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Monthly archives: February 2012

14 Impressions & Random Thoughts After 3 Months in Sweden

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snowflake close-up

How amazing is a snowflake up close? Very! Photo by: wild_turkey5300 (CC BY 2.0)

  1. I swear they have “Hollywood snow” here…The snow flakes are so large that it almost looks fake. It’s really beautiful because the snowflakes can be so many different sizes at once…Maybe Hollywood is getting it right, after all, since I have now seen snow look this way in real life.
  2. I miss my dog! I couldn’t find any statistics but there must be a much lower ratio of pets to people here in Sweden than in California. I see a lot fewer pets. Maybe it’s just because it’s cold out.
  3. The electric kettle is a wonderful thing…not sure why it isn’t popular in the USA?
  4. I was told that hardly any Europeans use duffel bags as luggage when traveling on airplanes. Then I noticed mine was the only one on the conveyor belt so perhaps it’s true. Why is that?
  5. Swedes bag their own groceries. You pay for how many bags you want in advance. Your purchases go down the conveyer belt and the cashier moves a bar so that the next customer’s purchases won’t mix with yours but instead pile up next to yours on the other side of the bar. Nevertheless, it get’s really stressful because the food tends to get crushed by the food coming down the belt and because the next customer’s (customer number three’s) groceries will then start to mix with yours when the bar is moved back.
  6. Week numbers…I never know what number week it is and even though Swedes refer to them (as in “Let’s get together week 8″) all the time, even some Swedes don’t seem to know which number equals which week.
  7. Wine in a box? Splendid!
  8. Taxis in Sweden are classy. The cabs are always clean and nice. You can order them in advance and depend on them showing up. Most prices are fixed in advance so you can rely on not getting taken advantage of.
  9. Swedes usually get a paycheck just once a month. Yikes! That requires good planning…
  10. Nearly every salad bar consists mostly of iceberg lettuce and cucumbers (and if you’re lucky, corn and shaved carrots).
  11. I know I’ve said this before, but I can’t help continuing to be surprised that 9 out of 10 winter jackets are black. Every once in awhile there is a red, arctic-style jacket with a faux fur-lined hood but where are all the other colors?
  12. I have learned that you must leave the house with your gloves and hat on and not plan on putting them on later. It’s a cumulative cold thing, once you’re cold, you’re cold. You must leave the house with everything on.
  13. Calendars that start on a Monday? Help, I’m confused!
  14. The coolest thing about snow is that (when you don’t live downtown), you can see all the tracks from the animals that came visiting during the night (I have seen deer, bird, and hare tracks and I live in the suburbs, not the country. I have also seen tracks I can’t identify… so I would imagine they are from Sasquatch…)

    black coats on coat rack

    Here's the coat rack at work...Thank goodness someone accessorized with a red scarf!

 

Kristin Lund - Work

February 26, 2012

Going to the Movies Swedish-style

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Continuing my theme of what a working stiff can do in her non-working hours, I thought I’d write about my recent night out at the movies.

The thing that struck me right away about going to the movies in Sweden is that you buy tickets in advance with reserved seats. It’s also 100 crowns which at this moment converts to $14.98. I have only been to the movies only once since moving to Sweden three months ago.

Having reserved seats makes the process a little easier. You don’t have to worry that you won’t get a good seat since you already know where you’re sitting. But it does take some coordination getting there. In downtown Uppsala, for example, the parking can be a challenge and the cold weather always makes things a little more challenging.

screencap of selecting movie seats online

Here's what one cinema's pre-order ticket system looks like. The red seats are already sold and the system is offering me two seats in the front...

 

My friend Ingrid and I went to the movies last Friday night. I met her at Uppsala’s Central Train Station where I had arrived on a bus. Ingrid found parking rather easily because somehow Ingrid can do anything. She managed not to hit someone who darted out into the street in front of us but the car stopping short caused her purse to fall off the back seat. In her purse she had some sort of small bucket of candy she had bought. The bucket fell out of her purse and spilled all over the floor, mixing with the dog hair-coated floor mats. Since it’s winter, the floor mats also have a nice layer of melted snow and grit from the sidewalks.

Ewww…

But, most candy in Sweden seems to involve a hearty dose of licorice so in my book, the candy already had a few counts against it. Perhaps dog hair and grit improves things. (I declined her generous offer to share.)

Once the car was parked, I put on my gloves and hat and scarf and zipped up my long down jacket. Then we picked our way to the theatre, trying to spot the icy spots on the sidewalk before we stepped on them. Once inside, Ingrid when to one of 4 machines where you swipe your credit card and it prints out your pre-ordered tickets.

Bolex camera

Bolex film camera. (This image is in the public domain.)

