Tuesday, November 9th, 2010: Dental care by the seat of your pants in Malmö and Helsingborg

What I think:

I've been to the dentist a few times over the past couple of months. Apparently there are spaces between my gums and teeth in which bacteria are starting to form, which could cause me grief a bit later on in life; the grief being that I could be toothless if I'm not ultra-careful about keeping everything spotless in my gaping cake-hole.

I've learned a few tooth/dentist-related Swedish words during my time here, which I'd like to share with you now.

In Swedish (bear with me on this):

- Tooth is tand; a direct translation.

- Dentist is tandläkare, which is a compound word, consisting of tand (tooth) and läkare (doctor). So the direct translation of tandläkare is tooth doctor. So a dentist, in Swedish, is a tooth doctor. Cute, huh?

- Gums is my favourite inside-your-mouth word. In Swedish it's tandkött. Another compound word, this one consists of tand (tooth), as you've already learned, and kött (pronounced kind of like "should", but you replace the last consonant sound ["ld"] with a "t". This means meat or flesh.). So the direct translation of tandkött is tooth meat. So gums, in Swedish, are tooth meat. Isn't that adorable? Bless.

- Tartar may taste nice on fish, but apparently it's nasty on the teeth. In Swedish, it's known as tandsten, which translates to tooth stone, which, unless you're Keith Richard [Hi Keith!], is really not as glamorous as it sounds.

- "Open wide". "Gapa" is what a Swedish dentist (or a sadistic dental hygienist, apparently) says when he (or, more commonly, she) says when they can't quite reach the tooth containing the nerve that will cause you the most agonising (US/CAN: agonizing) misery. Interestingly - and etymologically - the English word "gape" (as in "my gaping cake-hole") comes directly from the Old Norse word "gapa", meaning "to open the mouth".

There you go. You learned something new today. Unless you're Swedish, in which case: Håll käften.

So anyway, my four - no five - visits to the sadistic Swedish dental hygienist cost me around 3,000 kronor (this is, at the time of writing, about £278.50 / US$446.20 / CAN$447.65 / €322.70 / 2,063,673 Zambian Kwacha).

I guess this isn't too bad, considering all the torture you get for your money, but since other healthcare is so greatly subsidised (US/CAN: subsidized) here, one would have thought it would be substantially less. Ah well...

And now for a not-so-smooth segue. I was on my way to one of my band's [CSI: Helsingborg's] notorious Pissed Rehearsals in Helsingborg a couple of weeks ago, umm, after having brushed my teeth.

When I got off the bus and headed for the platform, I noticed that just about all of the bicycles parked near the platform had these bright pink seat covers on them.

You see, over the past year or so (possibly longer; I'm not normally terribly observant), someone came up with the clever advertising (US/CAN: advertising - ha, gotcha) idea of printing up logos and/or messages on pre-made bike seat covers and putting them over as many bicycles as they could find.

This is actually quite ingenious, as many Swedish cyclists normally use plastic carrier bags as covers to keep their seats dry when the weather really sucks (which is usually about 342 days a year) and - regardless of the message of who's selling what - would probably appreciate having this little cycling accessory given to them free of charge.

[Unless, of course, it was provided by the Sverigedemokraterna (The Sweden Democrats), in which case 5.7% would hang it on their walls, about 54.3% would burn it, a few would actually use it, and the rest wouldn't be sure whether they should sit on it or not. Oh yeah, some would sell it on e-Bay.*]

But I'm into advertising, and not politics, so I thought I'd just check out which company was splashing out on this particular benevolent gesture. When I approached the nearest seat, here's what I saw:The Skåne region's "dental health" authority is advertising on these things. What?

(By the way, Skåne is the county or province (whatever) in the southwesternmost part of Sweden.)

The large writing (roughly translated) means "Your smile looked after.". The bit in the black speech balloon means "Healthy dental care - now for everyone!". The bit at the bottom is this website ->

Now, Malmö is not a huge city; certainly not by American, Canadian, British, Australian, French, Spanish, German, Irish, Italian, (... etc... for ages...) Peruvian, Turkish, Brazilian, or even Swedish standards, but there are a lot of cyclists here; that is if you look at bikes per capita, and the number of those who actually use them regularly.

I looked over at (one of) the main cycle park area(s), and just had to go halfway across the bridge to share this with you:That's a lot of dental care encouragement, wouldn't you say?

Then glancing back at the other (main) end of the station:

And there's a bit across the bridge over the canal:Amazing.

So. I caught the train to Helsingborg, and was walking to the Charles Dickens Pub to meet guitarist CSI: Nils for our usual pre-Pissed Rehearsal piss-up, and I realised that the tooth-care-advert fairies had hit Helsingborg as well (Helsingborg is also in Skåne):I hadn't left Helsingborg's train station through the bicycle parking area, but it looked as though a deed had definitely been done there too.

A couple more bits of evidence:

So, apparently, the dental care authority of Skåne had spent loads of money advertising the fact that people in the southwest of Sweden should visit their dentists, as if this was a radically new idea.

Oh, by the way, when I was in Paris last month, I was at this place and went out for a smoke, and there was some guy selling funky-flashy glasses. I had to try them on...I didn't buy any, and the guy selling was a bit annoyed, but this guy did...
... and the funky-flashy glasses sales guy was happy again. That's him to the left of the guy wearing (two pairs! Ha-ha! of ) the funky-flashy glasses.

Oh, how we laughed, etc.

