Saturday in Stockholm

The temps were in the low 50s but the sun was shining. The sun is shifting back towards summer with a 5:26am sunrise and 8:10pm sunset already today. It doesn't feel like spring yet and most of the trees and stuff are still bare from winter. However, we headed to Kungsträdgården for the Cherry Blossom Festival to see the blooming trees in the park and finally a sign of plant life coming back to the city. It was a very small festival compared to the one we always went to in DC so it made us miss that part of home. Regardless, we're really enjoying living in Stockholm. It's definitely a walkable city best enjoyed on foot. We walked along some of the waterways to Kastellholmen and Kastellet which is a small military fortification built in 1667. Here's some pictures of our day and another beautiful walk around town ending with a typically Swedish fika or coffee break. Click on the pictures for bigger versions.

Paris

It was a 4 day weekend at work for Easter. It was another opportunity to add a few days and spend some time in another city on our European wish list which is pretty much every country in Europe. Paris might have seemed more exotic and different if we hadn't been living in Stockholm and visited Berlin, Lisbon, and Rome before this trip. It has it's own vibe and hearing French everywhere is different but there's something about European cities that's starting to feel familiar.

Gran Canaria

We're taking full advantage of opportunities to take vacations. I had leave from my previous job and saved more during 5 months of mandatory training. We've taken short weekend trips so it may look like we're on vacation a lot, but this was only our second full week of vacation since Dec 2013. My office has another IMS which gives me the luxury of taking time off as long as he's working. I may be the only one in the office at a future smaller post so I'm taking advantage of this while I can.

We headed south to the Grand Canaries to escape the Swedish winter and soak up some sun. The Schengen Area lets us travel around participating EU countries without international border control. It was as easy as flying around the US when we flew 6 hours to a Spanish island off the coast of Africa. I thought this might be the southernmost Schengen Area destination but Wikipedia lists EU's southernmost point as the French island of Réunion near Madagascar. This job definitely gets me looking more closely at world geography in a hands-on way.

IceHotel Sweden

We went to the IceHotel! They style the name as ICEHOTEL but I refuse to capitalize the whole thing since it gives it way too much emphasis with shouting letters. Icehotel doesn't look right and Ice Hotel is too generic because several of them exist around the world. The Hotel de Glace is near Quebec which is closer to our family and friends if they want to try something like this.

The IceHotel is actually in Jukkasjärvi but Kiruna is the big town with the airport. Kiruna is also a little easier to spell and say. We can now say we've been 200 km north of the Arctic Circle, slept in an ice room in -3°C / 23°F temperatures, and had lots of fun snowmobiling and dog sledding. Unfortunately we can't say we saw the northern lights because it was cloudy almost all of our time there. If we had an actual "bucket list" then we definitely scratched off a bunch of cool stuff... or would that be cold stuff? :-)

Foreign Service and Personal Finances

One big thing I look back on at the end of the year is personal finances. This year I'm sharing something about that since it was a big transition year. One thing we debated for a long time was if we could afford to take the plunge into the Foreign Service. We had great paying Civil Service jobs in the DC area, but our pay was offset by the great sucking expenses of DC area living. It made us wonder if it was truly worth it to stick with those careers.

I heard from many of my new hire classmates that it was a pay cut for them to join the Foreign Service. This was true for me and very true for my wife as she became a "trailing spouse" and quit her job. I knew she could eventually get some sort of embassy employment but nothing like she was making before.

The pay you may see on the job advertisement isn't the only consideration for this kind of career. The Foreign Service has many monetary benefits to ease living overseas. We get a cost of living allowance in high priced countries like Sweden and there's other pays to offset hardship conditions in other countries so each tour is financially different.

They provide us housing and utilities while living overseas. I don't mind not choosing our housing but that trade-off isn't for everyone. We're also not building equity in a house since we sold ours. I think it's worth it since we don't have the headache and expenses of renting out a house from overseas.

I knew I couldn't compare working in DC to working abroad because our spending patterns would change. Overall, the added benefits and changes in spending have worked out as I expected. Here's a peek at that in case someone else is grappling with the same decision.

First FS Post - 6 Months Later

It's hard to believe we've been in Stockholm 6 months already! That's 1/4 of the way through my first Foreign Service assignment. We've traveled around Europe a little and each time we return to Stockholm it feels a little more like coming home. It's amazing how quickly we adapt and settle into new routines. Seemingly different surroundings can become comfortable in a short time by fully living in the new place. Here's some thoughts about this place and time so far...

The darkness this time of year is a little weird but tolerable. The picture above was at 2:30PM before the impending sunset. The sun was up from 8:45AM to 2:50PM. In contrast, Washington DC had sun from 7:25AM to 4:51PM. The noontime sun sits low on the horizon if it's not overcast and hidden. The weather makes a big difference so we feel like hibernating when it's overcast most of the time.

Civil Service to Foreign Service Finally Done

Yes, I started with the Foreign Service back in February of this year. Yes, I brought along copies of my personnel record and filled out tons of typical government paperwork showing my 2 1/2 years of civil service time. No, it didn't all magically transfer over on my first day. This is still government work.

I took the suggestion from another blog (see Not Everything Transfers) and my new hire classmates on submitting my last civil service leave and earnings statement to speed up the transfer of my leave balances. I submitted it to payroll help and it worked wonderfully to get my annual and sick leave credited. The rest of the official transfer was soooo much slower.