I’m Henrik, and have been as long as I can remember. I am Swedish, a real Swede, born and raised in Sweden, doing all those Swedish things.
As I grew up I was very much into music. As a small child I played the piano, and learned to play songs by ear. As I got a bit older I started singing in church choirs, and through that learned to read music properly.
At the age of 10 I started to play the cello, and I still play it regularly. I dust it off and play about 20 minutes every year, before my fingers and ears are hurting too much and I put it away. Actually, I was once planning to study singing and become an opera singer.
However, somewhere along the line something went “wrong” and I ended up studying computer science and electronics instead. And now I have worked in the computer industry for almost 20 years.
You might ask what I am doing in Seattle (if you have read Denice’s description you know we live there.) In a way I do, too. Many years ago (1994) I ended up with an offer I could neither understand nor refuse. I ended up moving away from Sweden. I moved to Ediburgh, where I learned to speak Scots. This confused people when I later moved to London, when my completely confusing accent made most people assume I was from some godforgotten part of Ireland. After London I moved to Amsterdam in the Netherlands where I, among other things, learned to speak Dutch (jaa, echt waar).
But then I got another offer I just couldn’t refuse. And I’m talking about going to work for the biggest software company in the world, run by the richest man in the world. Microsoft. That took me to Seattle. The office is in Redmond, but as the eternal bachelor I opted to live in the big city with a horrible 15 mile commute every day, rather than living in family-friendly suburbia. I still don’t regret that.
Then I met Denice (more about that elsewhere.) She changed my world. I now share a place with her and her pets (Kiwi, Kula and Pawka.) We also have an interesting array of wildlife outside, like squirrels, flickers, finches, eagles, hawks and occasionally a seal.