Bassim
VIP Member
- Joined
- Mar 1, 2008
- Member Type
- Student or Learner
- Native Language
- Bosnian
- Home Country
- Bosnia Herzegovina
- Current Location
- Sweden
Would you please correct my mistakes in the first part of my text?
After living more than 23 years in Sweden, I have noticed an interesting phenomenon in myself. The more time I spend here, the less I am mentally present in this country. Instead, my mind wanders to my homeland, my beautiful orchard, and my home, which I would probably never see again. Although the Swedes have given me shelter, I feel that despite long time spent here, I have nothing in common with these people, who in the last few centuries never dared to oppose their government, and who have silently consented to every law, rule and decree from above. There are no demonstrations like those that you see in other countries, where working class people are marching in the streets with flags, banners and placards, demanding more rights and influence. The majority of citizens here think that everything their government do and tell them is the divine right, which they should never challenge. I believe that if the government told people that they should pay 80% in their taxes, they would willingly acquiesce to it. And if someone would have any doubts, he or she would read in the news papers or watch on TV that the government’s decision was the best for society. While in other countries journalists and the media often try to find the underlying cause of political decisions, do investigative journalism, or even provoke politicians, in Sweden they are simply conveying the message. Thus, the circle of governance and control of citizens is perfect. You do not need to waste your precious time pondering and having doubts because everything is already well thought-out. Your task is to have a firm belief in the authorities, work silently without ever complaining, and pay your taxes.
I was on a bus one day, when more than a dozen of small children and their two female teachers came in. A little girl about five years old and her teacher sat in front of me. In one moment, the teacher started to praise the Social Democrat Party. I was angry and chocked. I had experienced Communist brainwashing and propaganda, but even they let children in day care centres in peace. I imagined that little girl to be my daughter. How I would react if she came home and told me that high taxes were needed to pay for welfare, healthcare and education? When I was five years old, I was outdoors kicking a ball around, playing marbles and flying kites. Nobody ever told me to love President Tito or the Communist Party. But here they indoctrinate even small children to believe that the system is perfect and best in the world. If you hear the same dogma year after year without anyone telling you the opposite, you become not an ordinary citizen but a member of a sect. Your mind is conditioned to believe in the dogma you have been taught since childhood. You cannot hear any criticism without feeling embarrassed and angry. “How you dare to find fault with our system which the whole world admires and wants to emulate it?” You are boiling inside and blushing outside, and you do not want to speak with that person again.
Sometimes when I walk in the street and see a beautiful girl, I imagine her and me as a married couple. We lie in bed. I am aroused, looking forward to the exciting evening, when she tells me there is no reason why taxes should not go up, or that the only future is in the Feminist party, or that the experiments with mice and other small animals in all kinds of laboratories must stop immediately. How long would my marriage last? After a while, I would become either desensitized, mentally ill or maybe I would commit suicide.
On one occasion, I called the leading local politician and told her what I thought about her party and their politics. “So you tell me we are brainwashed and you came here as a refugee? Why did you choose our country?” She scoffed and hung up, not giving me the possibility to answer. I had many questions to ask her, like who gave her the right to manipulate her own people, how many refugees had she taken in her expensive flat, or why didn’t she live in some of the ghettos which her party had created during the past decades?
Whenever I visit such suburbs, after a while, I begin to feel intense anxiety, as if an invisible monster claws at me and wants to abduct me. The grey blocks of flats built in the 1960s look repugnant in the contrast to beautiful nature around them. It must have been a narrow and distorted mind which had planned them and then decided to populate them with refugees, immigrants, people on benefit, mentally ill, alcohol and drug addicts and other human beings who have failed in their lives. As I watch them walking around, I get an impression that the greyness and monotony of the buildings have affected also their state of mind. I never see a sparkle in their eyes. They shuffle along the gloomy streets like people without dreams and ideas. If they are young, they will probably get a chance to move to a better area, but if they are middle-aged or older, they will in all likelihood never leave this place.
TO BE CONTINUED
After living more than 23 years in Sweden, I have noticed an interesting phenomenon in myself. The more time I spend here, the less I am mentally present in this country. Instead, my mind wanders to my homeland, my beautiful orchard, and my home, which I would probably never see again. Although the Swedes have given me shelter, I feel that despite long time spent here, I have nothing in common with these people, who in the last few centuries never dared to oppose their government, and who have silently consented to every law, rule and decree from above. There are no demonstrations like those that you see in other countries, where working class people are marching in the streets with flags, banners and placards, demanding more rights and influence. The majority of citizens here think that everything their government do and tell them is the divine right, which they should never challenge. I believe that if the government told people that they should pay 80% in their taxes, they would willingly acquiesce to it. And if someone would have any doubts, he or she would read in the news papers or watch on TV that the government’s decision was the best for society. While in other countries journalists and the media often try to find the underlying cause of political decisions, do investigative journalism, or even provoke politicians, in Sweden they are simply conveying the message. Thus, the circle of governance and control of citizens is perfect. You do not need to waste your precious time pondering and having doubts because everything is already well thought-out. Your task is to have a firm belief in the authorities, work silently without ever complaining, and pay your taxes.
I was on a bus one day, when more than a dozen of small children and their two female teachers came in. A little girl about five years old and her teacher sat in front of me. In one moment, the teacher started to praise the Social Democrat Party. I was angry and chocked. I had experienced Communist brainwashing and propaganda, but even they let children in day care centres in peace. I imagined that little girl to be my daughter. How I would react if she came home and told me that high taxes were needed to pay for welfare, healthcare and education? When I was five years old, I was outdoors kicking a ball around, playing marbles and flying kites. Nobody ever told me to love President Tito or the Communist Party. But here they indoctrinate even small children to believe that the system is perfect and best in the world. If you hear the same dogma year after year without anyone telling you the opposite, you become not an ordinary citizen but a member of a sect. Your mind is conditioned to believe in the dogma you have been taught since childhood. You cannot hear any criticism without feeling embarrassed and angry. “How you dare to find fault with our system which the whole world admires and wants to emulate it?” You are boiling inside and blushing outside, and you do not want to speak with that person again.
Sometimes when I walk in the street and see a beautiful girl, I imagine her and me as a married couple. We lie in bed. I am aroused, looking forward to the exciting evening, when she tells me there is no reason why taxes should not go up, or that the only future is in the Feminist party, or that the experiments with mice and other small animals in all kinds of laboratories must stop immediately. How long would my marriage last? After a while, I would become either desensitized, mentally ill or maybe I would commit suicide.
On one occasion, I called the leading local politician and told her what I thought about her party and their politics. “So you tell me we are brainwashed and you came here as a refugee? Why did you choose our country?” She scoffed and hung up, not giving me the possibility to answer. I had many questions to ask her, like who gave her the right to manipulate her own people, how many refugees had she taken in her expensive flat, or why didn’t she live in some of the ghettos which her party had created during the past decades?
Whenever I visit such suburbs, after a while, I begin to feel intense anxiety, as if an invisible monster claws at me and wants to abduct me. The grey blocks of flats built in the 1960s look repugnant in the contrast to beautiful nature around them. It must have been a narrow and distorted mind which had planned them and then decided to populate them with refugees, immigrants, people on benefit, mentally ill, alcohol and drug addicts and other human beings who have failed in their lives. As I watch them walking around, I get an impression that the greyness and monotony of the buildings have affected also their state of mind. I never see a sparkle in their eyes. They shuffle along the gloomy streets like people without dreams and ideas. If they are young, they will probably get a chance to move to a better area, but if they are middle-aged or older, they will in all likelihood never leave this place.
TO BE CONTINUED
