Swedish News

Royal weddings lead to higher hotel rates. Royal oops by Carl Bildt. Swedish soldiers killed in Afghanistan. Best Swedish work environment. 

• Royal weddings lead to higher hotel rates.
  It won’t be easy to find a hotel room in Stockholm around midsummer, when Crown Princess Victoria weds Daniel Westling. And if you do happen to find one, chances are you’ll have to pay double the usual price. The royal wedding will be a lucrative affair for all hotel owners. “Some hotels more than double the prices,” says Johan Sturzenbecker, managing director for Res Zander bus tours in Kalmar. The hotel chain First Hotels confirmed the raised prices. “It’s always demand that controls the prices,” Helena Janson, hotel director at First Hotels Amaranten in Stockholm explains. “We’re already fully booked.” There are four months until the royal frenzy will explode – and yet rooms at Grand Hotel are still available. “There are people who haven’t made up their minds,” says Tuomas Liewendahl, managing director at Grand Hotel. “But all our rooms facing the castle are booked.” Not just the hotels, but all of Sweden’s tourism will gain thanks to the wedding. “It’s something very positive,” says managing director at Visit Sweden, Thomas Brühl. “All eyes are on Sweden, especially the eyes of other European monarchies. This will bring in a lot of money.” Svensk Handel, the Swedish trade federation, calculated that the sales of wedding related paraphernalia during the weeks around the wedding will bring in around 2.5 billion SEK ($3,360,801,433.97). So far it seems only bus tour organizers haven’t seen an increase in interest. Ramkvillabuss in Ramkvilla offers bus tours to Stockholm, which includes two nights at a hotel, and they are planning to take roughly a hundred people to the capitol for the wedding. “But we haven’t noticed a great interest, no,” says Anna Stålhand, who works with sales at Ramkvillabuss. “Hopefully it will pick up later in spring.”

• Royal oops by Carl Bildt.
  During an interview with Washington Post, foreign minister Carl Bildt told the American reporter about his stint as Sweden’s prime minister (which he was between 1991-1994) and how he then exchanged e-mails with the then U.S. president Bill Clinton. “When I was head of state in Sweden, Bill Clinton and I had the first e-mail exchange among two heads of states,” Bildt said. Well, Carl Bildt might have been Sweden’s Prime Minister, but head of state he has never been – and never will be. That title belongs to another Carl, to be specific King Carl XVI Gustaf. Oops, Carl Bildt.

• Swedish soldiers killed in Afghanistan.
  Two Swedish army officers (Johan Palmlöv and Gunnar Andersson) and a local interpreter (names as Shabab) were killed in a firefight in northern Afghanistan, Sweden's military command said in Stockholm. The command said a further Swedish soldier was wounded when the patrol was attacked by small-arms fire in Mazar-e-Shariff. He was taken to a field hospital run by German military forces. Previously, the international security forces ISAF in Kabul had reported the deaths of two ISAF soldiers in a small-arms fire attack, but in keeping with its policy had not divulged the nationality of the victims. Sweden has kept some 500 soldiers in Afghanistan since 2004. Prior to Sunday, the country had lost two soldiers in the Afghan conflict.

• Best Swedish work environment.
  Here’s where you should look for a job in case you’re getting tired of your sitting in that cubicle of yours: Österåsens Health Resort in Sollefteå. Its premises are full of tradition and it features a hard-to-beat view over the river valley of Ådalen and now it has been deemed Sweden’s best work environment. The magazine “Du & Jobbet” (You & Your Job) gives out an annual price to the best public and private work places. Österåsen, which also happens to be threatened with closure, received the price because it has an “environment marked with openness and participation, and an insight in what that means for the health of its employees.” www.osterasen.com