Four highlights in Gothenburg today:

1. Mikael Olsson's exhibition Södrakull Frösakull at the Hasselblad Foundation. Mikael gave a guided tour for a small group and it's a fine show. I am very much looking forward to the book.

2. Delicious lunch with generous printers Fälth & Hässler at the book fair.

3. Listening to Martina Lowden (above) interviewing Annelie Jordahl about the book telling the story of Ellen Key's love affairs. Lowden, of course, is the greatest genious of the three.

4. Buying the new Swedish Academy dictionnary of the Swedish language in two volumes.

I should possibly reverse the order here, placing #4 as #1 because of the much appreciated etymology included in the book of words..

Göteborg really makes me happy though. It's always refreshing, being from the Swedish eastcoast, to come to the westcoast and see all the different kinds of brick. Too few brick buildings in Stockholm if you ask me.

Eerie design hotels.

Here I am, a graphic designer at a design hotel, hating design.

Why is it that every time I walk down the corridor on my floor, at a certain spot, this ”sprinkling” kind of music is heard? The sound is triggered by people passing and it's like the sort of jingle that would be used inbetween the different entries of the Swedish heats of the Eurovision Song Contest, about when the artists stop and make funny faces to the camera, saying we-don't-really-take-this-so-seriously.

Also, for the first time ever I could use a desk in my room but it's been designed away and replaced by an unsteady round design table with three silly legs.

Ouverture

An enchanting soundtrack for walking the streets of Gothenburg towards the International Book Fair today would be the Ouverture to Leonard Bernstein's Candide. In fact, this should be the theme for my upcoming Italian adventure.

Drink me.

I am curious to see what coffee culture will be like in Italy where, I've been told, it's absolutely verboten to have a cappucino after morning hours.

Only recently I started drinking coffee regularly, at the advice of my good American (but not Oregonian) friend Douglas who a few years ago suggested I try latte macchiato. I have since been addicted to this sorry excuse for a regular coffee.

I realize I jumped on the coffee train very late and caffeine culture was way beyond its peak.

All the same, a latte macchiato, as we all know, is a bland version of a regular latte, already considered bland among coffee aficionados. Most cafés (in Stockholm) prepare it with a single shot of espresso and I'm ok with that even though quite often it gets way too strong for my delicate palate.

I like it bland. In Swedish we have a word for it: mescafé. (I'm afraid I would have to translate that one with pussy coffee.)

And in Sweden there is still big confusion concerning the definition of latte macchiato (as opposed to caffè macchiato or espresso macchiato). Quite a few times I've met the response "there is no such thing" or, worse, I've been offered the regular macchiato, strong as hell. Inferno.

Well it so happens the origin of this kind of coffee, of course, is Italian. It literally means maculate(d) milk. A few drops of coffee stains the innocent white milk.

Immaculate milk would be fun to order instead of a regular glass in a restaurant. That would be latte immacolato in Italian I suppose. Per favore.

Last time I visited Italy I wasn't really a coffee drinker. I am not expecting the Italian coffee culture to have changed one bit. Things you eat and drink seem, luckily, to stay the same in Italy.

However, I am not expecting good coffee - my style - either.

My favourite kind of coffee would be found at Stumptown in Portland, Oregon. (Incidentally, the main reason why I am writing this blog in English, is so that my Oregonian friends will be able to read it, bless their hearts if they do.)

Power, corruption and veline.

Only a few minutes into Videocracy by Erik Gandini I had the same feeling as I had a few minutes into Gomorra: I don't want to go to Italy anymore.

Why would anyone want to visit and support such a silly nation?

However, just like after leaving Gomorra, the sad feeling was soon gone. My romantic notion of ancient as well as contemporary Italy is too strong to seriously question my own going there.

Yet these films present a new image of what only a few decades ago was considered a much more innocent and sympathetic nation, albeit corrupt.

Even more disturbing than the corruption however is the poor choreography of the veline.

Why do so many Italian women covet the position as dancing hostesses in the tv-show Striscia la notizia? (I suppose any day now the new pair is to be announced, as this is done in September every year.)

Italian tv culture: puzzling.

Curiously, when watching Videocracy I kept thinking about a very different kind of movie: Brüno. They are both sad comedies, Videocracy less intentionally so. Gomorra doesn't make you laugh.

Leaving in less than a month.

Two pictures from my last (first) visit to the Sorrento peninsula and Capri in 2005. This was in November. The marble sculptures at the Villa Cimbrone were wrapped in plastic and the Mediterranean was completely swimmable still. I expect October to be even more of everything.