A week ago, I was waiting for the metro (or tunnelbana) on the  T-Centralen of Stockholm. It was around 11:20 pm on a Tuesday night. There, I could listen the echoes of percussion and strings. When I got closer I saw four teenagers playing a guitar, some drums and signing. The few people around where enjoying the show and music. I even shut down my mp3 player to listen to their “covers” of popular songs and feel the rhythms of the drums. When they finished with a song, the people around will applauded, a was a very fulfilling seen.

Things changed when the “security” came, you see the metro police or “ORDNINGSMAKT” are generally dressed in red. They are always around in public transportation to control any disturbances or drunks (very common on weekends). The thing that strike me the most, was that four members of the ORDNINGSMAKT (which the smallest was around 1.82 meter tall and around 90 Kg) came down to put a end to the 4 teens playing. The teens where at most 50 kg, this is passive bullying. When teens saw the first guard, they  started to pack. The image of four big men with the red uniforms around the kids, was priceless.

Yeah there is the rule that this kind of behaviors is not accepted and is worst when performers ask for money. However these kids were not asking for money, they were doing it for pleasure, for fun. The metro is full of art on the walls, “some saying is the biggest art exposition on the world”. Why not permit vocational performers in non rush ours to delight the passengers and add to the “art exposition”. Like I guy told me that night, what else can you expect, this is Sweden.

Stockholm metro has a history of problems with graffiti, if they had to chose between performances or graffiti, I bet they will go for the performances.

There is a time when policies should be reviewed and I never thought about until I saw what I saw. Is Interesting how we overlook some regulations since “its the way is been for a long time”. I wonder how many of our habits need are overlook, because we fail to see into the mirror critically and constructively.