"This is presenting Australia as we are. We're plain-speaking, we're friendly. It's using the vernacular." So said Australian Tourism Minister Fran Bailey when she launched the country’s new tourism campaign today. As you would expect, a brand new web site, WheretheBloodyHellAreYou.com, has sprung up overnight and is showing footage of the the new commercial. Here you will see film of Aussies larking about in the sun saying things like, “We’ve poured you a beer. We’ve had the camels shampooed. We’ve saved you a spot on the beach. We've got the `roos off the green. And we’ve got the sharks out of the pool. ... So where the bloody hell are you?”

We've had the camels shampooed??? Err...whiskey-tango-foxtrot???

Predictably, some people are hot and bothered by the “bloody hell” line, prompting Prime Minister John Howard to defend it, saying he did not believe the ads were offensive. “It’s a colloquialism,” he says. “It’s not a word that is seen quite in the same category as other words that nobody ought to use in public or on the media or in advertisements.” It's obvious that he hasn't consulted my gran, who would have radically different views on this and who is no doubt on her way to the headquarters of the Australian Tourist Board with a bar of soap to wash out their mouths. Go get 'em, gran. I bet the switchboards of the talkback radio stations are jammed.

I had a look at the ad campaign and quite liked it and agree that in the context of it all, the use of bloody is okay. It's certainly a word that does get bandied around a bit in Oz, even if I don't often use it. (Quiet, there in the rear stalls!) My only query was why they chose the young woman to say it. I think it is more the sort of thing said by the boys down at the pub. But then again, I've been away for a few years now and things have probably changed. I wonder, though, what the international market will make of this $180 million campaign to attract them Down Under by swearing at them. I guess the proof of its effectiveness will be shown in the rise or fall in tourists from the marketed countries (China, Japan, India, the United States, Germany and Britain). I think it's bright, fresh, quirky and a bit cheeky so I hope it's a success. My Swede thinks it's "bloody funny". Pity Sweden isn't included in the marketing sweep.

Today is a dazzling, sunny almost spring like day in Nynäshamn. And it is the first day of the big annual book sale all over the country. I have to say that this is among one of my favourite things about being in Sweden. Every year, in late February, every book shop here, simultaneously puts on a huge sale. Any place that sells books, from the huge bookseller chains (including on-line retailers), the smaller specialised shops, even department stores, supermarkets and the corner shop cash in on the Swedes love of reading - not to mention their love of a good bargain.

In true Swedish style, one must be there at opening time on the first day. When we lived in Stockholm we went along to the midnight openings of the big central bookshops, spending a couple of hours in the middle of the night browsing through the selection in our favourite shops and fighting off the hordes of people vying for a bargain. I tell you, it's like the post-Christmas sales and requires the liberal use of elbows and shoulders to fight your way in. Not to mention incredible patience to wait out in the darkness and snow for the doors to open. It's hard to fathom that they do all of this to buy books. I think it's wonderful as there is nothing I like spending my money on more than books.

Here in Nynäshamn, we have the one bookshop only and they opened this morning at 7 a.m. for the early birds who wanted the best buys. There were a respectable number of people here considering the time of the morning.




We had a fairly leisurely look around, but there was not a lot to interest us in the selection here unfortunately. I thought there were a lot of coffee table type of books and what I call "christmas present books" (garbage by Danielle Steele, Dan Brown etc). We had looked throgh the catalogue at home a few days before and picked out a few of biographies, fact books and novels to check out, but none of them were quite what we wanted. It made us pine for the shops in Stockholm! However, we did find a couple of road map booklets with detailed tourist information in them - one for Sweden and one for Europe - as well as a lovely little book on common Swedish garden birds that you see from your kitchen window.




So we bought them and trudged home through the rapidly melting snow. It was a little disappointing as in the past we had managed to find an armful of novels, but then there is always next year. That's the good thing about it - it's a regular event to look forward to and anyway, we may pop into Stockholm and look around this week anyway.

When we got home and looked out the window, I saw what looked like a smiling face in the snow of the front garden opposite us.




I was quite excitedly babbling about it, urging Lars-Göran to look at it and see if it looked like a smiley to him. He looked at me as though I was nuts and said "Well, of course it is. Obviously someone drew it." I looked again and said "But there are no footprints! It must be a natural phenomenon." Which was when he pointed out that perhaps someone had leaned over the low chainlink fence.

Of course I knew that already....