As they say, the only constant thing in the world is change ( my intro for a blog always sucks) and in staying true to this maxim, here I am uprooted from the cozy confines of hometown Chennai to the cold climes of Scandinavia. The below is my first day experience in this lovely country
Apparently the citizens of Gothenburg were waiting for snow for the last 2 months, that is ever since winter formally set in. Just like I was waiting for my Swedish visa to come in for the last 2 months, that is ever since I got and formally accepted the Sweden job. And the famed snow chose, as if by coincidence, or divine intervention to come down in a storm, the very day in which my flight was supposed to land at Gothenburg. It was “ supposed “ to land.. It never did. Instead it went to a city called Malmo.
While at Chennai you would find, auto and taxi drivers jostling to get you into their money minting automobiles, here in Malmo , we had to wait at the airport for a good one hour, because the airline could not find a bus operator to take us to Gothenburg. Finally they managed to find one and what followed was a three hour long journey on the highway, with snowstorm and all that around you. I was looking forward to seeing the Swedish countryside, but all that I could see was white sheets of snow and then darkness.
Reached Gothenburg airport at around 8.30 pm. Not a soul to be seen anywhere. The screeching noise my suitcases made as I dragged them across could have been heard in the next country. Whoever said that the airports of Europe are on high alert constantly ?? Either they are wrong or Gothenburg is not in Europe. Since the learned amongst us know that Gothenburg is in Europe, they are wrong. I had to make a phone call to my colleague, and lo the pay phone wont speak anything apart from Swedish. It only ate up 25 recently converted Swedish kroners and did not lead me anywhere. Thankfully there was a kind lady at the information booth ( it would remain a mystery to me as to why this booth didn’t close at 5 pm) who let me use the phone.
So out stepped Mr. Kumar into the snow covered taxi bay and one could see that the cab drivers were cozily relaxing inside their climate controlled cars. I had a strange feeling that they did see me but were not bothered , I had to wave, shout to wake up one of them and ask them to take me to the Gothenburg central station. He must have fallen on some bad patch, money wise. Otherwise I don’t see any reason he should have obliged to drive me to town. Give me the auto drivers of Chennai any day man.
I have seen the Chennai central station and now here I was in Gothenburg Central at 9 pm. To my still in India mind, 9 pm at Central station meant absolute madness. A million people, 2 million bags and suitcases, screaming kids , railway employees, a few trains leaving at the same time and a few trains that don’t leave on time. Gothenburg central at 9 pm was like a scene out of a madcap movie. Weird characters were lazing around the place,, one woman had about 20 piercing on her face, one was dressed up like some zombie ( whitened face, black lipstick, long trench coat and spiked hair) , there was a shaggy old man playing some haunting music and begging ( the only common factor to Chennai). Its been 4 days and I have seen these characters surfacing at the central station and the mall next to it after 6 pm ( that’s when the late night starts ) . U may wonder when night starts, that starts at 4 pm. Day ?? What is that ?? When I go to work it is still dark and when I come back it is dark. I feel like I am working in some call centre doing night shift.
Coming back to day one I found my apartment soon thanks to my colleague who was kind enough to brave the rain and pick me up. I had to get to the third floor and there was this lovely elevator which was in place for doing that job. Except that it did not climb up. So me and my two suitcases climbed three floors and I had to invent new expletives to vent my feelings ( most of them had been overused in the day) .The apartment was comfortable excepting the fact that being a service apartment and not a hotel I d have to make my own food. Now that was a problem. Here I was conditioned to home food for more than a year and asking me to make my own food was criminal if not something worse than that. But then hunger makes you do extraordinary things and I made my own food. It was noodles of course. What did you think , I d make a full meal the very first day ?? Id be surprised if I make a full course meal even after the 2 years id be here.
So ended day one. Tired , hungry, dirty. Having left my family, my best friends, my hometown , here I was freezing in snowing Scandinavia. But then life is a challenge ( the blog is about to end, one needs to give a philosophical twist) and one has to go on.
Till more Scandinavian updates.. Enjoy the sunshine and send some over.
