Good evening journal! I wasn’t even going to write an entry today, but I decided that today I had some stories to share. Today I had to move from one hotel to another because the hotel that I was originally staying at was in an oversold situation. So I moved from the Nordic Sea Hotel to the Hilton Holtel. Actually, the Hilton Hotel is quite nice and I rather enjoy it. However, none of this goes to tell the story, does it? So let’s begin.

I had just finished working out, taking a shower and all of that good stuff. However, something that you need to know is that I need to increase my intake of potassium after working out of else I get really tired and fall asleep. Well, I did have access to potassium, so as you imagine, I passed out half on the bed — my feet were firmly on the floor. Additionally, my um….hands were protecting the family jewels. Seems rather uneventful, except when I woke up about 2 hours later, there was a tray of fruit and chocolates in my room (this comes with being a Hilton HHonors Diamond VIP member). This means that someone came into the room while I was sleeping. I can only imagine what they were thinking…they come in and see a tall black man, asleep — fully dressed — headphones on, with one hand down his pants (in my own defense, my hand was in between my pants and my underwear…it was more like the way Al Bundy put his hand down his pants in the “Married with Children” TV episodes). If I were them, I would have taken a picture. I know that they laughed at me. And I would have easily laughed at myself had I awoken.

Why do these things happen to me? My life sometimes feels like a crazy sitcome. Maybe I should write some memoirs or something. But I guess that’s why I have the online journal to document my experiences. Oh well, I’ll write some more later as soon as I get the inspiration to do so…love you journal!

Ciao, Rodney

Well, after a long hiatus. I finally feel like writing something. I have wanted to write something to you journal all week long, but I just couldn’t bring myself to actually write it and post it up to the website because let’s face it, I am one lazy bastard. So now it is saturday night…my resting period before I go out tonight and an ass of myself due to my lack of understanding Swedish.

This week has been about understanding, or my lack of it. Sure, anyone will tell you that the Swedish understand English fluently and completely. But they understand English like the Japanese understand English. That is to say that a good percentage of them hear it, but I am not convinced that they understand it. When those situations have occured over the past week, I have had to remind myself that English is their second language.

Perhaps that was no more apparent than at a restaurant. They didn’t have an English menu, but my understanding was this was one of the best Swedish restaurants in town, so I had to give it a try. I went in, was promptly seated, and that was then the horror began. I ordered a dish involving Elk or something else that stares into headlights. Apparently, to keep the meal warm, they bring a chaffing dish. However, no one told me a chaffing dish was coming. So in his best English, the waiter says “plate on fire”. Without even thinking I jump up and yell “plate on fire?” Everyone is looking around wondering what’s on fire and if they have to evacuate. Then the manager comes running out telling everyone that everything is OK. After the manager talks to the waiter, the manager then explains to me what he meant to say what he wanted to bring me a chaffing dish to place the plate on so that the meal would keep warm while I was eating it. But you could easily see that sense of disgust in the manager’s eyes. The kind of look that wanted me to spontaneously combust. I guess I should have felt embarassed, but I’ve done dumber things, so this was pretty low on the totem pole.

In other news, I am not sure if I mentioned this, but to replace my Armani custom-made sunglasses, I purchased on Gucci sunglasses. I love them, they look almost the same as my old sunglasses, and that makes me happy. Truth be told, I need some happiness right now. I am not getting homesick as much as starting to feel a tad bit lonely. I need to join some clubs or associations pretty soon. That is now people meet around here I guess. Although many at work have advised me of places to go, places to be seen, and things to do. Most places they recommend they determine are too expensive for their budgets, but hey, since I am on expenses, I can go pretty much wherever I want. stockholm is my oyster. But still, it would be fun to know someone else here. So there is some excitement to the fact that Tim Jacobs and Steve Needham are coming to Stockholm at seperate times. A whole month of other people I actually know! Woo hoo!

Well, other than that, things are going pretty well. Work continues to be a big part of my day. And September 11th in Stockholm was barely noticed. It was then I realized that there are some pretty distinct categories of people and how they were affected. You were in one of these groups, in order of severity:

Group A

* Were in the immediate vincinity when the towers collasped and were covered in dust (incl. the pentagon)

* Were a survivor pulled from the rubble.

