Sweden - Nina and Andre's Wedding

"I haven't spoken to my wife in years. I didn't want to interrupt her."

As I pan across my lounge room, finding focus on the angry sky outside, I find that I am half blinded and half deafened, by the flashes of lightening and window-rattling volleys of thunder attacking my 15th floor apartment. It is a surprising and remarkable spectacle, with lightening going more horizontal than vertical. I am sitting on the cool marble floor of my temporary Singapore home, late on a Sunday morning. Breakfast is a sumptuous sugar rush from my wholemeal toast smothered in Swedish Honey (Svensk Honung), washed down with sips of strong, hot, milky tea from my green coffee mug.

In this electrified, sugary haze, I am inspired (finally) to write about the equally sumptuous, sweet and surprising, Swedish wedding of my dear friends Nina and Andre. Like this intrepid couple, Sweden was graceful and beautiful, generous and welcoming. I can’t wait to go back…

I have an IKEA

I, like most other people I know, had my own vision of what Swedes and Sweden would be like. But I thought I would wait until I got there and see for myself before coming to any conclusions. Here are my completely accurate and non-stereotypic observations:

• All Swedes are tall, blonde, blue-eyed, attractive, and wear woolly hats in the winter
• By nature they are shy, reserved, serious, industrious, and find it hard to laugh at themselves
• Swedes are usually punctual, honest, reliable, and clean, they brush their teeth religiously, and are very law-abiding - in fact, I understand Swedes will get soaked to the skin rather than cross on a red walk light even when the streets are empty
• Swedes are very cautious and rarely do anything on impulse (sneezing may be an exception). Take a simple matter like buying cheese - I saw a guy try at least ten different sorts of cheeses with intense deliberation, before finally deciding to buy twenty grams of Brie
• A male Swede is quite unlike most European men. Anything a housewife can do, he can do better – from cooking to sewing on buttons. In fact, everything in the home seems to be shared
• Most Swedes are fitness fanatics and seem to spend their weekends running through the nearest forest or sailing the nearest fjord or cycling up and down the nearest mountain. With their health in mind, they have also seem to have given up smoking, sugar, drinking coffee in the evenings and going to bed after 10 o’clock (wedding parties excluded of course)

Yes I am exaggerating, but only slightly (the cheese buying and the sewing & housework things were true, and they do wear woolly hats). But mostly they were just like other Europeans, and as a case in point, (forgive me for jumping ahead slightly), I have to tell you about the end of the wedding dinner: there I was, sitting outside in the freezing midnight air with a wonderful group of ‘elders’, some in traditional Norwegian garb, with a generous glass of single-malt whiskey in one hand and a long, smooth Cuban cigar in the other. Even with very little common language, and even though my smoking skills are rudimentary at best, I found myself laughing and singing, sipping and puffing, and smiling almost painfully wide; these people were as warm and generous and open and funny as anyone I had met anywhere and if I could have only felt my fingers and toes at the time, I would have been the happiest man in Sweden that night - after the groom of course.

I must say, before I go any further, that it must have been a logistical nightmare for the family; getting people from all over the globe to fly in on the right day; securing them the only hotel rooms left in this part of Sweden; organising the Icelandic Michelin Star Chef to come and cook on the night; designing, translating and printing off menus and invites in two languages; having the bridesmaids from four countries get their own dresses in vaguely the right shade of pink; getting Andre and his best boys into suits; getting everyone to write their speeches and songs; and having me (the Toastmaster), know how it was all going to be put together and by whom. This mostly happened thanks to Nina’s Dad, Kai and his determined efforts - Kai had written up the whole wedding into a spreadsheet with tasks, dates, locations, start and finish times and the people responsible for each task. I’m sure Nina thought this was organising overkill, but for me, since I had some 23 speeches and 7 food courses to announce over 6 hours, I welcomed the military order of things.

It is testimony to Nina and Andre that everyone did turn up on time (except Nina at the church, obviously), everything did go well and everyone (except maybe one unhappy person, to be mentioned later), had a fantastic time. Love, in that precise, organised, Swedish sort of way, really was in the air…

But I am way ahead of myself; meanwhile back to the Wedding…

Getting there
I had already spent a planning weekend prior to the wedding with Nina & Andre and Nina’s parents at the family Summer House near Gothenburg, so I knew the lie of the land; I had seen the flower arrangements, help design the menu, survived a Hitchcock-like picket line of angry black ravens at the church, survived the parents (always a bit tricky), and worked out how to get into and out of my bed in the Summer House roof space (the hardest part of the wedding weekend).

