2 Years Living in Sweden | MY Experience

so this here's me my name is travis i am a canadian who's been living in sweden for the past two years now i moved to sweden back in 2020 to play hockey and in the last two years that i've been here i've absolutely had my eyes open to swedish culture how swedes live their lives their values and i'll be honest at first i was really scared and i kind of hated it just miss home simply put but fast forward two years over the last eight months serena's really truly become my home i can honestly say that this is my happy place and a place that i really don't want to leave in this video i want to share with you my experience on swedish culture the cost of living the food scene the coffee scene lifestyle history and so much more let's get started i honestly thought sweden was going to be another version of canada or the united states with a few more meatballs and that swedish chef guy hanging around and believe me it was anything but i was going from huge houses huge meals excessive amounts of everything in canada to to be quite honest a minimalistic place for starters homes apartments and everything in between always smaller because europe's been around for thousands of years and they make the most of the real estate that they have also the people in north america everybody small talks each other and asks how's it going good in yourself well that doesn't happen in sweden watch this thank you it's fine are you i'm very good you're so nice i'm kidding oh really after that i learned very quickly that swedish people like to be left alone now what about the language barrier swedish is the official language of sweden but sweden is the third most english fluent country on earth where english is not the first language no granted the netherlands and denmark beat them out but only by two percent and i've had almost no language barrier since day one when i got here either people know english or they'll find you somebody who does maybe you can't read a sign you can't read an advertisement just download the google translate app they have a camera feature where you can scan whatever you're looking at and it'll translate it right into english for you that saved me a few times but outside of that i really haven't had any language barrier issues at all now let's talk about living sweden is home to about 10 million people 2 million in stockholm the capital of sweden half a million in gothenburg and about 300 000 to a quarter million in malmo three biggest cities in sweden respectively the rest of population is spread out throughout the country now i spent two months playing for a team in the stockholm area called flemingsburg or as the swedes pronounce it fleming's bad and that would be to stockholm what richmond is to vancouver it's just a suburb outside of stockholm after that i spent the rest of my time living and playing in the gothenburg area specifically where i am right now playing in warburg living in homestead or as the swedes call it va very inhalmstad more on that later one thing i hear a lot of swedish people complain about is the price of living if you're coming from canada let's say like in vancouver you live in los angeles new york city you're used to expensive places i come from winnipeg where to be honest in canada it's pretty dirty to live compared to sweden let's talk about that especially the gas prices i know all gas prices have gone up for swedish gas prices something else i found everything to be more expensive and sweet one canadian dollar today is worth about six to seven swedish crowns depending on the date and no the swedes do not use zeros don't make that mistake because i did when i first came here so right here these pastries are about one dollar a piece on sale probably a little bit more expensive than what you would see in a commercial grocery store in canada these chicken breasts 117 crowns they were 130 crowns so basically about 20 for let's say five breasts in canada i feel like you could probably get about the same for a little bit more than half the price here you have ten large eggs about five dollars pretty expensive if you ask me but that's a pretty typical swedish price i spent consistently around four to five hundred dollars every single month on grocery since i moved here in 2020. i wish i had some insight into rent prices but all three places that i've lived since i've came here were all found for me by my hockey team and i basically just showed up paid the bill and my rent is dirt cheap it's only like 400 500 bucks a month at the absolute most that i've actually had to pay dirt cheap if you ask me but it's also a rare situation based on what i've heard swedish rent can be about 1500 to 2 000 a month canadian for an average one-bedroom apartment what about gas so gas is 21.5 crowns that's about 325 for a liter but here's the deal here's the deal here's the deal because here's the deal there's the deal thanks joe in august gas is around 19 to 20 crowns a liter fast forward to right now in april of 2022 i saw gas just the other day hovering between 25 and 27 crowns a liter i'll leave that one for the swedes in the comments section because if you want to piss off a swede ask them how they feel about their taxes well the truth is you don't really need a car in most of europe in sweden specifically so this year's gothenburg central station and