Steve came down to my place around 10.00 on Friday morning, we talked a bit about our plans and just listened to some music while we were waiting to leave. Our train was due to leave the station 13.00, which gave us more than plenty of time. We left from my place around 11.30 or so, and headed down to Oslo central station. Decided to eat something at McDonalds before venturing onto our 4.5 hour long train ride. Ran into some drunk friend of Steve at the station, and talked some with him. Drunk before noon, not a bad achievement. Also ran into some old military friend of Steve at the McDonalds, and spent some time talking with him as well. Went into the local super market to buy something to drink on the trip, then onwards to the platforms to wait for the train to arrive.

It’s been insanely fucking hot these last days, and going into the only carriage on the train with no air condition didn’t exactly help anything either. We were sweating like pigs for over an hour untill we decided to try and find some new places in another part of the train, where the air condition was actually working. And holy fuck, was that one of the most delightful experiences we’ve ever had, going from a sauna carriage to a cool and quiet carriage. Altogether our train was incredibly boring, and between the Trollhättan station and Göteborg, we were forced to switch to buses, as they were doing some maintenance work on the railroad tracks. One hour onboard the barely air conditioned bus was sort of a nightmare, but we were able to sleep most of the trip which made it easier to endure.

Then finally we where there, Göteborg central station, where it was even hotter than in Norway. Originally before leaving, I talked with Luther and had decided to call him a bit before we arrived so him and oizo could meet us there, but we completely forgot about it, and decided to chill with a beer at some local bar instead before meeting them. Then completely out of the blue while walking in our own world through the central station, someone we walked past said something like “skint0r?”. What the fuck, talk about unexpected, there they were, somewhat of a shock. After having met both xtC and all the people at FEM before, I wasn’t really too nervous this time, but when it happened so unexpectedly it was truly weird. We went together to the local Systembolaget to buy some beer, Steve and me decided to share one tray (24 beers) of Carlsberg 5.2% 0.5l cans for Friday’s drinking schedule. oizo bought lots of different beers as well. The normal small talk had started, which always is a bit weird at the start, but it didn’t take long to get comfortable with each other so to speak. We took the tram together back to Luther’s place, taking about 10 minutes.

Luther’s place is in some sort of suburbian area, pretty nice location. It only takes 2-3 minutes to walk from the tram station to his place, and woho, we were finally there. Got comfortable and started talking a bit, then after a while we went out to meet and pick up Luther’s girl Karin at the tram station. Quite a hotty she is. Back to the apartment again. Beers were opened and consumed, and after a while we decided to order some pizzas. I already sort of knew this, but my god, are pizzas cheap in Sweden, 40NOK compared to our 200NOK. Steve and me took one pizza each, while Luther and oizo shared one. After calling in the order, it only took like 10 minutes before we headed out to pick them at, a few minutes walk from the apartment. Took out some money at the ATM first, then got the pizzas and walked back again. After not really having eaten anything during the whole day, except some french fries at McDonalds earlier, it was nice with some food.

Later on, rulF came down as well, and even though he was there for almost six hours or something, I still couldn’t find a single picture of him on the camera, we were a bit sloppy with the picture taking to be honest. Don’t really remember everything in order, but Steve eventually got pretty fucked up and passed out on the coach around 02.00. Right after that, xtC called and come over, somewhat drunk as well. Neighbours complained and at one point one of his neighbours were out on the balcony just staring at us, which eventually led to him and xtC arguing, and then I guess he just gave up. Went to bed eventually, on some thin matress with one of the cushions from the coach working as a pillow. Then after a while I got xtC as a bed mate, cozy, but impossibly hot. Like my FEM story, a lot of fun and smaller moments occured of course, but it’s hard to describe everything fully. A lot of those moments includes talking norwegian to the swedes, who not always understands everything, specially those semi internal jokes between Steve and me.

