Friday, August 08, 2008

08/08/08 in Stockholm, Sweden

It seems that it isn’t just the Chinese who are fans of the date today. Eight apparently being a lucky number. Hence the Olympic ceremonies and all that jazz. Stockholmers everywhere are also pumped about it. Now the uninformed might ask why. And the informed would look at them and explain to them that it’s all about the telephone prefix. Obviously.

A brief tangent. I am amazed by how excited people get about this date thing. Last year was 07/07/07. Woooo! This year was 08/08/08. Woooo! People seem so surprised by it all. Like there is some sort of meaning behind it all. I’m going to go out on a limb and predict that next year we will see 09/09/09. I know. It’s going to be crazy. Anyway… back to Stockholm.

Stockholm, Sweden uses 08 as their telephone prefix. And people from Stockholm are often referred to by their telephone prefix. And that’s enough of a reason to throw a party. So events have been planned throughout the city throughout the day. I went into town to check it out. And was promptly soaked through from the rain. Which also seemed to put a damper on a lot of the activities. But chiefly I went in to check out the water fight that was supposed to be going on in Gamla Stan.

A water fight had been promised between the south Stockholmers and the north Stockholmers. Like some sort of gang fight. It was like Greeley, Swedish style. They were even supposed to wear red and blue. Except these gangs planned on using water guns. Not real ones. But I saw nothing. And until about 10 minutes ago I was horribly disappointed. Turns out the event had been moved from the planned urban warfare in Old Town to Gärdet. A large grassy area. Like warfare of old. I just hadn’t been informed of the change. Oh well. I’m sure it was glorious.

Tonight there are more festivities planned throughout the city and since I love the 08 prefix (that’s a lie… I don’t even have a 08 prefix I prefer to rock the cell phone) I obviously plan to go out. We’ll see how the evening goes.

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2 comments:

  1. Ok, that explains some. I read from somewhere that Gröna Lund will give a lifetime-valid ticket there to Stockholm babies who were born 080808 i.e. today.
    Last year 070707 the churches were full of just married couples, which is supposed to be THE lucky day to Western people.
    I like these numbers myself, although it's just a conincidence how the year one was calculated in the first place...

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  2. @smek - yeah I remember all the marriage stuff from last year. this calendar stuff is going ot keep going for a few more years. wonder what else people can come up with for the remaining dates.

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