New girl in the city

Hej! here I am blogging from Goteborg, lagging three and a half hours behind my fellow Indians.

The evening sun is ready to return to its slumber and there is a slight chill in the air. This is beautiful, I mean the city, its people and living all by yourself in a new country, new surroundings, midst of new culture along with new people.

I have this big mug of tea in my hand as I am not at all a coffee person. This reminds me coffee is an important part of the Swedish life, Swedes take out time even in between their busy schedules, just for a fifteen minute coffee break! Fika they call it!  It's going to take me some time till I lose my taste for tea or why should I, I like this Indianness in me.

It's different, from what I thought when I was packing my baggage back at home. I had the eagerness to start a new life but it didn't sink in that this would be different.

It has been around two weeks since I arrived here but I already feel independent and much more self reliant after all I am trying my best to adjust in the Swedish way of life, learning the city names, understanding the street boards written in Swedish, shopping by looking at the pictures on the cartons and boxes, doing the calculations and conversions in Swedish krona and trying to remember the new Swedish words I come across everyday. How does it matter even if I picked yogurt twice thinking it's milk.. wisdom comes from doing mistakes and at the end some help from the courteous Swedes always helps. I do miss home and friends, especially when I see the families around or a bunch of friends hanging out in cafes or when I have to carry those big grocery bags all by myself..sigh! 

It's indeed tough to do cooking, cleaning, grocery shopping and completing course assignment well within the deadlines. Ah! I have got this big assignment and pretty less days left and assignment takes me to college and lectures. Lectures are usually interesting minus the home assignments and assignments are also tolerable if they don't tire the brain much!

I know I can't have it all at the same time but hopefully I'll cherish it at the end.
Sweden give me reasons to love you ;)

Chronicles...April'13

In the early morning hours from my room's window, I see the tiny red euphoria flowers shinning in full gleam, fresh from the morning dew and basking in the warmth of the early morning sun. With a pause I look at them silently, yawn and get lost in my thoughts. It seems ages since I touched flowers, smelled them and saw the bees buzzing around. In between the thoughts, I turn my back and have a look at the wall clock. It seems to be staring hard at me. Immediately I get up from my bed and splash the water straight on my face, as it’s already late.Finally I am awake, away from the dreamy mornings.

I get ready before I am late for office. Eat my breakfast and stand decked up, all set to leave. Many a times I have to take the metro and inside it’s same as the bees in the beehive, everybody is almost on the top of each other. Thanks to the thoughtful Delhi government that we women are privileged enough to have a separate coach else it would have been a big chaos. Despite the mad crowd, it’s usually a lonely start to the mornings. People read to themselves or listen to music. Some are glued to their mobile and sometimes, silently greet the blokes, whom they see every day while travelling. Many a times they know each other by face but, yet they are strangers.

I reach office, smiling faces, full of energy are all around but, then there are some, tired and seem as if they are burdened not by work but with their life. Some of them fake things quite well, their mind is all the time occupied with calculations and planning of all sought and then there are few like me, sometimes perky and sometimes expressionless and hard for others to decipher (mood swings…no I’m not on drugs). The gallons of work followed by the relaxed sips of tea and pepped up by the chatters and not to miss the lunch time where one keeps the dieting plans at bay just sums up the entire day. Between all this sometimes comes a thought, why can’t things slow down a little, why can’t the tea breaks be a little longer, why can’t the boss wait for the project reports and weekly analysis.

It’s the evening time; even the sun seems slothful now. I move back, this time a little fatigued after spending one long day at work which seemed much longer than the years I have lived and then all of a sudden it sounds wacky, a little senseless. 

I reach back home, walking through the groves. I see Birds flying to their nests, little children moving back to their pads after long hours of play and now here I am, in my room. I look by my window side, it’s all dark.