Latest news with #Olga
New York Post
18-07-2025
- Entertainment
- New York Post
Teen arrested for alleged bomb threat on plane — but his mom says it was just a joke: ‘He's a good kid'
A teenage boy's vacation ended with a one-way ticket to juvenile detention — after he allegedly made a bomb threat aboard a Spirit Airlines flight leaving Fort Lauderdale. But his mom says it was all just a dumb joke. The 16-year-old, who was headed back to Kansas City with friends Monday, was arrested at around 3:15 p.m. at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport after allegedly blurting out, 'I have a bomb in my pocket,' as the plane was preparing for takeoff. Cue panic in the aisle. 3 A Florida getaway turned into a Spirit flight from hell — ending with a teen cuffed and carted to juvie over a bogus bomb threat. Olga – A fellow passenger overheard the comment and reported him, triggering a full-blown security response and evacuating the plane. The unidentified teen was hauled off Flight 1332 by Broward Sheriff's deputies, per People, and later charged with criminal mischief of $1,000 or more and making a false report of a bomb or explosive. But his mother insists the offhand comment was never meant as a threat — just immature slang gone very, very wrong. 'He's a good kid,' she told the Miami Herald, adding that he was just joking about his masculinity. Spirit Airlines confirmed the midair mayhem in a statement made to NBC Miami, saying, 'The aircraft taxied to a remote location, and guests were safely unplaned.' 'The plane was inspected and cleared by law enforcement.' That not-so-funny joke cost Spirit an estimated $50,000 in delays and disruptions, according to testimony in juvenile court Tuesday. A viral TikTok reportedly taken from inside the cabin shows the moment the boy was escorted off the aircraft as confused passengers were forced onto the tarmac. The plane — originally scheduled to take off at 2:37 p.m. — didn't leave the ground until 7:44 p.m. 3 What was supposed to be a smooth 2:37 p.m. takeoff turned into a 7:44 p.m. crawl to the skies. stockphoto-graf – 'I would just like to ask for grace in this matter,' the boy's father, Phillip Schmidt, said at the hearing via Zoom. 'I don't believe he acted criminally. He was acting as an immature 16-year-old, in my opinion.' The teen's lawyer argued that the facts don't even clearly place the comment on the aircraft. 'There was one statement, 'I have a bomb in my pocket,'' the attorney said. 'But the problem is it doesn't say where this was said. Was this on the plane? Was it in the airport? Was it on the way to the airport?' None of it mattered to the judge — who ordered the teen to undergo a psychological evaluation and remain in custody at a juvenile facility. The Missouri native had reportedly been staying in South Florida with family friends before heading home — with what was supposed to be a smooth flight and zero explosive punchlines. No explosives were found on the plane or on the teen, and no one was injured — except maybe Spirit's schedule and the boy's summer plans. As previously reported by The Post, a Michigan man allegedly phoned in a fake bomb threat last month after Spirit Airlines wouldn't let him board his flight, forcing passengers to deplane and sparking an FBI response. Charles Robinson, 23, reportedly missed his chance to board Flight 2145 out of Detroit, then blew up at customer service agents when they told him to rebook. 3 The judge didn't flinch — slapping the teen with a psych eval and a stay in juvenile custody after his stunt. Nadzeya – In a wild act of revenge, Robinson called in a bogus bomb threat around 6:45 a.m., even making up a would-be terrorist and giving authorities a full description, prosecutors said. Looks like Spirit's summer travelers are getting more bang than they bargained for — no explosives, just explosive behavior.
