Dear Sweden...

Yesterday my residence permit card arrived in the mail.

Although all it does is allow me to legally live in Sweden until July, I feel like I can claim I'm officially Swedish. And having been here for over a month now (deary me that went quick), the anthropologist in me has been running wild analysing Swedish people in their natural habitat.

One thing I've noticed so far regards stranger etiquette. Let's start with this image my Swedish friend posted on Facebook the other day. I found it an amusing exaggeration of how Swedes deal with others.

However, only the next day, I found myself standing at the bus stop and essentially acting out the above scene. I drew a picture to give a fairly accurate account of the situation (snow included).

I'm not joking. When I arrived at the bus stop, the other two ladies were literally standing at least 4 metres apart from each other, and we only all came together when the bus finally arrived. Oh Sweden.

Now some people (mostly Australians) would find this highly bizarre. I mean, how can you have friendly chats with strangers if they stand that far away from you, right? Well in Sweden you actually follow the rule your parents taught you- 'don't talk to strangers'. Swedish people aren't interested in having menial conversations about the weather (we ALL know it's cold), and although some people might find this lack of conversational interest rude, I quite like it. Yes you miss out on the odd good conversation you may strike up with a stranger, but you also avoid all the awkward half conversations you are forced to constantly go through on a daily basis. But don't get me wrong- all the Swedish people I've met at uni or through friends so far have been incredibly nice. Truly. In many ways they're even more friendly than Australians (but let's save that explanation for another day). Once you've been here for a while, you start seeing how this whole thing works.

The second difference I wanted to point out is Swedish people in relationships. I think this one is my favourite, and it is well and truly the polar opposite to home. In Australia young people often flaunt their relationship like it won't exist unless it's right in your face, all the time, in every situation, without fail. However in Sweden, you can't even tell if two people are going out or not. The don't sit next to each other, they don't hold hands in public, they don't kiss, hey they don't even talk to each other that much if they're with others. Many people would say this is unnatural. That Swedish people must simply be uncomfortable with showing their personal feelings so openly, but that's not it. The typical behaviour of being inseparable and all over each other like most couples back home are, is considered childish and immature- something you did when you were 12 or 14. I know this is a big generalisation on both sides, but based on personal experience, the differences are astounding. You really can't tell if people are dating or just friends. Now I'm just curious to see how Swedish flirting works.