Did Honesty Bring a Loss or Profit?

The narrow street through the old town led us to a bay. There was a harbor alongside the bay and there we could see a lot of different types of boats and ships; a lot of small boats to go to the opposite side of the bay, an old-fashioned sailing boat, several sightseeing ships to go to Göteborg or elsewhere through the canals, two huge ferries to go to Finland.

We decided to make a round trip of the bay using a sightseeing boat. The boat was roughly the same size as a sightseeing coach with its ceiling made of glass. We took the seats at the rear of the boat.

From the boat, I could learn that Stockholm was made up of hundreds of bays, lakes, islands, canals and bridges. A row of historical buildings stood with dignity along the water front. I remembered Venice where my family had visited last Christmas. The view from the boat on the bay of Stockholm recalled me the scenery from Island of Lido which located at the opposite side of Venice. I then realized that there was a reason why Stockholm was also known as ‘North Venice’.

Our boat made several stops, at the imperial palace, at Strandvegen which was famous with its posh hotels, restaurants and shops and at an island only for a fun fair(!). After passing by the huge ferries, our boat came back to the place where we started the tour.

During the trip, no one had came and asked us about the fare. Therefore, we had no chance to pay. When we got off the boat, I told one young crew member that we had not paid. He indicated to a fat middle aged crew member in white shirt and trousers who seemed to be the captain of the boat. I repeated the same thing to the captain.

‘Oh, really! You have not paid yet?’ he said, surprised. My wife complained me in Japanese,

‘We should have just got off the boat without saying anything to the crew members. Then we would not need pay.’

‘Actually, I had wanted to pay but no one came and asked for it. We got on here and got off here, so we made a round trip. Should I pay 100 Krona for each?’

I asked to the captain. He replied,

‘I will give you a special discount for your honesty. Two times 80 Krona makes 160 Krona.’

It meant we only paid a half of the normal price for a round trip. However, my wife was still complaining that I was too honest. Looking at both my wife and the captain, I wondered whether my honesty had brought me a loss or a profit.

Looking for a place with nice view, we took an old naked lift called Katarina Hissen which was built in 1883. ‘Hiss’ means lift or elevator in Swedish and ‘en’ is added for a definite article. Therefore, ‘Hissen’ is equivalent to ‘the lift’ in English. At the top of the lift, there was a bridge to the hill on the opposite side. I was surprised that the structure of this area was quite three-dimensional.

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As the view from the top of the hill was not as good as we had expected, we went down to the water front again. We went onto a boat-café on the canal and ordered Swedish beer. The beer tasted like Heineken, my favorite beer. Drinking beer on a boat surrounded by the stately buildings… I felt a kind of déjà vu. After thinking for a few seconds, I remembered that I had had the similar experience on a sightseeing boat on the River Thames in London. When I told my wife this, she said that she was thinking about exactly the same thing; this place was similar to the Thames.