Novaya Gazeta Europe
15-07-2025
- Politics
- Novaya Gazeta Europe
Hanging on the telephone. A Russian reservist has begun an 18-year prison sentence for treason after trying to visit his mother in Ukraine — Novaya Gazeta Europe
One October morning in 2023, Olga Leonova's phone rang in the central Russian city of Dzerzhinsk. It was her mother-in-law calling from Ukraine to ask why her son, who normally called her every morning, hadn't been in touch and wasn't answering his phone. Olga said she'd check, and assured her that he probably either had no reception or his battery was dead. What she didn't know was that at that very moment, her husband, 57-year-old Gennady Artemenko, was being beaten up nearby in the back of a van by agents of Russia's notorious Federal Security Service (FSB), and that he wouldn't be calling his mother any time soon. Almost two years have passed since then, during which Olga has repeatedly assured her mother-in-law that her son is fine, but chose to leave Russia and has been stuck in a European refugee camp where his processing has been achingly slow due to him holding the rank of lieutenant colonel in the Russian military. She came up with the story so that her 84-year-old mother-in-law, Lydia Vasilyevna, could cling to the hope that she'd see her son again one day. But Olga is in fact now living in exile herself, and her husband, who was convicted of treason and justifying terrorism last month, has now begun an 18-year sentence in a high-security prison. Gennady Artemenko was born, grew up and went to school in the Dnipropetrovsk region of central Ukraine, then part of the USSR, where his childhood was indelibly marked by the death of his sister from leukaemia at the age of 12. Though his family had no military tradition, Gennady honoured his father's wish for him to become an officer in the Red Army, moving to study at an artillery school outside Moscow in 1985. After graduating with top marks, Gennady was given a plum first posting in East Germany, where he served until 1993, by which time the Soviet Union had collapsed. Gennady and Olga in Kyiv. Photo from family archive Returning to an independent Ukraine, Gennady initially attempted to find work with the Ukrainian military, but after being told that there were too many artillerymen and too little demand, he decided to try his luck in Russia. There, he was able to find work in his field of expertise, and was posted to the Russian Far East, and later to Tajikistan, where his service earned him early retirement. At the age of just 34, having attained the rank of lieutenant colonel, Artemenko left the army and moved to Dzerzhinsk where he became a reservist. 'All our friends and all the neighbours we'd known for at least 10 years dropped us when Gena was arrested.' 'We would go to visit Gena's mother in Ukraine every year,' Olga says. 'My mother-in-law had already buried her husband and daughter and lived for her son.' But in 2014, the war in Donbas began. Artemenko, a Russian citizen, nevertheless had an overseas Ukrainian certificate intended for those of Ukrainian origin who are citizens of other countries. According to a Ukrainian law signed in 2004, certificate holders enjoy almost all the same rights in Ukraine as citizens. On one of their annual visits to Ukraine, Olga even managed to track down relatives she had in the country's northern Chernihiv region. 'My cousin and her family know about my situation and are very supportive. The only family I have in Russia are my parents. All our friends and all the neighbours we'd known for at least 10 years dropped us when Gena was arrested,' Olga says. Gennady Artemenko. Photo from family archive The Gang of Three Olga woke up on the morning of 24 February 2022 to find her husband sitting with his head in his hands. When she asked him what had happened, he replied: 'They're bombing Kyiv.' He tried to call his mother, but was unable to get through. Having spoken to his mother once a week before the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine, Gennady 'started calling twice a day, in the morning and the evening, on the way to work, and on the way home from work,' Olga recalls, adding, 'They always spoke Ukrainian. … Maybe someone reported him?' Later that year, the pair travelled to Kyrgyzstan to apply for a visa at the Ukrainian Embassy in Bishkek. In 2021, at the height of the pandemic, Gennady had applied to the Ukrainian Migration Service for a residence permit. He worried that closed borders combined with the lockdown might prevent him from helping his seriously ill mother whenever necessary. But Gennady and Olga could never have imagined that it would be war and prison, not quarantine and the pandemic, that would keep them apart. Gennady Artemenko. Photo from family archive The Artemenkos' visa application was turned down. According to Olga, the Ukrainian consul was sympathetic to their situation and tried to help, but told them that during wartime it was the Security Service of Ukraine that granted visas, not consuls. Gennady wrote to the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry, Migration Service and Presidential Administration. On each occasion, he received the same pro-forma answer: 'We understand, but there is a war going on. We will consider your case after the war.' However, Artemenko persevered, planning another trip to Kyrgyzstan in 2023, which he was ultimately unable to take, as the Russian intelligence services had come for him by then. On the day of his detention, FSB officers lay in wait for him outside his house, and after beating him up in a van parked around the corner, they searched his home. They brought him back inside and said they had found 60g of explosives in the kitchen radiator. 