Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[DJ]

Well, I've come to a point where I have to either emigrate or do myself in, because I simply can't stand living in Bosnia any more. Fortunately, I also have Croatian citizenship, and Sweden is one of the few EU countries that have immediately granted Croatian citizens right to move to Sweden for work (others, like Germany, have a 5-year moratorium).

Anyhow, the issue is that my finances are extremely limited (this being one of the big reasons I have to get the hell out of here). At best I could scrounge up 600-700€, and the bus ticket alone will take ~150€ out of that number. Even if I were to immediately find work, I doubt I could survive on that till my first paycheck. Hell, I probably couldn't get board for the first month for that. So my only hope is some sort of work that comes with food and board, and frankly I have no idea how to even start looking for that. A big issue is that I don't speak a word of Swedish, though I hear you can get around Sweden reasonably well using just English.

Anyhow, I'm looking for Swedes, or even better recent immigrants to Sweden, to point me in the right direction. It doesn't really matter what sort of work it is as long as it's legal, I'll do shit Mike Rowe wouldn't do until I get up on my feet.

[GlyphGryph]

As someone who knows little of the conditions in Europe but does know a bit about moving around: Consider couch-surfing, buying a used car and living out of it, or otherwise keeping your costs down (and, simultaneously, options open) until you get a job. You could get a van and the gas for your trip for that price, I would think, and you wouldn't have to worry about sinking it all into lodgings for your first two weeks there.

I don't know how you get across the water - I'm assuming there are ferries, but that might cost too much. You could buy one there, of course, but you'd still have to figure out a place to stay while your doing so and that's cutting it close...

[Grakelin]

Not Sweden-specific, but you might be able to find somebody who will let you pay rent at the end of the month, if you're lucky. In that case, you probably could survive on 450-550 euros. In Canada, my girlfriend and I eat for roughly the equivalent of 150 euros per month, and each pay about 326 euros/month in rent.

Try using Sweden's craigslist-type website to find work and shelter in advance of even going over there. Good luck!

[Il Palazzo]

Can't help you, DJ, apart from maybe advising to contact job agencies? Manpower, Adecco, the lot. They usually pay you every week or fortnight, so it might help with starting you up.
Good luck.

As for this:

As someone who knows little of the conditions in Europe but does know a bit about moving around: Consider couch-surfing, buying a used car and living out of it, or otherwise keeping your costs down (and, simultaneously, options open) until you get a job. You could get a van and the gas for your trip for that price, I would think, and you wouldn't have to worry about sinking it all into lodgings for your first two weeks there.

I don't know how you get across the water - I'm assuming there are ferries, but that might cost too much. You could buy one there, of course, but you'd still have to figure out a place to stay while your doing so and that's cutting it close...

Europe ain't no States, gov. Owning a car is a mean business. Pretty much everywhere(as in Sweden) you need to buy obligatory car insurance. From what I read, the cheapest in Sweden costs ~1500 SEK/yr(~170EUR), which you have to pay up front or incur heavy fines. Add to that petrol being over 1.5 EUR per litre, the police being unlikely to let you sleep in your car, and the climate being far from accomodating.

[Grakelin]

Canada ain't no States either, gov.

[Il Palazzo]

Next you'll be telling me Mexico ain't neither.

[DJ]

I do have a run-down '89 Opel Vectra, but I'm not sure it'd make it all the way to Sweden. Besides, I don't think the law would take kindly to me living out of my car.

As for looking for job ads, my main stumbling block so far has been that they're all in Swedish.

[Pnx]

Getting a good handle on Swedish might be a good idea then. In general it's pretty hard to get by in a country if you can't speak the language very well.

[DJ]

My plan is to get some shitty menial job while I learn the language. I don't think I could learn it here, because my current situation is making me quite depressed and thus unmotivated for anything.

[Il Palazzo]

Try Croat Manpower and Adecco. They seem to have presence there. Their Polish websites are full of job offers in Sweden("no language required" type of jobs).

[GlyphGryph]

Europe ain't no States, gov. Owning a car is a mean business. Pretty much everywhere(as in Sweden) you need to buy obligatory car insurance. From what I read, the cheapest in Sweden costs ~1500 SEK/yr(~170EUR), which you have to pay up front or incur heavy fines. Add to that petrol being over 1.5 EUR per litre, the police being unlikely to let you sleep in your car, and the climate being far from accomodating.

All good points, aside from the climate one. The swedish climate is perfectly amenable at this time of year in most of Sweden.

Although on the car question - how important is having a car in Sweden to finding employment? Because the ultimate goal seems to be to get a job as quickly as possible, so...

[Scriabin]

Swedish guy here. I think that finding a job here would be pretty hard especially without swedish skills. If you live in a reasonably large city (by swedish standards  ) a car might be an unnecessary encumbrance. You should really have a job lined up before moving here. The social life could be pretty rough at first with not knowing swedish/people.

Check out these sites if you haven't already:
http://www.arbetsformedlingen.se/Globalmeny/Other-languages/Languages/English-engelska.html
http://www.thelocal.se/discuss/

[Evil Knievel]

Just to report an incident i recently became witness of in short impersonal words (sorry):

Man moving to Sweden from other European country. Education: Industry worker, no Swedish language.

Found a place to live with some friends.

Could not acquire social security number without job, could not acquire job without Swedish language, despite Manpower and all that. Could not get Swedish language course for immigrants without social security number. Vicious circle. After all his savings were used up, he left. Was here for about 6 months before giving up.

(Clarify: Your English helps you in highly qualified jobs and academia, where English is ok - basically jobs you should be able to find before moving if applicable for you. Otherwise, you are confined to what you call "shit jobs" and those are scarce in Sweden because everyone can do them, and probably also because they are still payed reasonably well)

That's how Swedish society protects itself against economic migration.

That's also saying:
If you got skills that get you a job in Sweden, you'd learn the language quickly, and all would be fine. I saw that happen, too. In that a case, a very skilled electrician from Kosovo. But I don't know how he started.

[DJ]

Yeah, I've come to conclusion that I can't really move for work there before learning Swedish. Currently I'm researching enrolling in a Swedish University, ie whether I could get student benefits as an EU citizen and whether I could survive on those until I find some part-time work (if I'm going to enroll, might as well work on getting a degree and that precludes having a full time job).