It was a beautiful sunny Saturday in Gothenburg, and everyone was out and about, including me, actively cherishing the last light-filled days before the wet and gloomy season shocks us all into hibernation. We walked to a coffee shop and I sat down, Dale*, as the adorable creature he is, also decided to sit right in between a total stranger and me.
This woman (the total stranger) and I looked at each other laughing and I apologized scooting the dog to the other side. “Don’t worry, I love dogs! I have two on my own but unfortunately, they live in another country with my daughter” she said, and just like that, we started having a conversation.
It turns out that she is Swedish, returning to her city after having lived for thirty years abroad. We kept on talking and despite the age difference between us, we had several things in common, one of which was having lived for years in the United States.
She asked me how was I adjusting to Sweden. I quickly reformulated the same question to her as well “It must be so strange to move back to your city after many years abroad!”.
It’s hard we both decided to answer.
She then proceeded to make an example.
To celebrate Appia’s first birthday, 20% off annual subscriptions —— Valid until Sunday, September 8th, 2024
Consider supporting yourself or gifting a subscription to someone you love.
“My husband and I just came from another coffee shop where we had lunch. The service was so poor which seems to be the standard here (as in Sweden). it felt as if we were bothering the staff just by being there and ordering food.”
That’s not the first time I heard (and felt) this about Sweden, especially about these big cities (at least for Sweden) of Stockholm and Gothenburg.
We then continued talking about all the cultural differences that made the adjusting particularly hard. I contributed by bringing up the one that I find the most difficult (weather aside) which is the lack of human-to-human warmth in the form of small daily interactions.
If I went to my neighborhood coffee shop in Brooklyn, say, for a whole week and then some more, I would at least know the name of the baristas and would have had a series of brief conversations with them and possibly other regulars sitting nearby. At some point, the staff would remember my coffee order and start preparing it as I walked in the door.
In London, I could be in my local grocery store and end up having a conversation about home fragrances with the person right next to me.
None of these interactions lead to friendships or anything magical like that (we know they can although that’s not the default), but they drastically improve the joy levels on any given day.
Perhaps the rest of Sweden is not like this at all and people are friendly and warm and this is the experience I have had (if that’s the case, please do tell me otherwise). Perhaps service is better and people are generally more talkative outside of these ‘big cities’ but somehow, I am under the impression that in order to get some kind of politeness or a few conversations here and there, you need to move out to the countryside or – get a dog.
I told the woman sitting next to me that since I had gotten Dale my life in Sweden improved exponentially.
I have gone from not having any kind of human interaction for days on end to being acknowledged and talked to. It sounds dramatic, but it can be very easy here, with all the technology that surrounds us, to never have to speak with anyone.
You get your packages delivered to these lockers where you input a pin and a little door opens up to your order; you have self-checkout cash registers at the grocery store, and the list goes on. If you want, technology makes it very easy to not have to interact with other humans in the flesh.
But with dogs, well, there’s a switch that gets flipped, and not just between dog owners, although a whole series of secret codes gets unlocked there as well.
People acknowledge your presence as another human accompanied by an adorable fluffy friend. There are smiles and nods, a few “Aww” and “What a cute dog!” but also brief chats that end up being lovely interactions.
My Swedish textbook had it all right from the beginning, to meet new people get a dog, and go to the dog park.
Now this doesn’t solve the challenges related to cultural differences or the lack of good service in the hospitality businesses but, had I believed in what I was reading, I would have at least improved my social life much earlier.
In case you missed the latest essays:
*And finally, Dale’s picture - for reference.