Friday, August 30, 2002

Well, this week has been an interesting week. The planning meetings gave me a wealth of information that I found to be useful and helpful. I am still trying to process it all, and that will take some time. But I think that I will ultimately be successful in the position.

On Thursday, I went to the Swedish Embassy in Oslo, Norway (where I am still based at the time I wrote this) to get my Swedish work/residence permit. When I get there, I was informed by the representative there that although the Swedish Migration Board approved my work/residence permit, they send the approval to my home country in New York, so they could not give me a the permits until they received the approval. “How long does that take?” I asked. “One to eight weeks, which could be longer or shorter depending on how quickly things go.” I then asked her what the approval consisted of. She told me that it was a letter — and that the letter had to go from Sweden to New York, and then New York had to send it to Oslo. “After all,” she stated “this is Oslo, Norway, not New York, USA.” Well thank you Carman Sandiego! Next time I need to know where in the world I am, I will just ask her. Anyway, she recommended that I contact the Swedish Migration Board if I was unhappy with what was happen. So I did. And guess what? The people at the Swedish Migration Board say “oh, we can fax them the letter this afternoon and everything will be all set. You can pick up you permits on Friday.” Grrr….this is why I am bitter sometimes. =-)

So on Friday I go back to the Swedish Embassy (because I am in Oslo, Norway you know). But before I go, I give them a call to make sure everything is OK. They say “yes, we have received your approval and you can drop off your passport and pick it up in 2 business days.” “No, I will drop it off and pick it up today” I replied and just hung up and went to the consulate. I arrive at the consulate and Hilda the Consulate Barroness is in full battle gear. She calls me up to the window and says that it will take a minimum of one business day to get my permits. However, I give her the contact name of a person in the Swedish Migration Board whom she can call and will tell her that this process should only take 5 minutes. She takes the contact name from me, and with her tightened smile, go into the back office to talk to someone, presumably to process my permits. She comes back “this will take one hour, please have a seat.” I go to sit down and as I am taking out my reading material to chill out for an hour, another woman comes to one of the other windows and calls me over. I go over and she says “here is your passport with permits included. Have a nice day.” I review the permit and I notice that it is only valid for one year, when it should be valid for three years. I say “excuse me, but the permits are supposed to be valid for three years.” To which the best reply she has is “but Mr. Cornelius, the permit is already in YOUR passport. You’d need to apply again for me to change it. Get to Sweden and they will fix it for you. Or just apply again in a year. Bye.” Well, I just decided that one year is better than no permit at all and cut my losses and left.

The good news is that I can now travel freely in Sweden, and I plan to get there on Sunday. I’ll make good come out of this

Monday, 26 August 2002

You could tell what kind of day today would be because I got to work extremely late. In fact, I got into work at noon. For no other reason than I over-slept. No one means to oversleep, but I did. I feel bad, and then I remember, I’ve had a lot to do in the past week or so and I am finally feeling refreshed. So in the end, it won’t be a big deal.

I got into the office today and met my manager as well as the person who was handing off responsibilities to me. As it turned out, what they are asking me to do is to build a process from scratch and get it off the ground. In some ways, I am nervous because I’ve never built a process from scratch. Actually, I have before — now that I think about it. I built IBM’s data privacy audit program from scratch (well, with a few additions) and the concepts that are in that audit program will be used for a long time to come. So I think that I can do this. Today was filled with learning little things, like the location of the toilets, where to mail something, how to get set up for printing, getting access to areas within IBM Norway. I doubt that I will be there regularly, but I will probably be there enough so that it was good information to know. The strangest thing about today was lunch. Lunches in Norway are very very small compared to the US. They usually eat a few pieces of bread, have some small meats and condiments, and a beverage. I was “splurging” bceause I had a single piece of bread, a small salad, and a piece of salmon. I am liking the possibility of losing tons of weight in the Nordics. And I’ll need to. The majority of people are paper thin and I think I’ll have to have clothing shipped from home. Not that I am grossly overweight either. It’s just that what is considered “average” in the is not considered “average” here.

