Tag: Stockholm Page 4 of 9

Stockholm Writers Festival #SWF18

On April 15, 2018

I write this as I am sitting here sipping at my first cup of morning coffee. Actually it’s already after noon and I just got up. My body aches. My eyes are fuzzy. My throat hurts and my voice is hoarse. No, I am not sick. I’ve spent the last couple of days participating in the Stockholm Writers Festival, the first ever writers festival for writers of English to be held here in Stockholm and I am so energized! (despite waking up this morning feeling like I’ve been tossed around in a tumble-dryer)

Who’s ready for a Writers Festival? Here’s a bunch of faces you’ll be seeing about in the coming days, all excited to meet you in just a handful of hours!

Thursday afternoon, April 12, was the kick-off mingle for helpers and faculty at SWF founder, Catherine Pettersson’s incredible new apartment. There were lots of home-made baked goods on the kitchen island along with different colors of wine, and Catherine’s son Victor knew to fizz the water with lots of CO2. Fuzzy beer was available on the rooftop terrace. And while the apartment was pretty cool, it was the people I had a chance to meet and talk to that made the evening. I got to schmooze once again with Cat’s rat pack of incredible people who helped her shepherd her idea to reality; Lizzie Harwood and her Mickael were there, as were Elizabeth Clark Wessel, Sandra Carpenter, Susan Wuest, Sarah Hollister, Kendal von Sydow and Adnan Mahmutovic. I got to talk sci-fi with Paddy Kelly. Met Eira Ekre again and her guy Dan who I spent a lot of time talking to about cool virtual reality stuff. I chatted with faculty member, Paul Rapacioli, from The Local. He was interesting and funny and also tall so I didn’t have to talk to him while scrunching down. Always a plus. I talked with the charming Clydette de Groot who together with her husband, Charles, sponsored the Festival’s First Pages Prize. I met (and talked with) Adam McCulloch, the winner of the First Pages Prize, who traveled here all the way from Mexico. Another of the Faculty members I had a chance to meet was Brooks Sherman and his wife, who came all the way from the US but via Italy so he wasn’t too jet lagged and seemed really excited to be here. There was a chance to once again meet the wonderful group of young people (yes, Ting Yiu, you are a young person) from the Stockholm University Masters program in Transnational Creative Writing who were going to be the helpful volunteer facilitators at the festival. There were many more there that I wanted to talk to but it was impossible to talk to everyone when there is so little time and so many great people. I knew I would see them later on Friday and Saturday.

And I also got to reconnect with my dear friend Amy Brown (who abandoned me and Stockholm, to move to the sunny shores of Florida) and her cuz Elinor Lipman (keynote speaker) who was lots of fun to talk to. Amy, Eli and I went and ate dinner together afterwards with our friend Carol Henderson.

A Writers Festival? But I’m a graphic designer!
It all started for me on Tuesday, 9 May 2017, (a whole year ago in case you didn’t catch that) in an Expresso House where I met with Catherine to discuss helping her with this writers thing she was doing. She knew I did graphics (and was also interested in writing) so she wondered if I could offer her my graphic designer help. It sounded like fun so I said yes. Catherine can be very persuasive.

She had already found a logo for the festival – I just helped make it more usable. I did a quick proposal brochure for her to show around. During the following months I made a few ads and the odd graphic here and there when needed until it was time to start work on the festival program brochure. Lizzie Harwood’s husband Mickael Gohier, Marketing Director for the Antalis paper company, was donating some very hi-tech paper for the back cover of the program. It had a computer chip embedded in it that when programmed would lead your smart phone to the comments page on the Stockholm Writers Festival website. I got to join Mickael and Catherine at the printer’s to watch the back page being printed and to test how it worked. It worked great! We also printed up business cards on Antalis donated paper with embedded chips leading to the SWF website. So cool – combining old tech with new tech.

