard him.

Spyaffair II, the Morjärvman

There are two Kalixcounties, upper and lower, and upper, Överkalix has been known lately for criminality. There are only 4000 inhabitants in the county, and very few policemen. The dialect is impossibe to understand for others than themselves, the lowerkalix dialect is very slow "A machinegun sounds paa paa paa paa, but much faster".
Morjärv, or Murderjärv as I sometimes call it is on the border between these two.
Many outlaws seem to like to live there, but 30 years ago it was known for the Morjärvman, Sanfrid Eriksson.
I had finished my military duty in March 1974 and hadn't any work yet, so I was skiing on the seaice among other things. One day when I had been out several hours, I had been skiing maybe 15 km, a man was waiting for me at home, he was talking Överkalixdialect. "Heej,my name is Sanfrit Eeriksson". He came from the Statistic Central Bureau and should interview me. I didn't know that he should come, and he had been waiting several hours. He interviewed me again later, it was a tooth investigation, so he called me every third month. It was fun to hear from him when I was working at a summercamp for Stockholm youth.
He lived in Morjärv and some years later he was arrested and locked in in the Policehouse in Haparanda for spying for Soviet.
The Security Police had followed him in 10 years, an informer lived in his house.
In his work he had driven on military roads that were forbidden for foreigners, he knew that they followed him, so he made an extra turn near the military buildings, they even helped him once when he had driven outside the road.
The big newspapers wrote about him, but it ended up with that he was reliesed, totally innocent. He got a lot of money for his suffering and traveled around the world. The only planes he had photographed were Russian, from a train outside Leningrad.

Robert Aschberg and Gert Fylking

Robert Aschberg and Gert Fylking has walked 1920 km from Ystad to Haparanda in three months and have collected over eight million SEK to the Cancer Fund. Here they are in Kukkola Rapids in order to bath in a smoke sauna. A smoke sauna has no windows or chimney, you make a fire which heats up stones, then you open the door and let the smoke come out, when you bath, you put water on the hot stones. Kukkola has a Sauna Academy with several different saunas, one is for 40 persons

The Enbom Affair

1952 there was a spyaffair in Sweden. A former reporter at the communist newspaper Norrskensflamman, Fritiof Enbom had was arrested for spying for Soviet. Six other persons were arrested after his arrest. Enbom and Hugo Gjersvold got lifetime in prison, Fingal Larsson six years. This is a big scandal, because Enbom has made it all up. Enbom said to the Police that Larsson had talked about secret defense buildings in a village in Norrbotten, but there weren't any there, they were built three years later. Gjersvold spent 10 years in prison for driving a truck to some fortresses. Their children are still fighting for their right.
1972 a TV serie was filmed about this, my dad had been in a radiotheater, so he was asked if he could play Enbom. He worked at the sawmill, so he said no. The role was given to Helge Skoog, today the funniest master of improvisation in Sweden. My mum and I was in the film. I was there one day, it was a political meeting, and my relatives Thores Trio was playing.
They cut my hair, and the next time I was asked to go there, I didn't want to because the hair had grown out. I got some pictures from the film from Bror, a guy from the film that I met several years later when we studied together. He used to notice what I said and write in the schoolpaper. I had to tell him not to.

Wikipedia:
http://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fritiof_Enbom

Cornelis Vreesvijk

It was 1965 and I was with my dad at a Parlament election meeting in Kalix. The partyleader C H Hermansson was there and he had Cornelis Vreesvijk with him. Cornelis was 28 years old, had come to Sweden when he was 12. He was very famous for his texts and how he lived. Some people didn't like a fat Dutchman who drank and sung texts like The hen Agda, which was about a rooster who picked off Agda's feathers because he wanted to have her naked. Cornelis sung his songs in the meeting. Hermansson has said later that they were on tour all over the country, and once Cornelis disappeared in Umeå and showed up in Gothenburg. He had always problems with taxes, authorities and once he took home two women who was men when he examined them closer. He chased them out with a knife. He was prisoned for that. He was very respected in the end of his life, he died in cancer 50 years old. He never had money when he lived, but now his songs generate money, and a fund in his name gives money to an artist who has never got any prizes before and sings in Cornelis' spirit.

There are three national poets in Sweden, Bellman, Taube and Cornelis.

I am very glad that I was at that meeting 1965, but I didn't understand it at that time.

Karl-Göran Välivaara

I have just read in http://www.aftonbladet.se/ about Karl-Göran Välivaara. He is a politician, Christ Democrat from Haparanda. He has said in a speech in Gällivare that Hitler did something good when he built the roads in Germany, but it went bad for some people. they asked him who, and he said the jews. He is a very religious man, laestadian. The laestadians don't accept women as priests, gaymarriages, TV, dancing, movies, birthcontrol. I shall write more about that later, it has connection to my own ancestors too.

