Hi everyone! I’m an Indian citizen, 27M single living in Sweden for past 3 years. I came here for my master’s and finished it, and I worked for a year in my field before switching to another job recently and I resigned from it. I now have 90 days to look for a new job or move back to India. I am contemplating if I should continue living here in Sweden or move elsewhere/India.

A bit about me:
I am quite introverted and reserved, but I open up when I find something interesting. Computer programming was my interest a few years ago, but ever since I realised that being just a programmer in some company will not really help me in starting my own company. I don’t have any specifics about what kind of company I want to start, but I want to be around people who run their own businesses. Given my current situation, starting a business is not in scope at the moment. Also, I don’t have issues with climate, or Swedish food. Furthermore, I want to get married sometime in the next few years, but do not plan on having any children.

Current concern:
Although Sweden is a great country, I clearly see it is not working out at all(unable to plan a life here). The thing hitting me the hardest is inferiority complex and language. I think these two would be the same no matter where I immigrate to. Although I find Swedish to be a bit easier to learn compared to other EU languages, I would highly prefer communicating in English. Even typing on the Swedish keyboard sometimes gets on my nerves.

I would really like to move to the US, but I see gun violence as a huge issue, which is far beyond my control. UK seems like an option, but given the fact that they are out of EU and the market is probably not so great right now, I am unsure of this option. Also I will have to apply for jobs first to set my foot in the UK. Not sure about Ireland though?

My current options:

  1. Find another job in Sweden and try hard to integrate into society. Not sure if it’s a good idea in the long run?
  2. Go back to India and work on something interesting. Friends/family support and Indian food/culture is always beneficial.
  3. Go to some other country(ex: Netherlands, UK, Ireland etc) and try to integrate.

My biggest concern with living abroad is that no matter how much I change and accept things, I will always be an outsider. I wonder if this feeling will ever go away?

I would greatly appreciate any suggestions on which option I could choose, and thank you for reading the post!

  • BZsArmy@alien.topBEnglish
    1·
    1 year ago

    Hello! i am 27M from South Asia, studied and now working for more than a year in Sweden.

    I was fortunate to get into one of their most ‘international’ company so language in work is not an issue however i completely understand why it can be in social life.

    For me, I am very introverted with casual friendship and can only do activity based (lets say sports or movies) hangouts. So Sweden has been very cool for me as I dont seek out warmth and friendship outside.

    Although I am fine working and contributing in Sweden for now, I am definitely not tied down here and nor you should feel the same way. I am planning to get some good experience in me and then try to move.

    When its time I may consider moving to UK/USA or Canada. I think there is enough discussions about the pros/cons of these countries but my POV is only from getting good jobs- UK will be easier to transit to being in Europe as the companies there will find it easy to recognize skills and degrees from Sweden. Canada can be a direct route of immigration with PR from day 1 through their generous skilled migrant program. USA on the other hand will be super tough for an early professional like us in my head. Reason is they have abundance of supply of internal graduates who work for upto 3 years without having a sponsored work permit. It also allows companies to judge the new grads before investing in them with H1B visa. I believe it will be a bit harder to get a direct access to USA job market ad of now. But definitely few years down the road I will be open to try it.