And so it starts

Friday, April 13, 2018
OK, so it was Friday the 13th, but what a great day anyway! And it was sunny!
Registration opened at 4pm at the Berghs School of Communications. Berghs generously donated their facilities for the festival. I got my nifty festival bag with a bunch of goodies and my name tag! I schmoozed a bit with people I knew and some I didn’t, till we were all called in by the clanger to take seats around the round tables in the Berghs Auditorium. Catherine was on the stage, dressed in a fantastic coat covered in images of Stockholm. One of my pet peeves (I have many) is people who speak in front of an audience and don’t know how to do it; who talk into their papers, who don’t enunciate clearly or speak too fast or too unhearable, people who quite simply don’t know how to take control of their audience. Catherine isn’t one of those. She is a natural on the stage, funny, authoritative and clear, and she belongs up there.

We started off with guest authors Elinor Lipman, Derek B. Miller, Jess Lourey, Cassie Gonzales, and Marina Blitshteyn on the stage reading excerpts from their books. (and I ended up doing something I told myself not to do – I bought 2 new books)

Then Lizzie and the de Groots announced the winners of the First Pages Prize and gave awards to the first and second prize winners who were brought here for the festival. Adam McCulloch won the first prize and Kristy Keller won second.

And then the big crowd of attendees rearranged themselves into their genre tribes. I joined Lizzie Harwood in the tribe of Memoir writers. We all sat together bonding over what we each wrote about. Yes, I’m beginning to think I belong here.

After a dinner of Hawaiian Poké with my friend Liz Watson and Hedvig Andersen, another attendee, we headed to the Hellsten Hotel for a SWF mingle. Don’t ask me to list who I talked to – my brain is mush by now. But if you talked to me (and remember doing it) write me a comment! (and remind me what we talked about!)

Saturday, April 14, 2018
And so it began – 8am registration. I got there at 8.30 because I was already registered. The coffee was very strong – and needed. The clanger started ringing and we all got summoned to the auditorium.

A panel discussion about the state of the publishing industry, moderated by Paul Rapacioli with the guest editors, agents and publishers; Terri Bischoff, Rebecca Carter, Amy Cherry, Peta Nightingale and Brooks Sherman, started the day off.

Then on to the first breakout session.
I had chosen to listen to Julie Lindahl talk about memoir: Writing from past pain. As a Jew with a grandparent who lost family members in the Holocaust, listening to someone discuss how discovering rather late in life that her grandparents had been SS members and how that hidden past had affected her and how writing about it had helped her, was very enlightening. I wanted to talk more to her later but didn’t manage it.

Then came 2 sessions of Buttonholing the Expert, a kind of speed-dating (with a lunch break at Urban Deli in between). I’ve never done speed-dating and I’m not really very good at rule-following so I decided to listen twice to Jess Lourey discuss editing hacks. Catherine, standing just above me on the stage saw me not changing tables and announced to the whole auditorium that I was not following the rules. Boy, what a bully she is! I didn’t move though. I figured I needed to know those hacks. I also went to Lizzie Harwood’s table and listened to her excellent advice on story structure.

Then we had time for 2 more break-out sessions:
First, The role of research by Jenny White. She described how she used research for her trilogy of novels about the Ottoman Empire. But Jenny is a star in my book because she told me when I had met her a few weeks ago that Diana Gabaldon had done a very nice blurb for her first book. Anyone who knows me or has read this blog already knows how I feel about Gabaldon and her Outlander books so I won’t get into that now.

The third breakout session was about Subtext and lead by Cassie Gonzalas (my writing guru) and was great as usual. She has discussed subtext in some of the workshops I have taken with her before and amazingly enough I actually remembered some of what she has taught me. And she gave us a writing prompt to do – always fun.

And then we needed to be rewarded with Fika – coffee and cookies and casual conversation. (Tea too if you preferred that.)

Midway in between bites of cookie, the clanger rang again bringing us all back into the auditorium to hear our guest writers, Katarina Bivald, Jess Lourey, Derek B. Miller, Marina Blitshteyn and Elinor Lipman, lead by moderator Sandra Carpenter, discuss how they kept on writing in spite of everything. Gee, even real, professional writers have problems writing (and tricks to get over it). Good to hear.