one of the best things about sweden is so many buses and options for travel here it's insane the train systems everything is convenient there's always a train usually within about 15 to 20 minutes of yeah it comes every half hour worst case every hour very convenient very cheap very affordable this train moving here behind me this is called the sjx2000 it's a flagship train for sj and it does i don't know how many routes between stockholm and gothenburg every single day the primary two main cities in sweden [Applause] let me explain a little more in sweden you have a few types of transportation you have the heavy duty trains run by sj the main carrier in sweden and they run all the major routes from gothenburg to malmo stockholm all the way up north into norway then you have the smaller carriers like monotog or sl the sl is what i took to practice every single day when i was in stockholm and the autozooms tag is what i took to practice this year in vyrberg sl will run you about 100 a month for a train pass and they run trains every 15 to 30 minutes throughout the day everywhere in stockholm the orson stag is going to run you about 200 a month and they run trains every 30 to 60 minutes sometimes every two hours depending on the day from gothenburg all the way into denmark obviously have smaller commuter trains like these but you also have regular buses the buses that you'd see anywhere else in the world now finally you have the infamous streetcar now i believe there are a few places in canada that still do do the streetcar but they are everywhere in sweden and you can get them included in your monthly pass if you desired so for me i got an all-you-can-eat pass from gothenburg to homestead any train any tram any bus i wanted unlimited for a month and considering that's about the same cost as two weeks of gas little lonely insurance parking cost of a car etc that's a steal of a deal the country of sweden was literally built for being mobile without needing a car one thing i was super worried about when i first came here was are they going to do everything in miles or kilometers everything is kilometers we're all good also if swedes drove on the right side of the car it's not like the uk on the right side swedes drive on the left now what's the weather like well up north it can get absolutely freezing cold minus 30 by september just like in canada i would compare stockholm to toronto weather-wise it's not super cold but it's also not super warm the gothenburg area where i live is probably something like vancouver here's why because we're right in the ocean at least here on this side of suite on the west coast we're right by the water to get kind of the vancouver the los angeles effect where you really never get snow there's gonna be a few times a year where you might get some snow it's the middle of march almost the beginning of april here and i've been in shorts for it feels like almost a month plus 15 was like plus 19 the other day plus 18. incredible now that may sound great however in the winter you're going to be seeing a lot of gray but you're also going to be seeing a lot of this this is the worst thing about living in sweden the fact like it just rains and it rains and it rains like in the winter time i'm not kidding you it will rain for like two weeks straight it'll just keep raining it'll keep going and it does there's no sunshine for a month it's insane visually though i would say sweden is a lot like the canadian prairie you could watch your dog run away for 10 kilometers and never lose track of them it's a lot of fields planes farms but with a couple hills mixed in here and there fun factory by the way the word berg is the swedish word that means mountain now i was told that this right here is the mountain that gothenburg was named after or yo tabari as the swedes would call it you'll notice a lot of burgs varberg flemingsberg falconberg there are a lot of birds and speaking of history sweden is probably older than christ and i'm not kidding you the vikings lived here and although you will not see many vikings kicking around today you will see some seriously cool ancient architecture gothenburg central station for example here is the oldest train station still in use in sweden it opened in 1858 almost 150 years before i was even conceived and it's the same station that millions of people departed from to head down to the water before heading over to the new world in north america for a new life and i gotta be honest this is one of the reasons why i love taking the train there is just so much history it's an absolute time machine and it takes me back in history from the first time you arrive to the last time you walk out everything is so old in sweden it's really beautiful it's really pretty and it's awesome except for this brand new tower or towers i should say let me tell you a little bit about it there's a building in gothenburg called gothia towers like the tallest building in gothberg and you get some of the best views of the entire city you can see it behind me i'm not looking behind me because i'm terrified of heights but i know that oh my god oh they got a pool that's the pool i know they have like two in vancouver but it's so cool so you can literally see all the gothenburg from these three gothia towers from the ferris wheel in the amusement park to the scandinavian the official