Lotta Engberg is in Järvsö for a performance when we speak on the phone. Shortly afterwards, she will go on holiday to Thailand for two weeks with her partner Mikael Sandström.
She made the decision to drop out of “Lotta på Liseberg” after first thinking about it for a couple of years.
– I do this for my own sake. Being free in the summer means that my grandchildren and I can hang out more. The two oldest turn ten. In five years they don’t want to be with me anymore. The youngest children start school and are locked into ten weeks of summer vacation. I want to do everything with them and be able to take them in so they can go to sailing school, play golf and fish for crabs.
“Mikael triggers me and I him,” says Lotta Engberg. Photo: HENRIK JANSSON
This year’s summer will be Lotta’s first time off in 48 years.
– It started with me stacking peat in the peat bog outside Laxå as a 13-year-old. After that I picked strawberries in the summer and worked as a tray girl at Esso motor hotel. There I made a career in the restaurant. I started at the counter, then became a cashier and ended up as a cook.
I even think vacuuming is fun.
Where does your energy come from?
– I have never analyzed it. I am a morning person who loves to do things. There are few things I don’t find funny, I even think vacuuming is funny. On the tour I like to drive my own car. Before you called I filled up the washer fluid and refueled, the day before yesterday I washed the car so it was fresh. On the one hand, I like to have a good time, on the other hand I like speed and wind.
Lotta Engberg
Age: 60.
Make: Artist and presenter.
Bor: House of 385 square meters at the end of the forest on a natural plot in Mölnlycke. The home has a spa area with sauna, pool and cinema room.
Family: Partner Mikael Sandström, 65. Daughters Malin, 37, and Amanda, 35. Six grandchildren, six bonus grandchildren. Leonberger bitch Nova, 4.
Current: Leads “Bingolotto” together with Daniel Norberg.
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Lotta and Mikael have got the Leonberger Nova together. Photo: PRIVATE
Have you always been this energetic?
– I think so. I suggested that we repaint the summer cottage, but Mikael thought it was useless. He’s a person who likes to read a book in the shade, but I’m not there yet.
Today, Mikael has retired from his work as chief physician, but remains as an expert in TV4’s “News Morning”. Last summer he wrote intensively on a book, and possibly it will be the same this year.
Mikael says I have a popcorn machine in my head.
– Maybe I will climb the walls this summer? Mikael says I have a popcorn machine in my head. He means that it pops and clatters in the pot. My skull is a bit like that, so it’s important to keep the lid on.
In previous periods when Lotta took things more calmly, she trained in bookkeeping and studied to be a good man.
– When you close a door, you can open a window in another direction, she says.
This summer she will make another attempt to listen to audiobooks.
– I have tried when I go to sleep, but I fall asleep in a second. Nanne Grönvall said I must listen to Persbrandt’s memoirs. I tried for five nights, but never got through the first chapter and the next night I had to backtrack.
How does life look otherwise in the future?
– I will continue to work with “Bingolotto”, which is a part-time job that I really enjoy. A super job with a super gang, just like “Lotta på Liseberg”. It’s such a heartfelt and lively program, where you call home to people who are real. I’m an ordinary girl who likes to be with ordinary people. Neighbors and ordinary life are close to my heart. I’m not a red carpet person, but can be if I have to.
Lotta Engberg hosts “Bingolotto” together with Daniel Norberg. Photo: Mathias Otterberg/TV4
What is it like working with fellow presenter Daniel Norberg in “Bingolotto”?
– Daniel is fantastic. There you also have a popcorn brain. He is lively, happy and intelligent. He and I are striving in the same direction. Daniel is also an ordinary guy who likes ordinary people. Many times I have worked in contexts where one person takes charge and the other has to back down. That is certainly not the case with Daniel. We make sure that the other has room and lift each other up instead of crowding each other. There is an honesty in the way you are.
Many times I have worked in contexts where one person takes charge and the other has to back down.
“Bingolotto” is a part-time job. What are you going to do the rest of the time?
– Clear my discounts a little better. We have a new discount of 200 square meters. Our house is quite newly built and there was a slope down to the stream where there were only large blast stones. Two years ago, we put soil there and via a Facebook group I contacted everyone who lives in Benareby: “Hey, we’ve had a blast. Anyone want to get rid of perennials?” Lots of people with mature gardens got in touch.
Lotta got lots of perennials such as mallow, giant rams and kantnepeta.
– I went around to any number of places and dug and they came here. It was so much fun getting to know people in this area. One woman had even sorted the plants into spring-flowering, summer-flowering and autumn-flowering.
– I climbed around and planted and planted on the steep slope. It has recovered wonderfully, but now it is full of weeds.
Maybe it took 60 years of life experience before we would fit together.
Lotta Engberg and Mikael Sandström found each other late in life. Photo: HENRIK JANSSON
You and Mikael seem to have a good time together?
– No, not cozy, that’s the wrong word. We have a lot of fun and intense together. Mikael has so many foxes behind his ears. He is a fantastically bubbly guy. We are still in the newly-loved stage and giggle and stuff a lot.
A large part of their time together is spent talking and discussing.
– Mikael triggers me and I him. We are very different and none of us are yes-sayers. It’s rarely quiet in our house. You know, you’re being teased all the time.
In addition to some house projects, they play golf together and then the Leonberger bitch Nova also gets to come along. Today, Lotta feels that they have become a natural “we”, where “I” also has an obvious place.
– We don’t eat breakfast together, rarely lunch, but always dinner. I’m a morning person, but instead of sitting and sulking that Mikael doesn’t wake up, I eat when I’m hungry. He’s not a lunch person, but I die without lunch.
Have you met at a good stage in life?
– I don’t think we would have become a couple if we had met at the age of 25. Then we were in other places in our lives. He was a medical student and our worlds were so different. In some ways, we are not so different anymore. Maybe it took 60 years of life experience before we would fit together.
How do you nurture your relationship?
– It’s not something we think about. We nurture it hourly and situationally, if I do say so. There is a basic attitude that we want the other to feel good. Then it will be good and if it is not, you have to say.
What is romance to you?
– It could be a hand on the arm. When I come home after “Bingolotto”, Mikael has always lit a candle and meets me at the door. Those little things. I have no need for diamond rings and flowers.
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