Figuring out the future so soon?

Stu & I moved to Sweden to be full-time grad students about 14 months ago now. We came from the US with shiny student visas (and in my case, a spouse visa since I hadn't heard about school yet.) We knew even though our programs were two years long, Migrationsverket (the immigration board) would want to check up on us after a year to make sure we were passing and still had some money to live off. Since his visa was set to expire September 1, Stu recently sent his renewal forms in for what I think of as "Stockholm, Year II." He just got his approval today, meaning he can head to Migrationsverket office for a new picture in his passport, and should have no problems traveling to London when we take my dad there next week.

But we were surprised when reading the forms...apparently, they only approved Stu to stay in Sweden until June 2011. We had been going on the assumption that we would have a full two years here, and though we would graduate in June, we would have the summer to finalize plans our next phase, post-grad school. We even signed our lease at our apartment to end on August 31, 2011.

That may not seem like a huge time difference, but we have no idea where we will be heading as of June 2011! The timeline in my mind was to start looking at the job market next May or so, and we would both basically apply for anything and everything that we saw in Stockholm, several large UK cities, and the major cities in the US. In an ideal world, we would get the summer to travel again, knowing exactly what city we would live in by July and then could leisurely move to new digs (whether in Stockholm or abroad) in August, starting fantastic and well-paying jobs in September. But the economy hasn't exactly bounced back as high as one would have hoped, so I know the job hunt could be challenging.

In fact, though, we hope to get jobs here in Stockholm, to take advantage of the connections and networking our education has fostered, to enjoy living in this country while making a decent living wage, maybe take advantage of some of the amazing parental benefits while we were at it, and pay back into the tax system that has so generously supported us for what will be 22 months.

But leaving Sweden in June is too soon! We have to give our landlady 3 months notice that we will be leaving (so that's the beginning of April.)  I foresee April being the *busiest* 30-day stretch for us school-wise in nearly 2 years, without even thinking about applying to jobs, applying for new visas, moving across more large bodies of water, etc.

I think it's worth noting how dysfunctional we find aspects of the Swedish education system when it comes to educating foreigners. Sweden has always (and will continue until next year) made education free to everyone, whatever nationality. One would think that if the government is investing millions into human capital every year, they would want to make it as easy as possible to reap the benefits of their investments! To educate someone from outside the EU, bestowing masters or even PhD degrees, and then giving them NO time to find suitable work in this country before they are legally required to leave just doesn't make sense. One of the reasons given that the country elected to institute tuition starting next year is because "people come for the free education and then leave." But in reality, the government gives them no choice.

It's going to be winter here sooner than I'd like to admit, so maybe if I were writing this blog post 2 months from now, the tone would be different. As in "get me the hell out of here!" Working in San Diego *would* be pretty great, come to think of it. But the point is that it is too soon to think about it!  Ugg, how frustrating.

Mondays will be rough

First Swedish class of the semester tonight, from 6-9pm. I worked at Moderna from 9-12, then went to my philosophy class from 1-4. And then had Swedish until 9pm. It was a long day. Mondays suck anyway, but they are going to be bad here on out.

I think Sweden has a Mondays-suck attitude, as well, based on the decision to "celebrate" Chlamydia Monday. It's already the worst day of the week, so getting tested for an STD and possibly finding out you have one can't make it that much worse, right? At least you aren't ruining a perfectly good other weekday with that kind of news.

And I guess it is a problem here. According to the ever-so-scholarly article in The Local, four people contract chlamydia PER HOUR in this country. I'm shocked at that number (condoms, people!) but feel like maybe I should take that "fact" with a grain of salt....after all, the related articles linked through this page include: Swedish officers fined for flying painted penis and Swedish snails hide sex to avoid horny males.

On that note, I've been waiting this entire long day, desperately hoping no one would spoil it on Facebook, to watch the True Blood finale. Oooh, I hope Erik isn't really toast...he's my favorite. And not just because he speaks Swedish on the show (I know that's what you were thinking.)

Hey wait, its DC bars that are known for inescapable political blathering

Its exam time in Swedish higher education. Not for Stu & I, with our bizarre module schedules, but we both did get our grades from the first course this week. Out of grades A-F (and yes, that includes the possibility of getting an E or an Fx grade) I got a B. Which was the highest in the class, apparently. And Stu also got a "pass," which meant he didn't fail (they won't get real letter grades for a while, as I understand it.)

Anyway, the end of exam time coincided with pay day here. Swedes get paid once per month, on or around the 25th. And people get *very* excited about pay day.  So we had a few friends over to our apartment for wine on Friday and then went out to a fancypants bar in Stureplan to meet up with more friends to celebrate the end of exams (but not for us), payday (again, not for us) and our friend RV's 30th birthday.

Stureplan is where lots of pretty people hang out, and spend too much on cover charges to get into clubs that are too loud to talk in. I prefer dive bars (I still miss the Raven and Wonderland...haven't yet found acceptable equivalents here, though Södermalm probably has a few close competitors.)  But it was RV's birthday, and he had a handful of American friends fly in to help him celebrate, so he wanted to show them a posh time, apparently. Not to mention these guys are lawyers or something with 6-figure salaries, so this was probably up to their normal standard.

