Jonas “Skansen-Jonas” Wahlström started working extra as an animal keeper at Skansen after ninth grade. When Skansen-Akvariet opened its doors in 1978, it was on Jonas’s initiative – and he has been there ever since.
Now Jonas Wahlström is 72 years old and past retirement age.
Earlier this summer, he announced that he “will probably quit within a year”, but when he visits News24‘s podcast “Flødet” he hints that he will probably visit the aquarium sometimes even after he quits.
– Of course I might go up to Skansen and have a look at some point, but I have a farm in Södertörn where I have animals and such. So I have a little hobby for me.
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Jonas Wahlström is financially independent
In a previous interview with Hänt, Skansen-Jonas has said that he is financially independent. But it is not necessarily the salary at Skansen that brought him there.
– My pension is not staggeringly high, but aside from the pension, I have had a lot of luck with good advice and share investments and such. So it has made me financially independent, says Wahlström in Flödet and continues:
– Both my wife and I have sold homes over the years that have increased in value by upwards of a thousand percent.
So you’re not staying at Skansen for the salary?
– No, no! It’s just the only thing I can do.
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Jonas Wahlström at the Skansen aquarium. Photo: Tim Aro/TT The program Skansen-Jonas refuses to participate in
No, there is no need for Skansen-Jonas financially – and perhaps that is why the popular profile has turned down several television requests over the years.
– It’s like that in Let’s Dance they have to have a village flag in every season, that’s why they’ve asked me on two occasions, he says in Flödet.
However, standing up does not come to mind, Skansen-Jonas is clear about that.
– No, but my God, I won’t be there!
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They offered Jonas Wahlström 475,000 – still refused
Another entertainment program that Jonas Wahlström has been asked to be part of is The Island, which is broadcast on Kanal 5 and Discovery+.
Other well-known faces who appeared in the program are among others Class Eriksson, Maria Montazami and Mikael “Soldoktorn” Sandström.
– I was actually offered to be there half a year ago, and then you would go to an island outside of South America as a group and collaborate. And it would be a survival course of a few days and then you would go down there for a month, says Jonas.
Photo: Kanal 5/Discovery+”I’m not sitting around starving”
But Jonas didn’t choose that program either – despite a juicy fee to say the least.
– I thought like this “well, it’s going to be slimming month” in principle, it fits perfectly. And it will be a white month, it fits perfectly, he says in Flødet and continues:
– And then you would receive SEK 475,000 as remuneration for that month. But then I thought “no, I’m not sitting and starving on some island”.
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