'They locked Gena out on the balcony and supposedly searched the apartment. Then they brought him back inside and said they had found 60g of explosives in the kitchen radiator,' Olga recalls. Olga understood immediately that the charge against Gennady for the 'illegal possession of firearms or ammunition by a group of people' had been prepared in advance, and that the explosives had been planted. 'The group of people must have been me, my husband and the cat,' Olga says wryly. Circumstantial evidence The charges for a group of people possessing weapons were eventually dropped, only to be replaced by charges of treason and justifying terrorism. Olga and Gennady. Photo from family archive 'Planting explosives is a standard FSB move,' according to Yevgeny Smirnov, a lawyer with Russian human rights NGO First Department, who knows the Artemenko case. 'They needed to place Gennady in detention to have time to open a criminal case on other charges.' The charges against Artemenko for treason and justifying terrorism were based principally on his membership of Telegram channel Civil Force, which is run by the Crimean Tatar Atesh movement, an underground guerilla group that aims to free Crimea from Russian occupation. The terror charge was added to his rap sheet when the Atesh movement was recognised as a terrorist organisation by the Russian government late last year. When leaflets similar to a banner frequently used by Atesh began appearing around Dzerzhinsk saying 'Let's stop the war together!' alongside the Atesh logo, Artemenko was accused of posting them due to his subscription to the channel. As far as the court was concerned, Artemenko was subscribed to the Atesh channel, and that was all the proof it needed. Investigators looking into the incident claimed to have seen surveillance footage implicating Artemenko, though they also conceded that it hadn't been sufficiently clear to identify the perpetrator with any certainty. During Artemenko's trial, his lawyer asked to see the footage, but the court turned down the request, as it did nearly all other requests made by the defence. As far as the court was concerned, Artemenko was subscribed to the Atesh channel, and that was all the proof it needed. The prosecution also presented the leaflet itself as evidence, though the sample they submitted for expert analysis was oddly pristine, as if it had just been downloaded and printed off, and had never been stuck up anywhere in the city at all. The prosecutors said that a psychological and linguistic analysis had revealed 'a desire to stop the war' in conjunction with Atesh. As if being charged with wanting to stop the war was not absurd enough, Artemenko was also charged with communicating with Atesh members, though no evidence of this was provided, and no correspondence was presented in court. Atesh leaflet in Dzerzhinsk, Russia. Photo: Civil Force / Telegram Running out of time The trial lasted for four days, after which the court convicted Artemenko on both counts and handed him a sentence of 18 years in a maximum-security penal colony and a fine of 360,000 rubles (€3,900). 'There have already been over 1,000 treason and espionage cases since the start of the war,' Smirnov told Novaya Gazeta Europe. 'The defendants are mostly not public figures, but completely ordinary people who for various reasons at some point or other have found themselves in the FSB's crosshairs.' 'I believe Gennady Artemenko came under surveillance when he attempted to seek permission to enter Ukraine. … That's a trigger for the FSB. They might have thought he was planning to commit treason by changing sides,' Smirnov continued. Gennady and Olga in Kyiv, holding a Ukrainian flag. Photo from personal archive, used as case material Evidence of Artemenko's anti-Russian position was provided in the form of a 2018 photograph of Gennady and Olga in Kyiv holding a Ukrainian flag. They had taken the trip to celebrate his 50th birthday, and Olga had bought tickets to a concert by Ukrainian rock band Okean Elzy. 'We were tired, but loved the concert. It was our favourite band, it was his birthday in Kyiv, and we had so many happy years ahead of us still to look forward to.' Seven years later and reserve lieutenant colonel Gennady Artemenko is in detention, waiting to be transferred to a maximum-security penal colony. Now 57, he has a long list of serious health issues, including hypertension, hernias and pancreatitis. Factoring in time served, he will be 73 when he is finally released, if he serves his full term. Olga now lives outside Russia where she works as a nanny and cleaner, but she hopes she'll soon be allowed to travel to Ukraine to see and reassure her mother-in-law. To this day, Lydia Vasilyevna knows nothing about the fate of her son, and Olga puts on a brave face every day when she calls her to say: 'Gena is fine, Lydia Vasilyevna! He just can't contact you right now as he's in a refugee camp. But he will soon. Trust me.'
