Living in Norway changes one's entire
concept of money. For years, when my wife and I were courting, I
could never understand how she had absolutely no understanding of
value, whereas I'd spent my whole life, always searching for a sale.
I'm sure many figured that my head would explode the second I moved
to Norway. Yet, now, nine months later, I still live, head intact.
In 2010, during my first visit to
Bergen, I nearly did lose my head. At this point, I was at the last
leg of my round-the-world tour, nearing the point of being broke,
which by my standards means that my bank account was dipping below
$3000. Michelle payed for most everything, which I found
unbehooving. I was completely fine, just barely enjoying myself
without the comfort of, well, anything. When you are accustomed to
living for only $15 a day, a $5 Snickers bar is easily frivolous. I
rejected all I could, but Michelle is a generous sort. I nearly had
her return a beer when I learned it had cost twenty bucks; I tried to
remember the last time I'd blew a Jackson on a whole night on the
town.
How quickly things change. Granted,
there was no smooth transition, especially in the six weeks
surrounding my wedding. Before coming here, I was working seven
hours a week as a teacher for $15 an hour, and filling my time
cleaning a youth hostel five days a week and being happy when the
skivvy owner slapped twelve bucks in hand when finished for the
afternoon, which I'd often blow when my wife asked me to bring home
milk and something for dinner. When we got to Norway, I never left
the house, filled my days with hiking, jogging, walking the dogs,
writing short stories (it was a prolific period in my life),
constantly eyeing the ink levels on my pen, knowing that to buy a new
one was an hour's wage by Hungary's standards. I was unable to find
a summer job and was all but overjoyed to return to my meager
earnings in Hungary, even if it only yielded a scant ten hours a week
teaching. Then, we made the decision to spend the next year in
Norway.
As you've probably gathered from the
previous paragraphs and the mere fact that I'm writing an essay on
such a theme, I can easily be described as tighter than an Oklahoma
farm wife in 1932. A six-week holiday was one thing, but moving to
the world's most expensive country, with no job, only enough
Norwegian to order a beer I couldn't afford, and no residency permit,
could quickly prove disastrous. I leered over my savings balance,
counting how many short weeks until I was truly broke (or down to the
$1,500 needed to fly back to Dad's spare bedroom). Now I had a few
things in my favor: one, we were living in Michelle's parent's spare
bedroom, paying just enough rent to cover food and electricity. Two,
we had worked out an obscure loophole that would allow me to work
legally without a residency permit. And finally, kitchens have a
common thread that crosses oceans: they're all populated by
immigrants with little-to-no knowledge of local languages. I applied
for 30 jobs in a variety of fields, lied a little about my Norwegian
levels, and got two interviews. I always nail the interviews.
Now I am working as a cook at TGI
Fridays and the hilarity of being an American, making hamburgers in
Europe never escapes me. I now can empathize with the Turks in the
kebab shops or the Indian curry slingers. Despite being right at the
poverty line in Norway, it's a distiction that means much less here.
M y wage is higher than any I've ever had. Norwegians can give me
sad eyes when I reveal my income, but at least I can purchase a $20
beer without fearing the loss of my $7 hotdog on the way home.
Living in Norway doesn't kill one's
ability to recognize value; it just changes the word's definition,
encourages a different lifestyle, thankfully, one I've already
mastered. It's common to buy as many things on sale as possible and
often sales in Norway come with insane discounts. Avoiding snacks
and nights of extreme drunkenness is even easier in Norway and the
reward is much greater. However, this is something that I do much
more than the average Norwegian, who finds spending two-days' wages
on a Saturday night a totally reasonable way to use money.
Much of the high cost of goods comes
from taxes and the general high wages of the people (and it spirals
in an infinite circle that benefits only those who life here). To
make a profit, one has to charge a lot, but thankfully people make
more too. The same economics works everywhere in the world, but when
living in Norway, your money goes further abroad, thus bringing me to
the start of the essay again. Michelle was a loose spender, but that
was because setting a foot over the border is like stepping into a
giant garage sale. This is not to say she is immune to bad
judgement, like the time she payed 10 euro for a coke and a bag of
pistachios in Turkey (the rest of Europe can just smell the
Norwegians' cod-breath). But when we went to the US, I found myself
doing the same. I brought an empty suitcase, bought a new wardrobe,
toothpaste, dental floss, deodorant, shampoo, three toothbrushes,
shaving cream, chips, candy, hair-dye for Manda (I didn't buy razors,
which due to Gillette's monopoly on quality products, are the same
price in both expensive countries like Norway and cheap ones like
India), all for the cost of typical trip to Norwegian supermarket.
In my first trip to a liquor store, I almost walked out 7 six-packs
before I realized that I could never drink it all in the 12 days I
was there, just because each one cost the same a single bottle of
microbrew in Norway. (Homebrewing cost nearly the same though :) )
As a writer, I can now afford to join writing contests, most of which
come with a subscription to lit journals. Now I have books pouring
into my mailbox and to pay for it, I just have to make myself a
sandwich on the way out the door.
The other big change, again, one that
was happening anyway, is that buying cheap things is idiotic here.
Cost has a logarithmic relationship to quality. Junk is expensive.
Mid-grade is expensive. So, once you already are paying forty
dollars for a hamburger, you might as well go up to fifty and have a
steak. By the time you are buying really expensive things, cost the
is nearly the same as everywhere else, you just have more disposable
income to use.
I don't want to create the impression
that I've abandoned my miserly ways. I still choose to walk thirty
minutes home instead of taking a taxi. I still spend ten minutes in
the supermarket calculating the most cost-efficient lunch. I buy
instant coffee which I mix in a coffee mug I always carry in my bag (
I kindly ask the cafes what they charge for hot water, all say
nothing after giving me a confused look.) I still complain about how
expensive everything is here (it really is ridiculous), but not
nearly as much as before, because, that's just the way it is.
