Move to Sweden
In May 2022 I received an invitation for a new job in Luleå Sweden. In August 2022 I moved. Here is information about my journey for my friends and family.
Luleå
(September 2022)
According to Wikipedia in 2018 Luleå had 48,728 inhabitants in its urban core. It hardly seems that big. That's bigger than Glenville NY (Google says 29k). It is a nice little city on the north part of the Gulf of Bothnia (the big body of water between Sweden and Finland) 140km from the Finnish border. In addition to the university, the Swedish Air Force has a base here across the bridge by the airport, and there is a steelworks and shipping. There is water all around. The downtown is a peninsula with a south harbor (my apartment looks out on it) and a north harbor (where the beach and BBQ are is located). The water extends inland quite a ways. There are many islands closer to the gulf outside of Luleå.
Downtown has a main pedestrian street with lots of shopping. The city is very pedestrian friendly with lots of green space. There is a cathedral here (Church of Sweden=Lutheran). There are good bike paths as you head out of town, and according to the city map there is a ski path/ice road around the peninsula in the winter.
There is good bus service. I bought a month pass the first day I was here. I very much do not want to buy or depend on a car. The buses aren't as heavily used as I would expect would be needed to maintain the network. Maybe it gets more use in the winter when many people stop riding bikes. I have about a 12 minute walk to the center of town where the main bus stop is. There is one closer, in the wrong direction, and that would limit me to one bus choice, or force a transfer. There are 3 buses that go to the university from center downtown. One drops me off right by my building, and the other two a block away (I have to walk on a path through the disk golf park). There is a fourth option, but it goes through lots of side neighborhoods making it a much longer trip, and I decided it was not worth it; I'm better off waiting for one of the other three buses.
The weather has been in the 50s since I arrived. On some of those days it was 100+ in Boise. When I arrived sunrise was about 4:30 and sunset about 8:30. It is now 6:01 and 6:52. Soon daylight will be only a few hours and the temperature will drop. Everyone talks about the cold. I found a website that had climate data and let you compare places. It is only a little colder than Glenville. While I've gotten "soft" living in Boise for 22 years, I think I can handle that. Also I realized that the people who were talking about the cold are from India, Pakistan, Malaysia, Greece, etc. Maybe that distorts their perception. Stay tuned. We have had a lot of rain since I arrived (Boise gets 12 inches per year). The first day it POURED several times, but for short periods. The last week has been lots of drizzle. I've been lucky and coincidentally only needed to actually use my umbrella once, having a schedule that hasn't put me outside during rain periods. Still an umbrella is something I carry regularly in my canvas tote bag.
I've already seen the Northern Lights. They were white, not green or red. My colleague said they were in the 90th percentile for quality. I'm sure I'll see more. I bought a tripod at the thrift store to take pictures. Stay tuned. A new camera might be in my future.
The city was moved in 1649 from about 10km further up the Lule River (Luleälven). There is now a UNESCO World Heritage site there. In 1492 while Columbus was doing his sailing across the Atlantic Ocean, a new church was consecrated there for the people of northern Sweden. The population of the "city" was very small (Luleå still had less than 1000 residents in 1800), but this church served people from a large rural area. Thus people built little cottages near the church which they would occupy for a night or two when they came for a festival day. Those cottages (about 400) are still standing, still privately owned and are real cute.
Folk dance and music
(18 September 2022)
My close family and friends know how much I like folk dance and folk music. I started with the Schuhplattler group my freshman year of college and broadened my areas ever since. When we lived in NY during our PhDs I found the greater Capital District folk dance and music scene. At that time one could go dancing every night of the week and have 2 or 3 choices on weekends. I don't know what it is like now (or pre-Covid). They still have the February Dance Flurry in Saratoga - 3 days of thousands of dancers and musicians in parallel tracks, big and small. Boise has very little. There was a circle dancing group when I arrived. I offered German folk dance through Community Ed for a few years. The Scandi Club tries to offer dancing (sometimes it would be 3 couples and 4 musicians. There was Contra dancing, but the band and dancers were never in sync, so I didn't go to that very long. The Cathedral of the Rockies had a singles ballroom dance for a while (wher e I met one of Pete's best buddies before I met Pete). That folded. So for the past 22 years I've been limited in my dancing to when I've traveled to Germany (or Austria), or if I traveled in the US to a workshop like in Salt Lake City. That's partly why I picked up playing the diatonic accordion -- I can play music by myself, but I can't dance without a community.