Int'l Business Times
15-07-2025
- Politics
- Int'l Business Times
Ukraine Covers Frontline Roads With Anti-drone Nets
A ravaged car with its engine destroyed and doors riddled with shrapnel lay on the side of the road near Dobropillia, a sleepy town not far from the front line in eastern Ukraine. Hit by a small, remote-controlled drone, the mangled chassis was a stark reminder of why Ukraine is hurrying to mount netting over supply routes behind the sprawling front line to thwart Russian aerial attacks. As Russia's invasion grinds through its fourth year, Moscow and Kyiv are both menacing each other's armies with swarms of cheap drones, easily found on the market and rigged with deadly explosives. AFP reporters saw Ukrainian soldiers installing green nets on four-metre (13-foot) poles spanning kilometres (miles) of road in the eastern Donetsk region, where some of the war's most intense fighting has taken place. "When a drone hits the net, it short-circuits and it cannot target vehicles," said 27-year-old engineering brigade commander Denis, working under the blazing sun. "We are shifting into a so-called drone war," Denis told AFP. FPV (first-person view) drones have already seriously wounded a few of his men. Some are armed with shotguns to shoot them down. The Russian army has also been deploying nets. "We weave nets like spiders! For extremely dangerous birds without feathers," the Russian defence ministry quoted a soldier with the call sign "Ares" as saying in April. An earlier article by pro-Kremlin media outlet Izvestia also showed soldiers mounting netting close to the front. Drones are also a worry for towns and cities. Since early July, the town of Dobropillia, around 20 kilometres (12 miles) from the front line, has become a target for Russian FPV drone attacks. During a recent visit to the civilian hub -- where some 28,000 people lived before the war -- AFP journalists saw residents on the streets rush for cover in shops when a drone began buzzing overhead. When the high-pitched whirring had died down and the threat disappeared, one woman exiting a shelter picked up her shopping bags and glanced upwards, returning to her routine. Every day, victims come to the small town's hospital. According to the hospital's director, Vadym Babkov, the enemy FPVs "spare neither medical workers nor civilians". "We are all under threat," Babkov added. In Russia's Belgorod border region, which frequently comes under Ukrainian fire, authorities have retrofitted ambulances with metal anti-drone cages -- a technology once reserved for tanks and personnel carrier vehicles. "Civilians have got used to it," Denis told AFP. Olga, a waitress in a small cafe and mini-market in Dobropillia, has devised her own way to cope with the constant drone threat. "When I drive and feel that a drone is going to attack me, I open all the windows to avoid glass shards hitting me," the 45-year-old told AFP. The atmosphere in the town had become "frightening", Olga said. The shop next to Olga's was recently hit by an FPV drone, leaving its owner in a coma. "Now we jump at every gust of wind," Olga said. "The day has passed -- thank God. The night has passed and we wake up with all our arms and legs intact -- thank God." But she doesn't know for how long. "Everything hangs in the air now," she said. We're living day by day." Some Ukrainian servicemen use shotguns to down the drones AFP
Int'l Business Times
15-07-2025
- Business
- Int'l Business Times
The "Wow Effect" Is No Longer Enough: How Businesses Can Stay Successful in the Age of Rational Consumption
