Just wanna share the videos/slideshows I made for our Sweden Culture presentation in our SFI class. I'm just proud of my work, all my classmates including my teacher had fun with our show and they all said it's great!

I did a videoke thing. Even if I'm an epic fail singer, they all enjoyed my concert! haha.

Du Gamla Du Fria - Sweden National Anthem

I love this Swedish song by Amy Diamond. Julen är här - it means Christmas is here.

Hope ya'll like it and enjoyed it too!

Merry Christmas!

I had it long time ago, I've just always missed to write about it. Not that I'm bragging, I just wanna keep a record and rate every gadgets that I have or get to mention that I'm a gadget freak. :P

By the way, this post is not about how expensive my iPhone is but about how I finally got it against the stupid Swedish rules. Oh yeah until now I'm still adjusting with the Sweden culture & stuffs. There are times that I can't help myself comparing Philippines and here. I always whine about it. Haha. Philippines is a lot poorer country compared here but I never really like the views and buildings here. It's waaay too simple for me or maybe I just have a high standards :P What I really hate is about the do-it-yourself rule here. It's ok that I have to pack my own groceries but fetching, installing or assembling the expensive furnitures we got is freakin'ly annoying me. Note that we're paying a very expensive tax here, eerrr ok not me, since I dont have a job yet haha :P What I mean is, in Phil., you give them a 20 - 50 pesos and they'll serve you like a queen! Ok i'm not that a big whiner, Sweden is an egalitarian country which I really like here opposite to how it is in Philippines. But enough of it, let's go back to my iphone. We have been planning to get a new phone way way back but the stupid rules stopped us. We're just like 6 months here and they require us to be at least 8 mos. registered here before they'd let us shop for a new phone. I was so pissed coz I badly want their package, with free spotify and internet so i can surf around wherever I am plus i think it is cheaper and more convenient for us to pay through installment. Comparing to Phil. again, they'd always please and beg you to shop or get a loan to them regardless if you can afford it or not. Talagang ibabaon ka pa nila sa utang. Good or not? I don't know. There's always a pros & cons. :)

Anyways I couldn't wait for another one or two months so we bought it in cash instead. Disadvantage: I can't surf unlimited and I'm using the prepaid one. Thank God there's a wifi almost everywhere.:)

Välkommen till Stockholm!!!

I've been living here in Sweden for about 4 months and last Monday was my first time to go to Stockholm, the capital city of Sweden. We went there to apply for my visa in British Embassy. Yes, we might go to London by end of this month so *fingers crossed!*. :)

From 3am, it took us more or less than 5 hours drive from Göteborg. Me and my husband loves travelling so it's always fun doing something like this. I had to always talk and entertain him so he won't fall asleep. Haha. We brought Jacky with us and thank God she's not car sick anymore. After we're done at the embassy we just look around the city, eat in a restaurant and that's it. We drove back home at night coz I have school in the morning. It's not enough time but we surely will go back there again sometime. :)

Anyways here's some of the pics we took there:

Beside this nice park lies the embassies of UK, US, Norway, Japan etc.

What a beautiful day :)

Just showing how it looks like there :P

Perfect timing when we got there, we saw this whatever you call it and I don't know what they're up to! :P

Of course, there's always camwhoring! :D

Their horses are pretty big. I felt like I'm watching a movie when I saw this. :P I'm not sure but I think this is how they do their changing of guards in the palace. Someone told me that they always do this everyday in the afternoon. I'll find this out next time we go back there :)

I don't know who those people are in the carriage, maybe a politician or some important personalities but I know for sure that they're not the Royal King and Queen of Sweden. :P

Infront of Kungliga Slottet - The Royal Palace of Stockholm

Waiting for my prince! :P

Alright, we're on a rush when we went there so I don't know what's that building in the background so pardon me :P.

Arghh, this one too! I promise to find this all out and learn about it next time ok. :)



Ciao! xoxo

Yesterday, after our 2 weeks in our SFI course, we had our examination. It's for our teachers to check our improvements and know our learning skills.

Today, they already announce us our exam result. They only told us whether we passed or failed the test. And cheers to me! I PASSED! Yeayyy!!! hehe. I knew it! :)

After our exam yesterday, I already knew that I did well. When I came home, I was confident enough to tell my husband that I find our exams easy. Probably because I studied well. Pfftttt! :P

Two weeks ago, I don't know any Swedish words at all. Of course except those that I see in the street or whatever that is too common sense. Everytime my lärare (teacher) talks infront of us, I don't understand anything at all. But after two weeks, I can say that I've learned a lot already. I can understand the instructions and everything that was written in our testpapers and I had fun answering all of it.

But I feel bad to my other classmates who failed the test. They were like 7 - 10 people out of 35 students in our class. It's not really something that you can judge them by saying that they're stupid or not smart enough. It really isn't. It's because we have different situations. Some people find it harder to learn another language. It could be because of the age, their social life and their cultures. I don't know, there's many other reasons. But as a Filipina, I'm proud to say that learning this language is pretty easy for me. :)

As a consequence for those who failed the test, they'll be moved to another class. They won't be our classmate anymore. They'll be transferred to another class that teach slower. It's for their own good and it's for the sake of every class. But it sucks that after we all got too close to each other, now we're gonna be separated. Oh well, what can I do? Life goes on!

First, what is SFI?

It means svenska för invandare or Swedish for Immigrants. It is the grundskolan or elementary school level. It is also part of the adult education system. It is a grattis (free) school provided by the each kommun (municipality) basically means the city & country or township.

Next level is SAS which is gymnasiet (high school) level. From there you can attend högskolan eller universititet (college or university) for högre utbildning (higher education).

Taking SFI is not a law requirement but it's a must to learn the language so that you can get a better job than cleaning a toilet bowl or washing the dishes.