Luleå has a folk dance and folk music scene, and I found it and they have accepted me into it. Last Saturday (10 Sept) was Luleå's Kulturnatten. This literally means The Culture Night, but it started at about 11am. I'm grateful to one of my LTU colleagues for posting a notice and the schedule in their discussion group. I read through the program and found the Hembygdsgille (literally the Home village guild) was on the schedule for Balkan and polksa (a Scandinavian dance form) at the Kulturcentrum Ebeneser, then a Kammerkor, then historic dances from the book of Lars Salomon Engelmark's 1793 notebook. OK. I put them on my schedule and went. Talked briefly with a woman there who was handing out leaflets with descriptions of upcoming events.Two about dancing. There was one for musicians on Sundays. I asked if they would meet tomorrow - yes. There was also the Luleå Accordion Club on the schedule in the afternoon at the Norbottens Museum. So I left the Ebeneser hall and went there for the afternoon. The accordion club was nice, but mostly chromatic button accordions. It would do in a pinch, but not when there are other options. They were followed by the Luleå Hembygdsgille music group. I listened to them too, but didn't interact with them.
So the next day, Sunday 11 Sept, I put my accordion in its case, and put that on my back and found buses to get me 11km out to the Gammelstads Kyrkstad. They welcomed me. They apologized for being a small group, but performing Saturday kept several away. They play mostly by ear, and take turns choosing and leading a song. Everyone there was a fiddler, but Saturday they had piano, guitar the hardanger fiddle and a clarinet. They tried to stay in G major so my BBX had a chance. I couldn't play along well, but they were ok with that since this is new to me, and said they would get me some sheet music next time. Next week they would be downtown at the Kulturcentrum Ebeneser. Yup. I saw that Saturday and planned to attend. That they wouldn't meet also in Gammelstad means I won't miss anything by not going to both. They took my name and email address. They also told me about a big music festival the weekend before Midsummer that attracts musicians from around Sweden and Scandinavia. There are apparently 10 songs "everyone" has to know and they play them together that weekend, plus I'm sure an assortment of everything else. They will get me music to those. As we went around I had to pick and lead a song 4x. OK. During the last song one of the guys came over with his cell phone. I thought he was going to photograph the sheet music. He had for the other songs. He wanted to film me up close - me, the sheet music, my instrument, me playing the instrument, both sides. It didn't throw me too much, but it did make me think about an event 8 years ago when I was in France playing solo at a bal folk and how nervous I was playing in front of established musicians. I am glad that I can tell 8 years have done something for me.
Monday evening was the historical dance group's dance/public outreach/recruitment session downtown at Ebeneser. This was one of the fliers I picked up Saturday. These dances are similar to English country dances I have done. Someone asked if I had been there Saturday, Yes. She thought I was with the Kammerkor. Will my teaching in Swedish be a problem? No, I can follow. I had no problem following even though I didn't understand most of the words. I picked up left, right, square. At the end they asked me if I had danced before: yes, for about 40 years. What kinds of dances: American contra, English country, German folk, Scandinavian folk, Cajun, ballroom. They said it showed. I asked: so I passed your test? "Yes, with honors." They then told me they also have dancing on Wednesday evening out at the Gammelstad. Where do I live? Here in downtown by the Telia building, and I work at the university. Do you have a car? No. Email me. We'll arrange transportation. Well Wednesday I was staying again at my colleagues' house to get the last details on their kids' schedules because next Monday they leave, but I'll go in the future.
Thursday was Polska dancing at the Gammelstad. One of the women Monday told me about it. I planned to go, but missed the bus I wanted to take, and had to settle for going all the way into town (which is really a quick ride), and transferring to another bus that is express heading out, then a 1.1km walk. The bus heading out of town had some sort of equipment fault and eventually kicked everyone out. I gave up and walked home instead of waiting for the next bus. I had Sunday's dance to look forward to.
