When you’ve lived the expat life for a long time and don’t get back to your home country very often it can sometimes feel like landing in a place you visited a long time ago: you know a bit about it, recognize some familiar things, but you aren’t quite on firm ground, because things change … Read more
Spring has arrived in Stockholm and while that means more sunshine (hello 4am !) and slightly warmer days it also means noise – and lots of it. Stockholm, for as long as I’ve lived here, has seemingly been under permanent construction. More than twenty years ago, during my first stint in the city, the lovely … Read more
My column is late. Actually, it’s more than late but I have an excellent excuse. No, my dog didn’t eat it (I don’t have a dog) and it didn’t get lost in the mail. Instead, I was struck down by one of the most vile experiences known to woman or man: Sweden’s dreaded ‘winter vomiting … Read more
The leftovers are finished, the old year is gone, and now we’re already three days into 2015. Three days! Yikes! This means I’m late writing my column but I have my excuses. My only excuse, really, is that I was out of town celebrating the New Year. I visited some old friends in London, where … Read more
As I sit here in Northern Europe on the fourth Thursday in November, I’m scrolling through the many social media postings that have been littering my feed over the last 24 hours or so, drawing my attention to Thanksgiving. There are the nice ‘I give thanks for my kids/partner/dog/life’ postings, and then there are the … Read more
Those of us who live in the expat world know the joys – and the struggles – of making new friends regularly. We also know the pain of saying good-bye, not knowing whether we will ever meet again. If you’ve been on the expat circuit long enough you know it’s a bit of a crapshoot … Read more
Here in Stockholm, when Swedes start discussing the ‘changing seasons’ we ex-pats look at one another knowingly and have a secret giggle. Why? Seasons in Sweden are broken down into ‘cold’ and ‘not so cold’. Not to say that we didn’t just have one of the most fabulous and lengthy summers in memory, because we … Read more
Tattoos and Abba – not two words you’d normally would – or should – hear together but they pretty much sum up my Swedish summer, which came to a screeching halt in mid-August when everyone returned from holiday and the autumn weather slowly started creeping in. Let’s start with the tattoos: in between working a … Read more
Like most of us in the expat world I have joined, for a variety of reasons, many a club over the years – usually when the summer holidays come to a sad end, life gets back on a normal schedule and the kids are no longer underfoot. Women’s clubs, expat clubs, professional clubs, book clubs … Read more