So I sat down next to this bearded burly American and introduced myself. Turns out, they all live in DC, so it was easy to strike up conversation.  Stu immediately got bored with this guy, and I suppose thats not saying much, but I should have taken cue. We did the whole "why are you in Sweden" thing, and he talked about how much he likes Stockholm so far.

Then he asked me what I did in the US before moving to Sweden, and I had barely gotten the words "...worked at a nonprofit by the White House" out of my mouth before he started shaking his head, and saying "Oooooh, one of thooooose."  Turns out we have vastly different political views, and he was the kind of person who wants to push his politics on you if you don't agree in the first 5 minutes of meeting you. Obviously, he stereotyped me from my "nonprofit" comment right off the bat. He proceeded to drone about how he didn't want to pay for health care for the entire country and blah, blah, blah (bored me just re-typing what he said.) And I thought, YOU ARE IN SWEDEN, you moron...they live this way and it works for them! 

Anyway, not to get further into a political debate (turns out we did agree on a few points that our "party lines" might not normally allow) but it struck me as funny. DC is a political town, where the first question you are asked in a bar is "so what do you do?"
Stockholm is not that way, from my limited 2.5 month experience. I have rarely been asked what I did for work in the US...very few people actually know that I am a librarian. I have not been asked at all (or stereotyped, for that matter) about what my politics are.  But you throw two District of Columbians (what do we call ourselves, I have no idea!?!) together in a bar in Europe, and we still seem to find that question as important in the first 5 minutes, and one on which we judge each other!

We carried on a fairly civilized conversation afterward, as he managed to redeem himself by buying me a beer (I am easy to please) and describing how the birthday-celebrating group accidentally found themselves at a cougar bar the night before. They were so drunk that they stumbled into Golden Oldies, even got carded by the bouncer who point-blank said "Are you sure you want to come in here?" and promptly charged them each 180kr cover when they beligerently answered "yes, we're here to drink!" (thats about $25 per person, to walk in the door!) They were the youngest by 25 years.
I laughed. And I actually learned from him...avoid Golden Oldies.  We even managed to meet up with them on Saturday night, at a much less pretentious place with extremely good sangria. And there was no political engagement at all. We all played nice.

Until talking with this guy, I had forgotten this aspect of DC politics...that it is nearly inescapable in that city.  Even more interesting, now that I think about it, is that in Sweden of all places, I meet one of the 3% of district residents who did NOT vote for Obama.

Regardless, my thoughts on this: I am happy with my grades, I wish I got paid so that I could enjoy payday, I like meeting new people no matter what their politics, I miss and I don't miss DC, the weekend was a blast, Monday comes too soon, and Stu is usually right.

And happy birthday to my dad.

Mascara is expensive

The exchange rate is in the toilet. At least as far as we are concerned, considering we are living off of our American savings. When we first started planning our move to Stockholm back in April, the rate was about 8.5 kronor per dollar. It meant the rent for our bigger, better Swedish apartment in a great neighborhood was the same as the mortgage on our DC condo. Fine by us! But the exchange rate has fallen steadily since its height in March, and is now hovering at 7 kronor per US dollar. It doesn't sound like that catastrophic of a fall, but it means that our rent is about $200 more per month than we were planning, just 5 months ago.

Aside from the exchange rate fluctuations, Stockholm doesn't seem all that much more expensive than DC.
Aside from the alcohol.
And cosmetics.
I was reading the Metro paper the other day (the free fluffy newspaper that they give out free on the subway, like the DC Express paper) and saw several ads from stores that sell cosmetics. They all advertised mascaras that ranged from 95:- to 165:-, and that is on sale (FYI, in Swedish, its "på rea". I learned that one real quick!) The Maybelline mascara I just tossed out was about 115 kronor...that's $16!! I am cheap, so I probably paid less than $5 for it at a CVS. Had I read the ad before getting rid of the tube, I might have kept it longer! And mascara is one of the few things I am anal about keeping fresh...they say toss it after 2 or 3 months of use, which I do. With always having contact lenses and sensitive eyes, and even more since having lasik in May, it's been important in preventing eye infections. Especially since moving, as we get free health care, but eye care and dental are NOT covered by the Swedish government (which makes me think I should stop eating all this Swedish candy soon. Probably.) But I can't afford to buy $16 mascara every few months being a broke student!

I'll miss using mascara. My eyes won't look the same. And we haven't been here long enough for me to miss all that much. American chunky peanut butter, affordable beer, friends, fam.
That's where you guys come in, friends and family. Several handfuls of you have said you will come visit us in Stockholm. And we WANT you to come visit! Come stay on our couch or blow-up bed (when we get it from the other side of the country, that is.) We'll play tour guide and make you Swedish food and entertain you. And when you come, bring a jar of chunky peanut butter, a bottle of scotch (at Stus request), and a tube or two of cheap Maybelline mascara (preferably not the waterproof kind...I would have to shell out for equally expensive eye make-up remover for that stuff!)

Please?