Saturday, Iron Maiden concert closing in rapidly. Steve and Luther, the hardcore drinkers, started as soon as they woke up I think. Karin and xtC went home pretty early, and rulF had already left last night, so it was just Luther, oizo, Steve and me left again. But not far away, Crazy and his friend Pär (not sure about that spelling) were on their way. Luther and somebody else which I don’t remember, went out to meet them at the central station. 30 minutes or so later they were back. After meeting all the elma people at FEM already, it came as no surprise that everybody I met in Sweden were equally nice people. Don’t really remember too much of what went on during Saturday, and I’m tired of writing as well so blah. Iron Maiden songs were played, and some beers were drunk, warming up for the concert later in the day. oizo left first, as he had to give a ticket to one of his friends or something. Then later on around 17.00 Crazy and Pär left because they wanted to catch In Flames, who were one of the two support bands playing before Maiden. Steve and me waited untill the very last moment more or less, as we were only interested in Iron Maiden. I think we left from Luther’s place around 18.00, and decided to take the tram down to Ullevi stadium where the concert was held. As the tram had just left before we arrived, we went down to some local pub/pizzeria thing and asked some Maiden people there about taxi and where to call to get one etc. I call, and I get some message about there being a technical error at the moment, fuck it. We decided to take a beer and just wait for the next tram to arrive, no big deal. Jesus christ, what a place that was. A really local pub where everybody knew each other’s names, you know the type of place. Drank together with the swedish Maiden people there, which was quite fun I must admit. Ooops, another tram missed. Oh well, another beer then. Damn, one more missed, etc. Eventually the swedish people left for the concert, we finished our beer and followed. Things started to get fun at this moment, semi drunk already, but not too much, and talking with random people on the tram about the concert and whatnot. Apparently norwegian people are quite funny to swedes. Got off near Ullevi stadium, still quite some time left for the concert to start, only the first support band had finished playing, In Flames were on next. What to do in the meanwhile I wonder? Beer it was. Went to some extremely crappy place called Persian Palace or something, waited forever to get our beers, and just ended up leaving with the glass and everything because the place sucked so much. Finished our beers while sitting near the river in Göteborg, then went around a bit in the city, tasting the atmosphere. Must have stopped to talk with over 100 people all together during our walk.

Finally it was time, we headed down to the stadium and got ourself inside. Woah. Quite a lot of people there. Bought more beers, which was a true pain in the ass, having to wait in a queue for 20 minutes with people shoving each other every minute, going around like a cattle herd. Sat down to chill with our beer at some empty area with not too much people. 10 minutes later the speakers gave out a recognizable sound, mmm… Back on our feet and pushed our way forward as much as we were able to. And what the fuck, 56.000 people there, and we actually managed to spot oizo standing further ahead, so onwards we went. Then even further and further forward. Eventually Steve and I lost each other, but we weren’t actually more than 5 metres from each other we found out the day after. We were pretty much as far ahead as one could go without a pass which only the few first hundred people or so entering the arena gets. I don’t really have any way of explaining what an experience this was. 56.000 people crammed together, jumping up and down while singing along to Iron Maiden songs, it was so fucking unbelievable. They played great songs one after another, and the mood was so intense. I don’t think I’ve ever been so sweaty in my life, after a while I just got completely euphoric and the concert got better and better every minute.

~2.5 hours later it was all over. I had agreed with Steve before the concert started, to meet with him after the concert around the place we came in. That turned out to be rather impossible, after waiting for 30 minutes there, I just gave up, as did he I think. The beer had really started to kick in at this point, where the hell am I going? I thought I had some idea of which direction I had to go, which turned out to be pretty much as wrong as it gets. I must have asked over 20 different people where the fuck the number one tram was, noone knew of course. After a while I actually managed to find it, but to my luck the last tram had just left 5 minutes ago. What the hell, on to some bar then. Ended up at another crappy place, but couldn’t really care less at this point. Met some other norwegian people there and flashed my visa card quite a few times during the bar visit, should be fun to check my bank account later. Left around 01.30-02.00, and took a taxi back to Luther’s place. I guess at this point I sent some SMS to oizo:

Hihi. Arrived at Luther’s place, greeted by Crazy in the door, everybody had gone to bed already, so did I. At this point I kinda wondered what the hell happened to Steve. His phone broke down before we went to Göteborg, so he didn’t really have any way to contact me or anybody else. Luckily I had told him Luther’s address earlier before we left the concert, and what do you know, around 03.00-04.00 he showed up. Besides the Iron Maiden concert, one of the other big achievements during this trip must be the fact that I’m able to say I’ve been in the same room as Luther while he has had sex.

Woke up pretty groggy on Sunday, partly because of beer, and partly because of sleeping away from home. It’s always impossible to feel truly rested and good when you sleep over at someone else’s place. Crazy and Pär left around 15.00, Steve and myself left around 16.30. Truly greatful to Luther for letting us stay at his place, it certainly took our cost of the trip down when we didn’t have to spend the nights at some hotel. It was great to meet everybody as well, certainly a trip to remember in the same way as FEM. Steve got pretty drunk again this day, I think the conductor on the train got a bit tired of us. Had a lot of fun on the train trip back home for a change, it was hard not to start talking swedish for some reason. Then finally home at 22.00, ah. Big thanks to Tomas, Peter, Johan, Pär, Mikael, Karin and Andreas for a great trip worth remembering! Much obliged.

Pictures!

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