My own journey started in London, with several of the wedding party. Since we are all cheapskates when it comes to flying in the UK, it was the usual 4:00am wake up at Nina & Andre’s, then a host of phone calls to the Iranian party (I use the word ‘party’ advisedly here – they do love to have fun), then a long, dark dash to the airport by mini cab, and after the usual McDonalds breakfast of egg-n-bacon muffins and bad coffee, you could find us all sleeping soundly in the tight Ryan Air 737-300 seats, heading to Gothenburg.

Sweden
I spent my first night in Sweden with Stina in a sort of plutonic love nest. To do the honour of being co-toastmaster justice, Stina wanted us to share the whole holistic moment together, going through her speech, my speeches and the plans for the day, showing me her wonderful dress and picking out which tie and cufflinks I should wear, and so on. So after much cold beer, much agreement on what we were doing, some dodgy McDonald’s burgers and a fashion show, we finally got some sleep in a small dark room off the main strip.

Röd Hus

The next morning we were picked up by Nina and Andre and I was taken to the Offenguard Summer House at Kolhättan, a ‘Red House’. In Sweden, wooden architecture is considered to be an important part of Swedish identity – the concept of the ‘Red House with White Corners’. To me, the red house has similarities to Roman architecture with low roof angles and its symmetrical design. Everywhere we went in Sweden, we saw these lovely Swedish wooden red cottages. You see other colours on more modern houses (there were some unpleasant grey ones nearby the Summer House), but they seem out of place somehow and everyone seemed to frown upon them – being traditionalists here in Sweden. In the 17th century in Sweden it was a sign of wealth and status to own one of these houses since bricks, common in other European countries, were very rare at the time. I did some research and found out that the red paint originates from a small region called Falun, based on a pigment which was a by-product from the Copper mines there. Although the mines have been closed for decades, there is still enough pigment stockpiled for centuries of red houses.

The Offenguard Summer house was one of these traditional red houses, poised perfectly on a granite outcrop, encircled by wide, wooden decking. Inside, the design was very modern in appearance, very white (they even use milk to seal the untreated pine boards), and quite minimal, although very well laid out and extremely comfortable. The house looks down on a wide channel of grey, choppy North Sea water, held in place by the lush green hills on the opposite side, and bisected by the large yellow car ferry. The view from my wooden seat on the decking outside was very soothing and calming, especially in the late afternoon when the low sun warmed my back in the cold air as I sat and read my book. As an admirer of sailing boats, the frequent passing of the elegant white and blue Malo boats through the channel was also an added delight, just for me. I have to say, Nina’s parents, Katarina and Kai were perfect hosts, and I could do nothing but love this place.

Gothenburg

The next day was spent in Gothenburg city where we caught up with rest of the wedding party guests – this pretty University town, bisected by the Göta River, is lovely; clean and bright, with excellent coffee and tall, pointy architecture hedging long straight boulevards towards large open squares. It was full of those gorgeous blond, blue-eyed Swedish women in short skirts and pony-tails I’d read about, and after a long walk around and a great lunch of crayfish and buttered brown bread with cold beer, I bought some local Aquavit glasses and Crayfish forks to remind me of the day.

Nösunds Värdshus & Orangeri

The next afternoon we all went out for a tour of the nearby town for some pizza and a few ciders.

Later that afternoon, Andre, Walter V, Paul and I moved to this small family hotel (I never did find any Orangeri), located about one hour north of Göteborg, on the Swedish west coast archipelago. Later that night I found myself up at 2:00am sitting in the bar of the hotel, with Andre, Walter V, Paul and a few glasses of cold German beer, writing the speech introductions for 23 people and adding jokes to most of the major speeches for the next day. It was a quiet end to a great few days, surrounded by very merry people in a very merry mood. But eventuality I had to get Andre to his bed, so he could be up again the next morning to get him to the church on time.

The Wedding

My first task of the day was to get Andre up, dressed and to breakfast. But he still needed to pick the wedding waltz song. So, after a quick breakfast, still suffering from broken sleep and a mean hangover, we found ourselves down by the shore, with a car door open, singing and dancing to various CD’s, picking that special song.

