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Your testimonial, the quote version
Gothenburg: green, cold and warm!
Your testimonial, the full version
I moved to Gothenburg in August 2024 for my Erasmus+ exchange, during my last year of Masters. Sweden is a wonderful country, and coming from France, I was struck by several culture changes when I arrived. The first one is how green the city is! Every transportation works with either electric or biogas engines, with an objective of being fully electric by 2030 (damn, even the ferries are electric!). Public transportation is as simple as it gets, with great coverage, amazing frequency, but unfortunately a bit expensive, especially for a foreign student.
In Sweden, every bottle or can that you buy has a 1 or 2 kronor consign, that you get back as a discount coupon in a grocery store when you bring them back, encouraging therefore the recycling of your containers, and making it so easy it would be a shame not to recycle. To add to the simplicity, in my student housing area (and in some others - probably everywhere actually, but I haven't checked), the trash boxes are provided for you to be able to sort your trash correctly and easily!
Another culture shock I experienced, was the Swedes themselves: they seem very cold and are honestly hardly approachable. But once you get to know them, they can be sweethearts! The hard part unfortunately, is to talk to them. It is rather hard to blend in the local community at time, even though Sweden's perfect English level makes it very easy to communicate and feel welcome nonetheless. The best encounters I have met, though, were with the fellow international students. I don’t know exactly why, but the international community is very tight here, and it honestly made me feel like I belonged as soon as I had landed in Sweden!
The winter here is very rough, even though we are lucky to be in the Southern part, where it is not as cold as Stockholm or Luleâ. But the atmosphere is very good and cozy, especially with this culture of fika, and warmth and comfiness! I have found my place here, and my Erasmus+ exchange has been wonderful; so wonderful, in fact, that I decided to stay longer than a year!
In Sweden, every bottle or can that you buy has a 1 or 2 kronor consign, that you get back as a discount coupon in a grocery store when you bring them back, encouraging therefore the recycling of your containers, and making it so easy it would be a shame not to recycle. To add to the simplicity, in my student housing area (and in some others - probably everywhere actually, but I haven't checked), the trash boxes are provided for you to be able to sort your trash correctly and easily!
Another culture shock I experienced, was the Swedes themselves: they seem very cold and are honestly hardly approachable. But once you get to know them, they can be sweethearts! The hard part unfortunately, is to talk to them. It is rather hard to blend in the local community at time, even though Sweden's perfect English level makes it very easy to communicate and feel welcome nonetheless. The best encounters I have met, though, were with the fellow international students. I don’t know exactly why, but the international community is very tight here, and it honestly made me feel like I belonged as soon as I had landed in Sweden!
The winter here is very rough, even though we are lucky to be in the Southern part, where it is not as cold as Stockholm or Luleâ. But the atmosphere is very good and cozy, especially with this culture of fika, and warmth and comfiness! I have found my place here, and my Erasmus+ exchange has been wonderful; so wonderful, in fact, that I decided to stay longer than a year!
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Your topic-specific testimonial
You should get a personnummer at the Tax Agency (Skatterverket) as soon as you can!! If you stay longer than a semester, at least. Not having this number makes it considerably hard to get a doctor's appointment, open accounts in anything, and some other things too... Creating a bank account and getting a BankID is also nice, but more comfortable, rather than necessary... I have been living here for 15 months without a Swedish bank account or a BankID.