So today is Sunday. 6-7 was a "class" downtown at Ebeneser teaching beginners the basic Schottish and polksa. It was pretty well attended. Most of the folk who were in Gammelstad last Sunday were on the stage playing for the dancers. While they were setting up one of the musicians from last Sunday asked if I'd be there next week. She knew someone who wanted to meet me. She apparently told him about me and/or my instrument. Sunday depends on the return of Marcus and Fotenei. OK, then the next week. The dance leader, Eva, was at the dance last Monday, so she knew I didn't speak much Swedish, but could dance. I'm glad that the first few dances they taught I wound up dancing with someone who was experienced. We had no problem. When I shifted to two beginners, it didn't go well (the polksa is one of the more complicated steps to learn, but once you "get it" it is very smooth), and if that had been all the others would have seen of me, they wouldn't have known if it was me or my partner.
Then at 7pm open dancing began and the stage swelled with musicians. Half the dancers at the class were musicians (some trying to learn the dances, some already pretty skilled), and once they moved, there weren't many dances left. After a couple of songs, several musicians came down off the stage. Then after an hour the musicians announced something like "break time", they stepped down and the other half went up on the stage to continue playing. That was the younger crowd of musicians. One played a small 2-row diatonic accordion for a few songs in a very modern style. The median age of the people at the dance was under 40. In the open dancing it was quite a mixed crowd. Some were beginners, some were quite experienced. Some were young friends who have been doing this probably since they were kids, and some were couples. Most were very casual. There was one child there, probably the son of a musician. He didn't dance at all. They ended at 9pm with the Family Waltz. That tradition seems to be Europe wide. I walked home with music flowing through my brain. I am luckier than I imagined before coming.
Sunday
(18 September 2022)
It is Sunday morning. No work today, and I'm trying to be Swedish and NOT work evenings and weekends. I made a list of things I want to do for ME and not for work and remind myself to look when I pause to think about what to do. It isn't about being bored, it is about making a decision.
Today it is drizzling out. I wouldn't want to go out and walk to much just for the sake of walking because I get in a lot of walking during the week: 0.7mi (10 min) x2 apartment to city center bus stop. Same distance to the big market at Södra hamnplan (other side of the South Harbor). One bus stop near the university I frequent is 450m from my building (a student from our group was on the bus with me Friday and when I got up to get out at that stop, she said, so you like to walk? 450m isn't far and it means you don't sit on the bus waiting for it to make a loop and get you to the other side of the campus.
I make coffee at home on weekends. I brought our last bag of hazelnut coffee with us. It is getting a bit stale (it got buried in our cupboard at home and I was surprised when Pete "found" it shortly before my trip, and I confiscated it and put it in my suitcase - sorry Pete!!), but is still much better than the dark roast in the Fika. I'm switching to tea drinking - English Breakfast. One of my first thrift shop purchases here was a French Press coffee pot. I sit a little longer at my kitchen table. It is still bright out in the mornings. I get to watch the ferry that goes to the local islands stop at Södra hamnplan by the crane. It arrives 9:30 and departs 9:45. Some day I'll take a day trip on it -- when Pete is here to go with me and when the weather is again warm and desirable to be out on the water. I hear the church bells ring at 10am to tell people to get to church and again at 10:30 to announce the start of the service. I remember living in Dortmund and there the "get to church" bell meant I had better be out of my apartment on my way or I'd be late. There are no English language church services in any church in Luleå, at least not noted on the webpage that lists "all" English church services in Sweden. My Swedish isn't strong enough to make it worth going yet. I still have 5 years. The services broadcast on the web from the Washington National Cathedral is in the evening here because of time zones. I hope to be out dancing or playing music every Sunday evening. Tonight is a Schottish workshop for beginners followed by an open dance here in the Luleå downtown. Usually it is music out in Gammelstads Kyrkstad. That's not easy (also not impossible) to reach by bus, especially on a Sunday with reduced bus service.
