Gotland greetings

[Bapopik at AOL.COM]

   Greetings from Visby, on the island of Gotland.  It's called "the town of roses and ruins."  I love this town.  The stone Viking (or, "Wiking" as some have said) markers with runic inscriptions are just what I love.  Just add a "no one has been able to decipher this" and I'm hooked.

OK Q8--Popular 7-11-type stores (found on highways) in Sweden use this name.

F-WORD--Advertised in the subway in Stockholm was "en film av Lukas Moodysson."  The film?  "Som Gjorde Fucking Amal."

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SWEDEN: THE SECRET FILES
WHAT THEY'D RATHER KEEP TO THEMSELVES
by Colin Moon
Today Press AB
26 pages, 1999(?)

   "Swedish English (Swenglish)" is on page 24.  An example is:
"Please take off your clothes and follow me to the whip room."
(Translation: "May I take your coat and accompany you to the VIP room.")

Pg. 4--Stockholm is inhabited by "zero eights," so called because of their telephone area codes.
Pg. 7--It also makes and exports Absolut vodka, which is rather ironic as the Swedish word for teetotaller is "absolutist."
Pg. 15--..."langom," meaning "just enough"...
Pg. 21--Swedish small talk.  Swedes call this "cold talk" or "dead chat" which more or less sums up their opinion of it.

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XENOPHOBE'S GUIDE TO THE SWEDES
by Peter Berlin
Oval Books, London
64 pages
First edition 1994, second edition 1999

Pg. 21--As the Swedish saying goes: "Like master. like dog."
Pg. 30--The cakes are covered with green marzipan, or sliced almonds ("toe-nails"), while the pastries have gobs of vanilla and strwaberry jam in the middle ("grandmother's cough").
Pg. 58--The Swedish Model has become the Swedish Muddle.