home in the shl for the frolinda indians and also this soccer stadium which i only discovered there is a professional soccer team in gothenburg about a week ago which is kind of cool but it goes without saying swedes love their sports they also love their metal hair metal may have died in north america in 1991 when kurt cobain came along but believe me hair metal is alive and it is well over here it has not died let's talk a little bit more about food swedes love black licorice if you don't like black licorice that is okay i love black licorice so i'm totally okay with it but the swedes like it's salted but another thing that the swedes love is called fica swedes take their coffee very seriously over here now this right here is the textbook definition of what fica truly is but this is going to sound really cheesy it's more of an excuse to get out of the house and honestly get swedish people to talk to me if you don't have a coffee to offer no swedish person in the right mind will actually want to talk so on the topic of coffee obviously you have to have some food some pastries with coffee sugar is like super expensive to to buy to import don't use it as much as in north america where everything is just like sugar on top of sugar on top of sugar let me present to you the semler pancake semla and a pancake it's this in pancake format american pancakes looks like too the best gothenburg's finest i've tried them all now assembly here or as the swedes call it samla is a spring pastry that is basically a swedish long john minus the chocolate it's dough infused with cardamom by the way the sweets love their cardamom loaded high with whipped cream almond paste finished with icing sugar but it's not just the semlla it's the countless other pastries including but not limited to the cardamom bouillee the cardamom bun the vanilla the vanilla bun or the kennel boulet the absolute flagship of flagship swedish treats it's basically a cinnamon bun but so so much better now don't get me wrong you have other weird swedish foods from hot dogs and mashed potatoes to kebab to kebab and french fries on pizza well this here is shrimp salad this is a swedish staple it is literally shrimp mayonnaise dill but i like it if you don't like shrimp you will not like it and obviously the holy grail of swedish foods the swedish meatball now trust me i love these things now i promise you since i came here my middle name is meatball swedish meatballs you may have a preconceived notion of what they really are the lingenberry sauce which is basically like cranberries but a little bit more swedish the pickled cucumbers basically just normal pickles the meatballs the brown sauce the meatballs by the way are infused with cardamom that's a big theme here swedes love cardamom the brown sauce the mashed potato puree it is incredible and my personal favorite swedish dish also the french double circle k is a gas station that is everywhere in the world in north america but in sweden it is not just a gas station in a convenience store it is a delicacy the double french two mainers one bun whatever sauces you want you can get one wiener one bun whatever you're into but the crispy french bread toasted with these wieners you want a cheese and bacon smoky you want chicken you want vegan you want honestly a hot dog that's probably gonna shave off five years your life expectancy you can get that and it is amazing it is incredible and keep in mind it's like ten dollars for a hot dog they are so worth it they're the best hot dogs i've ever had in my life now what about work obviously you got to come here and pay the bills some way i came here to play hockey and if you want to see my first hand experience going to play hockey in sweden you can check out my 20 20 21 vlog playlist from my hockey season that year or this year's 2021 2022 vlog playlist i'll have a link down in the description i feel like coming from north america you see pigeons and like movies and tv shows all the time in europe but then when you come here you start realizing like they're everywhere this is something i found interesting this country has changed my life it has provided me with so many great relationships i've met so many amazing people it has opened my eyes to what's really out there in the world coming from north america you're kind of taught to be egotistical in the sense that we are the best both u.s and canada we are the best the whole world revolves around us and the truth is it doesn't there's so many other things to see especially in europe the culture the food i could go on for hours and although i may be leaving to go back home to see my family in a couple days from recording this video i can't wait to come back again sometime soon i want to say thank you very much for watching this video i hope you enjoyed the differences between canada sweden my experience it's been two years and i'm very proud to call sweden home it's honestly got my favorite place in the planet hit the subscribe button thank you for watching i will see you soon bye [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] hey [Music] [Music]

Channel: Trav

Views: 742,300

Keywords: what is living in sweden like, moving to sweden, living in sweden, my experience of sweden, Gothenburg, stockholm, should I move to sweden

Id: rmpVN7ymNpU

Length: 13min 7sec (787 seconds)

Published: Mon Apr 18 2022