As a Swede who has lived in many different countries (including countries in Africa) I want to address a few things in this video. The Swedish culture is one of respect. You always respect the other, many times above your own comfort. We understand that we as a society function better if we make a little sacrifice for our fellow human beings, and don't put I before we. In Swedish society, we don't value wealth or titles either. If you are rich or have a title, it means nothing to a Swede, it is WHAT you say and how you behave that matters. But what a Swede values most is respect. If you look at some things in this video, large parts are about respect. Queuing, distance, punctuality, equality... it's all about respecting your fellow man. Here we are all equal, no one has special rights, but we all have obligations to each other. There is room if you want to live alone and have crazy ideas. But then you have to do it all alone, this applies especially to religious people, Swedes don't believe in fantasies. The rest of us choose to live with each other, and repect each other. Accept it and we welcome you. Come here thinking you can convince us otherwise and you will never enter the fellowship. I also want to add that I appreciate you not making it about race. Swedes in general do not care about your color as they do in, for example, Africa or the USA. But we care about how you behave. If we think you're being rude, pushy, or acting like you're better in some way, we'll politely, or in some cases, rudely tell you what's going on here. We didn't ask others to come here, you came here. Accept us for who we are or leave here if you don't like us. We are not ashamed of what we have created up here in the north. :)
About the sound level, as a swede I think loud people are rude and/or have bad manners. As you said, you hear loud children. Older children and growns ups have learned how to behave. (Not that loud children are bad. They are children. Adults however, are not children.)
Hi, just found your channel and found it quite enjoyable! I'm from Sweden and the thing you mentioned about punctuation and transportation was so funny to me. I was in Egypt a few years ago and we asked our hotel when the bus arrived and they answered "Inshallah" which as you can imagine was quite a culture shock for us. Same thing but the opposite side
This was such a good video to watch, very thorough. (I'm from swe and it's always interesting to view things through the eyes of someone else since they see things I don't)
# About punctuality, If we agree to meet outside ICA at 2pm, I will stand there - staring at the ground until you come. Every minute you're late I will be thinking about how you made me stand around doing absolutely nothing with my time! 10 minutes isn't too bad, but more is pretty bad if you don't let me know you're late. I would get angrier and angrier. Then if it turns out you were stuck in traffic or had an accident or something, I will understand and not take it personally. But if you're nonchalant about it I will definitely take it personally, like my time isn't worth anything to you! I am in a sense giving you a piece of my life, I'm not going to be here forever, just a handful short decades if I'm lucky. So be respectful of my time and the fact that I'm willing to spend it with you. If you were to come visit me at my home on the other hand, I can spend the time doing random everyday things like cleaning or reading (:P) and it's not really that bad, though it could be the case that I have been stressing all day to make things ready in time, and then it turns out I could have planned it differently and that might make me mad too :P Also I would probably be worried about you if you took way too long, and then I would be mad at you for making me worry! I guess it's about respect for each other's feelings and limited time. # Religion; Most of us are Atheists and think religion are scams, but we're very respectful of other people's choice to be religious. I think you've picked up on us not wanting to say the wrong thing to upset you, it's like walking on hot coals for us because religion is known to be a sensitive issue. Just saying that I'm an Atheist feels like it might come off as disrespectful, like I am better than you. I think less than 30% of Swedes are "practicing" Christians even though we're labeled as a Christian country and a lot of us are baptized. Most "true" Christian people keep to themselves and only socialize with other Christians.
As a Swede I value peace and quiet most of all. Don't bother me and I certainly will not bother you. Regarding meetings, I am almost always 5 mins early, because it is embarrassing being late. ☺
Hello MA! Thank you for your video and explanation as always! Now I'm astonished but impressed about the manners and behaviours of people in Sweden. Well I found out some of them are rather similar to ours except that we tend not be quiet on public transportations such as trains, subwas, trams and buses here in Japan. Also I imagine that they are well-mannered and they don't tend to throw away rubbish on the streets and these are always kept clean without any litters on them. Anyway it's always good to know about Sweden and hope to be able to visit there in the near future. 😀☝
No, Swedes throw trash on the streets a lot more than Japanese communities. Swedes pay a lot of tax and a bunch of it is used for paying for cleaning crews to make Sweden look clean.
Nice video. But regarding religion, I think you are a bit off when you say it's very personal. Most swedes regard religion as superstition. And if someone is very upfront about being superstitious, that's a very weird person, we stay away from them. :) So if someone talks about meeting Jesus, we pretty much see that as the same thing as if they were talking about meeting aliens, fairies or Elvis Presley.
Also, since we know that this religion is important to other people we tend to not want to talk about it. We would only offend or hurt the person we are talking to, and why would one want to do that? Imagine the conversation... "What is your religion?" "I don't believe in fairytales."
@@DivigYep. Very true. If someone asked me that, I would answer something very bland, like quietly mumbling "Nothing." hoping that would be the end of it. If they persisted, I would have no other choice than to be honest. And then my answer could be something like "Religion is something that we should have left in the middle ages, I don't understand why intelligent people believe in those fairytales.". And that is a conversation I don't look forward to..
I dont find any of these "culture shocks" bad in any way, the Swedes are doing everything right. Keep quiet and give me as much personal space as possible, be on time and respect other peoples time, don't litter and take care of public spaces
About religion - most swedes do not go to church and are not organised in that way. But we are religios in our love for nature and also in some christian ideas - equality, love your nabour etc. You can believe in " god " but not in the powerstructure of church. So if you ask a swede which church he or she belongs to it is most of all a surprising qestion. Most people celebrite christmas and easter in a strangely enouff nonreligios way like a family holiday. And even though sweden is a very tolerant country, rasism exist here to but in a lesser degree than in many other countries. Forgive my spelling !
Systembolaget! How important is alcohol in foreigners lifes? Why does it matter were you can find alcohol. How hard can it be? Try to by alcohol im muslim countries.😮😅😂
Americans are now´n for being loud but that is just because they all the time talking over each other so they must speak louder and louder 🔊 🔊 all the time📣😵💫
You got it all I think but you don't understand why we are like that yet. If you are a creative person, the brain is constantly thinking about stuff and noice from others interfere. When it comes to religions, we just don't believe in those fictions. Maybe there are 5-10% of native Swedes who was born in the bible belt but the rest are immigrants who left countries that was messed up by their religion but still bring it here. Who will worship a God who kill >1000 children under 5 every hour in africa with bacteria and parasites ? It make no sense. When it comes to a landlord who demand evidence of income, it will be clear to you when you learn the law they must follow. It happen often that someone move in and then stop paying the rent. The landlord can't just kick them out, it must go thru a long process that may take a year and under that time the department may have been messed up so it requireba total reconstruct. Another problem is that water is included in the rent and a department for 1 or 2 has an estimated usage of water that is low. So if suddenly 6 people live in a apartment for 2, the profit is gone. You missed one thing, Swedes don't throw trash around them, we learn from our parents to use wastebaskets. You can easy see if some area has many new immigrants, it's trash everywhere and it don't look as the country I was born in.
About time keeping i have struggled alot😅😅😅but im on the right track now! I also find Germans very organised and obedient especially with the traffic lights unlike in my country where we dont even look at the lights😂😂😂!
Don't know about depression, but something that is related is happiness, and the nordic countries are ranked at the very top when it comes to being happy.
