Gallows Hill

Despite my three years in Halmstad, today was the first time I ventured up Galgberget, with its nineteenth-century lookout tower, birch forest, and steep climbs. The tower even housed an anti-aircraft battery during the Second World War. Finishing my run at Espresso House with a freshly baked croissant, I felt almost as if I were back in San Diego, where Johanna and I would go for coffee runs in the mornings.

With the first three days of this week jam-packed with meetings, there has not been much time to reflect, but I look forward to turning Hallandsgatan into a more permanent home in the autumn, as Eddie will also start a new school here in Halmstad. For now, I guess it is back to work and that last sip of South Australian Shiraz.

Two hours

More than six years after Kipchoge’s highly choreographed two-hour marathon in Vienna, Sebastian Sawe broke the last great barrier and ran the world’s first official sub-two-hour race in London this morning. Meanwhile in Hamburg, my long-time Strava friend Niklas set a new marathon PR of 3 hours and 17 minutes at the age of 52, proving once again that no human is limited.

Trying to inspire the kids to adopt some of the same mindset, I took them on their longest hike ever this morning (which, apparently, also became my longest hike activity on Strava) under the most beautiful blue skies, spotting sparring deer and endless spring flowers as we traced Gotaleden eastward towards Jonsered. Topping it off with a record 15-kilometre indoor row at Nordic Wellness Örgryte, I think a recovery week in Halland is just what I need now.

Forty years later

Today marks forty years since that fateful night at reactor four of the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant, and what would become history’s worst nuclear accident. As the news media keeps recounting the events, a new report by the Anthropocene Institute brings much-needed perspective as it points out that the number of premature deaths would have been at least ten times higher had Chernobyl been a fully operational coal power plant. Though less spectacular, hundreds of thousands of people die every year from fine particulate pollution caused by the burning of fossil fuels, yet none of these deaths seem to inspire HBO documentaries or sustained public outrage. Having been to Pripyat myself back in 2016, I am not trying to trivialize the human tragedy but, given the urgency of climate change, irrational fear of nuclear energy may ultimately prove far more dangerous than radiation itself.

Saturday slow

Experiencing a sudden bout of springtime lethargy, I struggled to get out of bed this morning. After all the boundless sunshine, the sky had turned grey, and it took all my self-discipline to lace up my trail shoes and head out around Delsjön. Stopping to listen to the birds with the Merlin app, and then to spot KLM’s morning flight with the Planefinder app, I got my share of augmented reality before returning home to two boys playing Minecraft.

According to the forecast, it will stay colder, but with the sun returning, I will make another effort to go hiking with the kids tomorrow. Otherwise, I plan to spend much of the weekend clearing things out – including my multi-decade collection of Monocle – as we have finally given notice to our landlord and will be leaving Ängtegsgatan at the end of July.

Bureaucratization

Yesterday, Johanna and I drove down to Malmö for the world premiere of Kvalitetsplanen, a “performance lecture” about bureaucratization with Patrik Hall, who, some twenty-five years ago, was largely to blame for me ending up in political science. In the play, Patrik skillfully captured the paradox of the ever-increasing number of “organizational professionals” who are presenting their work as a response to bureaucratisation rather than a source of it.

Afterwards, we headed over to Vibliotek, which apparently was celebrating a decade on Södra Vallgatan, for some very Spanish tapas and happy hour prices on Estrella Damm. With the parks and fields turning green, one soon forgets that life in the Nordics is not always like this. Driving back over Glumslövs backar this morning – “där ute bland kuster och motorvägar” – everything somehow came together in one moment.

Stamboul Train

With fifty thousand Turkish Airlines miles expiring at the end of this year, train may not be the obvious choice for trips to Istanbul, but after watching Murder on the Orient Express in snow-laden Gyltige, its charm is nevertheless undeniable. Having finished The Quiet American, I wanted to read more of Greene, and the interwar years always hold a special appeal for me.

Unfortunately, for the moment, I am afraid I must focus on the 14-page review of the International Marketing programme in Halmstad that I have to read by tomorrow morning. As so many times before, I find myself wondering whether these ritualized exercises genuinely improve quality over time, or merely consume the energies that ought to be devoted to the work itself.

Bondi

Known as Hoka’s max-cushion cruiser for recovery days, the Bondi has been on my radar for years so, when Sellpy had a white pair for 400 SEK, I immediately jumped at the opportunity. Taking them out for a test run this morning, I think the shoe was just what I had been looking for and, though I do not know how many miles they already have in them, they felt plush and stable. While I primarily plan to use them for easy, sunny days on asphalt, I might also use them for longer walks, as none of my current white sneakers are any good for that.

