Thanks to some savvy planning (if I do say so myself), my recent journey to Rwanda began in Uganda and ended in Kenya. That resulted in the best deals on flights and gave me just enough time to get a tiny sample of the countries at either end. Your choice! Here – and in life. So what to do with a 6-hour day in Nairobi? After a lazy night in Nairobi doing basically nothing, it’s time to get moving. From all accounts, Uber works well here. However, since I don’t want to risk losing my flight, I ask the hotel reception to organise a driver for me for the next 6 hours. A few minutes later, Fredr ..read more

Are you guessing Oslo or London? Tokyo or Zurich? Not today, folks. We are further south in the world. In the southern parts of Africa. Angola, to be precise, a green and gorgeous country and Africa’s largest oil producer (even larger than Nigeria), and infamous for a 27-year-long devastating armed conflict – encompassing both a civil war and a USSR/USA proxy war. Sadly, that’s what usually happens when an occupier – Portugal in this case – just leaves without a plan for putting a democracy in place. Angola has also been infamous for having had a rigid visa regime – had being the operative wo ..read more

Entebbe. What comes to mind? For me, it is Idi Amin, 1970s dictator – and a hijacking at Entebbe Airport in that same decade. The decade of hijackings. There’s bound to be more to the former Ugandan capital than the memory of this rather sad chapter in history, and I was curious to learn. So when booking a flight to Rwanda recently, I decided to make a brief stop there, for a tiny taste of Entebbe. Welcome to Entebbe It’s the thought that counts, right? Entebbe is a green city on the shores of Lake Victoria. At just under 60,000 km2 – about the size of Latvia – it is Africa’s largest lak ..read more

23 March 2024 At the beginning of this year, I wrote about visiting the world’s dark places. About however unpleasant, however bad or sad or angry it makes me feel, it is necessary. I can choose whether to go – or not. Those who suffered through unimaginable horrors did not have a choice. I owe it to them to hear their story. At the very least. So I am in Rwanda. Just arrived in Kigali. It’s late at night, and one of the first things I notice is Amahoro Stadium. You can’t miss it really. It’s huge, with room for 45,000, and all lit up. Technicolour against the African night sky. 24 March 2024 ..read more

Billboard in Cabinda 1. Antigo cemetério Wandering around the historic cemetery here in Cabinda, I spot an interesting grave. Here lies the Viceroy of Cabinda The Viceroy of Cabinda! Fabulous title, isn’t it? One that sets the wheels of the imagination spinning. I’m picturing a character in a vintage murder mystery, ca. 1850. And this house! Just a ruin now. It must have a story, too, don’t you think? Since we don’t know it, we will have to make one up. Did the viceroy have secret meetings here? Illicit liaisons? Wait a minute, I hear you say. Before you continue with fabricated stories of ..read more

Valparaíso! What a cool, colourful and delightfully bohemian city! I can safely say I have seen nothing like it, anywhere else in the world. And that’s saying something. And let me warn you from the get-go: this is a photo-heavy post. It is practically impossible to take a bad photo of this city. I normally delete about half the photos I snap on my phone. But here, well it was more like 10%. Valparaíso suffered a massive earthquake (magnitude 8.2) in 1906, four months after the one that struck San Francisco (magnitude 7.9). As if that wasn’t enough, 8 years later, the Panama Canal opened, an ..read more

 Ah, Easter Island! Doesn’t it conjure up the most wonderful images? I’ve wanted to visit this enigmatic island in the South Pacific ever since I first saw one of the giant moai in the Kon-Tiki Museum in Oslo, decades ago! Thor Heyerdahl’s documentary about his expeditions (1955-56 and 1986-88) only served to keep the fire going. Where did they come from, the Rapanui? What happened to them? And why did they create the moai? Mysteries all round here. And a cultural landscape unlike anywhere else. So when friends invited us on a trip to Chile, there was no doubt: we must include Rapa N ..read more

Every once in a while, when travelling, you will come upon the world’s brutally evocative places. Places where horrible events have unfolded, where nature has gone amok (Mt Vesuvius on 24 August 79) – 23 August: a wealthy, thriving Roman town. 24 August: a town and 2,000 people buried in ashes (culprit in the background) – or, more often, where people have behaved despicably. The Nazi concentration camps belong in this category. As do the Soviet gulags, the Stasi prison in Berlin, and the Killing Fields in Cambodia. My own country has not been spared such horrors either. 13 years ago, a ragin ..read more

What’s a mama bird to do when the last baby bird has left the nest? Take up new hobbies, perhaps? Pick up old ones? I’ve been doing both this year. New ones for the first six months – and then playing with an old (somewhat dormant) one for the last 6 months: the quest to see the world. All of it is probably not possible within one lifetime, but a taste of all the world’s countries should be doable. By my count, the world has 198 countries: 193 member states of the United Nations, plus the Vatican, which has permanent observer status in the UN, as does Palestine – which should by rights be a ..read more

Do not enter Ever since reading Wilfred Thesiger’s Arabian Sands as a young’un, I have wanted to visit Saudi Arabia. But women were not allowed to enter this enigmatic desert kingdom until they were 45, unless they were accompanied by a father or husband. That was a magic number, apparently – the age when we would no longer be considered a dangerous temptation for the local male population. Back in the day, riding a camel through the Empty Quarter was what fascinated the teenage version of me. Still does. In Bahrain some 10-15 years ago, I remember looking across King Fahd Causeway, the bridg ..read more