Innovator Olga Osokina on how AI has changed the relationship between consumers and brands, why emotional reactions matter, and what makes the Labubu case worth studying. In recent years, the global trend toward conscious consumption has gained momentum. In 2025, its popularity surged—tens of thousands of people joined the No Buy 2025 initiative, aiming to go a year without impulsive or irrational purchases. And while this trend has a positive impact on the environment and mental health, it poses a challenge for businesses: traditional sales tools are losing effectiveness, and the cost of customer acquisition is rising rapidly. Olga Osokina, CEO of UME Tech, has developed a fundamentally new approach to working with consumer behavior. She explores the intersections of artificial and biological intelligence, integrating neurobehavioral analytics and cognitive architecture into marketing, sales, and product development. Olga is the winner of Innovator of the Year (International Business Award), Entrepreneur of the Year (Stevie Awards), and Innovation Leader of the Year (Global Innovation Online Awards, 2025). She also served as a judge at the Consumer Electronics Show alongside representatives from Meta, Amazon, and Netflix. Previously, Olga founded Mirri—a sensory learning platform for children with autism spectrum disorders. The results of its use were presented at several scientific-practical conferences, including those on inclusive education. This experience became the starting point for developing the biointelligence model in the business environment. From Emotions to Decision-Making Neuropatterns Olga Osokina notes that for a long time, marketing relied on the "wow effect" —the drive to trigger a strong emotional response. But today, that's no longer enough: "The modern consumer's brain has become 'immune' to one-sided stimuli. To achieve engagement, we need to understand how the brain processes emotions, visual signals, and price anchors. What works best is an emotional sine wave, a sequence of shifting states where peaks of interest alternate with relaxation and doubt. This dynamic is what activates conscious decisions, not impulses." Under Olga's leadership, the UME Tech team conducted a series of behavioral tests involving 214 users in an e-commerce setting. During the experiment, the following were tracked: glucose levels via CGM (continuous glucose monitoring), neural activation through wearable sensors, behavioral data: clicks, scroll depth, response speed, and CTA choices. The study was carried out in 2024 in partnership with experts in behavioral economics and neurophysiology. The pilot was not a clinical trial and was not intended for medical diagnosis; the goal was to validate hypotheses about how emotional scenarios influence behavioral engagement and motivation to act. All data was anonymized and collected in accordance with internal ethical standards of UX analytics. "We found that when an emotional scenario is built on contrast—for example, an anxious audio background at the start followed by a visually warm scene—engagement increases by 23–26%. And not due to impulse, but due to internal confirmation of choice," Olga emphasizes. AI as a Barrier: How the Brain Resists Algorithms Olga stresses that AI technologies, intended to enhance communication, are increasingly triggering subconscious resistance among consumers: "People intuitively sense when content is generated by an algorithm rather than a human. The sales funnel stops working, even if the communication appears personalized." Osokina's team developed neuro-oriented engagement scenarios based on cognitive rhythm—not aggressive swings, but a deliberate activation of trust. This creates the sense of "I made this decision myself," instead of "I was manipulated." Digital Avatars and Neuro-Negotiation in B2B In 2024, UME Tech introduced AI-avatar technology—digital brand ambassadors adapted to the audience's psychotype and cultural context. At launch, they helped companies nearly eliminate costs for paid audience acquisition. "Later we scaled this approach to the B2B sector. By applying speech dynamics patterns, visual trust markers, and negotiation tempo, we helped clients increase average contract value by 15–20%," Olga shares. The Labubu Case: Not a Product, but a Symptom of the Environment This case is presented not as a pop culture reference but as an example of how a product can resonate with the audience on a cultural and neural level. Labubu demonstrates how a brand can become an interface of cultural tension. As Olga Osokina notes, its image is built on the principle of semantic incompleteness: it's both cute and strange, fluffy and toothy. This activates a projection mechanism—the consumer fills in the meaning themselves, triggering the effect of an unfinished