Coffee's done.I've read the online NY Times article highlights. On to something else. Enjoy your Sunday wherever you are.
My Apartment
(September 2022)
I have an apartment! It is 97 m2 = 9700 sq ft. It has 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, a kitchen and a large living/dining room. One bedroom off the kitchen is an office. One bedroom has a fold out sofa for company (you are invited!!). It is in the downtown area, with a view out the kitchen and bedroom windows to the south harbor. It also has a balcony, but it is at ground level. That will be nice next spring/summer.
I couldn't move into the apartment when I first arrived. The woman who owns it was here with her daughter to do final packing. She is moving to Stockholm to be near her daughter, where her daughter can also take care of her. The first Saturday I was in Luleå I visited the apartment, met my landlady and her daughter, signed the lease and got the keys (one for Pete too). The keys are pretty advanced. There is a physical key for the apartment door. The head of the key has an RFID tag in it. That operates the door to the building and the mailbox access (the mailbox system know which apartment I'm in and unlocks my mail slot when I put the fob by it. The complex has a laundry and I get two loads per week. I reserve my time on a screen with the key fob logging me in. I can also reverse a sauna, and there are two guest apartments (a 1 BR and 2 BR) I can reserve for extra guests with extra payment.
I had access to the apartment Sunday. I was however spending Sunday at my coworkers' house learning their schedule for when I take care of the kids in a couple of weeks while they make a trip. Monday after work I took the bus home from work and came here. I unpacked my suitcase and box which came "with me" on the plane. I'll have to reorganize how I store my clothing once the 6 boxes Pete will help ship arrive and again after Pete gets here.
The bedroom and kitchen are mostly complete. Saturday my colleagues took me out shopping. I bought linens for the bed, sheets, pillows and comforters. I bought navy blue towels for my bathroom. The kitchen came with a table, chairs, pots and pans, plus plates and some glasses. I need to buy an electric kettle, deep bowls and food storage containers, but it has enough to feed myself for a while. The living room needs a sofa++. The guest room and office are sparse (fold out sofa and desk), but not important. There is a second table in the dining area.
I went grocery shopping to start filling my pantry and fridge. Unfortunately the freezer didn't work. I contacted the landlady. She sent her uncle and a neighbor over to look. They did the same things I did. "Kaputt" was their analysis. The landlady contacted a store in town on Friday to replace it. I borrowed a measuring stick and took measurements What a way to start my relation with her, but it did give me a chance to meet a neighbor and re-meet her uncle. The neighbor speaks a *little* English He asked me how long I'll be here and I dug into my Swedish and got five=fem and then had to get the pronunciation for year=år (the o above the a means pronounce o not a). There is a similar word in my lessons är=is/are (pronounced like "air") and I had to decide which word I needed, then how to pronounce it on demand. His eyes lit up. You speak Swedish. I dug deeper - Jag lär mig svenska (I'm learning Swedish). That's what I hoped for - a way to connect to people. Not needed, but it helps.
The University
(September 2022)
I have an office on campus. My work visa is still processing. There was some confusion about the process this summer and the whole country shuts down in July and August, so it was submitted a bit later. The estimate is 2 months, although they are writing to the immigration/tax office asking for them to accelerate it. They can do that in Sweden!! In the meantime I don't have LTU computer access or email yet, because I don't have a contract because I don't have the visa yet. I'm here now on a tourist visa. If the work one doesn't come by early October I'll fly to NY and wait there. I used 6 weeks of my 3 of every 6 allotted months in the Schengen Zone this summer during our trip (see above). I'll change my affiliation in LinkedIn and make a short post to my general connections once this is official. I'm still patient.
The people here in the department/unit are really friendly. They are so happy I am here. I have an office (they say they want to move me to a different and slightly larger one so this and the next will hold my PhD students and PostDocs). It has a glass door and the colleague with an office down the hall waves when he passes by. People have been stopping in to introduce themselves. The group does social things together. They have a whole channel in Telegram (their preferred communication method) for non critical discussions, which includes happy birthdays, I'm sick, anyone want to plan a BBQ for Saturday? I've been invited to join others for lunch and coffee. They have an amazing faculty break room "Fika": three coffee machines, hot water dispensers and drawers of tea, a basket of fruit twice a week, cupboards with mugs and plates and silverware, refrigerators, 6 microwaves, even a regular oven and two dishwashers. It has tables and sofas and even a billiards table!!