Group B

* Knew a person or people who died in one of the attacks.

Group C

* Knows someone who knows someone in Groups A or B

It seems unfair to say that there’s a difference between the groups, but there is. If you only have peripheral involvement, then your sense of loss and feelings are different. I wish it were as simple as “national pride” or “collective togetherness”, but it is more complex than that. There are people I’ll never see again through no fault of their own. I asked a couple of colleagues if they were doing something special on September 11th? One said “work. is that special?” The other said “just what I doing last September 11th. My job.” That differs sharply from the responses I got from people who knew people that died.

Anyway, I missed writing in your journal, and I promise to write again soon. Love you journal!

Ciao, Rodney

September 11, 2002

Although not everyone knows it, I was personally impacted by the events of September 11th due to the deaths of a couple of people. But who I want to remember today is Amy Toyen.

So instead of focusing on me and my life, I wanted to take this time today to focus on the life of Amy, a vicitm of the attacks on the World Trade Center. But I don’t want to focused on how she died. Rather, I want to focus on how she lived.

Amy Toyen was a graduate of Bentley College with a B.S. in Marketing. One of the many on-campus organizations she was involved in was the fraternity of Delta Sigma Pi, of which I am also a member. It’s a co-ed business frat (just so I can explain why a female was a member of a frat). And she was a very very devoted member to the fraternity, serving on more board and in more officer positions than I can remember. Her fiancee was also a member of the fraternity. So to most people, this seems pretty cut and dried…someone devoted to the pursuit of making herself a success in business has passed away, but that is only one side of Amy. There’s another side which not many people saw.

Amy might have been a business woman, but she was also an idealist. A person with the ability to think outside of the box, a person who stood up for her beliefs and convictions. A person who spurred others to action when the cause was just. She learned as much as she taught others — about themselves, about her perspective, about her faith (She was also active in Hillel). And that’s not to say that I agreed with her all of the time. In fact, there were many times when we didn’t agree at all. But in the end, there was — and still is — a mutual respect for the ideas we had, a mutual respect for the common values we shared, and a mutual respect for where we agreed to disagree.

The Amy I remember cared a lot about business and being a success. But cared more about being a successful member of the world community. When there was an act of vandalism and biggotry at our school during our senior year, Amy was so moved to action that she was part of a core group of students who rallied the campus in a diversity initiative. She (and others) hung up signs around campus that said “Biggots not welcome”. So moving and profound were her actions that if you want to, you can visit Amy’s spirit today — a drawing of her and the others who led the initiative covers a wall in the LaCava building at Bentley College.

Years ago, there was a campaign sponsored by the United Way called “How Do You Want To Be Remembered?” It suggested that the typical person wanted to remembered as the powerful executive, the superstar athlete or singer, or the genius whizkid. But there was another category of people. They were the people who cared — people like Amy. People who when they pass on, through ill will or other reasons, leave a hole that the world doesn’t quite know how to fill.

I very much miss my friend Amy, but I know I’ll see her again. I don’t know if I quite believe in heaven, but I think there is some sort of after-life. Someone once said “don’t be dismayed at goodbyes. For meeting again, after moments or a lifetime, is certain for those who are friends.”

Amy…until our paths cross again….

Love, Rodney

Friday, 06 September 2002

Good afternoon! Or at least it is afternoon for me. It seems strange, but this is actually only my second Friday outside of the US. I have no idea what I am going to do this weekend. Actually, yes I do. I am going to take a couple of tours of the city over the course of the weekend. I think that I need to do this because I still don’t understand the design of the city. I think getting an understanding of what is where will be a good thing and help me to make sure that I can adjust. I also have my monthly train pass, so I can use the metro system as much as I want. By the way, they call the subway system here the “T”, just like they do back in Boston. That got me missing Boston a bit.

Anyway, I am not sure if I mentioned it and I am too lazy to check, but last weekend in Norway I lost my sunglasses. These weren’t just any sunglasses, but my Giorgio Armani clear shade UV-coated sunglasses. Talk about being pissed off. I was so angry. I am so angry. I don’t wanna talk about it.