gestalt. Combined with a scarcity model (limited releases, exclusive collaborations), this creates predictive coding of desire. The toy tapped into already-heated themes—mental health, the inner child, and kidult culture—and became a neurosymbol of returning to oneself. Even the packaging became part of the engagement: an ASMR effect when opening, minimalist visual encoding, tactile material—all of which activate the ventromedial prefrontal cortex, the area of the brain associated with intuitive confidence. "Labubu is not hype—it's an environmental marker. It's not sold—it resonates. This is a new type of product power," concludes Osokina. The Future Belongs to Cognitive Interfaces According to Osokina, the cost of customer acquisition in 2025 has irreversibly increased and will continue to rise. The winners will be the brands that learn to activate not surface-level interest, but deep intention. "The future lies in cognitive extrapolation. When a person lives their ordinary life, but the system has already 'heard' their desire. This is not manipulation, but a return to oneself through an interface," Osokina summarizes. UME Tech's model is based on a multidisciplinary practice: behavioral economics, cognitive architecture, marketing, and AI analytics. It's at the intersection of these fields that solutions are born—not only adapting to the market, but anticipating its evolution. Olga Osokina emphasizes: "It's important to note that I consciously use terminology from neuroscience, cognitive psychology, and artificial intelligence within the framework of applied humanistic analysis. These terms do not replace clinical or academic definitions—I respect the boundaries of each discipline. My goal is to integrate knowledge from adjacent fields to find practical solutions for business and society."
Courier-Mail
11-07-2025
- Courier-Mail
I spent 48 hours in Stockholm, this is the ultimate 2-day itinerary
Don't miss out on the headlines from Lifestyle. Followed categories will be added to My News. Set over 14 islands connected by 57 bridges, Stockholm is a captivating city where grand historic buildings and modern architecture mix with lush green spaces and sparkling water. Here's how to spend 48 hours in the largest city in Scandinavia. X SUBSCRIBER ONLY DAY ONE: Morning After sailing into Stockholm at the end of our Viking Homelands cruise my mother and I wake up in the Bank Hotel in the heart of the city. The hotel is set in a historic bank and breakfast is served at Bonnies in the Art Deco former bank hall. From our hotel it's a short stroll to take a boat ride around some of the 30,000 islands that make up the Stockholm Archipelago. Stromma sightseeing boat tours include hop-on, hop-off options for visitors with more time to explore, but we opt for a 90-minute tour where we sit in the open air and listen to the live English commentary as we take in the views. Back on land take a taxi or Uber to the sculpture park and art gallery Millesgården, the former home of sculptor Carl Milles and his artist wife, Olga. Keep in mind taxi prices are not regulated in Sweden and can vary wildly. Look for the rate displayed on the rear door window before getting in the car. Taxis also accept Uber bookings so you could travel the same way for less. At Millesgården start with fika, the very easily embraced Swedish tradition of coffee and tea breaks with a snack and chat. Try a knotted cardamom bun as you look out over Milles; sculptures before exploring the gallery and the home. Millesgården sculpture park in Stockholm. Afternoon Head to the park island of Djurgården and start your visit with lunch at Ulla Winbladh, where traditional Swedish food heritage is being kept alive in a historic building. From here it's a seven-minute walk to the Vasa Museum, the home of a 17th-century warship that is a true work of art. After sinking on its maiden voyage in Stockholm harbour in 1628 the Vasa was salvaged 333 years later in 1961, and you can now be transfixed by this ship covered in hundreds of carved sculptures. Then it's less than 10 minutes' walk to a different kind of Swedish history at Abba The Museum. Book ahead to secure your entry time and save money, and prepare