After work tonight (I took a taxi home, but it’ll be cheaper if I learn the train station route so I will), I was all set to fall asleep in my bed again, but I forced myself to get up and see Oslo while I am here. I walked up the main street in Oslo (Karl Johan’s gate — “gate” means street in Norweigan), which is a major shopping street leading up to the Royal Palace. After that, I walked even further, up to the Swedish Embassy (and passing the American Embassy on the way — stopping to talk to the guards because you know, it’s my Embassy). It was a good thing to do because I have to go there on Thursday in order to get my Swedish residence/work permit sticker. Today I also submitted an application for an apartment at the hotel in Kista, where I will need to stay for about 2 months. I will hear back tomorrow. Although I was going to stay in Norway if I couldn’t get an apartment in Sweden, I have decided that regardless of the situation, I am going to stay in Sweden. If the apartment is not available, I’ll ask for a monthly rate at the hotel in Kista, as well as for a monthly rate at the Sheraton towers. The Sheraton is more expensive than the Memory Hotel, but if I can get them to lower the rate, then I’d rather stay there and get some points of the deal of having to live in a hotel.

Anyway, after my stroll, I went to dinner in a cool Brasserie. I had dinner all by my lonesome. I often forget how different it is to eat dinner alone. usually, when I eat dinner alone, I bring my book, or some work with me in order to pass the time, but I didn’t bring anything with me. They originally sat me in what was close to the center of the restaurant, but then I told them I wanted to be in a less visible place, so they were nice and put me in a more private spot. I was sitting in between 2 couples. On of whom spoke Norweigan, and the others spoke Italian. I did some rough translations (from French into Italian) and the Italian man made a joke about the food. I laughed and then he asked if I understood. That was semi-embarassing, but I guess one should never assume that people don’t understand! Anyway, I thought my dinner was good. After dinner, I took another walk around Karl Johan street (noted future shops to visit) and then I went back to my hotel room (where I am now).

Well, that’s it for now…exciting day…can’t wait for tomorrow. But in the meantime, time to spend the requesite hour learning Swedish. I want to be semi-fluent by the end of the year, so wish me luck. Love you journal!

Ciao, Rodney

Good evening (it’s 11pm here in Oslo). I have to tell you all that I have been quite lazy today. I woke up to have some breakfast (I can’t tell you how good it is to be on an expense account again…life is expensive!) and after breakfast, promptly fell asleep again for most until about 16.00. It just really goes to show you how tired my body was. I woke up at 16.00 and didn’t have the energy to do much else, so I decided to upload a ton of my pictures from the past 3 years to my O-Foto account. If you want access to about 3 years worth of pictures (and that’s not even all of the pictures), send me an e-mail and i’ll share my photos with you.

Other than that, I really didn’t do much today. Didn’t leave the hotel room at all except for breakfast. But I can certainly use the rest. Moving took more out of me than I can even say here, but at least I am done. And come tomorrow afternoon or Tuesday morning, I’ll have the legal authority to be in Sweden.

Speaking of that, I made some flight arrangements to go from Norway to Sweden at the end of the week. Tomorrow I must call the hotel to confirm that they have an apartment flat available. If they do, I’ll live in Kista during the month of September, but will aggressively be looking for an apartment to move into by October. This of course assumes that all of the administrative stuff with my international assignment gets worked out in due course.

My study of Swedish continues to go well. Today I learned cardinal numbers, ordinal numbers, the alphabet, and “question words” (who, what where, and when). I am self learning for the moment, but the books help out loads, and since I have the tapes, I can hear Swedish spoken. However, I have practised verbally and think I need to have much more focus on the word stresses and vowel pronunciation. But I am still learning. If I could be semi-fluent by the end of the year, I’d be psyched!

Anyway, I have to get going. I am still kinda tired, but after a good night’s sleep tonight, I should be just fine. Besides, I have a very busy day tomorrow. I am meeting the business management team, have some Nordic administrative things to do, training for the handover in my responsibilities, and have to work in a visit to the Swedish Consulate in Oslo.

Love you journal.

Rodney

I arrived into the hotel today. This is the first day that I am a resident of the Nordics (although I don’t have a home yet). The flight was actually good and I slept a lot. When I was all said and done, I had 2 big suitcases, a duffle bag, a backpack and a computer bag. It seems like a lot, but I had to also pack for the possibility that what I have in my luggage is all I will ever be allowed to have with me. So I think that I did quite OK for myself.

Guess what? When I checked e-mail today, I got a note from the Swedish Consulate in New York that my work/residence permit had been approved on Friday. Of course! Wait until I leave the country to let me know. The good news is that it is approved far ahead of schedule. These things typically take 3 months. I have managed to go through this process in 6 weeks. And I have my Swedish friend to thank for that — certainly not the IBM Sweden RDM (see previous post) who refused to help me.

