Month: October 2017

Live, Love and Carry Proper ID

On October 27, 2017

I left my son at the security check at the Copenhagen airport today and it was so much harder than I thought it would be. He is headed back to Los Angeles, on a nonstop flight that we booked back in July, back when the parting tears were fresh and my husband and I wondered if we had been wrong to drag a 15-year-old away from his best friends.

But this morning, as we stood there, and he let me hug him and kiss him in public, I suddenly felt panicked. He was getting ready to walk through the security gate and disappear and I would not be able to follow. If he needed me, I would not be able to help him.

I walked away, forced myself to breathe, told myself to stop being silly. I would have LOVED going on a trip like that when I was 15. My parents let me go on a trip to Venezuela when I was 16, and it was life changing in all the good ways.

Besides, I am proud of my son. And I love his friends. They are all great kids with great moms who have eagerly agreed to pick River up from the airport and drive him around LA. I want him to have this opportunity. He is so excited about going to LA to visit his friends. I am excited for him.

But my heart froze.

Twenty minutes went by and he did not call to tell me he was at the gate. I went to the airport Starbucks because there are no Starbucks in Malmö or anywhere I have been in Sweden, and I had told him I would stay in the airport until he boarded the plane. Ten more minutes passed, still no call.

I called, left a message, decided to buy my train ticket back to Malmö, kill a little more time before I went back home to the emptier apartment.

This is how it is going to be. This is the future.

While we were walking through the terminal to the security gate, River had almost sounded hesitant.

“I’m used to associating travel with us, with our whole family,” he said. “It’s different to be just me.”

It was as if that reality had just occurred to him for the first time after weeks of planning, anticipating, dreaming about going to visit friends.

Yeah, that is part of this whole international thing. If Dad and I are going to live outside of the US, you are going to have to travel to us sometimes. It’s good.

I thought about my daughter in college in Colorado. I went with her to college for move-in. I wanted her to feel established in college before she felt alone, but I know the next time she flies to see us she will be coming on her own too.

Scattered.

It is part of adventures, paths diverge, converge, diverge again. There is always something new, somebody new. The best travelers love and let go and move on to love more.

Family is different though.

I miss my parents. I miss my daughter. I miss my friends, the ones I know I could still call despite a 9-hour time difference and say, “Can you pray for me? I’m feeling like a wreck today.”

River is on a plane to visit those kinds of friends this week. It’s good. It’s really good.

After what seemed like an eternity, and exactly half of my Starbucks, he called. They were holding him at passport check, not letting him leave Denmark. His plane was boarding and he could not leave.

I freaked out.

It was exactly what I worried about. He needed me and I could not come to him.

What is the problem? You have your passport? You have your Swedish ID card? He didn’t know. He just had to wait, and so did I.

I knew I couldn’t go back to Malmö until it was resolved. What if he didn’t make his flight? Would we be able to get him on another flight to LA? What about our trip tomorrow? Kip and I were planning to go to Madeira. We had plane tickets and hotels booked. We were only planning for it to be the two of us.

I walked back to security. They said, no. Of course they could not let me through to passport check. I waited for a while longer and then decided to walk back to the airline check in. I found a helpful clerk who called the gate, told them the situation. Maybe they could hold the plane…. maybe. Somehow I doubted they would hold a fully booked, nonstop flight to LA for a 15-year-old who could not convince police that he was legally living in Sweden. I was not even sure why the Denmark police cared.

Finally, River called. He was getting on the plane. It was ok. Just a misunderstanding. He would call later, when he got to LA.

In the wave of relief that passed over me I remembered that this was exactly what international travel is all about — the unexpected, the freak-out-moments, the unknown. Its why so many people don’t ever leave their comfort zones, let alone the US. I’m ok with being the one sweating in security line while the plane is boarding. I’m just not used to watching my young adult son navigate it alone.

Alone. I felt his absence.

I want my son to have an adventure-filled life. I want him to explore, to dream big, to climb high mountains. I want him to reach his full potential with nothing holding him back, not even me.

