I felt that it was time that I started to write some in Swedish, both because in my case it may be useful to practice and just because there is a chance. I've always thought that Swedish is a very nice language and one that I want to be better at because for my part I have always found that a second language has been important in my work as much as it has been a link to my upbringing.
However, it has not always been like this. At this point it is probably important to explain that I was born in Gothenburg, Sweden and lived there until I was seven years old. After that the whole family moved to England due to one of my parents having a job there. The move was really just meant to be temporary, one or two years at its worst, but it turned out that after four children have gone into the schools and are in various stages of their lives, it was not so easy to get back to Sweden. In the end, it was eighteen years for me and my siblings will probably never move back there.
My upbringing was to say the least Swenglish-I am not particularly fond of the word, but in my case it's true and it has always been difficult for me to find out where I really belong where I am Swedish when I live in England or Scotland but feel incredibly English when I live in Sweden. Luckily my parents always saw that I knew the Swedish traditions of Christmas and Easter celebrated in a Swedish way, and Midsummer, so even if we lived in a foreign country we were in touch with our roots, and I had a chance to feel Swedish rather than English, but I do not know really if it did make the debate easier or harder to handle.
This has naturally affected the way I express myself in writing, as you have probably noticed. I have kept up with the Swedish all these years, thanks to my parents, and just one month of formal teaching of the Swedish language. To begin with, when we moved to England, English was the only language I wanted to speak and it only took me a year to become fluent, it was probably inconceivable that Swedish would die out completely, but it did not. These days I feel different and I have to say the Swedish is used both as part of my normal life and working life. In addition, there is some desire to express my self in Swedish, despite the fact that when I write I can think of a million better ways to write it in English and that it would have taken me half the time to write in English as well.
For my part, it now has more relevance when the Swedish language has become more and more mixed with English. All the years abroad, and my difficulty in keeping up Swedish at all means I try to keep Swedish and English languages separate, and generally I agree to this philosophy to the other languages I learn. I wonder how much this phenomenon has evolved, but perhaps it is only me who understands how Swedish culture works nowadays. A friend of mine said it was simply easier to express themselves in English and that there was a finer vocabulary. And to some extent, I agree, English is a great way to express yourself and as I said, have found that English is easier than Swedish, but if you have a Swedish upbringing, should we not have the vocabulary to express himself as well as you do in English? The thing I'm worried about now is that English has become largely a native of Sweden, is that Swedish people simply stop trying with the Swedish language and all their creativity is instead created with English. I think that would be extremely trisst.
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