Anyway, what this all means is that I will only have to spend a week in Norway and expect to fly to Sweden on 31 August or 1 September, depending on if we can find an apartment hotel. Right now that means Kista, Sweden (right next to the IBM office), but I will see if there is another place that we can select. Kista is nice, but it is also far from the city and part of what I need to do is to explore Stockholm and learn more about it. If there is a way that I can get a temporarily furnished place in Stockholm than I will do that. I guess it just all depends on cost. Worst case scenario, I can pick Kista — which is not all that bad.

Anyway, I am dead tired and will spend the rest of the day sleeping — lord knows I need it. I will write again soon. It has been a good day…lots accomplished and some very good news. Besides, tomorrow I want to go experience what Norway has got to offer and see some of the sights. Monday through Thursday will be very busy for me as well and I have a lot of learning to do and have to do it quickly.

Ciao, Rodney

I am writing this from the plane. Friday most the hectic day of all. I had anticipated getting my hair cut one last time, picking up my suit, dropping off the rest of the small storage items, and some other things. I managed to do everything I wanted except picking up my suit from the hotel I left it at. However, Cara has volunteered to get it and take care of it for me. I love her. She is making life easier at this moment. Well, I am officially out of US territory. I am still an American, but I am not living there anymore. I don’t have a residence — just my sister’s address in order to get mail. Who knows now long this assignment will last. It is scheduled to last for 2-3 years, but IBM is notorious for cutting short international assignments when the need suits them. However, as many people have said, flexibility is required. And I will be flexible and practical within limits. The administrative details still have not been worked out, so in the meantime, I’ll be staying in a hotel in Norway for the foreseeable future. And another hotel once I get into Sweden until we can figure out how housing is going to work.

Man, driving to the airport, there are so many things that I saw as if I saw them for the first time — from buildings to people. Perhaps today I noticed the diversity of the city more than anything else. Where I am going, there are not many black people who are successful professionals. Many of the black people in this region are immigrants or refugees of one type or another. But I am sure that they will get used to it in time.

This is going to be a great experience…I am looking forward to it…

Ciao, Rodney

I just got back from dinner with my sister. It was a social visit (that was the first time I saw the house that I helped her to buy) as well as a practical one. I gave her one of the 4 storage keys to my storage facility. However, once the other members of my family heard that I went to visit Roxanne, I had to visit them all, but could only make it to see Aunt Lulu and my mother. At this point in my move, I have to decide not to do things or pass them up until some time in the future. I am so stressed and no one understands that. There is a lot to do and this is a life change. Excited and apprehensive at the same time. In a way, I am looking forward to arriving to the Nordics, if for no other reason than I need the weekend to recover. OK, I have to get some sleep.

Ciao, Rodney

Reached an important milestone tonight. Most things of consequence are moved out. And the only thing left to move out with the rental van is my desk (which I boxed up) and my leather chair. Everything else can be moved out with the car on Friday. The only things left are small things that I either have to store, give away, or throw away.

I was supposed to have dinner with my sister tonight, but she is sick and so am I. In terms of time, I really can’t afford to go, but I need to go, so I will make the time to go tomorrow. I brought a few more books today as well. Some on learning Swedish because I have so much to learn. It is entirely possible to exist in the Nordics and speak only English. However, I will get more out of the experience if I learn Swedish, and everyone from Swedish nationals to expatriates are telling me to learn Swedish. So I will use the books I brought as a base. And once I get to Sweden, I’ll get some personal language instruction.

I have also managed to finalize my travel date as being Friday, 23 August because there were no seats on the Saturday flight to Amsterdam (which I had to connect through to get to Norway). This makes it tougher. Oh yeah, and my passport came back today. Unfortunately it won’t have the residence and work permit for Sweden included because they are still processing the application. However, they had anticipated as response by September 15th, so I will anticipate that I’ll be in Norway until that time and then move to Sweden. Oh well, the work continues.

Ciao, Rodney

Today was a good day. I’ve accomplished so much in the past couple of days. Not only have I finally settled on a place to store things, but I also managed to rent a van to move everything. All of this will take place tomorrow.

On Monday, I had dinner with Tina Caterino, a very good friend from school. And Monday was the first day when I realized that all I had been used to would be changing in a big way in the next few days. During the second-semester of my senior year at university, Tina and I would often go to Ruby Tuedays for mega-ritas, which are super-huge margaritas that had swedish fish in them. As a goodbye gift, Tina got me margarita mix and Swedish fish so that I could make mega-ritas in Sweden. And then she gave me a photobook with pictures of her and I throughout the years. I almost cried at the table and then at the car, but instead, like a good male, I got teary-eyed privately at home. Of all the gifts that I got, that one was the most personal (that can be shared in public — right Cara and Lynn?!? =-). On Tuesday, I had dinner with Tim McAnany and it was a lot of fun. It’s only took 3 years to have dinner with him at a time that worked for both us — we’ll have to do it again in 3 more years!

