This period was one when NATO forces ran huge joint military maneuvers in the northern area where I lived. Big warships would come to our town and stay for a few days. They were under orders to be friendly to the “natives” and held “open ship” days for civilians to come onboard. For us kids it was like paradise, being permitted to climb to the top of big anti-aircraft guns and be shown live how they worked. No shots were fired, though.
The soldiers showed us tricks with cards and coins and engaged in small talk with us and gave us chewing gums that we had not seen before. I remember I found two of the guys easier to talk to than the others. They were from the state of Tennessee, they had said. Only years later did I realize that so was Elvis and understood that those two soldiers probably spoke much the way he did. We had even seen the film King Creole and heard him speak as well as sing. Probably, by then I had developed a keen sense of hearing the minute details of spoken sounds.
/Karl Hofsö
The Hofsö Method 