Later, we were back at our room, standing around in dress shirts, ties, cufflinks, and our underwear. By the time the cleaners (also gorgeous tall blondes), came around to do the rooms, we decided it was easier to explain ourselves to their strange looks by getting our trousers on. After a glass of champagne or two to ease the nerves, it was on the bus, off to the church…

The beautiful wedding was held in the bright, upright and lightly decorated Summer Church in Ödsmål. Although a little late (only 20 minutes), Nina arrived by Bentley in full white splendour to an eager Andre at the end of the aisle. After Kai escorted her to the altar, Nina, framed by the pink entourage of her bridesmaids, took her place beside Andre who was flanked by his groomsmen in classic dark suits. They made an elegant, loving picture…

Very bravely if you ask me, Andre had rehearsed his pronunciation over the last few weeks, and recited his half of the required responses in perfect Swedish, balancing his umlauts flawlessly. After the usual compliment of vows, hymns, “Ya’s” and “I do’s” they exchanged their hand-picked Greek wedding rings and were pronounced “Maka och Fru!” to us all. As they kissed, camera’s flashed, some people clapped, while other people dabbed tears from their eyes. It was a lovely, romantic moment that seemed the perfect result of their equally romantic engagement in Venice the year before…

Stina and I then leapt into action, quickly ensuring all the cold champagne was waiting outside, the bubble blowers were handed out for their exit, and we set out to make sure everyone enjoyed themselves until it was time to get back on the bus. After much champagne, photos in every pose and some rounding up of those Iranian’s having too much fun, we were back on the bus.

M/S Byfjorden

After a short bus ride to Byfjorden, we found ourselves on the windy docks, ready for a short jaunt down the coast on the good ship “M/S Byfjorden”, to the reception at Nösund. After a short delay to retrieve some forgotten documents, it was a very pleasant wind-in-your-hair ride down the coast. The drinks and finger food were very welcome, and I finally had time to sit and meet some of the people carrying out the speeches later in the evening.

The Wedding Dinner

I have to say, the menu was fantastic and the wine divine, so much so that I am forced to list the dishes here for prosperity – the Michelin Star Chef from Iceland outdid himself:

Menu:

• Grilled scallops in a pureed garlic and white wine sauce
• Homemade Nösund toast with crayfish tails in a smoked eel and red onion mayonnaise, with rainbow salmon caviar
• Västerbotten pie in a lemon and dill shell, served with rainbow salmon caviar and a marinated red onion relish
• West coast Sole filled with assorted shellfish, served with a vanilla-infused lobster sauce and new potatoes
• Grilled fillet of Venison in a thyme and port wine jus, served with Swedish gratin potatoes
• Raspberry yoghurt mousse topped with a dark and white chocolate fan, served with Bourbon vanilla foam
• Coffee, Tea, Baileys, Cognac

Wine:

• Pierr Sparr Alsace One, Alsace France
• Tarapacá Sauvignon Blanc, Chile
• Faustino VII, Rioja Spain

The evening started wonderfully; we had the grilled scallops on the terrace as the sun set; the champagne was flowing; I looked sharp in my London suit, shocking pink tie and Silver Italian Vespa cufflinks; I was sat opposite the gorgeously matching-pink Stina, and next to the equally lovely Merete (also in pink); I had written most of the speeches and jokes myself the night before so I wasn’t nervous, and everyone was in a happy, receptive mood; Stina and I had shown everyone to their tables and introduced the wedding parties and newlyweds to everyone, and I even had enforced ‘spacers’ between courses on my call sheet, for “toilet breaks and cigar business” as Kai notated them. We were very organised :)

Kiss! Kiss!

I loved the added customs in Swedish weddings – like most European weddings if people tap their wine glasses the couple have to kiss, but here, if you tap and also stomp your feet as well, they have to balance on their chairs and kiss. Harder as the evening wore on and the couple became a little unsteady. Then, in a throwback to more Viking times I imagine, if the groom leaves the room at any time, all the men in the room get a chance to kiss the bride until he returns (Nina really encouraged this manoeuvre during the night, shouting at us to run and quickly kiss her whenever Andre went out), and if the Bride leaves the room the reverse is true (unfortunately, Nina has a small bladder and so Andre had a better time of it). The word "love" was repeated all evening long, by every speaker. Being bathed in such an atmosphere was a wonderful experience. I will always think back to this wedding with emotion and nostalgia. It was a great way for them to begin a life together.