I took the commuter train back to Sweden, watched the water flowing under the Øresund Bridge, and thought about all the days ahead of us, all of us. Paths together, paths apart. Paths. Like the rhythm of a commuter train.

The bridge ended. We stopped in Hyllie, just over the border in Sweden and border control officers boarded the train. A young blond woman in a lime green reflective vest, an official Border Security uniform, stopped at my train seat when I showed her my US Passport.

Where is your proof of residency?

I showed her my identity card, just like the one my son showed passport control in Copenhagen.

That is not a residency permit.

But I have one. I have a Swedish personal number. I have a bank account and an apartment. Do you know how difficult it is to get a personal number and a bank account, obviously, I could not have gotten any of that without legal residency.

No, I need proof of legal residency, a card.

Maybe she meant the little red card we got when we arrived and were photographed and fingerprinted at the migration office?

I waited while she conversed with a group of her green vested colleagues who had gathered to determine my fate. The train stood still.

After a few long minutes they came to a consensus. She let me know my mistake and let me go with a shrug, a typical Swedish chastisement. I muttered something to the Swedish passenger next to me who responded something polite about immigrants, and I nodded. I know, it’s not personal, its just the system.

I got off the train at my regular stop, walked the few short blocks back to the apartment, enjoying the crisp fall air and thinking about my own trip to Madeira the next day. I might not pack my heavy jacket. But I’ll be sure to bring that residency card.

Live, love, let go and carry proper identification.

Just a few of my dear California friends on our last night together.

A Little Bit of California for Breakfast

On October 18, 2017

In Uncategorized

When we arrived in Malmö in June, I felt like I had survived a decluttering marathon. We had lived in our Malibu house for six years. Our kids had literally grown up there, as evidenced by the pencil scratched benchmarks on the kitchen doorway and the two closets full of toys in my son’s bedroom. Sorting through our accumulation of life was not easy.

We had amassed six years of stuff, the usual clothes and books, tools and toys, furniture. But there was also a pile of stuff the kids had also grown out of — books and toys, stuffed animals that used to be friends, games we never got around to playing. I knew it would be silly to ship most of it to Sweden, and just as silly to let it sit in storage. But it was not easy to let it go. I felt like I was letting go of my kids’ childhood, which, to be honest, I needed to do. Healthy mothers nurture and equip and release their young adults to their full potential without making them feel guilty for growing up. I know this. I want that for myself and my teenagers.

So in the weeks leading up to our move I gave my friends most of the books, games, dishes and random things that I thought they might want. We sold other things on Craigslist, but on the day before we left California there was still a car load full of donations to go to the thrift store.

The whole process was emotional and exhausting, and in the end, rushed. So much so that I had several moments during the three-month interim period between our moving-out day and our moving-in day that I could not remember if a particular item was in the anticipated shipment or if we had given it away.

Even so we ended up bringing things we did not need, and we gave away a few that we had to repurchase in Sweden. Already I have looked around for at least one book that I wish I had kept. But really, most of our material possessions needed to go. It is good to move on when you move on.

We accidentally packed rocks.

But even so, there are a few items, really just a few, that I have been very happy to have with us in our new apartment life in Malmö. The Vitamix is near the top of that list.

We had to get a huge transformer to make sure we did not burn out the Vitamix engine on the 230 volts piping through our electric outlets here, and after blowing a few power fuses, we have worked out a system to make it run in our Swedish kitchen. It works pretty well.

This morning I got up, despite the persistent October grey, and went for a run. When I came home I made an awesome blueberry, banana, almond smoothie. It was perfect, the true breakfast of champions, not unlike so many Malibu post-run breakfast smoothies. And as I ran the Vitamix I thought about how this transcontinental move is all about that process– simplifying, moving out into the unknown and living this next part of life well. But in the end a familiar purple smoothie just makes it all sweeter and a little easier to swallow.

Möllevångstorget

On October 18, 2017

In Uncategorized

Möllevångstorget_2017-2 Möllevångstorget, a cobblestone square characterized by The Honor of Work, a giant statue of men and at least one woman holding up a giant rock embossed with the image of an industrialized city, is its own center of Malmö.

