For the holidays, I purchased my favorite Christmas movie, Joulutarina. Since I’m planning on moving to Sweden (and because the American version of this movie is a horrible horrible English dub and does not have a subtitle option), I purchased it with the European region code.

Of course, as any American may realize, this is where things got annoying. You see, I didn’t purchase it for normal DVD where I could easily hack my DVD-ROM to play any region. Oh no, in my infinite wisdom I said to myself, “Spazure, get it on Blu-ray! It’ll be gorgeous! You’ll watch this with your kids someday!”

The problem here is, the only Blu-Ray player I currently own is my PS3. Sadly, there is no *simple* way to hack a PS3 to unlock all region encodings, and I’m not about to brick my PS3 just to watch a Christmas movie on New Year’s Eve. This means I either need to shell out another $300 to purchase a Blu-Ray player that’ll play European discs (keeping in mind I only currently own ONE region 2 disc)… or, I could be a genius.

I decided I’m going to purchase a BD ROM for my computer. I will then lock it to region 2, so I will have a blu-ray drive (and normal dvd drive, all in one, yay backwards compatibility!!)

“But Spazure, how will you then play it on your TV?”

Well, self, you see, Microsoft’s Windows Media Player isn’t all bad. I can play a Blu-Ray disc from my computer on my Xbox 360 over my LAN, because I’m a dork like that.

One step closer to home.

tl;dr I’m not dead, just nothing new to report.

Now, I’m aware of the possibility of the Michael Moore effect, so keep in mind that the sources I used are NOT the same sources used in the documentary. They’re independent facts I found by googling “infant mortality rate” and “maternal mortality rate,” the fact that the numbers I found coincided with the documentary just lends more weight to the information being correct. Still though, I did feel the whole film was slanted towards a particular POV, so I did some additional poking around. I then watched The Business of Being Born, which also touches on some points the other one did not. Most importantly, it gave the medical community a voice as well — it told the story from both sides. Even in doing so, it ultimately just strengthened my desire to ensure that I am in Sweden before I settle down to have my family.

That being said, my most recent Swedish lesson went well. I still don’t know if I got into the foreign exchange program for Lund this Spring yet, but at least I’m able to “sort of” hold a conversation in Swedish now. I can ask questions, ask for clarification, make spontaneous sentences out of my existing vocabulary.. such as the ever-important “Var är toaletten?”

Apparently, the Netherlands requires people to be ok with topless beaches and homosexuality in order to get a visa [workpermit.com 06 April 2006]. I think this is FREAKING AWESOME, and would love to see other European countries follow suit. So thank you, Netherlands, as I would have never even thought that this sort of screening process could exist. Now that I do, I’ll be spreading the word in the hopes that it can get more support across the continent!

… and now back to finals, but not before saying HAPPY MOTHER’S DAY to all the mothers out there. Without you, none of us would have ever been born. You’re the reason humanity exists, and just know that you are loved! <3

Other close relatives
In exceptional cases, you may obtain a residence permit if you have lived in the country of origin with the relative now resident in Sweden. This category covers, for example, children over the age of 18 and the parents of the person resident in Sweden. If you belong to this category, apply for a residence permit as soon as possible after the date when your relative was granted a permanent residence permit in Sweden.
You must be able to prove that you lived with your relative immediately before they moved to Sweden and that you were dependent on them in the country of origin to the extent that it is difficult for you to live apart. In this context, ´dependent´ means that you are financially, socially or emotionally dependent on your relative who lives in Sweden.

Keeping that in mind, I’m getting paperwork and such together now so I’m not scrambling when the time comes. I’ve already saved the forms (yay pdf!) I’m going to need, but right now it looks like I need to work on the supporting documentation. My mother and I were kind of travelling gypsies (not literally, but we did move a lot) in the time period right before she moved to Sweden, so digging up sufficient proof that we lived together prior to her move will be difficult, but not impossible.

On a (somewhat) unrelated note, I just read an interested blog post regarding the downfalls of the Swedish social system. I found it to be an interesting read, and something I will certainly take into consideration when raising my own children in Sweden.

Yesterday, that all changed. A simple comment on reddit pointed out that, finally, I’m doing something interesting enough with my life that someone might want to read it. More importantly, my experiences can be used to help others who want to do the same thing see real-world examples of how the whole process works!

As one might guess by either reading the link in the previous paragraph or the blog title, that topic is I’m moving to Sweden!

If you’re American, you may be questioning why. Why would a single, thirty-something working class woman with a decent job, great health benefits, great apartment and amazing friends here in America give up that privilege to be a foreigner in another country, especially considering the sheer amount of xenophobia we hear in regards to many European nations.

While I certainly do not want to put my head in the sand and say that xenophobia does not exist, I can, with absolute certainty, say that it is not nearly as bad as the people trying to talk me OUT of moving to Sweden are led to believe. My mother has been there for many years, and year after year it’s still the Americans that are constantly giving her shit about moving there. I have yet to hear of a single incident of her being mistreated because she’s American and knows little Swedish. In actuality, instead of harassing her for being American, Swedes tend to embrace her presence as a chance to practice their English. Furthermore, the number of Americans being derogatory towards people who believe in the Swedish way of life far, far FAR outstrips any hatred we are likely to encounter in Sweden.

In my travels, I have only encountered ONE negative incident in Europe, and that was because I asked a German woman to speak in English — she had every RIGHT to be upset! I was in HER country! (Also, the negativity was simply an ugly face for a second, saying “Nein!” in a condescending voice, then speaking to me in German as if I were a child, which worked because that’s about the level of German I can speak and understand. This is not unlike what I imagine Mexican immigrants who barely speak English encounter every day in the United States.)

This brings me to my next point. I am not leaving immediately, as many Americans certainly wish I would, but I am in the process of learning Swedish first. Not only will being bilingual help me in the job market, but it’ll also help me socially. I refuse to be the American who believes everyone else should speak my language because I’m too lazy to learn it — there’s enough of those people littering the streets of Europe as it is.

To be completely honest, I’ve never really considered myself an American, anyway. As my mother (who will likely drop by this blog at some point) can attest, I’ve always flown the German flag instead. I’m half German, it’s my heritage, it’s where I come from. I’m half German. It’s my heritage; it’s where I come from. This is just the country my mother happened to be in when she gave birth to me, but it has never felt like my home. Certainly, Sweden is not Germany, but I’m OK with that. Germany and Sweden are close enough to each other that I can live in Sweden and still explore my German heritage. The ferry isn’t a terribly far drive, and the view out the windows is absolutely beautiful. More importantly, though, Sweden is not the United States.