Speech! Speech!

Anyway, as I said, the evening started wonderfully, so full of promise: The first speech was presented as an old fashioned two-hander by Kai and Katrina. It was hilarious to watch Nina’s parents act out a conversation of the sort:

Kai: “Well Katrina, look at all the people here today, just for our little Nina”

Katrina: “She certainly has a lot of lovely friends”

Kai: “So what do you think about our Nina marrying this New Zealander?”

Katina: “Well Kai, he seems like a good fellow – why, should we be worried?”

And so on…

It had us all in stiches, as the very funny jokes were delivered in parent-corny fashion. Wonderful! It really set the relaxed and happy tone of the evening. Nina’s sister Anna delivered probably the funniest speech, made all the more impressive since she delivered it in Swedish and even the non-Swedish speakers like me were laughing :)

A speech too far…

By speech eight or nine I began to get grips with the people and the material. This was a good and responsive audience, and although my English jokes were pretty tame and corny, the parents and Norwegian and Swedish elders were grinning widely, and Nina’s mascara had begun to run down her rosy cheeks. We had sung several hilarious songs to the couple (oddly, all to the tune of “My bonny lies over the ocean”), and the lovely Stina and Merete were all smiles and encouraging nods. I was on a roll, what could go wrong?

As the laughter died down from the last speech, I stood up and called for the next speaker. It was then I noticed the full moon…

The room suddenly lost all colour and I was greeted by an arctic chill. Turning around to see what the problem was, the new speaker rose unhappily from her chair (if unhappy was a colour, this was a particularly dark shade of unhappiness), she gave me a look that could turn your bowels to ice water – the kind of look a can of insect-spray gives a fly. I didn’t know what had happened to the universe at this minute, but as my testicles ascended deep into protective tissue and my feet started to turn to the nearest exit, my instincts told me I was in deep trouble - the sort of trouble where the scars would be visible for weeks. My smiling, delusional mind told me I would be fine as long as she said nothing and just sat down. This protective silence enveloped me for just an instant, but ultimately I was done for. After a brief torrent of accusing abuse in front of everyone - to the effect of “you knew didn’t you, so you did this on purpose! How could you!?”, (this woman clearly had issues), and with me replying gently that it was obviously MY mistake, and would she like to just sit down and we’ll go on to the next speech, she eventually cursed my future children, turned back to the audience, then gave a short and somewhat muddled speech about Nina, correcting herself out loud whenever she made a mistake. When she finished her speech, stopping half-way through a random sentence, she came over to my table to give me that look of “your testicles are mine” (and not in a good way), then sat down, glaring at me for the rest of the wedding. Two people clapped (out of synch) in the silence.

[Insert long silence here...]

Smiling rather fearfully by now, and with a noticeable sheen of perspiration, I stood up and continued with the speech introductions. Worried about what the next speaker might say I was a little wary to say the least. But some fourteen speeches and five hours later, the dinner and speeches were over, I had completed my duties for the night and the live music and dancing was set to begin.

Avoiding the crowd and carrying a large alcoholic drink, I ventured out the back of the venue to take a breather and get some distance between me and the angry woman. It didn’t work. She had tracked me down (she really did have issues). Moments later, I had a manicured fingernail (Chanel Sheer Ballet Pink 145), thrust into my face and a bout of swearing and abuse more appropriate for a Hell’s Angels rally than a wedding reception. I was accused of all sorts of things (seems I am also responsible for Smallpox, Menopause, and that Asparagus pee smell), and I had to defend myself for half an hour before I eventually convinced the very unhappy woman and her sassy female entourage that I knew nothing about her “problem” (I found out later that it had to do with a break up with a boyfriend, so she was in no mood to give speeches about love and marriage), and that the speech list was actually given to me - I repeated it slowly “g-i-v-e-n” to me, repeating that I had no idea what her situation was. I had to show her my printed speech list, character references, pictures of my cat Cosmo, my Amnesty International Membership card and receipts of my donations to various charities, before she calmed down. But she still stormed off, looking unconvinced. With the full moon looking down at me, it took a good ten minutes to coax my happy face back from under the stairs.