 

We couldn’t get the machine to work and had to get an employee to help us. You can buy tickets right before a performance but I think it is liable to be sold out. We had tickets for “My Week with Marilyn” and the only seats left when we purchased them three hours earlier were in the front row. We took a chance and bought those anyway.

There turned out to be a lot of space between the screen and the front row so it wasn’t a problem. I must say that a person needs to book an extra seat just for all their extra winter clothing. What are you supposed to do with it all? They should have coat racks in each cinema. If they did, I didn’t notice them.

Swedish movie ticket

Here's my crumpled up movie ticket for "My Week with Marilyn."

 

I love seeing movies with Swedish subtitles. My favorite thing is a Swedish movie with Swedish subtitles but I can only get that with movies on DVD. The subtitles are for the hearing impaired. Obviously, a Swedish movie shown in a Swedish movie theatre does not have subtitles. But, a movie in another language, such as English, will have subtitles. Then I get to practice my Swedish and be entertained at the same time.

Nirvana!

Kristin Lund - Work

February 23, 2012

14 Things I Will Bring Back to Sweden with Me

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…It’s just a matter of how much should I haul back with me! Photo by: Drew Coffman (CC BY NC SA)

A million years ago (okay, three months), I blogged about what to bring to Sweden from the US. As an example, I talked about the “Eggsact Eggtimer” I owned and whether I should take that to Sweden. It was not an expensive item but it was super handy and I thought it might be hard to find one in Sweden.

You know, Sweden is not exactly a third world country, my Swedish friends assured me.

I didn’t pack the eggtimer and later I stumbled across a large container of them at a store in Stockholm so it turned out to be a good decision.

But I am traveling home for a week this month and I am busy trying to assemble a list of what makes sense to bring back with me (that I already own) and what would be smart to stock up on while I am in the States.

You might recall that I arrived in Sweden three months ago with three enormous bags—two of which I paid extra fees for. I had done the research and found that it was cheaper to pay the airline fees than to try to ship extra stuff. So this time around I am considering paying for one extra bag again.

Here are a few of the things that seem really expensive to me in Sweden. Most of them are really mundane, everyday items but I just can’t bring myself to pay Swedish prices while the US prices are still fresh in my head. Perhaps I will bring some or all of these things back from my trip. (And yes, I realize that paying for an extra bag also adds to the US price but I think I will still come out ahead. Who really knows?)

Buy new:

  1. Backpack for carrying my computer, etc. back and forth to work (definitely exist here but too expensive)
  2. Power bars for a high protein snack. They have them in Sweden but they are twice as expensive
  3. Transformer so that I can bring some US electrical stuff to Sweden (for example, my electric toothbrush) Note: I purchased this before I came to Sweden but then it was too heavy to bring!
  4. Underwear (don’t laugh, too expensive here)
  5. Socks (ditto)
  6. A special kind of shampoo I haven’t found in Sweden
  7. Winter jacket (already ordered it during a really good online sale) The one I use for medium cold days here is really and truly ugly, not at all fit for wearing to work…
  8. Sports phone case – they have them here but again, they cost about 40% more

 

Bring from storage:

  1. sheets and pillow cases (higher thread count than I can afford in Sweden)
  2. pens – my word, the office supplies are horrible in Sweden!
  3. Wii console and games
  4. Long “body” pillow – haven’t seen one in Sweden but they’re probably here
  5. Some DVDs (I miss my collection!)
  6. Laptop pillow for computer (yes, I know, but this one is perfect and I have never seen this type for sale again, even in the US)

I know what you’re thinking…Why not bring back armloads of iPads and other electronic wonderfulness since those definitely cost more in Sweden?

Well, the answer is money. You can see how modest (and dull!) the lists above are so there will be no fabulous new purchases, I can tell you that!

And I won’t bring back  the “Egg-Per’fect Color Changing Eggtimer” (the eggtimer formerly known as the “Eggsact Eggtimer”…there’s a Prince joke here somewhere). That will stay in California since egg-loving Swedes can buy buckets of them….

eggtimers for sale in Sweden

I didn’t pack the eggtimer and later I stumbled across a large container of them at a store in Stockholm.

 

Kristin Lund - Work

February 17, 2012

My Big Fat Portable Office

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I have never worked in an office that was so, well, portable.

The software company  where I work as a Technical Writer  has 70+ employees. We are currently over-crowded and have been waiting for the other half of the floor we rent to be made into usable office space. (The company started out renting half the floor with the option to later expand into the other half. It exercised that option a few months ago but it has taken awhile to get the unimproved space ready.)

People at work

Yes, everyone does look this young at my office... Photo by Ulf Lundin/imagebank.sweden.se

 

In the meantime, we have a constant desk sharing, leapfrog sort of system in which people share desks. It somehow works out. It’s a little “first come, first served.” If you get to work and someone is sitting at “your” desk, you can look around and see if someone is working from home that day or on paternity leave or in permanent meetings or something like that.

