[Sanaa-]

Originally Posted by stunner

Hmmmm Very interesting.Questions:

So is education free even for International students? i dont understand how this works. i mean dont you pay anything for admission,classes nothing just jet in the country and appear your diabs in class?? elaborate kidogo.

Compulsory free education on every level ( kindergaten till Masters) is everyones right (that includes international students) Completely free. No tuition fees, no hidden administrative cost, no buying books. Everything is provided by the universities. They can afford to because the Universities are state funded, also the Nordic countries are financially able to support that kind of a system, it also introduces a competitive edge against other Euroepean countries, meaning more people (future work force) will want to move here instead of other European countries. Ironically..thats not always the case. Nordic countries are desparate for a bigger and well equipped younger work force, because there will come a time when there will be a deficit in the work force due to too many old & retired people.

The popultion is only just around 5.25 million so it is not difficult to support this kind of a system.

Second, 900 euros(abt $1400) you get makaratasi? Is this regardless of what job you are doing? Or does it have to be a professional job?

It doesn't matter if you are a janitor or a newspaper delivery boy, any job profesional or casual where you have a year long contract is ok.

third.By makaratasi you mean a working visa or citizenship?

In your first year if you apply for a permit/Visa on the grounds of your job, you get a working visa and the second time you get a 3 year working visa, but inbetween i.e after two years of continious living or working here as a non-student you have a right to apply for permenent residency.

The thing is, on a normal student Visa, you have the same benefits as a permenent resident, BUT you are not entitled to your rent and living expenses being paid. Because Students (perment residents & Citizens) recieve money for their rent and bills, also they get student loans (on the condition that they get a measly number of credits in school) which they pay back after graduation upon finding a professional job.

here a jamaa working in wal-mart (supermarket) earns $7-8/hr. Scandinavia je?

The least paid would be perhaps a Janitor (although we don't call them janitor here and the pay is from 12$ - 14 $ per hour (not including your "holiday money" ) Working in a supermarket the wages are higher 14$ - 16$ because it means you can be both a shelf packing person or a cashier and such jobs they consider them as Customer Service jobs.


The not so nice thing about the place is that a nurse will earn around 23$ - 25$ an hour. As in the wages between different kind of qualified and non qualified jobs are not so different. Mostly people here don't equate money to happiness and are not so ambitious so you won't hear anyone complaining about the wages (besides an African .