The buildings on campus are named A, B, C, D, E and F. I am in A. I like how they decorate the exterior with scientific notation. EPFL in Switzerland were I attended a conference last September had some similar decorations in a passage under the train tracks to liven it up. I suggested it last year to BSU's Dean of Engineering to add to the deep orange, blue and gray hallway walls. I guess she didn't like that idea.
I'm still using a tiny laptop I borrowed from my father as I passed through NY in July. They have ordered 2 new laptops for me - one large and one smaller, similar to what I had at BSU. One has arrived, but needs to be set up. While I'm waiting for my employment contract and computer account I'm using Eduroam internet server with my BSU login. This is a network of university wifi servers at most universities in the US & Europe and maybe further. I'm ok for now with what I brought. I'm actually spending time coding instead of teaching and doing admin. "Admin" meetings are starting, but they are more startup meetings to discuss my research plans. They want me to teach one lecture to the freshman Intro to Machine Learning and AI course in early October.
They also have university issued cell phones instead of desktop phones. I had my choice of Android or iOS. They gave me my cell phone. The SIM card is registered to another faculty member, but I can use it. I installed Telegram and WhatsApp, two commonly used apps now that I have a phone with more memory. My US one is maxed. I'm now using two phones. I haven't decided to retire my US number. Through T-Mobile Pete and I (& Dad) have great international plans - unlimited international text and data for about $35 per line per month. Maybe I'll change my mind later and down size. Ask me if you want my Swedish phone number. It starts with +46 in case I call you.
I'm actually doing work even though I'm not officially employed. The thing about my job and what made me take this position is that I get to do the work that **I** have been wanting to do. I'm continuing collaborations with BSU including 2 VIP (undergraduate research) projects, at least for this semester. That makes for lots of 4pm Zoom meetings, which is 8am in Boise. One VIP is the Melville project I've worked on for a decade. We had a conference presentation in May and a journal paper this summer. The other is sheet music recognition. That was to try out an idea based on my PhD student's (Nishat) PhD work. He is collaborating on it with Fort Lewis students. That one I might drop in December. It was a way to get undergraduate ECE students involved in my research. I'm not motivated toward that goal any longer. I have access to students to work with me here.
At the end of August I heard a journal paper with my former PhD student Nishat was accepted. All conferences in my field are full paper 3-peer reviewed. Some have taken to having a journal first track where a journal paper is submitted and reviewed, and if accepted, possibly after revisions, it is published in an associated journal and presented orally at the conference. This is in contrast to the procedure from publishing the 6-page conference paper, doing more work, then writing a 15-20 page journal paper. Nishat is at Fort Lewis College in Durango with a former BSU prof Jeff. He likes it there, but it has a very heavy teaching load (4&4) and low pay. I'm impressed that he has still been making time for research, and on his own got a conference and (minor) journal paper out last year in addition to our bigger paper. Our paper is for a conference in Hyderabad in early December. LTU will pay for me to attend.
I've also submitted an abstract to a workshop on historical documents (much more on the humanities side) in Hamburg and planned to go there in late September regardless of whether it is accepted. Then I found out that they wanted abstract submission in August 2022 for the conference in September 2023, not 2022. It is just an abstract (800 words) about planned and in-progress work (the code I have been writing!!). Again LTU will pay. The Wallenburg foundation money gives me lots of conference travel flexibility.
European universities have a different structure than US universities. I am in a "department" with 4 professors (including me), 2 senior lecturers, 5 PostDocs (plus eventually my 2), 10 PhD students (plus eventually my 2). PhD students are given a lot of responsibility. They are hired for 40 hours per week. Three departments form a Division, like a "College" in the US, but smaller. Ours will have a "retreat" in early October, in a town an hour south of Lulea. This will be followed by an extra day for "seniors" to meet. The good news is that they do seem to have retreats that are more than reporting. I attended part of a day long meeting via Zoom when I was in Passau this summer (right before starting our bike trip). You can nose around our group at <https://www.ltu.se/org/srt/Avdelningar/EISLAB?l=en> It is in English.