I am supposed to have dinner with one of my sister’s today, but I have come down with something. Shit! This is not the time to get sick. I have so much to do tomorrow and I will just have to work through it. I can buy drugs and medicine later, but for now, back to packing and loading things up. The plan to is to move all long-term storage stuff first, and then evenually move the stuff I want to take to Sweden (at a later date) with me.

Ciao, Rodney

This weekend was very interesting. At the goodbye party my family threw for me, I yelled at one of my nieces. I mean I screamed. And I have never in all of their years ever screamed in front of them. I don’t think that they have ever heard me yell. But the oldest neice was being obnoxious. And then my mom went to defend her behaviour and I left. However, I just needed some away time, so I drove back after going home to change clothes and take a cold shower. My mom made my neice apologize and my sister downplayed the incident, but they missed the entire point that my neice is spoiled and needs to listen to all of her older relatives, not just the ones that she feels like listening to. Until that happens, my neice and I will have a bad relationship. Then there was this whole thing with gifts, but I won’t get into it. Let’s just say that my buying gifts for the family is on hold for the foreseeable future. But overall, it was a good time and it was good to see my family one last time all together. I can’t let one argument spoil all of the good stuff that happened.

Sunday was a lot different, I had to focus most of the day on all of the packing, sorting, and storing that I had to do to. I still haven’t settled on a storage place, but I wanted to select a storage place that had a bit more security and better lighting than the place I originally looked at. I will have to find something in the next few days, and I have to reserve a rental van in order to move all of my things. It seems like I have put things off until the last minute, but since these things cost money, I don’t want to spend more than I need to. For the time being, all of this costs is coming out of pocket, but I am confident that IBM will reimbursement me for some of it sooner or later. I just need to keep all of the receipts.

Another cool thing on Sunday is that my roommate, Jason, and watched Sex and the City together for the last time, and he brought an ice cream cake. That was cool. A lot of people don’t have friends like Jason anymore, so I am one of the lucky ones. Since he was leaving the next morning to go to his consulting engagement in New Jersey, Monday was the last time I saw him.

Anyway, there’s just so much going on at the moment, from trying to make payment arrangements for companies I deal with that don’t have websites or electronic billing, to a bunch of things, there’s just no more time to waste. U-Haul continues to be my best friend so that I can buy packing and moving supplies. OK, time to get going…I’ve got work to do.

Ciao, Rodney

What a busy week this has been. I don’t go outside much because I have so much work to do, but I can’t say that I haven’t been busy. I walked into the U-Haul near my apartment for the first time today. I have a lot to do. I bought some boxes in order to pack stuff that would eventually be moving to Sweden (if at all…the administrative issues are still being worked on within IBM). However, I also realized that long term, rather than continuing to buy tons of boxes, I would buy some plastic containers for my long term storage needs. They just feel more secure than boxes and creepy crawlies are less likely to be able to get into them.

In terms of IBM Sweden, I managed to talk to that other American expatriate in Sweden this week. She was a wealth of good information and good hints and tips for dealing with the Swedish culturally, professionally, and socially. She and I will be meeting for lunch just as soon as I get my resident/work permit approved, which is a story in and of itself.

For the past few days I have been asking the IBM Sweden Resource Development Manager (RDM) to contact the Swedish Migration Board to speed up the review of my application — which is what the Swedish Consulate in New York recommended. However, to make a long story short, he basically refused to call them, probably because it was not in his job description. Ultimately, I had one of my friends who speaks Swedish call and they told her that they would do everything possible to speed up the review. What pisses me off is that I went to the RDM for help and he said no. Basically, I feel like I would not be able to rely on his if I needed is his in a critical situation. But I will work out an arrangement where hopefully I can work with his United States or others instead of going to him. In effect, he has probably helped cost IBM money because if he had acted sooner on my request (I contacted him earlier in the week), I have every confidence that the Swedish Migration Board would have placed my application further up in the queue. I think they did anyway because of my friend making a case, but the sooner the better. I think that time will bear me out on this one as being correct.

Anyway, this weekend I have a goodbye party to go to being thrown by my family, and on Sunday, I have to make a lot of forward movement on the packing and storage and stuff. I’ll probably write some more on Monday.

Ciao, Rodney