A hundred years ago, this square, surrounded by new factories and recently urbanized residents, was the birthplace of the Labor Movement in Sweden. You could even say Swedish socialism has its roots here. Today it is still a working class neighborhood, a multicultural hub, a living testament to the extent of immigration in Malmö, a place you can Google on YouTube and see a pandemonium of illegal fireworks from last New Years Eve.

I go there to buy cheap fruits and vegetables, and I love it.

IMG_5588 - Copy

A couple of weeks ago I braved the unknown and rode my bike to Möllevångstorget on a quest to find the farmers market. When I got there I was shocked by how much cheaper the vegetables and fruit were there than in the regular Swedish grocery stores. They were even cheaper than produce in US grocery stores.

In southern California going to the farmers market is a wonderful experience, but it is hardly cheaper than shopping in the national chain grocery stores. Last time I went to the farmer’s market in Santa Monica, I don’t think $10 bought more than a handful of apples and a couple of avocados, maybe a head of lettuce.

No she is not Sweden’s first female prime minister. The 100kr bill celebrates this classic Hollywood movie star who was born in Stockholm.

Today I spent 100 kroner, currently worth about $12 and got 2 onions, 6 potatoes, 8 lemons, 4 tangerines, 3 apples, 3 avocados, a bag of green beans, a bunch of bananas, 30 eggs and a giant head of lettuce. I don’t think it is all organic, and given the state of sunshine in Sweden, probably not all local either. I have yet to see a banana farm in Skåne. But it is fresh produce, whole foods, and a whole lot better than frozen pizzas.

When we visited Malmö for the first time last April, the hotel desk clerk told us not to go past a neighborhood called Davidshall. He specifically said not to go to this farmer’s market, so in my mind it was on the “no go” list.

It should not have been.

Möllevång is a colorful place at the crossroads of busy bicycle paths where more people commute on two wheels than four. Traditionally ethnic Swedes and more recent immigrants mingle in the farmer’s market. Most of the vendors converse in Arabic to their clients in hijabs, Swedish to everyone else. I like it because I have to remember my basic numbers in Swedish as the vendors often do not speak English.

The neighborhood surrounding Möllevångstorget is an “ethnic” food lover’s cornucopia. Restaurants from every Asian and Middle Eastern variety crowd the streets leading up to, and surrounding, the square. Indian, Lebanese, Persian, Chinese, Vietnamese are all well represented there. Last week we had Thai, not exactly like our beloved Thai Town in East Hollywood, but not bad for northern Europe. I would go back.

Like so many hipster neighborhoods in US cities, Möllevångstorget also has the atmosphere of a community on the verge of a vibrant economic upswing. I get the feeling that younger Swedish workers live there, ignoring the graffiti and double locking their bikes. One of our single Swedish neighbors told me she plans to buy an apartment near Möllevångstorget next year. And I can understand why. It is affordable and it feels alive. It is easily one of my favorite Malmö surprises.

Pippin is curious, always curious.

Fika is a Word that Means Coffee

On October 11, 2017

In Uncategorized

Fika is a word that means coffee.

But fika is a Swedish word that means more than just coffee. It also means coffee break; as in stop what you are doing, relax, drink coffee and talk to a friend. Of course, coffee alone is not really fika. Fika needs carbs like nachos need cheese. So Fika culture is all about baked goods, cinnamon rolls, carrot cake, chocolate-coconut balls, even an open-faced sandwich of local cheese and cucumber will do in a pinch.

Last week Sweden celebrated Kanelbullens Dag. Cinnamon bun day. It is a real thing, every October 4^th. The local grocery store had a huge display of fresh cinnamon rolls, 5 for 25 kroners, about $3. I bought a bag of them for a very happy teenager just coming home from school.

And that is Fika at its best, mid-afternoon, mom and son, talking in the kitchen. How was your day?

Its easily one of my favorite Swedish delights.

Today I Mailed a Letter

By Theresa Haynes

On October 11, 2017

In Uncategorized

“Theresa Mailed a Letter.”