By the way, did I tell you that the elevator worked when my colleague wanted to go down 3 floors after showing me my apartment ???
Apparently the citizens of Gothenburg were waiting for snow for the last 2 months, that is ever since winter formally set in. Just like I was waiting for my Swedish visa to come in for the last 2 months, that is ever since I got and formally accepted the Sweden job. And the famed snow chose, as if by coincidence, or divine intervention to come down in a storm, the very day in which my flight was supposed to land at Gothenburg. It was “ supposed “ to land.. It never did. Instead it went to a city called Malmo.
While at Chennai you would find, auto and taxi drivers jostling to get you into their money minting automobiles, here in Malmo , we had to wait at the airport for a good one hour, because the airline could not find a bus operator to take us to Gothenburg. Finally they managed to find one and what followed was a three hour long journey on the highway, with snowstorm and all that around you. I was looking forward to seeing the Swedish countryside, but all that I could see was white sheets of snow and then darkness.
Reached Gothenburg airport at around 8.30 pm. Not a soul to be seen anywhere. The screeching noise my suitcases made as I dragged them across could have been heard in the next country. Whoever said that the airports of Europe are on high alert constantly ?? Either they are wrong or Gothenburg is not in Europe. Since the learned amongst us know that Gothenburg is in Europe, they are wrong. I had to make a phone call to my colleague, and lo the pay phone wont speak anything apart from Swedish. It only ate up 25 recently converted Swedish kroners and did not lead me anywhere. Thankfully there was a kind lady at the information booth ( it would remain a mystery to me as to why this booth didn’t close at 5 pm) who let me use the phone.
So out stepped Mr. Kumar into the snow covered taxi bay and one could see that the cab drivers were cozily relaxing inside their climate controlled cars. I had a strange feeling that they did see me but were not bothered , I had to wave, shout to wake up one of them and ask them to take me to the Gothenburg central station. He must have fallen on some bad patch, money wise. Otherwise I don’t see any reason he should have obliged to drive me to town. Give me the auto drivers of Chennai any day man.
I have seen the Chennai central station and now here I was in Gothenburg Central at 9 pm. To my still in India mind, 9 pm at Central station meant absolute madness. A million people, 2 million bags and suitcases, screaming kids , railway employees, a few trains leaving at the same time and a few trains that don’t leave on time. Gothenburg central at 9 pm was like a scene out of a madcap movie. Weird characters were lazing around the place,, one woman had about 20 piercing on her face, one was dressed up like some zombie ( whitened face, black lipstick, long trench coat and spiked hair) , there was a shaggy old man playing some haunting music and begging ( the only common factor to Chennai). Its been 4 days and I have seen these characters surfacing at the central station and the mall next to it after 6 pm ( that’s when the late night starts ) . U may wonder when night starts, that starts at 4 pm. Day ?? What is that ?? When I go to work it is still dark and when I come back it is dark. I feel like I am working in some call centre doing night shift.
Coming back to day one I found my apartment soon thanks to my colleague who was kind enough to brave the rain and pick me up. I had to get to the third floor and there was this lovely elevator which was in place for doing that job. Except that it did not climb up. So me and my two suitcases climbed three floors and I had to invent new expletives to vent my feelings ( most of them had been overused in the day) .The apartment was comfortable excepting the fact that being a service apartment and not a hotel I d have to make my own food. Now that was a problem. Here I was conditioned to home food for more than a year and asking me to make my own food was criminal if not something worse than that. But then hunger makes you do extraordinary things and I made my own food. It was noodles of course. What did you think , I d make a full meal the very first day ?? Id be surprised if I make a full course meal even after the 2 years id be here.
So ended day one. Tired , hungry, dirty. Having left my family, my best friends, my hometown , here I was freezing in snowing Scandinavia. But then life is a challenge ( the blog is about to end, one needs to give a philosophical twist) and one has to go on.
Till more Scandinavian updates.. Enjoy the sunshine and send some over.
By the way, did I tell you that the elevator worked when my colleague wanted to go down 3 floors after showing me my apartment ???
