Arriving was fun for me because I missed my host student at the airport with my name on the placard too!! I then walked up confidently to the policemen and to my dismay found that they did not speak English!! So with my host student just few steps away I talked to her on the phone for the first time when they directed me to the help desk :\ but finally it was fun meeting her and travelling back all the way from Arlanda to Stockholm and Solna. On the way she gave me a good introduction to Sweden! She was very kind and enthusiastic even though she had a tight schedule of her own being a dentistry student. At T centralen my other student partner from India picked me up and we arranged to meet the next day with the host student.

the travel arrangements were good, and i was accompanied all the time. the health center worked so fine, i never had to got here again :)

I was accommodated in a single room in Strix. got it through the UAC. It was a good room with adequate furniture but inadequate heating L however the view was awesome and the furniture was adequate (one table, two cupboards, table lamp, three chairs, one clothes hanger)

 Also the laundry facilities and sauna was good J the kitchen also had good facilities and cooking food together and along with other people from Asia was a fun thing to do :D what more? Oh yes, the accommodation was very far from the place of work in Huddinge..so we had a long travel to do every morning except in the emergency nursing  posting which was in Radmansgatan…just a few minutes away :D however shopping complexes and other facilities were very close so it was an okay deal for me J

For me it  was all about learning about Swedish lifestyle and culture…and also getting to know and interacting with as many people as I could in Sweden J the formal occasions were the International students parties which to be honest, were not as grand or crowded as I thought they would be. But we did get to know other students and teachers J I did ask my coordinator and she very kindly got me in touch with a few Spanish girls…then ofcourse life was different for me. I did get to meet people from all over the globe J I tried to be as open and accepting of cultures and behaviours. I went out for trekking, partying, dinners and even took part in a church activity of feeding homeless people J the MSF activities weren’t many when I arrived, I even missed the kayaking by a day L however, you always can do whatever you want to…I even visited Finland, Riga and Berlin in my free time. Going to other places was made very convenient and easy as we worked only four days a week. The best times of my life have been in those weekenends J

I had a very good time in these three months at Karolinska. I think it is a very mature university with very intellectual faculties. I would encourage students considering Karolinska to go ahead and do a semester there. The best thing about Stockholm is that there are people from all over the world and the faculties are very open and receiving of the students. Moreover KI has taken a lot of efforts to bring about ease for international students.

One particular quote that stands out in my head is that of the KI director (am not sure though about who said it) “The world does not need Karolinska as much as Karolinska needs the world”. This is such a wonderful show of the fact that KI has a lot of openness towards international students. True knowledge is not a pool of clear water, for a pool of water is never clear…however a collaboration of different calibers of brain, experience, knowledge and understanding …like a clear stream of water.

It’s one thing to want, another to be wanted. The second is always more rewarding.

KI wants you J

Learning Swedish was a cold experience, but I say this only because the classes were in the cold evenings of September and October. But otherwise the teacher was very warm and understanding of our ignorance of our language. She had great patience as we tried to learn the language and wasn’t even laughing at all the wrong pronunciations J the class comprised of people from all over the world and so it was interesting to also learn about another country’s language and weird phrases. It’s a bit difficult for me as an Indian to learn the fact that I have better English than most Europeans. But anyways the class was a good way of getting education with a totally different group of people (nobody else was a nurse) !! J and since I was a nurse the toughest job for me was to pronounce the word “sjukhoterska”!! right from the first day at the hospital. So ofcourse when the teacher gave us the assignment of trying to pronounce the phrase ’77 nurses’ in Swedish…guess who was all smiley ;) J

We didn’t have a lot to study from the university except our own studies to do ofcourse which then was only more interesting. I had mostly practical’s in different areas and was able to learn a lot from the patients…who were my real study materials J also the rounds with the doctors and nurses were very educative about the care being given to the patients. I also used the library sometimes, for various reasons. The library is an amazingly large spacious and comfortable one. The tutors in different wards were also very encouraging and helpful in whatever area of life that I needed help J many of them had also been exchange students and had a good deal to understand me and help me in the different problems J