The reason it works is that nearly everyone has a laptop computer. Most desks have a monitor and you can plug your laptop into the monitor if you want a larger screen. There are no land line phones. Everyone has a work cell phone.

So, you see how mobile everyone is.

There is no such thing as having your own pens and sticky pads and notebooks, etc. If you have to staple something, you look around and see whose desk you can nick one from. Remember the movie “Office Space” in which one character was very protective of his red stapler? That would never work here.

The one thing that I still haven’t figured out is where people keep files and things like that. Other than the CFO, who has file cabinets for all her financial documents, I can’t see that anyone is storing many paper documents. Most of my work is in electronic form but there are certain kinds of editing, etc. that require me to print out in order to do the job well. So far, I stick them in these plastic folders and sometimes in a binder but I don’t think this system will work for a long time.

Because we work in large rooms and the desks are very near each other, phone conversations take place elsewhere. If someone’s phone rings, they carry the phone with them to an empty conference room. If they can find any empty one, that is.

There are lots of very small conference rooms—some would be crowded with more than three people. Some are currently being used informally as people’s offices only because there is a table there they can use. With the completion of the new space, I think there will be enough conference rooms so that finding an empty one “on the fly” won’t be the challenge it sometimes is.

I think it’s quite a good system. It reminds me of an article I once wrote for a magazine about something called “cohousing.” Cohousing embodies the idea of a community of private homes that share amenities and common space, such as a central kitchen, work, and entertainment spaces, etc. Cohousing communities are committed to the idea of community and also the idea that you can share space instead of everyone having their own private version. It’s like taking the condo idea, where you might share a laundry room and a pool, and going a few steps further.

Cohousing is, not surprisingly, a concept originating in Denmark.

I’ve worked in offices where I felt I really needed my own workspace and I cherished having a cubicle (the more private the better) that I could call my own.

But lately, with the addition of earphones and Spotify (when things get too distracting), I don’t mind at all being right out in the middle of things, sharing a desk, and taking my phone calls wherever I can find a quiet corner.

Kristin Lund - Work

February 15, 2012

Shopping at Ingvar’s

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Diners at IKEA cafe

IKEA diners. Photo by: Nightscream (CC BY 3.0)

 

I have always loved IKEA.

There, I’ve admitted it.

For a long time, there weren’t any IKEA stores in the San Francisco Bay Area but they finally built one in Oakland some years ago. Going to IKEA was a shopping adventure and I always found something I could not live without. Plus, I got to fill up on meatballs, lingon, and fresh potatoes, dreaming of the next time I would be able to visit Sweden.

And since this is a work blog, I don’t mind saying that I’ve done a lot of work from home at my various IKEA desks. And as I posted in an earlier blog, even my Swedish workplace buys some of its desks at IKEA.

When I took Swedish lessons in Berkeley, I had a reader that had an article about the history of IKEA. It was there that I learned the name ”IKEA” is a made-up word composed from the initials of the founder’s name, Ingvar Kamprad, the farm where he grew up (Elmtaryd), and his home parish (Agunnaryd, in Småland, Southern Sweden).

I was surprised to see that although the first IKEA opened in Älmhult, Småland in 1953, it wasn’t until 1985 that an IKEA opened in the United States.

As I mentioned, my family enjoyed eating at the café in IKEA in Oakland and when they started selling food you could take home, we happily started doing that. We bought jars of lingon, frozen meatballs, gravy, and sliced potatoes with cheese (not unlike Janssons frestelse (“Jansson’s temptation”)—a traditional Swedish potato dish.)

One day we were disappointed to find that the fresh, small potatoes in the restaurant had become mashed potatoes and that IKEA had pulled the products we liked best from its food department. It turns out that we weren’t the only ones who were disappointed.

According to an article in Svenska Dagbladet, (article in Swedish) Ikea decided in the Fall of 2011 to sell predominantly its own brand of food. They planned to offer a range of food, approximately 150 products, but for unclear reasons, it hasn’t been working out and now IKEA is considering adding back in their previous suppliers—at least for the time being. (IKEA says that they are interested in customer feedback but that that is not the reason they are adding back in products.)

IKEA previously sold well-known food brands and when they stopped, many shoppers were unhappy. On the internet, protests were posted on blogs and groups formed on Facebook. Trade associations protested that IKEA is an important “window” around the world for Swedish food producers.

I always assumed that Swedes didn’t really shop at IKEA, that it was considered too cheap and low quality. I assumed that the other IKEA shoppers I saw in Sweden were mostly students and tourists. I still go to IKEA today even though I now live in Sweden and you know what, I think a lot of Swedes do shop there. The things you learn!

 

Kristin Lund - Work

February 14, 2012