Translated article from BLT
Here is an article that I've translated from today's BLT (Bleking Läns Tidning, Bleking County Paper) about Victoria's visit to Blekinge yesterday, and especially her meeting with the paper Mediaboom - a paper run by mentally retarded/intellectually handicapped.
The Crown Princess took the whole Mediaboom with calmness
– It’s great to be in Karlskrona again, Victoria told BLT and shined with Mediaboom, which is now the only paper in the world that knows the truth about the marriage rumours.
- But that’s a secret. We won’t say anything, says Ann-Sofie Karlsson.
It’s a merry atmosphere this grey and wet December morning the hour before Mediaboom will get the best Christmas present. An interview with Crown Princess Victoria. Despite the big interest from all of Scandinavia, the Royal Court has said that the Crown Princess takes the interview so seriously that she wants no other media present.
Role model from Karlskrona
All the questions are polished and divided among the 16 people in the editorial staff. All sorts of questions are included – if the Crown Princess likes to travel, if she likes golf or fishing best, what she does during the days and how it’s like to have Säpo in your heals all the time. And of course, the question on everyone’s lips – how is it with the love to Daniel?
Can a person say “you”? For the Mediaboom’ers this doesn’t seem to be an issue.
- I think it will come naturally, says guide (at the paper) Jenny Lenemark, who has spurred her editorial staff during the autumn to send letters and a video to the Royal Court – asking for an interview.
- I think we’ve become a good role model for other journalists. We have showed that you should never give up.
For Mercy Wilhelmsson, Anna Ulvhuvud and the other royal fans – the Crown Princess’s positive notice (about granting the interview) as a chock of happiness.
- She is my biggest idol, says Mercy.
- I’m gonna say “hello aunt”, jokes Jeremy Andersson, and the jittery feelings that makes his heart beat faster stops for a moment. In honour of the say, he is dressed in shirt and his good trousers.
- I thought about wearing a suit, he says and wonders how the Crown Princess will be dressed.
- Of course she will be nicely dressed, say Laila De Bie.
And of course our Crown Princess is tidily dressed in blue trousers and jacket when she and Elisabeth Tarras-Wahlberg steps out of the County Governor’s car outside the residence.
Victoria the most nervous?
Victoria, who has officially come to Karlskrona to name a ship, has chosen to make it a whole day in Blekinge – foremost to meet Mediaboom, but also to speak about environmental care with a group of students from Blekinge Institute of Technology.
- I get many requests from papers about interviews. This time it was Mediaboom’s turn, says the Crown Princess in her natural way. And she jokes back on BLT’s question if she’s nervous for the coming questions:
- No, but you seem to be.
- It’s gonna be very nice to meet Mediaboom.
An opinion that is of course answered by the gang of journalists who waits in the Pillar Room. When a charming Victoria walks around and takes all the Mediaboom’ers in hand, there is one person who cannot control herself. Jenny Persson’s hug has such natural and genuine warmth that not even the Säpo guard can’t resist smiling.
And when the other journalists are driven out of the room, we hear the laughter’s on the other side of the door.
- It’s nice that she comes now when it’s so Christmassy nice, says the Lady of the Household at the County Governor’s residence, Karin Abrahamsson, who is preparing a light lunch for Victoria – a saffron and shellfish filled salmon with shrimp salad and walnut bread – so that she has energy for the whole day until the dinner at the Naval Museum.
Sleeps in Göran’s room
Everyone who works around the County Governor thinks it’s great to have the Crown Princess on a visit.
- She’s a great person, says County Governor Ingegerd Wärnersson.
- But of course it’s a bit nervous, if one would break the time schedule, says the County Administration’s Information Director, Christer Johansson, who can also say that the Crown Princess stays for the night at the residence. Not in a royal suite though, as one could assume.
- No, it will be the same room that Göran Persson (the Prime Minister) uses when he’s here.
Despite the scheduled half hour has gone and the group of students from Blekinge Institute of Technology has already arrived, the room to the Pillar Room remains closed. Another five minutes passes before a happy Mediaboom editorial staff rushes out and says in a chorus:
- It was wonderful!
- It was the coolest thing I’ve ever experiences. She thinks we’re great and do a good job who writes the truth instead of making stuff up like the gossip magazines do, says Jeremy Andersson.
But any yummy details to his colleagues in the press are not to talk about. We can read it all in Mediaboom, which comes out in a few weeks.
Sing-song/sing-along loving Princess
The only thing that is revealed is that Victoria would choose Mediaboom if it was a party and she would vote, that she loves sing-song/sing-along but hasn’t attended it at Skansen, that she keeps studying for a while more and is convinced that someone else in the Royal Family would like to meet Mediaboom in the future.
Gert-Åke Johansson’s question if the Crown Princess would like to come to his birthday party was the only thing she couldn’t answer.
- It must’ve been a hard question, says Laila De Bie.
- Her father has his birthday on the same day…
