England – a mould trap

I was just flickering through the TV channels and found this lovely little documentry called “Our House – a mould trap”.

Probably not the funniest program but it made me smile and think about when I was lying on my sofa back in London watching property programs. Here in Sweden we have the occasional property program but they are more about interior designs rather then doing up houses, as all our properties are as you know in pristine conditions.

Today’s program was called “Is it safe to return home?”

And just listen to the synopsis of the program: “The nerve-racking process goes on and the families in the mould infested houses are waiting for the local authorities decisions on how to move forward. In seven programs we follow four families whose houses are infested with mould”.

HAHAHA! Isn’t funny? It’s like a scary movie.

Bear this in mind the next time you judge a Swede for having a hissy fit about the mould in their home/office/hotel room/GP surgery/shop etc. We were brought up to believe mould is something very dangerous and just the thought about mould is nerve-racking. Give us a break, will you?

I remember myself arriving at halls of resident at uni, going to the janitor’s office asking them to decontaminate my bathroom as I had so much mould in there I could scrape it off the walls. They then hurled abuse at me for being an international student coming to their country and complain about everything. Yes, it was nerve-racking.

A program like “Our house – a mould trap” would never be made or aired in England, or even watched.

I can see the Brits sitting in their sofas eating take aways, watching telly, and wondering why these families are leaving their homes. At the same time they reach for there asthma inhalers as it feels a bit hard to breathe. They don’t even notice the smell of damp as they have air fresheners plugged-in in every socket to make the house smell of cheap perfume.

Brits would never make a bloody TV documentary about something as normal as mould. Buy an air freshener and the problem is solved!

For sale (/for Meghan)

I was reading the paper in bed this morning and found a rather interesting article about Swedish behaviour when buying houses. There are three things that would stop us buying a house no matter how much we loved it:

1. Mould
2. Damp
3. Pests

I guess that rules out every house in England.

The goodbye

It’s obvious that one hasn’t got enough inspiration writing about the English lifestyle whilst living in the glorious Sweden. Therefore this will be the last thing I write on this blog.

I remember when I started this blog, it was a life ago in my bed in London, and now I’m ending it in my bed in Stockholm.

Back then this blog helped me in a lot of ways as there was no one around me to understand what I was going through. The culture shock that came with moving to England hit me so hard I’m still in therapy.

If you where moving to a remote village in Africa where people live in huts you wouldn’t expect humanitarian living standards. But when you are taking your belongings on a plane for two hours to a United Kingdom you do expect this.

It was love at first sight. It was love that kept me in England and it was the love for oneself that made me leave.

My hopes, dreams and the life I wanted are continuing in England without me there. And of course this hurts, to know that it only took five minutes to erase five years. It was like I was never there.

But I was there.

So thank you England for Pimm’s, Tattler and Day Nurse! What would my life be with out it?

Property Developer

I’m doing a lot of translating work at the moment and I got stuck at the word Property Developer the other day. I was trying really hard but I couldn’t come up with the Swedish translation. I asked around at the office but I had to explain what it meant to be a Property Developer, and we all agreed that such an occupation didn’t exist in Sweden.

In England you can make a lot of money by calling yourself a Property Developer and buy a shabby property and do it up. But since there are no shabby properties in Sweden we therefore don’t have Property Developers.

I will tell you why: at the moment I’m having some renovation work done at my house. All of our outer windows have been taking down and shipped of to a factory where they will be taken good care of, while there will be some handy men sorting out our window frames.

I once again live without double glazing, but only for 3 weeks.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with the windows, it’s just that we learnt in Sweden that if you maintain your home, it will last forever.

With renovation work like this there will never be a shabby property for a Property Developer to do up in Sweden. But not to worry there will always be tones of work in England.

And now I would like to share this little renovation story with you, it takes part in England. Where else?

Once upon a time a pair of good looking Swedish girls was sharing a flat in London. Being Swedish they paid quite a lot of money to be able to live in a nice flat (English standard). So they where living there doing their things but quite quickly both of them started to feel unwell, lots of colds and just feeling miserable.

After some time they could see lots of big damp patches on the walls. They called the landlord who came over with a bucket of paint. His solution to the damp = paint it over. Only in England my friends, only in England.

Credit crunch?

I heard you were having a bit of a time over there, so I thought I’ll come over and spend some money to sort of help you out in these difficult financial times.

With my pockets full of Swedish kronor, I pass the boarder and entered the United Kingdom once again in a very short amount of time.

I came to London to shop but it wasn’t easy when all the shops were closed.

So you are talking about recession and bad times, but then I want to know why you close all your shops when London is full of tourist with spending money. Is there anything wrong with our money? Would it make a difference if we used cheque books rather then credit cards?

My old home is up for sale and as no one is buying during these very difficult times, my guess is it will be on the market for some time. I’ve been thinking of putting in a very low offer. The money I’ve spent on hotels in London would be enough for the deposit. It could be my second home. How flash!

We talked about it over Champagne at Nobu. There and then, happy on Champagne, we decided I would defiantly do it. I would buy my old home back, and move in.

The inclination this country has towards me these days is very powerful.

But since I’m not mad, I am of course staying put where I am. Why go back to hell when you live in paradise (Sweden)?