How to learn Swedish in 1000 difficult lessons

After a week of taking the ferry to the new offices, I feel so much more how the city of Stockholm is a city built on water, how the people of the city look to the water, that the city impresses most when approached from the water.

And then on Friday, it was even more apparent how Stockholm harbor is a grand highway. As we pushed off from the landing next to Gröna Lund, ahead of us the deadly and beautiful black-green water was a mad criss-crossing of ferries full of people making an early start on summer and going out to their summer homes on the islands of the archipelago. The enormous cruise ships to Finland, big as skyscrapers laid on end, were sliding into their spots to disgorge passengers and pick up new ones. Taxi boats skimming in and out and making their way to the sluice. A few of the tall ships from the 750th year anniversary of Stockholm were leaving at last, and the absurd reproduction of a Viking boat that is normally docked in front of the royal palace was whizzing along, incongruously without sails, a tiny motor boat tied behind it in such a way as to look like a put-upon child forced to keep up with its parent's swift gait.

The Swedish compound verb for the day is att åka på färjan. It means to go by ferry.

- by Francis S.