And finally our Keynote Speaker, Elinor Lipman got up on the stage to talk about her writing process, one sentence at a time. As she spoke from her collection of index cards, she explained to us how she puts her books together with no advance formal outline. As I watched her shuffling through her cards, I realized that was the same way she wrote speeches too. She was warm, funny and very entertaining. A very good ending to a fantastic day.

But wait! It’s not over yet…

Together with my pal Amy Brown, her cousin Elinor Lipman, Editor Amy Cherry, Newsman Paul Rapacioli and publisher Peta Nightingale I went for dinner at The Queens Head, a nearby British style pub. I had Fish and Chips – what else!

By 8pm we had rejoined the rest of the SWF18 gang at the Hotel Hellsten for the Literary Idol event in their glass-covered room. A variety of hors d’oeuvres and wines of different colors was there to sample. Elinor Lipman, Amy Cherry, Terri Bischoff, Brooks Sherman and Peta Nightingale sat as judges as Marina Blitshteyn read 1-page entries submitted by SWF18 attendees. If 2 or more judges raised their hand before the piece was finished, it was out. It was so interesting to listen to the variety of the entries and there were a lot of them. By about 10.30 the judging was over and it was time to call it quits. I said goodbye to new friends and old and left to come home.

There was an additional series of Intensive Workshops scheduled for Sunday April 15 but they seemed to be more for those who are further along on their writing paths so I didn’t go to those.

In summation…
This has been my first and so far only writers festival so I have nothing like it to compare it to. But I worked in the conference field for over 15 years, making slide shows for speakers and I have been to a few of those conferences. And I will put this first time effort up there in the top 5! Professional was just one of the words I would use for this event. The Festival committee members Lizzie Harwood, Elizabeth Clark Wessel, Sandra Carpenter, Adnan Mahmutovic, Cassie Gonzales and especially the brain child behind this amazing endeavour, Catherine Pettersson have done a fantastic job. Their modest goal of selling 100 tickets was more than met and as I looked out on the auditorium filled with people who all seemed to really want to be there, all I could think was that here in Stockholm, Sweden, a place where English is almost a second language, holding a writers festival for writers who write in English was something that was long overdue. I am so glad I could be part of this whole event, both as contributor and attendee and I am really looking forward to coming again next year.

And next year I will take a picture of each new person I talk to while they are holding their name tag!

Here’s to #SWF19!

Death and life

By Hilarie

On January 16, 2018

In Uncategorized

The North Chapel

I went to a funeral on Friday; for a woman who was exactly the same age as I am. I have to admit that I didn’t really know her very well. We circulated amongst the same circle of American friends here in Stockholm. While I had socialized with her IRL a number of times, it was mainly through the modern world of social media that I got to know her. She was a writer, among other things, and it was through her blog that I knew her best – that was where she kept us updated on the progress of her illness that eventually got the upper hand.

It was a very nice funeral. It wasn’t the first I had attended here in Sweden so I sort of knew the ropes; I think it was my 7th actually. Is that odd to keep count of, the number of funerals one has occasion to attend? The weather was better than one might expect in Stockholm, in January – it wasn’t snowing at least or even raining but just a cold gray cheerless kind of day that we have had more than enough of this past winter. She got a pretty good turnout, in spite of the weather and it being just an ordinary Friday. I saw a lot of the Americans I know here, the people she knew too, as we all stood outside waiting to go into the chapel. Some of them I had seen recently, others – it had been a while, most of them I meet on Facebook. You search through the crowd finding the familiar faces, you go over to them, you hug, ask them how they are – an unnecessary question actually. You could tell by their faces how they were. And a funeral was not really the appropriate place to catch up on things.

The service was calm, lovely and felt meaningful, personal. Her husband and two daughters gave emotional heartbreaking eulogies. Other friends of hers went up and talked about her. Two recorded songs were played towards the end of the service. By that Hawaiian singer. The notes of his ukulele floated up and filled the small chapel with images of sand and beach and warm sunny days. The second song was “Over the Rainbow”, one of my favorite songs since I was a small child. It wasn’t Judy Garland but maybe almost better.