Harbour life

Working since 5 a.m., I decided to trade my laptop for the brilliant spring sunshine, running along the quays of Gothenburg, just like a month ago, passing Amerikaskjulet and the slow churn of electric ferries crisscrossing the harbour, taking in the salty air with its mix of diesel fumes and pine tar.

After 17 kilometres, I stopped at The Alchemist for coffee and a chèvre toast with apricot jam, walnuts, and thyme, before returning home to the growing backlog of student papers to comment on. Though it exacts its price, finding time for these kinds of mid-week long runs is really worthwhile, and the coming weeks are expected to bring a lot more sun.

Upper Eden

On our way into the desert, Johanna and I stopped at a Trader Joe’s just off the I-15 to stock up on cheese and supplies. Among the shelves, a Pinot Noir with a blue label from the Santa Lucia Highlands proved irresistible (yes, embarrassing as it is, I sometimes buy wines based on the label alone). Packed with memories from the Central Coast, not far from Steinbeck country, it turned out to be just perfect for yesterday’s “Spargelzeit”, as duly celebrated in the interior of Halland with a Sunday steak and beurre noisette.

Based on all the feedback I received in California and through the internal review process, I have now resubmitted my book chapter to the editor in Singapore under its new title, “Surprisingly Green: Ecomodernism, Social Democracy, and the Limits of Eco-Centric Politics”. As always, having to cut words is painful, but I think the chapter is significantly stronger after these revisions. If the original timetable holds, the book may appear in print with Routledge sometime in early 2027.

Hunger games

“This is the best book I have ever read”. In this day and age, few things make a dad as happy as seeing his eleven-year-old kid completely absorbed by a novel rather than a screen. And after hiking eight kilometres together, surrounded by wood anemones, I have had the plot explained to me in wonderful detail. It is fascinating how books really can become doors to other universes.

Tomorrow, William has another chess tournament coming up and, with heavy rain expected, I am glad I got to run around Delsjön yesterday afternoon in the sunshine, even if it meant working all morning today.

One-hundred-eighty-three billion

Instead of moving quickly to build publicly owned nuclear power and clearly articulating its importance for phasing out fossil fuels globally, the Swedish government continues to procrastinate. The latest example is the announcement of 183 billion SEK for a new geological repository for nuclear waste.

It is difficult not to react – not only to the sheer scale of the sum, but to what it represents: yet another instance of nuclear power being burdened by politically constructed costs and institutional inertia rather than technical realities.

There is a much simpler alternative: continued interim storage. In Sweden, this takes the form of water-filled pools where spent fuel is cooled and shielded. This is not a temporary fix in the sense of being inadequate. It is a robust and well-proven method that can function safely over very long time horizons. Crucially, it also provides something that geological disposal does not: time.

Time to develop better technological solutions.

The case for geological disposal rests on a familiar assumption: that spent nuclear fuel must be isolated deep underground for up to 100,000 years. At first glance, this sounds both reasonable and morally compelling. But it contains an obvious contradiction. The 100,000-year requirement assumes that civilization is stable enough to plan, fund, and execute a century-long engineering project – yet somehow too fragile to be trusted with monitoring a storage pool a few centuries from now. You cannot have it both ways.

Because spent nuclear fuel is not merely waste. It is also a resource. With advanced reactor designs and technologies such as transmutation, there is real potential to significantly reduce both the volume and long-term radiotoxicity of spent fuel – while generating large amounts of clean electricity in the process. To permanently seal this material deep underground therefore appears, at best, premature, and at worst, a deliberate decision to foreclose future options.

This raises a more fundamental question: why the urgency to make something irreversible?

A common argument concerns security – the risk of proliferation or nuclear terrorism. But the logic here does not hold up to scrutiny. Sweden's interim storage facilities are among the most monitored, regulated, and physically secured sites in the country, operating under constant oversight precisely because of their political sensitivity. If a proliferation risk exists anywhere, it is in the vast and loosely tracked global inventory of nuclear material – not in a Swedish facility that is under continuous scrutiny. The question is not whether interim storage can be made secure. It can. The question is whether geological disposal is actually more secure, over any realistic policy horizon. The answer is far from obvious.

What is really at stake is a deeply embedded idea that the problem must be solved once and for all, permanently and irreversibly. But perhaps that very idea is the problem.

Rather than committing hundreds of billions to a system designed never to be reopened, the priority should be on what actually matters in the near term: rapidly expanding nuclear power to displace fossil fuels, in Sweden and beyond.

Seen in that light, 183 billion SEK for a geological repository is not just a large cost.

It is a misallocation. An extraordinarily expensive one.

