‘We had forgotten how lucky we are to live in Norrland… until we went abroad’

A few years ago Paul Connolly and his girlfriend, Donna, went on their first trip away from Sweden since the birth of their twin girls. It was an eye-opening experience. Illustration by Jessica Kwan.

The incident unfolded almost in slow-motion, as if time itself couldn’t believe what was happening.

Our five-year-old twins, Caitlin and Leila, were playing in a small playground in a Turkish resort when a girl of about eight walked up to Caitlin, who was about to climb the slide, and punched her in the face, knocking her down.

There had been no provocation. The girl just wanted to go on the slide first and had been unwilling to wait her turn. My girlfriend and I were sitting having dinner about ten meters away. I rushed over to make sure Caitlin was OK. She was physically fine, but was obviously shocked and distressed, so I held her. And then turned my attention to the assailant. All I did was look at her sternly before she started to cower and plead with me in what I assumed was Russian.

First summer holiday

Since our girls had been born in Sweden in 2013 we’d not left the country. Donna and I were too busy with the twins and with trying to build our professional lives in a new country. But in the summer of 2017 we spent a few days in the UK before heading off to Turkey for our first summer holiday as a family.

Given the Brexit vote we weren’t too surprised to find that civic life in the UK had coarsened since we’d left five years previously. But seeing life through the lens of being a father of daughters was remarkable. And not in a good way. It wasn’t just the way I saw women being catcalled by men in the street. Or that I overheard men making openly lascivious remarks to women. Sadly, those morons existed before Brexit emboldened the reactionary and dim to air their prejudices and insecurities. But this misogyny had even seemed to affect those who should know better.

One friend with an adolescent daughter teased her mercilessly over the fact that she didn’t want to shave her legs. He called her ‘Hairy Mary’.

Another friend laughed at his daughter’s suggestion that she could play football professionally.

Out of control

When did this happen? When did it become acceptable in the UK to demean and limit girls and women?

When we arrived in Turkey, the difference in how females were regarded was even more palpable. Female airport security guards were not allowed to pat down male passengers. There were far fewer women in obvious positions of authority. However, it was at the resort, run by a very well-known French operator, where the differences were most notable.

There was a large contingent of Russian families at the resort, mostly unaccompanied by fathers. Many of the kids were out of control – aggressive and terribly behaved. The adults were not much better. They were rude, obnoxious and showing levels of entitlement I’d not encountered since I’d worked as a waiter at the posh Henley Festival in the UK. Even the kids’ club, a feature for which the French travel company has an enviable reputation, had obvious problems. When I mentioned that the girls wanted to play football one morning, the staff member responsible for the activity looked at me as if I were a little unhinged. ‘No,’ she explained slowly, as if trying to explain astrophysics to a toddler, ‘the boys play football and the girls can sit in the park and pick flowers or something.’

Amongst savages

Due largely to the antics of some of the other kids, our girls loathed the kids’ club. One morning, just as we turned up with the girls, one boy just punched another child in the face. The staff did nothing. Our girls were terrified by the violence.

After five calm, measured years in Sweden we almost felt as though we were amongst savages. Some other nations seem eons behind Sweden.

But despite the barbarism we witnessed, we did enjoy our break.

Fun in the pools

It was great to feel real heat for the first time in years and, as a family, we had fun in the pools and sea. Leila learned to swim and Caitlin threw herself at the waves. However, we were glad to be back home in northern Sweden. We know we live in one of the best countries in the world to raise daughters. But we’d become blasé about how lucky we are to live in a country which values its young and doesn’t limit its females, a nation that nurtures kids. In Sweden, it’s a major event if the girls have even the tiniest row with one of their friends. There is no violence, no intimidation. And, most importantly, there is nobody to tell my girls they’re the wong gender to play football.