to feel the Abba magic as you see those Abba-licious costumes, take photos in the Arrival album's helicopter, dance on stage with Abba holograms, see that Eurovision medal and so much more. Wax figures on display at Stockholm's ABBA Museum. Evening Hop on a tram back to the waterfront boulevard of Strandvägen for dinner at Glashuset. Here the 'fun dining' philosophy has created a welcome way to enjoy cocktails and Swedish flavours on the water's edge. Then wander past some of Stockholm's most beautiful Art Nouveau buildings lit up at night on the short walk back to the Bank Hotel. Colourful houses on Stortorget Square in Stockholm's Old Town. DAY TWO: Morning With most museums and attractions not opening until 10am early risers can explore Stockholm's Old Town, Gamla Stan, before the cobblestoned streets start to fill with tourists. Make your way to Stortorget, the oldest and most picturesque square in Stockholm, before heading to the city's narrowest street, Mårten Trotzigs Alley, which whittles down to around 90cm across. From the alley it's a five-minute walk to one of the best fika spots in town. The winner of last year's Best Cinnamon Bun in Stockholm competition, Skeppsbro Bageri is a 100 per cent organic artisan bakery with waterfront-view tables. Then explore more Gamla Stan streets on the eight-minute walk to the Royal Palace. With five museums you could spend all day in the official residence of the King of Sweden, but to save time we take in two: The Treasury, where the Swedish Crown Jewels and other dazzling regalia are stored deep in the cellar vaults, and The Royal Apartments, where opulence is the word and some of the original furnishings date back to the 1730s. The Avicii Experience in Stockholm. Afternoon After lunch in the cosy Chokladkoppen café in Stortorget travel 1.3km to the Avicii Experience, honouring the life of one of Sweden's most prolific songwriters and producers, Tim 'Avicii' Bergling. This interactive museum had me in tears even before I saw the recreation of his childhood bedroom with his original items and doesn't pull any punches as it shows the intense highs and lows of his life. Then it's back to the waterfront to meet a ferry for the future. The world's first electric hydrofoil ferry, the Candela P-12 Nova, is faster and uses 85 per cent less energy than traditional diesel ferries, and when it rises up on those hydrofoil wings and flies along the water it's a whole lot of fun, too. Take the Nova for a ride to Tappström on Ekerö and back to Klara Mälarstrand before a seven-minute drive to SoFo. Named for 'south of Folkungagatan' in the Södermalm district, SoFo is full of creative and interesting shops including vintage and thrift stores, local jewellery and fashion boutiques, record stores and tattoo parlours, and cafés and wine bars. Depending on the day, you might catch open-air markets in Nytorget Square, while the last Thursday of the month sees lots of shops open until 9pm for SoFo nights. Evening From SoFo stroll to restaurant Pelikan where you can dine on classic Swedish dishes in one of Sweden's oldest restaurants. Try its fall-off-the-bone pork leg that's baked at 90C overnight, or doppsko, the creamed Swedish hash with egg yolk and beetroot. Then it's back to the Bank Hotel for a nightcap before bed at the rooftop bar, Le Hibou, where cocktails on the terrace come with city views. The writer travelled as a guest of Viking Cruises and stayed as a guest of Small Luxury Hotels of the World. Bonnie's Restaurant in the Bank Hotel. Picture: Amanda Woods How to get to Stockholm, Sweden from Australia Multiple airlines fly from Australia to Stockholm including Qatar Airways, which has one-stop flights from some Australian cities to Stockholm, and Finnair, which offers flights through Singapore or Hong Kong before a hop to Helsinki. Where to stay in Stockholm, Sweden Part of Small Luxury Hotels of the World, the Bank Hotel has 111 rooms including windowless vault rooms for total blackout sleeps in a historic bank building where modern art mixes with heritage touches just a stone's throw from the waterfront. Originally published as I spent 48 hours in Stockholm, this is the ultimate 2-day itinerary
