Yes, I know this is not Sweden. I just wanted to get your attention by starting with the best shot first. I guess I was a bit more agile then, ready to lie down on the ground for a good viewpoint. This is a good example, at dawn on 1 January 1974 during our long trip back to New Zealand. Our one and a half year old son was very obliging.
My first real camera was bought, duty free, as we headed off for our big “OE”. I loved it, an Asahi Pentax Spotmatic. I couldn’t afford additional lenses so everything over the next few years was shot with the standard 50 mm. We lived for almost 4 years in a suburb just north of Stockholm, Hägernäs, in this huge block of apartments.
For a New Zealander used to the terrible urban sprawl in our cities, every dwelling with its own little patch of land, it was a surprise to see how the very high-density housing could create a very rural feel. There were great walks through the nearby fields, even in early winter like that shot. When spring and summer came round, the colours could be glorious:
Just before we left Sweden I had the chance to go tramping, way north of the Arctic Circle in Lapland, walking the famous ‘Kungsleden’. My three companions shown here were Klaus and Gunnar (colleagues from work), plus Hans-Evert (the partner of my Swedish teacher). This next shot really captures the mood of the trip: occasional bitterly cold days walking for hours along a glaciated valley, up over a pass and then another long lakeside walk. (The next day could be 20°.)
I was working a research institute and just to prove it here I am, pipe and all! The diagrams on the blackboard are mine, but I don’t think I was responsible for the (totally irrelevant) Einstein equation.
Konstigt nog, sitta lite språket kvar! Fast det går väldigt trögt, samt det sägs att det låta mycket gammaldags. Jag prata ’70-talet Stockholms dialekt. Men det går.