It’s only Friday afternoon, but it feels like it has been a long week. Trying to get things done has been a challenge, but I am coping. It will be nice when I finally get my own desk, my own telephone, and my own work-authorised mobile phone next week.

I also have to work on an apartment. I haven’t been lazy in looking for an apartment, but I definately need to make some progress on that. I think that I also need a Swedish social security number or something like that. My understanding is that this number is used for anything important. I will find out how to do this soon enough. In the meantime, I am living in a hotel. I don’t mind staying in a hotel — the one I am at now is quite nice, but it will be good to get into an apartment and do my own cooking again.

Speaking of food consumption, I was eating at a place called “Sushi King” the other day. I ordered a lot of sushi and while I was eating, a pizza delivery guy came in with an order for hte Sushi King shop owner. Now, I may not be the wisest when it comes to customer service, but I think that if you can’t eat what you sell…I actually tried to find out why they wouldn’t eat sushi, but they laughed at me (as most Japanese do when they are presented with a situation they find potentially embarassing) and then ate their pizza. Strange.

To understand Sweden it is necessary to understand that it is a place driven by process and by everyone having a distinct role. People wait in lines for fun, and what should take 4 minutes takes 35 minutes if you for one moment fail to follow the process. On the other hand, they are also very imaginative people and inventive — as long as there is a process for this. But so far, everyone I have met has been really nice, so Sweden continues to get high marks.

Finally, I decided today that I am going back home for the thanksgiving holiday. Out of all of the holidays, that is the one holiday that I do not miss — at all. I don’t mind missing christmas and New Years, but Thanksgiving is the one day all of the family gets together. Now I just have to buy my tickets before the price increases. I am taking American Airlines home — woo hoo! Well…my boss has to approve the vacation time first.

Anyway, I have to visit the other office today to make some introductions (and one of the people in the other office is helping me to find an apartment). So I will write again later.

Love you journal,

Rodney

Tuesday, 03 September 2002

Well, I finally arrived into Sweden on Sunday, after an awesome weekend in Norway! In fact, I was disappointed to leave Norway and I didn’t think that I would be sad — but I was. The people there were very nice and friendly and I spoke and met all kinds of people. I seriously was lethargic and lazy on Sunday morning and didn’t do very much. Even today, I am still weak from the weekend — it included a really demanding workout at the gym that made me sore even as late as last night. I missed my original flight to Sweden, but luckily I was easily accommodated on another flight.

When I arrived into Sweden, it was exactly the same as when I left it during my two day visit for the job interview. The weather was surprisingly warm, the IBMers were nice, and the taxi driver felt compelled to provide me with an education, which I must admit, was quite helpful. He basically outlined what he thought was the state of racial relations in Sweden. He was an Iraqi that moved to Sweden. I asked him how well immigrants are treated (for all of the fancy terms, I guess I am basically an immigrant — just a self-supporting immigrant). He said that basically if your skin is not white, then it is assumed that you are poor or somehow lower than everyone else. He said that I would face an unique challenge — being black on the one hand, but American on the other. He theorized that many people would make assumptions at first, but then ultimately “be put at ease” once they realized I was an American. It’ll be interesting to see how correct he is. To be fair, I’ve met some really nice Swedes. To be balanced, even my guidebook notes neo-nazi activity in Sweden (including an annual rally in Stockholm) and says that some clubs/bars have subtle racist policies at the door. But above all else, I will make this determination for myself. If after some period of time I truly feel that the environment in unsupported, I can just simply apply for a Norwegian work permit and spend the remainder of my assignment there. But above all else, I will be positive about this. We have the same activities and attitudes in parts of the US, and like in the US, I will cross those bridges when I come to them.

As I become used to my Swedish surroundings, I find that I am starting to be able to make sense of words and phrases — basically I am in survival mode. People here speak English very well and I am glad that they do. However, eventually, if I am to learn Swedish, I have to find ways to further immerse myself.

There’s a lot on my mind at the moment and I am still very exhausted. I hope to make a full recovery by Wednesday. I need to get back to the gym and exercising and being active. But for now, back to work!

Ciao and Love You Journal!

Rodney

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