Every year, some days before July 25, I tell myself: this year I will do something special on the day. And every year, when the day comes, I just forget. Some years were harder than others, and I was too busy fighting my own fights to celebrate anything.
This year I remembered. Today it is exactly 15 years since I landed in Norway, on July 25, 2011. And since I now have a blog, this post is my something special. On my About page I wrote that I didn’t choose Norway, it’s more like Norway chose me, and that the story deserved its own post someday. Someday is today.
The dream I couldn’t afford
Studying abroad was always my dream. I grew up in a working-class neighborhood in a big city, in a family that was poor, though maybe not the poorest (I still got a good education, with extra tutoring when I needed it). I was not a super smart kid either. I did quite well in a low-ranked high school, but nothing compared to the good schools in the city, if you understand what I mean.
No money plus not-excellent grades: that’s a bad combination for scholarships to the top universities of the world. But I had a strong will. It took me two years to get into the top university in my country, which people there found weird, because normally only the very good students go there, and they make it on the first try. I needed three.
During my bachelor years I spent a lot of time on the internet hunting for scholarships. I wasn’t eligible for most of them, especially in the USA, the UK and Australia, the popular destinations, very competitive and with very high tuition fees on top. So I opened my search to smaller countries with either a full scholarship or free tuition, and applied to several in Norway, Sweden, Finland and Denmark. I didn’t get all of them, of course. But the first offer that arrived was from BI Business School in Oslo, with a scholarship that covered everything. The offer had an acceptance deadline, I had to answer quickly, so I said yes.
That was the whole choice. No dream about fjords, no love story with the North. A deadline.
“Why are you so proud of that country?”
Here is the funny part: I barely knew anything about Norway before that search. Where I come from, people really only know about the US, the UK, Australia and a few rich European countries. Those are “the best” ones. I had no idea Norway was actually richer than most of them.
By the time the scholarship came I had finished my bachelor and was already working. When I mentioned at work how nice Norway seemed, people laughed at me. To them I was bragging about a country nobody dreamed of, and between the lines: if it were one of the “good” countries, someone like me wouldn’t have gotten a scholarship there. Fifteen years later, I still smile when I think about that.
Three days after July 22
Here is the part of my story I only understood the weight of much later. The news broke one day before my flight: a bomb in the government quarter in Oslo, then the shootings on Utøya. My parents were scared to let me go.
Honestly, I don’t remember much fear from those days. I was busy preparing for the move. And I was very young. Maybe not young in numbers, but in my culture I was still a kid: I still lived with my parents, still taken care of in all the small ways parents do. They were worried, I was worried too, but we had no choice really. And I think my excitement was bigger than the fear.
So on July 25, 2011, three days after Norway’s darkest day, I landed in Oslo.
The empty, sunny city
The weather was so nice that day. Oslo was almost empty, but I had no reference point, so I just thought this is how it is here. (It was summer. Summer Oslo really was that empty, at least 15 years ago.)
And here is the honest part: I didn’t see much of the mourning. Or maybe I didn’t pay attention. I couldn’t read Norwegian news yet, so everything I knew about July 22 came from the news back home. I had never lived abroad before. Actually, I had never lived outside my parents’ home before, and suddenly I was alone in a country far away with a very long list of things to handle. The first days were overwhelming enough on their own.
I stayed the first days in a hostel because my student flat wasn’t ready. The prices were the only real shock, even though I knew beforehand that Oslo was expensive. Everything else was excitement. I still remember walking out of Oslo S (the central station) that first week, and the mixed feeling in my body: excited, scared, uncertain and full of energy, all at the same time. That memory is still completely fresh, 15 years later.
Staying was the hard part
I always intended to stay and find a job after my studies. Life back home couldn’t compare with life “abroad”, at least that’s what I believed then. Remember, I was a kid who had never lived an adult life anywhere, and everything I knew about Western countries came from media. People hear what they want to hear, and I was probably a little extreme about it.
What came after graduation was a period of nightmare that deserves its own post: visa deadlines, no money, a job market that didn’t want me, and Norwegians who were, let’s say, not easy to get close to. Most of my international friends from the study years left Norway. I honestly don’t remember anymore why I fought that hard to stay. But I found a job in the end, and life in Norway started for real.
Fifteen years of up and down
I have been through a lot with Norway. At some points I was properly fed up: housing prices, job market, politics, the cruel winter, no family here, life just felt too hard. But I kept staying. Partly because I didn’t know what I would do with my life back home. It wouldn’t be easier there: I didn’t think I could find a good job, and even if I did, the working culture is much harder. And when I looked at my friends’ lives back home, none of them had it easy either: kids, family, the pressure from everyone around. In Norway, nobody cared that I was single and had no kids. Back home, that would be a big topic at every family dinner.
So I stayed. Some days happy, some days feeling life was pointless. My life became very stable in recent years, maybe too stable, if you know what I mean.
And then, at my lowest point of Norway tiredness, I got cancer.
I know how strange this next sentence sounds, but the cancer made me love Norway again. Suddenly I was taken care of by some of the most educated people in the country, the treatment was completely free, with the most advanced medication (that whole story is in My unexpected journey). At the lowest point of my life, this country showed me its best side. I felt lucky again.
What Norway actually gave me
Something else changed after that, something I didn’t expect. I stopped being angry at where I came from. I started enjoying my visits home more, wanting to go more often. I started loving things I used to hate, I “forgave” people, I stopped trying to fix everything, I just accept it now. I accept my original self too.
And I feel lucky for the person I became here. Norway gave me peace of mind. I’m not materialistic, I found some kind of balance, and I learned that money is not everything. That might sound obvious, but not everyone truly knows it, especially where I grew up, where money often matters more than it should.
Honestly, this is not the “life abroad” I imagined at all. In my head I was going to be a successful manager in some big global company, with money, a nice car, a nice house. What I got instead is the life of a normal employee, with work-life balance, clean air and time to actually know myself. Nobody told me that life existed. It turns out it’s a very good one.
Still here
Fifteen years passed so fast. I somehow feel at home here, and somehow still feel like a newcomer. Many of the years just passed through, like a movie in fast forward without special moments to remember. With all the moves and stages, I feel like I have lived many lives in Norway.
And at the same time, I feel like I stand still, watching life back home go by: my friends married, had kids, some divorced, some married again, their kids started school, their kids are so big now, the people in my old neighborhood got much older (I got older too, sure). And me? I’m still here. Still in Norway.
I always wanted to do something special on July 25. This year, you just read it.
If you live abroad: did you choose your country, or did it choose you? I would love to hear your story.