Anyway, as I was saying, I wonder how much money was spent on producing and distributing those glasses - no, seat covers - in Skåne. Most Swedes that I've met are well aware of the existence of dentists, and most actually go through the ritual torture that that awareness entails; it's pretty much a part of being Swedish.

So why spend so much money on this silly campaign? Can't they use the money for the research and development of more efficient and painful torture devices? It's all very futile, it's ridiculous, it's costly, and it's time that the Swedish government did something about it. That's what I think.

[*Based on figures I made up, for the most part.]

Wednesday, June 23rd, 2010: Top Toilet Tips: Pubs in Malmö - Part One: The Pickwick Pub

What I think:

A wise man once said: "Time flies like an arrow, and fruit flies like a banana."

With those words, and following the great success of my Top Toilet Tips for pubs in Helsingborg*, I start my first in the series of Top Toilets Tips for pubs in Malmö.

But first, I've got to show you something I saw on the platform at Malmö station yesterday:

The smoking area

Cool, huh?

OK, off we go to The Pickwick Pub...

Pickwick's is located on the corner of Malmborgsgatan and Stadt Hamburgsgatan. During the summer (which usually lasts for about eleven days here in Sweden), it's nice to sit outside with your beer, where you catch some cool northern rays and chain-smoke yourself to death.

It's the pub I go to most in Malmö, as the staff are friendly and attentive, and they're all English-speaking (there's a Swedish girl there, but her English is really good). OK, so that's not necessarily the best reason to go to a pub in Sweden, but the place does seem to attract a fair number of expats, which means that you can actually find people there drinking during the week - generally a big no-no in Swedish culture.

Apparently it's a good place to work as well; although the staff seem to be mostly in their 20's or 30's, they've all been working there since about 1948 [citation needed].

The interior is done up in a very English-pub-like way, with plenty of dark wood, knick-knacks, and upholstered seating. They've got a very good selection of ales, and some Czech and German lagers (I think they might have some Swedish shite as well, in case you have no sense of taste).

When you come in, there's seating directly in front of you, with the bar on the left. There are actually two entrance doors, but I'm referring to the main one on the corner, as the other one is closed for all but the eleven days of summer in Sweden.

Look left again, and you'll see another seating area, referred to by staff as "The Library". This is probably because there are some books there:Also to your left (before the library), there's a dart board. Next to it, there's a chalk board, on which you can either keep scores, or write important messages for the next players. Below, Jenni tells us that she's best [citation needed]. One can only wonder at what... Oh, actually, she does a pretty mean palm-reading; I know that for sure.So now it's off to the toilets. If you enter the pub and go straight through, passing the bar (and more seating) on your left, and the previously-mentioned seating on your right, you come to a doorway with a helpful sign:In the photo above, you can see the sunlight coming in from the right, through the pub's second entrance (which is currently open - Yay, Summer!).

Turning left, as instructed by the helpful sign, you've got a little corridor leading to the stairway to the toilets:Once through the double doors, and turning left, you're at the top of the stairs, over which stands a copy of the Tin Man from The Wizard of Oz. Just joking, kids; it's called a suit of armour (US/CAN: armor):Quite daunting, isn't it? Don't pee yourselves now; keep up with me here...

Finally, turning left at the bottom of the stairs, you'll find the doors to the toilets.You can probably guess that the one on the left is the Ladies', but the doors aren't always open like that, so I thought I'd point it out.

I'm guessing that the doors are left open when the pub opens because the staff had just washed the floors, and want to allow air through to allow them to dry quicker... but it could also be (partly at least) because these places smell bad, and they want to keep them aired out for as long as possible.

Now, I know that pub toilets are generally not world-reknowned award-winning areas of nose-pleasing, aromatic Gardens of Eden, but these ones can get pretty nasty, by any standard. I don't know whether it's partly because they're under ground - and that dampness could be part of the equation - but... well, at times, it's an experience.

Of course, my only experience comes only from my olfactory observations of the Gents' (US/CAN: Men's Room) , so ladies, I can't say for sure what awaits you on the other side of the wall. Just bring a small - yet stylish - nose plug, just in case.

Another gripe I have is with the hand dryer. What is it with these things? It's 2010, for crying out load (and stamping feet, screaming "It's soooo not fair!!!"). A little bit more than a gentle breeze, please?
Having said all this, there is a certain aesthetic charm here as well. The urinals (US/CAN: urinals, but pronounced differently) are good, solid, old-fashioned pieces of work. Crafted in Stoke-on-Trent (like one of the bar staff), even the name of these masterpieces of yesteryear are an eternal testimony to the pleasures of weeknight drinking in a society in which it is frowned upon: ADAMANT.

Even though I don't give it top marks, mainly due to its odourificiousness (yeah, I know it's not a word, shut up) and the pathetic hand dryer, at least the stalls (not shown in these photos, sorry) are usually relatively clean and usually have toilet paper. And the toilets actually work (although at least one is missing the little knobby thing that you pull on to flush).

Toilet stuff aside, The Pickwick Pub has a really fun (and free) Quiz Night every Wednesday evening at 8:30 p.m. (SWE: 20:30), the beer is good - and there's a wide selection of it, and the staff are absolute diamonds. Oh yeah, and they serve some tasty, and good-value, meals as well.

But really, those pathetic hand dryer things - the ones that barely work - should be banned, and it's time that the Swedish government did something about it. That's what I think.

*Top Toilet Tips for pubs in Helsingborg

Part One: Charles Dickens

Part Two: Hamnkrogen

Part Three: Bishops Arms

Part Four: PL13