After the service we all went back outside and waited for the hearse with the casket to begin a slow advance towards the gravesite with everyone following behind. That was new for me. It felt very ceremonial, to walk behind the hearse – a sombre procession on a cold gray day. At the gravesite, family members carried the casket to the grave and it was lowered in. A rectangular hole, six feet deep with a pale casket at the bottom. I know I’ve seen graves in movies or in photos but this was the first time I stood next to an open grave in real life. “It’s so deep.” was all I could think. And so final. I tossed my pink rose onto the casket lying there at the bottom. And said good-bye.

When I started writing this piece, I had only planned on putting a few words up on Facebook – to say I had been to a funeral and it had gotten me thinking about the whole getting older thing. And then I would link to a post I had written about aging. But the words grew more and more about the funeral and so ended up here instead.

I don’t think, when I was younger, that funerals disturbed me all that much. I was young. Illness and death were far away. Sad. But far away. As I age and as my Baby Boomer generation ages, death is less far away. But the people who I have known, cared about, loved, who have died, don’t seem dead to me. They are still alive – in my head. But I just can no longer call them. My smart phone seems to have lost their number. And even if I could call them, they wouldn’t answer me. But I am not going to spend my time thinking about death. It’s not really interesting to me. I’d rather think about the journey – the process of aging. Who am I at 66 years old, the same age as my friend whose journey is over? What am I becoming? How am I different from my 25 year old self. Or am I still the same?

Here’s a link to that older post I was going to link to on Facebook. It’s called I’m still a lot like I was and its actually about life not death.

Passover minyan 2017

By Hilarie

On April 15, 2017

In Uncategorized

As I sit here writing this post, the 5th day of Passover is almost over. My supply of matzah is already half eaten, though there is still more than enough left to do a matzah brei tomorow. This year, as usual, I attended 2 Seders. The first one was a Swedish one – Progressiv Judendom i Stockholm’s Seder. I’ve been on the board of PJS for over 10 years and as a board member, I help out with all the activities we have done through the years. This year we did an especially good Seder. Eva Ekselius, with the help of Marianne Prager and Mats Frisk, led us through the Haggadah and even added other interesting tidbits of information. Marianne’s singing and Mats’ guitar playing were wonderful and helped to make it a fun evening in spite of the fact that I was in the middle of having a horrible cold. I can only hope I didn’t infect everyone I talked to that evening. Oh, and the food was good too!

And then, a few days later on Good Friday, I led my J.A.P.S.* Seder as I have been doing for almost the past 20 years. These people are my minyan, my family, that I feel like I gave birth to here in my adopted homeland. The Jewish People have a long history of moving from one country to another (not always as voluntarily as my choice was) and building from scratch, a full Jewish life in the new place. It wasn’t until I moved to the land of the blue-eyed blond that I discovered just how much the Jewish life I left behind in New York City meant to me. And how much I needed it. I knew I would miss friends and family but I didn’t know I would miss Jewishness. So I set out to rebuild it for myself and for my son. And 20 years down the line I feel I have succeeded.

The kids

At this point, we are 7 families with children (can we still call them children if most of them are not even teenagers any longer?) and a few who come on their own. This year the group was smaller than usual because a number of us were traveling to other places. But still we filled my Co-op’s party house with 20 people.

Before we start the seder proper, I always welcome my minyan with a little speech and even though I was sick and stressed and just plain tired and thought I would just skip the talk, I couldn’t let it go. As usual I had to say a few words. These are the words I said:

Welcome everyone
I won’t bore you with a long speech. I have a cold and don’t feel really up to long speeches.

We are a rather small group this year. A lot of our young people are not able to be with us. Many of our children are now old enough to have their own agendas, not just what their parents want them to do. This absence of our youngsters, made me think of the reason we are commanded to celebrate the Passover – to teach our children. To tell them the story of the Exodus, to remind them that once we, as Jews, were slaves and now we are free.

The oldies

By commanding us to tell our children, the entire process of Passover becomes a generational event. To tell our children, we need to also have the mothers and fathers at the Passover table – mothers and fathers who once were themselves children, listening to the story their parents told.

