Christmas Cheer

While I always enjoy my Christmas in Sweden, this year was worth that little bit extra. My new job has taken a lot more of my time that I ever could have anticipated. I knew that it wasn't going to be a traditional 9 to 5 job, but a typical day starting at 7am and ending around 8:30pm wasn't quite what I had bargained on. That is not taking in to account any weekend work. I do enjoy the job, and I'm glad that I took the risk, but it is coming at a cost.

 

My role is part of the project management team for a major international construction project, about 30km away from my home. There are probably 20 of us who are employed by the main contractor and, of those 20, I am the only one living in the area. In fact, I am the only one based in Sweden. There are a few local consultants who are hired in on an hourly basis, but they disappear at the drop of a hat. They certainly don't work after 4pm and never at weekends. The others work here for about 4 weeks, before heading back to their home countries for a week. Partly a contractual thing, and partly a taxation thing, I suspect. Anyway, the result is that they get one week off every month.

 

Not so if you are stupid enough to live here. While the others are basking in Manchester, Madrid, Washington, or Manila, guess who is left minding the fort. I haven't had a full weekend of free time since June. Actually, that isn't strictly true as I stopped working weekends as a regular thing, about a month ago. I figured that my foreign based colleagues could start picking up the slack while they are here. However, there isn't much choice when they all bugger off home for 2 weeks, 8 days before Christmas. We (read "I") closed up the site for 4 days, just after 8pm on the night before Christmas Eve. I have never enjoyed 4 days more in my life. I was as lazy as hell and loved every minute of it. I didn't even turn on my cellphone to check my emails for 4 days. I have never gone more than a few hours without doing that previously. It wasn't easy, but it had to be done. I thoroughly appreciated the Christmas time with my Swedish family. Even the usual Christmas arguments were cherished simply for being part of a normal life for a brief moment. Loved it.

 

Here I am back on site, working the days between Christmas and New Year. Ironically, none of my contractors are on site, so I am babysitting everyone else's. Fortunately my boss has realised what is going on, and has forced one of the local consultants to come back early and cover a couple of days for me directly after New Year. That will actually give me a total of one week away from the site. I'm not sure what I am going to do with myself. Hopefully nothing but, whatever it is, it will be with the cellphone turned off.