Driving to Sweden

The first few weeks in Germany I felt lost a good amount of the time. I was constantly looking at maps, asking people for directions, and I got pretty good at making quick U-turns. At the time it seemed I was the only one having this problem.

So I must admit to feeling some satisfaction when I see a native European have the same kind of trouble.

Last week I was at a seminar in Copenhagen then would be visiting with a company in Sweden the next day. Two guys from the company were at the seminar, and they were going to drive me the 2 hours to Sweden.

Their names were Mats and Martin, and they had just started with the company after finishing college. Martin was going to drive. Right away I could tell he had this endearing sort of ineptness about him. He seemed like the kind of guy who would lose his car in the parking garage, but would laugh about it.

Which was exactly how the trip started out.

We found the car though, which was actually the company minivan, which was a new experience for Martin. You don’t see too many minivans here (and then with an automatic transmission).

He tentatively put the van in gear and backed out of a space which was meant for something about half the van’s size. When we got to the gate to leave the garage, we needed a validated ticket to raise the gate. Martin had misunderstood where the free parking was. We had to pay – which meant going back to the payment machine. But by this time, there were already a half dozen cars backed up waiting to get out. He pressed the button at the gate to speak with someone.

“Do you know Danish?” I asked.

“If we speak Swedish, they can understand us. But we can’t usually understand them.”

“Do you know what she just said?”

“Actually, no”.

In the meantime, Mats had jumped out and validated the ticket. The whole thing had gotten Martin a bit flustered, because when we pulled out of the garage, he made a left turn into 3 lanes of oncoming traffic on a one-way street. In the blare of horns he froze. We got him to finally turn the van around, going up on the sidewalk.

Once Mats and I finally stopped laughing, Martin said, “Not a word of this tomorrow.”

Now, to really appreciate this, you have to imagine a Swede saying this in English, with the stereotypical melodic way the Swedish speak English. Think of the Swedish Chef from the Muppets show. Actually you can see him at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mbs64GvGgPU&mode=related&search=

There is also an “Enchefenizer”, which will take English and transform it into what the Chef would say. The amazing part is it is exactly how Martin was talking:

“Nut a vurd ooff thees tumurroo.”
(Not a word of this tomorrow)

“Iff unyune-a sev thees fun zeey veell nefer by unytheeng frum us.”
(If anyone saw this van they will never buy anything from us.)

A few moments later followed by, “I'm ell sveety noo” (I’m all sweaty now).

I was then laughing to the point of tears.

The initial wrong turn meant we got started in the wrong direction. After 40 minutes, 4 U-turns, and a stop at a gas station we still had not found our way out of Copenhagen and to the motorway.

“Thees is insune-a. Zeere-a ere-a nu seegns [signs] in Cupenhegee.”

And it really did seem that way. Finally I spotted a sign for the airport, which I knew was on our way to Sweden.

After driving a while on the motorway, Martin said, “I elveys vundered hoo sumeune-a cuoold dreefe-a zee vrung vey. Noo I knoo.”

Which then started another round of laughter.

About 30km from our destination, the motorway was closed due to an accident the day before. A truck carrying paint had overturned. We inched along in traffic on a secondary road. Our scheduled 2 hour trip was approaching three hours.

Mats pointed to the fuel indicator, now getting close to “E”.

“Zeey tuld me-a zee tunk ves fooll. It ves nut fooll.”

They kept apologizing to me, as if it was their fault we were stuck in traffic.

Eventually we made it to my hotel, without any further incidents (except for Martin giving up on parallel parking the van in front of the hotel after 3 attempts).

Later that night I ate dinner with their manager and 2 other guys. I had promised not to talk about the wrong way driving. So all I said was, “they seemed a little nervous and kept apologizing for the traffic. Oh, and we almost ran out of gas.”

They looked at each other and burst out laughing. Somehow I think this has happened before. Their manager smiled mischievously and said, “I’ll tell zeem zeere-a vere-a sume-a cumpleeents ebuoot zee dreefing.”