Come sail away

This morning, I briefly escaped to the balcony with a cup of coffee and the escapist treat that I was able to pick up with some surplus cash at San Diego airport. Reading about the 16th-century Portuguese colony of “Paraty” on the Costa Verde, just south of Rio de Janeiro, the vibrant azulejo tiles and the intense greenery tell me that I am far from finished with the Lusophone world. For now, however, the only realms I will be sailing on are virtual ones, as I juggle a constant stream of student emails and Zoom meetings, topped off by the utter absurdism of watching the Swedish comedian Messiah Hallberg euthanize the Bolibompa dragon together with William.

Lucky

Only a few days after Johanna and I got back from the United States, the pilots and cabin crew of Lufthansa decided to celebrate the airline’s centenary in the most traditional way possible: by striking. With thousands of flights cancelled, customers have apparently spent up to six hours in line trying to be rebooked or found themselves stuck in endless loops with AI bots. Thinking back on our trip, with our double upgrade on the way over and our hike among rattlesnakes in the Cleveland National Forest, we certainly had our share of good fortune, and I even got a box of Lindt chocolate to bring home.

Sticking to the theme of luck, William went downhill skiing in Kiruna while I was in the US. Reviewing his Suunto app stats together, I got a bit of PTSD by proxy when seeing that his maximum speed had been 61 kilometres per hour and that he had made a couple of two-metre jumps. Happily, all went well, but I guess this is clearly one of those situations when the less I know, the better off I am.

Kongahälla

Taking the express bus north again for another tournament, this Sunday follows a now familiar pattern: me working and William playing chess, Picadeli lunches, and William’s friend Amos wearing his signature red bow tie.

The only break from the routine has been a visit to the nearby Nordic Wellness Kongahälla gym for the first ten of this month’s fifty kilometres, followed by a few more on the treadmill. After going without a quantitative running target for the first three months of the year, I have realised that having no target makes me just as stressed as having one. As such, I have decided to aim for 50 kilometres per week for the remainder of the year, for a total of 2,600 kilometres. Though significantly lower than in previous years, I hope that goal will help me stabilise my running at a sustainable level while still giving me time to be a present dad.

Birdsong

With Artemis II safely back on Earth despite some initial concerns about its heat shield, I am spending this weekend in Gothenburg making up for past sins by going to the gym with the kids, running thirty kilometres in the forest, and shopping at Lidl. Tomorrow, William and I are taking the bus up to Kungälv for the “Trekungamötet” chess tournament, where I hope to check out the indoor rowing machines at the nearby Nordic Wellness Kongahälla gym and finally stop feeling bad about that “Americone Dream” ice cream by Stephen Colbert ;-)

Running through the forest this morning, there was a lot of birdsong, which reminded me of Johanna’s fascinating Merlin Bird ID app, something that felt incredibly Star Trek. Developed by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, the app provides a spectrogram and is capable of identifying numerous birds at the same time, as can be seen in the screenshot above from our hike to Three Sisters Falls last Monday.

Circadian reset

It was already dark by the time train 499 reached Halmstad last night, so after commenting on a few student papers and taking some melatonin, I fell into a dreamless sleep, only to be brutally awoken by my Suunto watch at 6 a.m. After an epic struggle to get out of bed, I had no choice but to cut my planned run to Jansa Brygga short and instead go for a quick bread run to the local Bärlin sourdough bakery.

Under beautiful blue skies, I then did my best to get as much sunlight as possible between classes, and back home the tinted glass cast beautiful reflections on the wall, a promise of what is to come. Still, with the jetlag monster never far away, I headed out for five more kilometres at sunset to help further reset my circadian rhythm.

Seeing the images coming in from the Artemis II mission, showing the Earth from the far side of the Moon, certainly puts my own jetlag struggles into perspective. Instead of the mere twenty-two thousand kilometres that I have travelled over the last week, the Artemis crew will have travelled more than half a million kilometres by the time they splash down in the waters outside San Diego tomorrow. Like so many times before, space exploration points to what humanity could become if we directed our energies outward, toward building rather than destroying.

Approval

Far from snowy, Munich was almost as sunny as Imperial Beach (above) when Johanna and I landed after eleven long hours in the air. Having been spoiled beyond words on the way over, Premium Economy on the A350-900 still felt like a substantial upgrade, with plenty of legroom, a brand-new cabin, and external cameras showing the red desert in all its grandeur. Sadly, Lufthansa once again proved a little hit and miss on the culinary front, reminding me just how much Turkish Airlines is in a class of its own.

Before leaving the Americas, Johanna’s and my application to the Swedish Ethical Review Authority was approved, which felt fantastic given that it is my first time as a PI. With the formal approval now in place, we will try to get the quantitative survey done before the end of the spring semester so that we can do some analysis over the summer holidays. As for the two months that remain until school is out, I will be splitting my time between Zoom classes in Gothenburg and computer lab sessions in Halmstad, with a fair amount of X2000 commuting in between. In terms of bigger trips, however, the only thing I have planned this year is a conference in Naples in mid-June, so after the recent global whirlwind, the blog will probably feature more harbour runs and dog hikes going forward.