Arrival
(September 2022)
I stayed the first week at a hotel downtown. The apartment wouldn't be available until the end of the week. The daughter was back in town to help her mother pack the last few things including her father's hunting rifles, which they would drive back to Stockholm. The hotel room was a single. It was a fine place for me. The breakfasts there were super!! They say one can buy breakfast even if they aren't staying there. Once Pete moves here I hope we can go there once a month for a weekend breakfast.
Marcus and Foteini have been super. They took me to lunch Wednesday and drove me around to show me places. He showed me some things in town. The Recycling center is huge and has dozens of categories. They also have a thrift shop. He said usually lots of bikes, but today only kids bikes. They did have lots of x-country skis.
We spent Saturday together downtown. There has been an international food fest downtown on the pedestrian main street this week. I'm intrigued that the nationalities while they include Greek gyros and Italian it also includes British (fish and chips, and another one with fudge), Spanish (paella), 3 French booths (crepes, sweets and hearty stew like dishes), Thai, African, Hungarian and Transylvanian. Thursday I ate Hungarian (kind of a pizza fritta with garlic sauce, shredded hard cheese, onion and ham) and yesterday Transylvanian (a stewed sausage and pork pieces on polenta) -- trying to be different.
My lease started Sunday (4 Sept). They picked me up from the hotel this morning and took me shopping for linens. We dropped one of my suitcases (the "box") and my purchases at the apartment. I'm at their house now. I'm learning their routine with the kids. In 2 weeks I'll stay here and watch the kids while they go to Africa.
I found an apartment in Luleå through a site equivalent to CraigsList before I left Boise. I got the keys to it and signed the lease Saturday. Yesterday we dropped off most of my luggage there, but I spent last night at my colleagues' house. They are making a business trip to Africa in 2 weeks and I'll stay at their house while they are gone and look after their two kids (4 & 6 yo). I got to see much of their procedures yesterday and this morning. Also last night about 1pm we went out and looked at the Northern Lights. They were cool. Marcus said they were much better than average, but still they didn't have any color (white). I'm sure I'll see more before I move away, so we didn't hang out too long looking at them.
The Trip
(August 2022)
I left Boise August 29th.
We came to the airport the day prior to departure to check luggage sizes and weights and I was able to check in then. The suitcase was at 38 pounds and the box at 31, so I could add more stuff to them at home. The agent said bringing the luggage dolly should be allowable on the planes, so that was added to the plans. I carefully weighed everything I was considering adding on the accurate kitchen scale.
I have two large (but still 8-10lb below the weight limit) "suitcases" checked (one is a cardboard box). I packed a very large suitcase which I bought at a thrift shop for this purpose and an equally large cardboard box which Pete tied with twine to help keep it from splitting. The suitcase and box were reweighed at the airport check in and were still fine. The suitcase had enough margin that I took the book of music out of the accordion bag and put it in the suitcase to not have to deal with it while traveling and on the plane.
I have my accordion as my carry on luggage piece. I have a canvas bag with assorted electronics and two slices of pizza. The big winter coat Dad bought me a few years ago is rolled up and strapped to the accordion. It will come off and be worm as I board the plane, and sit under me on the plane. The accordion and coat are on the luggage dolly I use for the accordion around town, and need for the box. My bicycle helmet is also strapped on.
Flight day was an easy drop off of checked luggage and there was no line. No line at security either (TSA Pre had a dozen folk, longer than regular line, but I didn't have to take off my hiking boots).