After a few final sips of my drink, I rejoined the flock, everyone dancing and singing and having a wonderful time. As I mentioned, I had been up until 2am that morning writing speeches, so I was a little weary, but fun and laughter is infectious and I danced and laughed until the hotel cut us off around 1am. The evening finished with the ‘Polynaise’, not the healthy sandwich spread you might have thought of, but a sort of dancing human chain winding its way around the chairs and tables. At some point Merete grabbed my hand and I found myself whizzing through the various rooms and even the outside areas of the hotel until I eventually slipped from the chain and sat down with some of the elders. This is where I was offered a big Cuban and some 16 year old Lagavulin – and you know the rest of that happy story.

Eventually, after Stina rounded everyone up, I left my smoky refuge and joined the others for the cutting of the cake in the Atrium. At some time, between cream and chocolate fillings, the beautiful Lia and I got engaged (much to the dismay of the male waiters at the hotel). Obviously my pick-up line must have worked: “Let's get out of these wet clothes and into a dry martini” :) So as we slipped on our cardboard engagement ‘rings’ to formalise proceedings, we promised ourselves a life of love and happiness.

At 3:00am the hardiest of us were looking for a place for our party to continue (not easy to find in a quiet seaside town in the middle of nowhere), but Nina and Andre were given a luxury honeymoon suite around the coast a little: one of the Luftslottet rooms. So, armed with baskets of champagne, strawberries, glasses and nibbles from the hotel, we small band – we small, happy band – ambled our way around the coast, drunkenly shooshing ourselves whenever we passed an inhabited house, until we found this little cottage with sunken bathtub and king-sized bed. Hours later, after much out of tune singing, all the champagne and all the fruit and nibbles, we bid the happy couple goodnight and stumbled out into the emerging dawn. I found my room (it took some finding), as the sun was rising. After some tricky key turning, I found the inside of my room, and then found my bed (it also took some finding). Smiling a lot, I crashed like a fallen tree into the cool white sheets. I figured I would undress at some later point in the morning. Where were those lovely cleaning ladies when you need help getting your suit jacket off? Zzzzzzz

The day after the night before

A very generous 7 or 8 minutes later, I was awoken by the cleaning beauties, wondering when I was checking out. Looking dashing in my crumpled suit, in a sort of shabby-sheik sort of way, with my eyes closed (they refused to open) and those enticing pillow marks on my face, I held on to the door frame (for vertical support you understand), and replied that I would be leaving soon after breakfast, for which I am late so I must go and shower and change and eat breakfast, yes I must. I was making complete sense to myself, but not so much to them I imagine. They just giggled slightly (I checked, my fly was not undone), and said they would come back later to clean the room.

At some point I managed to let go of the door frame and managed to find the shower, and shave and re-dress myself without too much injury. By now, with my headache enthusiastically beating out the Rumba behind my eye sockets, my need for strong coffee won me over, and I headed very delicately to breakfast with dark glasses and mismatched socks. Coffee, banana cake and lots of aspirin and orange juice later, I was feeling almost sub-human. I was still talking as if I had a mouth full of pebbles, but at least I was talking. At some point, my eyes creaked open from behind my glasses and I noticed other people around me – the happy cheery couples with children who left the party very early and were noisy and in full spirits; the one or two young guys who hadn’t gone to bed yet but looked fine; and the rest of my own party who shuffled in with dark glasses, mismatched socks and a loud sighs as they sipped their first coffee. I knew their pain…

Eventually we rounded ourselves up, packed our things and headed to the summer house for official Coffee and Cake.

Coffee and cake at Kolhättan

I didn’t say much during the day, preferring my sunglasses to speak for me. My mouth was very occupied with coffee drinking. But the cakes were delicious, the coffee strong and plentiful, and the gorgeous Carolina and Lia (my new fiancé) were there in good spirits.

We spent the last day and a half in quiet seclusion, the happy couple, Kai, Katrina, Andre’s Mother and Sister, and me. We had dinner at one of the local pizza parlours, walked around the small town nearby and eventually parted our ways until Nina, Andre and I caught the late night flight ourselves and ended up back home in cold, grey London.

It seems a long time ago now, sitting in hothouse Singapore writing this, but the feelings, the love, and that weird brown Norwegian Cheese they have for breakfast (Gjetost), have all left an indelible mark on me that I will remember forever.

Trevlig resa!

Walter x