I wrote a fairytale about politics in Haparanda many years ago, where I called Välivaara (KDS) for Kådis-Kalle, Condom-Charlie. Haparandabladet thought it was to much so they called him Church-Charlie instead.

The Sociology Professor

When I was 11 years old, the sawmill in my village was closing and the people left for southern Sweden. There were massive protests against this, and it was known all over the country, even the Prime Minister, Erlander, visited the village. The workers were either communists or social democrats. I remember how shocked a British woman was when she visited my school and asked if we know the name of a British newspaper, I think she was thinking about the Times. I said Daily Worker, the communist paper. I had never heard about the Times. This was the situation when a sociology student named Åke came to the village.

He was writing a sociology study about the village to become doctor of sociology.
He interviewed the workers, lived with them and ate with them, he was in our home too.

It resulted in a book which was used as literature in sociology studies, I read it myself when i studied sociology for 20 points. I was an expert on that book, and other students started with common sauna-bathing after reading it. The names were made up in the book, but I knew which persons it was about.

Some years ago, Åke wrote a new book where he wrote the story of how he had done when he studied my village, and wrote the actual names as well. He is now a retired professor. He wrote that he had bought two jackets in a worker clothing store and shaved of his moustache, he ate sloppy and walked with big steps to blend in. He called the leader for the communists a 'communist bigshot'. They had become friends when he wrote the book and he had never thought that he could become friend with a communist.

I called Henry, the communist and told him about what Åke had written, and he bought a book. After that I sent a letter to Åke and was critical, I didn't like that people that is still alive are mentioned in a book without being asked for their consent.

The professor

I mentioned earlier the professor I met in the military tent. I noticed him at once because he had tweedknickers when we signed in. Someone said that he was a chemistry professor from Uppsala, I keep the name for myself, he is still with us. He was boss in the University for our commanding officer, a lieutenant. I remember him because was laying in the tent and singing an underbelt version of Tivedshambo by Stikkan Andersson, ABBA's manager. I know the text, but If I write it somebody might be offended. When the Nobel Prize was given one year, I saw his name, he is member of the Royal Academy of Science. What I want to say with this is that the military repetition weeks makes boys of men. We are all the same no matter what we do in the civilian life as soon as we wear the uniform, all social roles disappear.

Stockholm syndrome

I was in the military in August 1973, the old king Gustaf VI Adolf was lying on his death bed in Helsingborg. A criminal, Janne Olsson took three bankemployees hostage and locked himself in with them in a bank vault at Norrmalmstorg, Stockholm. After some time, he ordered the Police to bring Clark Olofsson to the vault. Clark is Sweden's most known criminal, he has been in the press since 1964 when he was chased all over Sweden for the murder of a guard. His partner in crime, Gunnar Norgren, shot him when they where discovered.

There were three hostages, two women and one man. The women sympathizised with Janne and Clark and that was called the Stockholm syndrome after that. The men spent a long time in prison after that, Janne was here in the county in an open prison, met a woman, and started a pigfarm in south Sweden, emigrated to Thailand and is now back in Sweden. Clark emigrated to Belgium, changed name, has had a charterboat in the Caribbean an is now locked up again for smuggling heroin.

1977 I was called in for a military exercise at the Arctic Circle for three weeks in February. They always had their meetings when it was the coldest time of the year, -40, in a tent with wet firewood, bad clothes and only reindeer skins and pinebranches on the ground. I had never frozen that much before, i went home during the weekend and took my feather sleepingbag.

I say this because I met the male hostage from the vault there in the tent, he wasn't feeling well.

I met also a professor who was involved in the Nobel Prize in the tent, but more about him later.

Björn Afzelius

40 years ago there were a lot of groups who played progressive music, 'progg' in Swedish.
One of those bands was Hoola Bandoola Band. The name comes from an old Donald Duck film.
Donald is on picnic and has food on a blanket, the ants see it and calls the others. 'Hoolabandoola, hoolabandola!'. Donald loses the fight of course.
The leading members in the band was Björn Afzelius and Mikael Wiehe. Mikael plays in the neighbourhood this summer with Stefan Nilsson. Björn smoked very much so he died of cancer.
Their songs are very pleasant to listen to, I was on a Björn Afzelius concert here, I liked it very much, and our daughters have the same name too, just the spelling differs.

