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ENJOYING STOCKHOLM

Stockholm Q & A: Where can I find a good spa?

A reader wants to take his girlfriend to a spa in Stockholm for her birthday. But which one? Peter Vinthagen Simpson has the answer.

Stockholm Q & A: Where can I find a good spa?

My girlfriend’s birthday is next month, and I really want to book her some pampering in a spa in Stockholm. Can you recommend a good one?

While there are a few more obvious choices closer to the city centre – such as the stately Centralbadet or the plush Sturebadet, my choice would be to send her packing to Stockholm’s own slice of the far east – Yasuragi in Hasseludden.

The Japanese-themed spa is an oasis of calm, beautifully located by the water as the city’s pulse moves over to the quiet simplicity of the island archipelago.

They have various offers for both overnight guests and day visitors and have established a reputation as a family-friendly destination.

To sate the appetite the spa offers a choice of two first class restaurants where you can savour the finest flavours from Japanese and Asian cooking.

Yasuragi is the Japanese word for inner peace and offers all the pampering that any deserving partner could desire.

Do you have a question about Stockholm – a particular type of restaurant, a special place to stay, or perhaps you’d like to know more about the history of a building or area? Whatever your question, drop a line to Peter Vinthagen Simpson and he’ll try to answer.

ENJOYING STOCKHOLM

Sweden: A land of hairdressers and writers

Sweden's capital Stockholm is full of hairdressers and writers, and sometimes even writers in hairdressers. And it can be a disturbing city when you're a bald Frenchman who happens to be a writer, observes Luis de Miranda.

Sweden: A land of hairdressers and writers

As a bald French writer exiled in Stockholm since last year, I have rapidly noticed that 50 percent of the Swedish population is either a hairdresser or a writer – or both.

In Stockholm, there is a frisör every fifty metres, where you usually find a lonely person getting a blond hair colour or a new cut, while reading the newspaper.

In the newspaper you will find many articles about people who engage in many different activities but who are also often designated as författare (writer): Sven Svensson, actor and författare; Camilla Johansson, yoga instructor and författare; Fredrik Reinfeldt, prime minister and författare.

It seems that any kind of printed material entitles you to be a författare, and some daily newspapers need to display book reviews in every edition in order to keep the pace and make all the författare happy.

Let’s be honest: I can understand that everybody agrees to call everybody else

a writer – that is an interesting form of collective vanity – but why so many

hairdressers? Some say it’s about money laundering. Or is it also about vanity?

People want to have nice blond hair and it is understandable. But as a bald French writer, I simply don’t exist here in Sweden: having little hair makes me invisible and

being a writer makes me very common.

I am considering wearing a wig and stopping my Swedish classes in order to remain relatively illiterate in the language of Swedenborg (no, this is not the name of my hairdresser). I shall refrain from writing even the slightest memoir on beard shaving.

But please don’t misunderstand me. I love Sweden and the Swedes. I respect any författare, any frisör, and I like fika, folkhem, filmjölk and feminism…

Sweden is just…fantastic.

Luis de Miranda is a French novelist, philosopher, editor and film director who has been in Stockholm for a year. He is also bald.

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