My school paraphernalias...

Now, my first week in SFI was FUN. I enjoyed every days of it. First, because I finally met new friends and secondly, after almost 5 months of boredness, I finally have something to do here in Sweden. Although I was kinda shocked and in panic during the first days coz I didn't expect that most of my classmates knows or speak lots of Swedish already. I was like wtf?! nosebleed! I don't understand what my teacher is talking about. I don't know what's going on at all. As in zero! My classmates obviously understands and responds to our teacher who speaks Swedish only for us to learn faster. Most of them is because they've been here in Sweden for like 2 years already or they've been here much longer than me. Some has a Swedish husband, wife, boyfriend, girlfriend or someone that helps them or lovingly teach them everyday. I felt like blaming my Norwegian husband coz he can't really teach me. Sometimes he tries his very best in helping me everytime I ask him but he doesn't really know much Swedish. I felt like I'm the one who knows less Swedish among our classmates, or maybe it's just my insecurity. hehe. I regret that I never prepared nor studied earlier for this. I should've at least tried advance reading Swedish books or watched Swedish tv shows or movies to help myself when I was still on my vacation. But bleh, it's too late for that now.

The next days, I was able to adjust already. Things are getting better everyday. I'm learning more and more each day and I realized that I know more than enough or much than the others. I'm starting to be more confident. It's not that hard than I thought. I'm enjoying every words that I'm learning. It's actually pretty similar to English. Though it feels like I'm back in kindergarten again. Weeeh? It really is! I'm back learning the ABCD, AEIOU, counting 123, time telling, pronunciation, grammar, blah blah. Only difference is that I'm an adult now, I should have my own initiative to learn and it should be so much easier. But I hate the pronunciation and listening part. I really suck at it.There are some words and letters that is really new to me. Well, I know it's just normal in learning a new language so let's just see my progress until the end of this course. :)

About my classmates, they are pretty cool. They're all from different parts of the world and all of them are very friendly. We are all funny. We all have this sense of humor which makes our class much more fun and inspiring place to learn. There's never a day that we don't laugh about something. For the past 5 days, we had a strong bonding already. Everyone is approachable. Most of us (girls) have the same reasons why we moved here: for our husband/boyfriend. :P We just laughed at each other everytime we talk about it. Another funny thing and somewhat flattering thing is that they're really impressed with my English. Yuhoo! They all think that I speak really good in English. Well, it's not really like unusual for me but I think it's just really interesting how the foreigners appreciate and praise my English while all I get from my fellow Filipinos back in Philippines was an insult and discrimination. Haha! :P That's just one of the reasons why I love being with foreigners. :)

Going back on our SFI class, on the first day, I thought I'm the only Filipina there. Although I suspected one that looks Filipina too but at the end of the day I convinced myself that she's a Thai or whatever. During the introduction of ourselves I didn't really hear what she said, if she came from Philippines or not. I thought that she's not a Filipina coz when I heard her talking, her accent sounds different. On our second day, she sat next to me. I was in doubt to ask her coz I really dont like approaching Filipinas, much more being friends with Filipinas here. Ya know, I dont wanna be snobbed at. Why? You ask yourself to whoever Filipina reading this and you should know why. :P But oh well, my friendliness prevailed! I was like, should I ask her in Tagalog or not? But I ended up asking her ''Hej, what's your nationality? (if you dont mind me asking) with a matching smile of course! And she was like, ''Yeah, both my parents are Filipina but I grew up in the US.'' Oh well, duuuudee, she's really slang! At first I don't know how I'm gonna react to her. Should I feel embarassed or what? I was confused how I'm gonna talk to her. So I tried asking her like, 'so nakakaintindi ka pa ng Tagalog?' Then she answered, 'Yeah, I can understand a bit but I can't really speak Tagalog anymore.'' So that's how our conversation started. She explained to me that her family moved in the US since she was 9 years old blah blah blah. It was really nice talking to her. I find her really cool and I forgot that she's still a Filipina. Growing up in the US made her act and think like a westerner. I mean, her openmindedness, the way she carries herself etc. She's a silent type person. Nasa loob ang kulo but in a positive sense of it. So far, it seems that we both like each other. We started hanging out and do things together. We even went out for a movie and got drunk in the middle of the day..hehe. She's also a best shopping buddy. One thing that made us closer to each other is that we have similar story. Like how we ended up being in Sweden and the stories about our personal lives. I'm giving it more time for us to get to know each other and I'm hoping that our friendship would last forever. :)

Here's a few pics with some of my 'United Nation' classmates in SFI.

Palestinian, Filipina, Indonesian, Syrian & Moroccan.

Busy effect.. hehe! :P

Ofc, the Philippine Mabuhay is in the hot seat! :P

Today is one of my happiest day ever. After a few weeks of worrying, and bothering myself with so many questions like, ''Will I get it?'', ''Is it going to be approved?'', ''Am I going back to Philippines?'', and after checking our mailbox for like 2-3 times a day, crossing my fingers waiting for the letter from the embassy, now I can finally take a deep breathe and say ''Finally!!!'' After all that we've been through, it was really worth it. :))

The residence card I got is valid for 5 years which means I'm allowed to stay and travel in all the countries of the European Union without a visa. After 5 years, I can become a Swedish citizen. :)

The application process was really fast and easy. And hey, it's free! That's what I love in Europe, almost everything is free and very convenient. :) We were told that the usual processing time was up to 2 months, but it took us exactly 3 weeks only! And while waiting for the result, I'm already allowed to work, study or live just like a normal resident. I thought that was really cool! :P

I am very thankful and I am feeling so blessed for this especially that it means that me and Papa Lars would never be separated again and that this time, we could live happily ever after, TOGETHER. ^_~