That title reminds me more of a children’s book than an adult expat’s blog. But the thing is, I am kind of like a child here. Someone on one of my social media groups said it best when another member was complaining about the difficulty of finding work here without knowing Swedish. He said, “Look, basically you are like a four-year-old until you learn their language. “

And he is right. I have to ask for everything, in English, and hope that the clerk will be happy to oblige me in my ignorance. Luckily for me, right now, Swedish people seem to really enjoy speaking in English. English is taught universally in schools, so speaking English well is a mark of education, prestige. The only non-English speakers are older Swedes and immigrants from non-English speaking countries. And even then, older Swedes often understand English but are shy about using it.

I understand that too. I am picking up new words every day, especially written words, but I am a little terrified of having to actually use them. It is not helpful to my long-term learning that everyone is so quick to put me out of my misery and converse in English.

One small advantage that I have is that I look like I should speak Swedish, so often clerks speak to me in Swedish first and I make it a game to see how far I can go without admitting that I have no idea what they have just said. There have been many times that I have interacted with a cashier, never saying a word, only understanding half of what he said, and he never knew it. I am pretty good with nonverbal cues, and it is amazing how far that goes.

Hi.

Is this all you want?

Great. Put your credit card there.

Sign there.

Take that stuff you just bought.

See you later.

Tack!

But some basic adult life tasks require more than just language acquisition skills. Simply being able to speak the same language is not enough. Customs and etiquette are different. In fact, the whole government system of health care and schools and registration is just a little bit different here. A small task that I took for granted at home can seem like a mini crisis here, like mailing a registration form to a government office.

So let’s break it down.

The first step is to translate the form. That is not too difficult with Google Translate, but even if Google Translate fails, I can always call the government office, wait on hold forever while thinking about my American mobile phone bill’s international calling plan. Once I have the form filled, I have to get to a post office and mail it.

And here is complication number two. It has been explained to me that Sweden does not have post offices any more. They don’t use checks either, so if you need to make a payment that is a whole different set of hoops beginning with trips to the migration office and the tax office, then fingerprinting and official ID photographs, culminating in several in-person, appointment-only visits to the bank before you can make an electronic payment. It literally takes weeks, if not months, before you can electronically send someone money, a big problem for newcomers in an almost cashless society.

But assuming that all I need to do is mail the form, I have found that it works to smile and ask people in English, “Excuse me, how do I mail a letter?”

And if they are heartless and under 30 they look at you like you are a 4-year-old.

Duh. Put a stamp on it and put it in one of the yellow boxes that are everywhere.

But where do I get a stamp if there are no post offices?

You can buy them at grocery stores, office supply stores. You know, the same places that you can buy stamps in the US.

Oh, of course. I can do that.

And they are right. It is really easy. Even a 4-year-old could do it.

A Drizzly Saturday Morning in the Park

By Theresa Haynes

On October 9, 2017

In Uncategorized

I was right about the sunshine, wrong about the rain.

The sunshine did not last. Saturday morning, I woke up to grey clouds and a deep desire to get out, go for a run, breathe deeply into life. By the time I got out the door the unforgiving sky was threatening to rain. Then came a fine sprinkle and then a full London-style, persistent, wet drizzle that could almost count as rain. But I ran to the park anyway and found that unlike any 50-degree rainy Saturday in California, the park was packed, completely full of people. And it began to occur to me that Swedish people are not hindered by the California delusion that sunshine is necessary for outdoor enjoyment.

There were the usual outside people, the kind that don’t really have a choice, dog owners. But there were also plenty of other people strolling along the park’s extensive paths — couples with babies, family’s with little children on little bikes, runners of all ages, single people walking, running, just enjoying being outside in their water-resistant clothing. I saw plenty of red-cheeked smiles.

I was not wearing water resistant clothing so I was quite sweaty and rain drenched by the time I stopped at the library, which was also full of people enjoying a rainy Saturday morning in the relative tranquility of Malmö’s public library.

