Response

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Just writing this message in response to a few questions.

SO! First I should point out that the idea to get an apartment in Copenhagen is simply an idea, not something that I am seriously considering. Remember, when you're in a foreign country things work at a snails pace, especially when the country you are staying in has a government that is leaning against increased immigration (ie, Denmark, Sweden, France, Germany, Italy...etc.)

So first of all you have to apply for a work visa or some type of extension. If you're an electronic engineer or a doctor you can get a job almost immediately, your visa will be given immediately as well.

If you want to go to school here and are willing to pay around 11,000 dollars per year for tuition, getting a student visa isn't too difficult. If you want a regular work visa, you will have to wait for several months. In my case, and I'm lucky, Canada and Denmark have a special agreement called a Working Holiday where I can stay here for one year and work for 6 months and the application to get this permit is only around 1 or 2 months, regular working visas for people from other countries can take up to 6 months (one of the people who stayed at Svanholm was from Russia and had to wait 6 months for his work visa just for a small factory job for example)

I have just sent out the application today so we will wait and see. If this gets through and I somehow find a carpentry job in Copenhagen that would accept me without having an international drivers license and no previous experience, then I could work on finding an apartment in Copenhagen. All three of these things take months, not days.

This is a nice dream but I like to think of many options, some of them fanciful, some of them more realistic. In all seriousness it would be nice to stay in Svanholm and work with the building group and simply move to a nicer room at the farm. The rooms aren't really THAT bad. It's basically like staying in a Youth Hostel but the working guests stay in an area separate from the people actually living at Svanholm. We stay in a basement that is half under renovation and the bathroom isn't very clean and the rooms are old and plain....don't imagine that there are rats or anything, the place is really not that bad, it just doesn't really give you a warm feeling. I think it's mainly because so many guests are coming and going and no one is really assigned to clean it all that often.

Anyway, since there are so many guests the people at Svanholm are used to some people staying for a month or two. It seems like I would have to stay for awhile before I could ask to stay in a nice room with the rest of the people living at Svanholm. One of my friends who has lived in Svanholm for pretty much all his life told me that for people to even consider applying to join the community they should expect to stay closer to 2-3 years before they would even consider it. I'm not planning on joining the community but it just gives you an idea of how long you have to wait just to get their attention, basically. If you stay for 3 months, then maybe I could talk with them but I wait and see.

One thing at a time. Let's wait for this permit to pass or fail and then I will see where to go from here. For now, I'll continue to work hard, have fun and try and meet some more pretty Danish girls!

All the best,
Nicholai

PS, the reason I haven't called home in 2 weeks is simple, they don't have a phone where you can make international phone calls. If you download a program called 'Skype' we can talk through the internet for free. I was told to do this by some of the other guest workers. Try to download the program and then we can arrange a time to chat!

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