"New" Title Photo in Celebration of a "New" Residence Permit

I know what you're thinking, I'm such a friggin' copy cat!! But I took a picture and edited it to be quite similar to the really awesome one I swiped somewhere online. (A reminder of the old, stolen pic). At least now this work of art is one of "my own." I feel soo uncreative for this. At least my version has a wintry touch and communicates the atmosphere of the whole city these days!

This blog is coming back to life! I found my camera's card reader (in my sock drawer) a couple months ago and tried many times with no results to upload an awesome video from Christmas. Coming up are some long-overdue photos about what the heck I'm up to!

FINALLY!
OH and it's not a big deal or anything, but after 8 months consisting of.... 1 case worker who had 8 weeks summer vacation, another case worker who, I recently found out she'll be back at work on July 7, my THIRD (or maybe millionth) case worker dusted off my case when I called him during the *1* hour a week he has "phone hours" (he also doesn't even have voicemail). He told me there was no reason I wouldn't get a living permit, it was just a matter of approving it (aka putting a stamp in ink and stamping??). He'd do it for me the following week since 8 months was quite ridiculous especially for an obviously-allowed-to-live-here-no-matter-what case. Then he was sick. Of course I couldn't reach him nor another human being that works at that office (when there are "too many" people calling, aka always, the customer service just tells you to call back another time, no queue option). So I guessed on the spelling of his name, sent an e-mail to 2 spelling variations of first.last@ridiculousgovernmententity.se, and within a couple hours got a response!  Ridiculous that these people are so hard to get a hold of unless you take stalker measures. (For the record, this guy was nice, competent, and helpful, unlike 80% of employees I have managed to encounter who work at this organization).

LONG (and WHINY) story short, I was approved yesterday to live here until 2013 if I want to. Whooop Whooop!!! I can do so many things now. For one, apply for some $$ reward for learning Swedish. Let the fun begin!

Here's another nice video of Göteborg! It's an ad for the energy company here and a musician from here (Timo Räisänen) singing sort of a love song to the city. The song's title Aldrig Långt Bort means "Never far away." He's saying "Even if I leave you now.... I'm never far away from you, Göteborg." Isn't that so sweet?



So, at 0:25 that is one of the streets right by my apartment, and the dome in the background is the Museum of Natural History that is nearby. (Sounds a LOT cooler than it actually is, trust me!) Next shot is of the boat going across the canal that I take to school though not a very good view and in a different part of the canal. View after that of all the trees is at the square not far from my apartment.

Ah, I just found another good video if you are REALLY interested in seeing footage of where I live.



At 0:20 (also the view before you press play) is the view from Christoffer's office in the Lipstick Building. PS Apparently this video was someone's school project.

LOTS of pictures coming up in the next post!!