This place, by the way, is beautiful. Located on the edge of Malmö’s Slottsparken, this urban library is a modern architectural masterpiece. Half of the library is old, a castle-like museum that has housed books for seventy years. The other half, which was finished in the late 90s, is a massive glass box, ushering light into the main hall of bookshelves, illuminating even the grayest of days. This half is called a “Calendar of Light,” and is a perfect example of modern Scandinavian genius for drawing the light inside. I love it.

While at the library I picked up a stack of travel books to help us plan our fall escape. Our son has a week off from school at the end of October and has already planned to make his first solo international trip, going home to visit friends in LA. Kip took the week off from work, so now we just have to decide where to go. Spain? Italy? Morocco?

We both want to get a little autumn sunshine, but we don’t want to break the bank either. I find myself checking historical weather averages of different places within reasonable travel distance. If we are going to travel, it would be nice to get a little unbottled, natural Vitamin D. I know that there is joy in the rain, but I still want to find a little sun, just for a week in October before the real winter arrives.

A Moment of Sunshine

By Theresa Haynes

On October 6, 2017

In Uncategorized

I woke up to a patch of blue sky warming the cold streets where pedestrians were still scurrying, faces against the wind, hurrying on to work and the places they always go on a Friday morning.

It looked like the little blueness would work into full sunshine, if only for an hour before the clouds picked up in the afternoon. Maybe I was in a cynical mood, but I thought about Ray Bradbury’s short story, “Summer in a Day,” and felt that I had to get out. As quickly as possible.

Since I don’t yet have a place to go in the middle of a Friday morning, I grabbed my bike, the one I have hardly ridden since college but somehow made it on the shipment from California. And I rode across Malmö.

Malmö is small and covered in designated bike paths, so it is not difficult to ride across it in less than an hour.

I rode to the beach and walked out onto one of the piers. There was a trio of older women walking together, touching hands, laughing, speaking a middle eastern language I did not recognize, letting the gentle sea breezes tease the scarfs around their faces while they posed for a picture together. A Scandinavian man rode his bicycle to the pier, walked past the women in their coats and scarves, stripped down to his shorts and jumped into the frigid ocean water. That is so Malmö.

I rode up the beach, into neighborhoods I did not know, ones still transitioning from the old industrial shipping docks to modern apartments. A few fishing boats clung to the docks, reminding the present of the past. Even human infrastructure has a limited purpose, a time and a day, a moment of usefulness. Abandoned rails nearly hidden in the sidewalk testify to that. I wondered when the newly constructed apartment buildings along the docks would be outdated and laughable.

I stopped to observe a swan family. The “ugly ducklings,” almost the size of their mother paddled behind her gracefully, effortlessly gliding along. I wondered if they would stay for winter or fly somewhere south. I wondered when they would grow white feathers and look like their parents.

The cob stayed behind, nonchalantly guarding his flock while serendipitously eating the water plants growing at the edge of the bay. This summer I saw a swan attack a golden retriever that had gotten to close to his cygnets. I wondered if this was the same bird. I kept a respectful distance.

Then I rode home, feeling warmed by the sun.

An October Run Through Pildammsparken

By Theresa Haynes

On October 5, 2017

In Uncategorized

Swedish geese ignoring me. I took this picture right before I realized that in my journalistic enthusiasm I had knelt in a glob of bird poop. Yay. Park life.

Its another grey October day in Malmö, but I am learning that one of the keys to enjoying life despite the clouds is just to embrace it. Get outside and move. Hike. Walk. Bike. Run.Running is best, especially since we live next to a huge urban park frequented by runners all hours of the day and evening.

This morning I ran and took pictures, just because its beautiful.

Tall green trees so big they are hard to fit in the I-Phone frame. Rich, earthy dirt. Mushrooms. Expansive lake. Water fowl. Trees just hinting that its almost time to change colors and drop leaves.

While I ran I was listening to an old favorite, John and Stasi Eldredge’s Captivating.

Nature is not primarily functional. Its primarily beautiful. Stop for a moment and let that soak in. — John and Stasi Eldredge’s Captivating

When it rains almost every day, life pops up everywhere, sometimes overnight.

Trees calling me away from the rows of apartment buildings and into the park center.