My grandparents, immigrants from Poland before the second world war, were the first people whose Seder I remember being at. They didn’t do much story telling – mainly because they really didn’t know much about it themselves. But it always somehow felt very authentic to my child’s mind though my mother told me that my grandfather basically just said Kiddush and then we ate. But he said it with a strong Yiddish accent so I guess it just felt more real. After my grandfather died when I was ten, my mother and my aunt took over hosting the Seder – alternating years between them. By then, our families had graduated to using the free Maxwell House Haggadahs that many American Jewish families in the 1950s and 60s grew up with. Each year we would take turns going around the table reading portions from the color-coded and illustrated texts. It was a sort of Haggadah for Dummies. It told you with detailed instructions what you were supposed to do and when. We sat there and endured the boringness of the ritual, once again just waiting for the food without really understanding what the words meant.

It wasn’t till I was no longer a child and, on the outside at least, finally a grown-up, that I was invited to a Seder led by someone who actually knew what the whole thing was about. It was then that I realized that it didn’t have to be that meaningless mumble that it had always been my whole life. Since then, I have tried to lead a Seder that had meaning. I don’t know if I always succeeded but I tried. It has to be about more than just waiting for the food to show up.

Passover is truly about generations of parents passing on this story to their children and then they to their own children and so on and so on. My greatest hope (well maybe not my greatest hope but at least as it applies to Jewishness and Passover) is that my passing on of the Seder story to our next generation will continue into the future as it has for several thousand years past.

In addition to the absence of some of our children, when I look around this group I remember some who have celebrated with us who are no longer able to be here. Last year Marina’s mother, Rachel was here with us. Before that Danielle’s mom, Lydia celebrated with us and even further back my own mother, Evelyn. Now they are no longer able to share in our Seder or pass on what they know to their daughters who are still here.

So I want to start this year’s Seder by asking Danielle and Marina to join me in lighting the candles, in memory of our mothers, as we once again start the yearly telling of the story of the Exodus – of our people’s journey from slavery to freedom.

Chag sameach.

*Jewish American Parents in Stockholm

Photos are all courtesy of Danielle Shevin

Day of Atonement

By Hilarie

On October 10, 2016

In Uncategorized

This evening is the eve of the Jewish Holiday Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. It is probably one of the most important holidays in the Jewish Calendar. Unlike most of the other Jewish holidays, Yom Kippur is not celebrated by eating a large quantity of food. On Yom Kippur one is supposed to fast for the entire day. And one is supposed to atone for the sins you have committed in the past year – to say one is sorry, to ask for forgiveness and to forgive.

This evening is also the evening before I leave for my trip to New York City. I stand next to my bed and look at the piles of clothing and other things that I have been laying out – choosing what to bring and what to leave behind. Is this item what I want to take with me on my trip or is it something I want to and can leave behind me, unneeded?

I feel these piles are also an apt metaphor for Yom Kippur. Between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur one must ask forgiveness from those one has wronged. And on Yom Kippur you are judged whether you have done right. I have hurt people. I have said unkind things. For this I am so very sorry. And like the items on my bed that I choose not to bring with me on my trip, I would rather not carry my atonement and its subsequent forgiveness with me. It’s not enough to just ask for forgiveness. The other half of the equation is that forgiveness is given. Without that, the books can not be closed and the journey becomes harder to continue.

I guess when I was younger, I thought that by the time I had reached 65 I would have figured out Life, be settled – know where I have come from, know where I am, know where I am going. But even at 65, it is still all so confusing. Where am I going? How will I live my life? What am I doing?

Tomorrow I will be traveling to New York City – the city of my heart. The first time back to the East Coast in over four years. The place I left almost 30 years ago to live here in Stockholm. I will be staying there for a whole month – the longest time back there in over 20 years. I am no longer the same person that packed her bags in 1987 to move to a foreign land. How will it feel to be reunited with my heart? Will we even recognize each other?

And after that month, I will return here to my home, Stockholm, to pick up the pieces of my life once again, hopefully forgiven. With all my baggage, all the pieces taken with me and even those I thought to leave behind – all the pieces of my life.