Traveling to get to Sweden was more complicated than usual. My flight BOI-ORD was diverted to Cedar Rapids. There was a line of thunderstorms. The plane circled a couple of times trying to wait for them to pass, but they didn't move, and the plane was running low on fuel, so it landed in Iowa. We got more fuel and the storms passed, but ORD wouldn't let us take off. Thus we were even later getting into ORD and the long layover I had evaporated and I missed my flight to Stockholm. Probably because my ticket was purchased through SAS United didn't automatically reroute me. I'm sure I wasn't the only one with problems because of the storm. Live humans who could help are scarce in ORD. I found an online chat option and the agent rebooked me, but the connection died before I could get a printout or email with the details. I made another call, waited again, that agent saw I was booked (convincing me it was real), and some information was sent to me. Still no bording pass. I had to find a Lufthansa agent to get that. I went to a gate, stood in line. By the time I got to the front of the line (an hour later) the agent had change to a United agent who couldn't help me, but said the Lufthansa agent would be back in an hour. She was able to get e-bording passes sent to my email, and that was adequate.
I got rerouted through Munich, then to Stockholm and got into Lulea 8 hours late. My luggage didn't get rerouted with me and spent the night in ORD. It came the next day and spent the night in the Luleå airport, and then on the third day was delivered to my hotel room. We are reunited now and both made it here in good condition. I travel so often, this wasn't a terrible experience just an inconvenience, and it makes for a better story.
The Beginning
(May 2022)
I had a sabbatical approved for this coming academic year which included spending 2 months (February and March) at Luleå Technical University in Sweden. May 16th, the day after I left Boise for a conference in La Rochelle France and our summer travels <https://sites.google.com/view/drbarney/home/europe2022>, I received an email from 2 of my colleagues at LTU. LTU has been admitted to the Wallenberg Foundation's AI Autonomous Systems and Software Program <https://wasp-sweden.org//>. This is funded by a 4.9 billion SEK grant for AI research. The Swedish government is adding another 1.3 billion SEK to the program (divide SEK by 10 to convert to USD, but it is still a large amount in USD). This is being used to recruit AI researchers and students from around the world to build Sweden's capability in the field. They want brain-gain in Sweden instead of brain-drain.
My colleagues invited me to take (not apply for) essentially a full time endowed chair professor position in Luleå Sweden focusing on research in applied AI starting September. I met with my colleagues at the conference, where we discussed the position, what I had planned for my sabbatical and the next couple of years, and what my needs were. The position comes with funding for 2 PhD students, and 2 postdocs. The department offers plenty of conference travel funding. Teaching is basically optional, but will mostly be graduate course sharing with others in the AI field at LTU. They encourage partnerships with industry and getting grants, but not with the same level of pressure in the US in general and at BSU specifically. I can still do the research I was planning for my sabbatical this fall (expansion of projects on historical document analysis like in my TED talk), and continue with it beyond that. They want me to add in analysis of engineering drawings, which fits nicely with my interests. I am encouraged to spend chunks of time working with partner groups at other universities around the world. New projects would largely be my choice, and ones people there are working on and interested in having me participate in are of interest to me. With all of this, I decided to accept the position, and told them I'd stay for at least 5 years.
While I will be on a 12 month contract instead of the 9-month contract common at US universities, I will have 40 vacation days (in addition to the MANY holidays Europeans recognize), and the ability to work remotely several months per year, especially with other research groups around the world. It will be like a 5-year sabbatical.
I spent 22 years at Boise State. The last several had a heavy admin load that was draining (chair of the undergraduate committee, and advising for "problem" students). University support for undergraduate and Masters level research declined with the start of the PhD program and the growth of the university to R1 status, and that depends on bringing in large funded grants (hard in my field). I'm looking forward to a more research focused position for a while, where I'll have flexibility, support and be more appreciated for what I can contribute. I'll definitely have to work more/differently, but since it will be projects I like, I'm looking forward to it. I did not solicit this position, it found me. I think this is a remarkable position, and I am honored that of all the people my colleague knows around the world, he sought me out for this position.
Instead of quitting BSU, I moved my retirement up to this summer. I have been approved for emerita professor status. I'm keeping my houses in Idaho and will visit Boise once or twice a year. We found a nice guy to rent our front bedroom suite. He can live there when we are in Boise, and when we are gone, and I hope he can help take care of the place some when we are gone.