The Stockholm School of Economics is a private business school located in Stockholm, the capital of Sweden.
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Welcome to episode eight.
MSc life at SSE
I'm here with Yuanqing.
Yeah. Hi, everyone.
Hey, you're a master's student.
Yes. Master's student in the Economics program.
Yeah. Um, do you want to grab a fika?
Yeah. Okay. Let's go.
Come with
So Yuanqing. Please tell me
What do you think about Masters life at SSE?
You know, I study most of my time in Stockholm.
So I think that at SSE the study life is
a little more intense than that I had in China.
Oh, more intense.
But there are two periods.
It's a semester.
And you need to continue studying when you finished your
first period of studies. You need to finish
the examination immediately after the course because there's not a lot of time
in-between
the periods
Yeah. But in China, you know, I have maybe one or two
weeks to go through that, what I have studied before.
So in this sense, I think it is more intense
So what do you think about the social life as a masters student
You know, I saw that there are a lot of
parties that was held by the student association.
That is totally new for me because I have
not attended this kind of party
before. But what I really enjoy is to go,
to a trip with my friends, together
I think I will be out at night, you know,
enjoying these kinds of entertainments
We're going to check in with Aidan.
He's actually checking the temperature with some other fellow
Master's students to see what they're up to.
Can I come in for a photo?
Yes, sure. Come on in.
So student life super relevant for all of us.
Super big part of the university experience.
So here we have Fred.
Nice to see you. Hey, man, were are we right now here?
Here, so we're in Huvudsta
It's one of the main student residences at SSE
As you can see, I've got a small room at the residence.
I try to make it a little bit more cozy.
I got some plans.
I still got my guitar, but this this room actually makes me go out more.
So I spend most of my time at the university just either studying or hanging out
with people.
So, yeah, cool.
And what about you?
So you're a Masters student.
Where are you from?
Yeah. So I'm from Portugal.
I just came here two months ago, never been in Stockholm, and I'm studying a masters in finance,
which I think is a very good course for what I want to do in my life.
So far no regrets.
Cool.
And one question.
So tell me what? What's your morning routine?
What do you do in the morning when you wake up?
Ok, so since it's the winter, the first thing I do is getting up.
I take my vitamin D, which is something very popular here in the Nordic countries.
I just take a shower, eat a breakfast and go straight away to school.
Let's have a look. Hey, hey,
hey.
I mean, actually, I have a friend of mine here.
Oh, he's Portuguese.
Oh hi, Fred. Hey, how you doing?
Yeah, we just we just came by.
Oh, so yeah, we're in.
Huvudsta still. But why don't you tell me, where are we right now?
We are in, uh, my room.
This is like a bit bigger than Fred as, uh, it's I have a kitchen, a bathroom.
And of course, this is my living area, which combines a bed and also living
room.
Nice. And I mean, you are a master student as well.
What do you do?
I I'm doing finance.
I love the topic and I decided to come to SSE because there's great academia.
Uh, I like the courses.
Actually, I must say that when making the choice between coming here and other places, I
really enjoy SSE Unfiltered, and it was a big part of my decision.
I like the vibe, I like the show and also motivate me to come to this beautiful city.
Oh, nice. Well, it's a compliment for us, I guess.
But but one quick question like, Uh, what do you think you do or what do you do right now to stay balanced on
top of everything?
Yeah, sure.
SSE is challenging. It's a lot of coursework in the Masters, so I try to do my
work but never stay detached to people that I hang out with.
Do sports go to the gym also engage in SASSE activities
If you do all this, it might seem too much, but it's the best way to stay in shape and stay sharp.
Awesome.
Hey, hey. Come on in.
Just hanging out with a few masters friends.
Very nice. So,
James, tell me, tell me about yourself.
Yeah, I'm James. I'm from the UK.
I also do a masters in finance.
Like these two guys. Yeah, lovely.
And I guess we're in another example of a nice room.
Yeah. So one one question here on weekends, you know,
school's out. What do you tend to do when it's summer?
I mean, one thing I love about Stockholm is it's surrounded by water.
So I love to just go for a swim or find a nice beach for my friends.
Just just relax.
But now I was getting a bit colder, usually like maybe go for a fika or just hang out or
go for a nice hike. Just so many nature reserves around Stockholm.
Just to like, enjoy like weather like this.
It's beautiful. Just hang out.
Yeah, absolutely
Brilliant. Housing is difficult in the city.
Students that don't go for housing through SSE usually opt to get their own apartment somewhere in,
around or close to Stockholm.
So guys, where are we headed now?
Yeah, like near Huvudsta. There's a water park near the river so we can go for a swim
there. And there's also a really beautiful area that we sometimes hang out at when there's
a
Bit of sun. Cool
So guys are going to do some rapid fire questions now, are you ready?
Yeah. Cool.
Coffee or tea? Tea.
Coffee. Tea.
Cool. Night in or night out.
Night in and night out.
Yeah. Nights out. Instagram.
Or Facebook. Instagram.
