Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
eaten almost anything, even a plate of my grandmother's famous creamed ham and diced carrots, the only
dish in history to have been inspired by vomit. Late in the afternoon, a porter came along with a creaking
trolley carrying a coffee urn and snackstuffs, and everyone stirred to a kind of frisky wakefulness and
examined the fare keenly. I had twenty-four kroner of Swedish money, which I thought a handsome sum, but
it proved sufficient to buy just one hopelessly modest open-faced sandwich, like the bottom half of a
hamburger bun with a menopausal piece of lettuce and eight marble-sized meatballs on top of it. Eating in
Sweden is really just a series of heart-breaks.
I bought the sandwich and carefully peeled away the cellophane, but just as I lifted it to my mouth the
train lurched violently over some points, making the bottles clatter in the drinks trolley and causing all the
meatballs to jump off the bun, like sailors abandoning a burning ship. I watched with dismay as they hit the
floor and bounced to eight dusty oblivions.
I'd have scarcely thought it possible, but the lady in black found a look of even deeper contempt for me.
The schoolmaster skittishly slid his feet out of the way, lest a meatball come to rest against his glossy
brogues. Only the young Swede and the trolley attendant took a sympathetic interest and pointed helpfully
as I gathered up the meatballs and deposited them in the ashtray. This done, I nibbled bleakly on my piece
of lettuce and dry bun and dreamed of being almost anywhere else in the universe. Only another two and a
half hours to go, I told myself, and fixed the old lady with a hard stare that I hoped somehow conveyed to her
what pleasure, what deep and lasting pleasure, it would give me to haul her off her seat and push her out of
the window.
We reached Gothenburg just after six. Rain was belting down, drumming on the pavements and
coursing in torrents through the gutters. I sprinted across the open square outside the station, jacket over
head, dodging tramcars with split-second if largely inadvertent precision, skirted a large puddle, feinted
between two parked cars, head-faked a lamppost and two startled elderly shoppers (once I start running, I
can't stop myself from pretending I'm returning a kick-off for the Chicago Bears. It's a compulsion - a sort of
Tourette's syndrome of the feet), and darted breathless and sodden into the first hotel I came to.
I stood in the lobby, a vertical puddle, wiped the steam from my glasses with a corner of shirt tail and
realized with a touch of horror, as I hooked my glasses back around my ears, that this was much too grand a
place for me. It had potted palms and everything. For a moment I considered bolting, but I noticed that a
reptilian young reception clerk was watching me narrowly, as if he thought I might roll up a carpet and try to
carry it out under my arm, and I became instantly obstreperous. I was damned if some nineteen-year-old
pipsqueak with zits and a clip-on tie was going to make me feel loathsome. I marched to the front desk and
enquired the price of a single room for one night. He quoted me the sort of sum that would necessitate a trip
to the bank with a wheelbarrow if paid in cash.
'I see,' I said, trying to sound casual. 'I assume it has a private bath and colour TV?'
'Of course.'
'Free shower cap?'
'Yes, sir.'
'Assortment of complimentary bath gels and unguents in a little wicker basket by the sink?'
'Certainly, sir.'
'Sewing kit? Trouser press?'
'Yes, sir.'
'Hair dryer?'
'Yes, sir.'
I played my trump card. 'Magic-wipe disposable shoe sponge?'
'Yes, sir.'
Shit. I had been counting on his saying no to at least one of these so that I could issue a hollow guffaw
and depart shaking my head, but he did not and I had no choice but to slink away or sign in. I signed in.
The room was pleasant and business-like, but small, with a twenty-watt reading light - when will
Europeans learn that this is just not good enough? - a small TV, a clock radio, a good bath with a shower. I
tipped all the lotions from the bathroom into my rucksack, then tossed in the little wicker basket, too - well,
why not? - and went through the room harvesting matchbooks, stationery and all the other items that were