Bengt Pohjanen

I have written about Bengt Pohjanen in the local newspaper several times the last month. The reason for that is that he is celebrating the old fennomans. A fennoman is a finnish nationalist who wants to wipe out everything that isn't Finnish and also integrate the Finnish speaking part of Sweden, Tornevalley into Finland. He has written that he wants to blow away the statue of the founder of The Peoples Highschool in Övertorneå, De Vylder, and replace it with the fennoman Wanhainen. De Vylder's son is 95 and has been very upset about this. Pohjanen has also said that that 'the devil has come to Meänmaa', Our Land in Tornevalleyfinnish, he means De Vylder. Now he has appologized in Haparandabladet.

I have written more that haven't been published yet, I have suggested a Pohjanen musical with songs like 'I wanna be like you', 'Don't cry for me' and 'Pajala, Pajala'.

He has been crying over Wanhainen's grave in Övertorneå. I have also written a fairytale about an owl whitch makes fun of him and his parents.

Stefan Nilsson

When I was 15, my cousin had played in pop bands in several years, one day he came to us with two new bandmembers from Kukasjärvi, Tornevalley. One of them, Stefan Nilsson, 13 years, was fantastic on piano and organ. Now he is one of the best composers of film music in the world.

He has written music to Bergman films, and one of my favourite films, "As it is in heaven" was filmed here in Norrbotten, it was Oscar nominated. Gabriella's song performed by the best singer in Sweden in my opinion is a very beautiful song. Helen will be performing on Broadway in the nearest future in Björn and Benny's musical Kristina.

I think you can see a line in my writing now, I write about artists I have met or seen live

ABBA

In the sixties I liked several bands, for example Hep Stars, two of the members were Svenne Hedlund and Benny Andersson, they had a hit with 'Cadillac'. "My baby drew up with a brand new Cadillac". Svenne had scoliosis, a hunchback, so once a guy shouted to him " Take off the rucksack!" All girls had a poster of him on the wall.

An other band was Hootenanny Singers with Hansi Schwartz and Björn Ulvaeus, they sang 'Gabrielle wipe your tears'. Benny and Björn formed a new band with their girlfriends, they called themselves Fästfolket, the Couples, but changed name after a while and used their initials Annifrid, Benny, Agnetha, Björn. ABBA.

I was in the Military in 1973, and the first day there, there was a guy who said that he would leave because he was going to play with ABBA. In Midsummer that year I went to a 'Festival mountain' about 120 km from home, Brännaberget, I used to go dancing every weekend.

ABBA played there, I stood and listened for a while, then I left, 'only playback' I thought, the girls in the dancehall were more attractive.

In 1974, ABBA won the Eurovision Song Contest and were world famous.

Välkommen, Welcome

Välkommen till min blogg, jag kommer att skriva resten av det här inlägget på engelska så att mina vänner overseas förstår.

Welcome to my blog, I live in a region in north Sweden that is quite unknown in the south Sweden, and most likely in the rest of the world, Torne Valley is an exciting mix between Swedish, Finnish and Lappish. There is a week here in the fall when the workers on the farms was allowed to seek new jobs in the old days, it's called Römppäviikko in Tornevalleyfinnish, Rumpvecka in Swedish, Ass-week in English. This week, they found new lovers.

It is more men than women here, the girls move and the boys stay and hunt and fish and drive snowmobile. One year a group of British women came to the week, it is still celebrated, and one of them got the question if she knows how it is like here. She answered that she had read Jean M. Auel's book about the Neanderthals, so she knows how it is.

There is a book by Mikael Niemi, Popularmusic, that describes the region, it also gives me memories from my childhood.

I will tell you about interesting people and stories from my life in the blog.

I am engaged in the local debate by writing anonymus texts in the local newspaper under different signatures, for the moment it is Ummikko, it is a name that Finnish speaking people give Swedes who can't speak Finnish. I don't like the name Ummikko at all, but I use it of the same reason an afroamerican can call himself nigger.

In Haparandabladet a famous Swedish author, Bengt Pohjanen has written about bad Swedish Police, Customs, School, Church, in several years, he attacs people who has been dead in 50 years and their children, so I write songs, limericks, a fairytale about him. He doesn' t like it.

More about that later.

One year the Social Democrats had no working class flags or songs at First May.

I didn't like it, so I wrote a song that they could use next time, it was in Swedish, but the meaning was like this; Working class Day we give a shit, The songs are heard a little bit.

This region is very beautiful, friendly people and I hope that I can give a good picture of it so people want to visit here.

I will also tell you about a Gypsy family here who are known as the most dysfunctional family in Sweden, some of them are my friends.

That's all for now folks