On the home stretch in Sweden with less than a week left! I’m sad to go, but It will absolutely be nice to head home. This past week I got to go to the Vasa museum, where the previously sunken ship the Vasa is kept. The ship was restored in the 1920’s after sinking in the 1600’s. Even though me and my roommate got soaked from the rain, it was absolutely worth it to go see the amazing boat!

This week’s prompt is about communication differences — something that is definitely present in Sweden. Swedes tend to leave a lot out of communication, relying on the other person to understand more without explicitly saying it. In the US it’s the opposite — we tend to say more rather than less.

There have been times when I’ve had to guess what people mean and look beyond what they say (if they say anything at all; I’ve gotten some dirty looks on the metro for being too loud). It can be a little hard, but it is useful being able to read signals like that from other people.

Another communication difference is that Swedes can be relatively direct. They don’t often beat around the bush and imply things, but rather say them outright (on the other hand, if they don’t want to say something, they won’t). A friend here told me that his first day here, he got lost and asked multiple people for help, and every one said “no”. It’s funny in hindsight, but it does highlight how different Americans and Swedes can be.

Thankfully, nothing like that has happened to me. Communication differences haven’t been too much of a problem, and more an interesting difference to see.