Instagram, for sure. Same Instagram.
Snow or sand?
Sand also sand. Econ or Finance?
I'll take econ. Finance is better. Finance.
Finally, land or sea? Land.
I'd rather have the sea
Hmm. Financial context, the opportunity cost between
land or sea.
James, you know, it's November
At SSE, it's important that everyone feels comfortable on campus and fairly
treated with respect.
Hi, Aidan.
Hi, Karol.
Diversity, equity and inclusion manager at SSE.
Hey, come on in.
Welcome to my office.
Well, I wish it was my office.
We're in room 120 with the fire going, which we need.
You know, it's kind of November now to keep ourselves warm.
Yeah. Good to see you.
Hey, everybody.
So we have a few questions for you.
Seven point three questions.
Come on have a seat. So first, we can ask, what is your favorite place in Stockholm?
My favorite place in Stockholm.
It's actually it's called like the Mountain Street
It's above Slussen, so you can walk up above there and then you can have a view over the
whole city. You have, like the Old Town and you can see into the north part of the city and then the amusement
park Gröna Lund, which I also really like.
But it's it's a beautiful place.
Amazing.
Amazing. And what does diversity and inclusion mean to you considering it's, I guess,
Part of your job? Exactly.
Yeah. Well, you know, there there's this famous quote from this woman named Verna Meyers, who always said
that diversity is being invited to the party.
Inclusion is being asked to dance.
And I really like that.
But I would like to build on that and say an equity is being on the planning committee.
So it basically means that, you know, everyone can come here.
Everyone feels like they can express themselves.
They have the power to participate there.
They're able to be their full selves while they're here at SSE.
So that's my job.
That's what I want to be doing.
Amazing. Come on, let's go out.
We heard that you were in the U.S.
before you were here.
That's correct. Yeah, I'm originally from California.
Yeah. So the Swedish winter,
We're wondering if you miss the U.S.?
Well, you know, to be honest, there's not a lot of it that I miss, but one of the things I do really
miss, having come from California and growing up on on a little farm is the fruits and vegetables.
I really miss that, you know, being able to go out and pick a cantaloupe and immediately eat it for breakfast or, you know, pick
some, some corn or some grapes right off the vine or something like that.
But but now I've been in Sweden so long that I feel like this is the this is the place where I'm going to spend the rest of my life.
So we'll see.
Makes a lot of sense. And uh, well, now that you are in Stockholm, you've been here for a while.
Uh, maybe you could say, what's your favorite place to get fika?
My favorite place to get fika.
Well, if we're thinking about close to SSE, I'm not a big fan of Espresso House.
I don't like the big chains, but rather I really like this cafe nero that's directly across the street.
And I like it because they're always really friendly when you go in in the morning.
They have like classical music playing.
They play jazz in the afternoon.
It's kind of a cozy environment.
They have a little fireplace there as well, so I like that.
But other than that, yeah, the fika is really expensive in Stockholm, so that is unfortunate.
I wish we had some cheaper fika that would fit people's wallets a little bit more, but that's a
nice place.
Amazing. And what do you usually do on weekends, then, besides maybe getting
fika?
Well, I really like to hang out in our garden.
My wife and I have a garden that we take care of.
We sometimes go for walks in the forest.
Something like that walks with the dog.
But then also one of my favorite things to do is softball.
It's a sport that is kind of like baseball for Swedes.
I sometimes say it's like really, really advanced.
Brännboll, which is this game that you play here in Sweden as well.
So I used to play it, but now I'm an umpire, so so I'm often, especially during the summer on a softball field somewhere.
Umpiring a softball game
Very cool. And last question is, do you have a fixed time for waking up?
I do the alarm clock on weekdays, anyway, it rings at six o'clock and then I'm
a snoozer. So you know, it's, you know, hitting it a few times.
So maybe getting up around six, 30 ish and then on weekends, you know, the worst thing I can
possibly do is forget to turn the alarm off because then I want to really sleep in.
But yeah, around 6:00, 6:30,
I think it's so inspiring for some.
Yeah, but that's all that we have here.
So thank you very much for being with us.
And yeah, I suppose.
Have a nice day.
Great, good to see you.
See you all around. See you at school.
Bye.
Hey, you're back.
Sorry, actually, I forgot one question is very important.
What is something that you'd like to see more of at SSE?
Oh, what do I want to see more of?
How much time do you have? You have all day?
I just want to see more of all of you.
I'm so happy and I'm really going to look in the camera looking.
I'm so happy that we're back on campus, so I want to see more of you and I want to see more of your
authentic selves.
So be crazy, you know, dress however you want.
Act however you want.
Bring all your friends.
Whatever. Let's make SSE really a place that looks just like the rest of Sweden, the rest of
Stockholm, the rest of the world.
So I want to see more of that here.
Yeah.
Inspirational. Thank you so much.
I hope So.
Yeah. Sorry for coming back in again.
No worries. No worries.
I was just going to have a seat by the fire.
So OK.
All righty. Take care. Bye bye, everybody.