Rental car return

After 1,023 kilometres on the roads of California (and more than a couple stops at Chipotle), it was finally time to return our Genesis G70 to Hertz. As Hyundai’s premium brand, the white Genesis was a pleasure to drive on the mad highways of L.A., but slightly less suited to our desert adventures. In any case, we made it back without a scratch, and that is what counts at the end of the day.

Now checked in with Lufthansa to Munich, I wonder whether snow will await on the other side, as it did twenty years ago when my flight from Hong Kong landed in Bavaria. After the upgrade bonanza on the way over, I am still happy that Lufthansa accepted my upgrade bid to Premium Economy, which I think will be more than enough on the spiffy new Airbus A350-900.

3x San Diego

Washboarded

Driving along dirt roads into Cleveland National Forest, Johanna and I had ample reason to research the phenomenon known as “washboarding”: the series of regular transverse ripples that develop on unpaved roads and make them resemble laundry washboards. With squirrels constantly crossing the road and breathtaking views of the surrounding mountains, taking it slow was, in any case, the right approach.

Once at the trailhead, we started our hike down to Three Sisters Falls, which still had plenty of water after the winter rains. We saw lots of lizards, but the rattlesnakes, despite plenty of warning signs, were luckily nowhere to be seen. With a few other hikers around, we skipped a swim in the ponds, which was probably wise given the existence of brain-eating amoebae and other entertaining microorganisms in California’s waterways, though the risk, in all fairness, is extremely low.

As so many times before, California simply blows one’s mind with its natural scenery and wildlife. Leaving the mountains behind, we drove down to La Jolla for some beach time, which almost felt cruel after reading all the weather reports from Sweden. Jumping into the Pacific, we then finished the day, all salty, at our motel in Point Loma.

Ranchita

With Guy Clark singing “If I can just get off of this L.A. freeway / Without gettin’ killed or caught”, Johanna and I checked out of The Fig and followed the I-10 into the Inland Empire. Stopping for an Impossible Burger and one more iced americano somewhere south of Riverside, the dizzying midday heat made the scene feel picture-perfect as the coastal mountains gave way to shrubland and then the salt flats of Borrego Springs.

Now in our A-frame house, waiting for the stars to come out, this trip has already exceeded our wildest expectations. With two more days left to explore Southern California, and with storm “Dave” ravaging southern Sweden, it has been worth every dollar, even if it means instant noodles for the rest of the month.

Breakfast at the Griffith Observatory

Hotel Figueroa

Colloquially known as The Fig, Hotel Figueroa first opened in 1926 as a space for professional women travelling alone. With its Mediterranean Revival architecture, I instantly fell in love with it when I discovered it a few months ago.

Staying for two nights on the twelfth floor, the hotel has truly been an oasis here in downtown LA for Johanna and me. While the nightly rate itself was surprisingly affordable, the now familiar trend of adding arbitrary “resort fees” and prohibitive parking charges makes it less of a steal, to put it mildly. In any case, it was absolutely lovely to go for a refreshing swim in the saltwater pool after yesterday’s race, followed by a few more laps this morning under the fig tree.

Sky Duster

Jumping up at 3:30 a.m., Johanna and I hit the I-5 south, leaving the city behind as we made for the mountains and our long-awaited trail race. Unlike in 2023, when I ran the 50k Diablo Trails outside San Francisco, today’s race was only 27 kilometres, which felt more than enough as we drove into the imposing Silverado Canyon.

Running into the sunrise, we climbed “The Motorway” up to Bedford Peak which, at 3,760 ft, offered expansive views across Los Angeles, with the Santa Monica Pier clearly visible in one direction and the Inland Empire in the other. Just as on Gran Canaria, uphill running proved to be my true strength, and I soon found myself in the leading pack. With aid stations every five kilometres, the race felt superbly organized and, with the sun rising higher and higher, I needed every centilitre of water I could get.

Passing the half marathon mark in 2 hours and 35 minutes, I still felt strong, but the last fifth of the race turned into a true quad-buster, with hundreds of metres of descent for every kilometre. Ultimately, finishing fourth among the men, I was very happy with my performance, even if I was an unbelievable forty minutes behind the winner and twenty minutes off the podium.

Having forgotten my phone in the car, I was grateful that Johanna stopped to take photos along the course. Sadly, she did not happen to cross paths with the grey fox I had the good fortune to say hello to. Once we had both finished, we were shuttled back to our car in an iconic green 1974 Toyota Land Cruiser and, in no time at all, were back at Hotel Figueroa for a Sky Duster West Coast IPA by the pool.