Nikodemus Blog

Before I went to college, I worked for a year as a debt collection administrator for a private debt collection agency back in Sweden. When you hear the words “debt collection,” you probably have a lot of negative images popping up in your head. You are probably imagining some large, intimidating man coming to your house, taking all your stuff, and threatening to sell your property. This scenario is very far from reality. Debt collection is actually quite undramatic and most debts are repaid long before anyone has to come and take your belongings. Let me first break down for you how the industry works. If a person buys a good or service from a company, and after several reminders still fails to pay for that good or service, then the company will hand over the matter to a private debt collection agency. If this private debt collection agency is still unable to convince the customer to pay, then the private agency will hand over the matter to the government’s debt collection agency. ...

So far, I have very much enjoyed reading Growing a Farmer. I had a feeling the book was going to be nothing like the books I have read before, and it turned out to be just as quirky and unique as I had expected. Although he sometimes goes into so much detail describing his various machines that I have difficulty picturing them in my head, I liked learning about the different processes that go into making honey, cider, butter, cheese, etc. I think that, at least in my case, Timmermeister has succeeded in his goal in making the reader appreciate the work that goes into making real food, because I certainly do appreciate it more now. And there is something about his mentality---his desire to leave the trifling "struggles" of the city and go back to the basics---that I can relate to. I could kind of see myself doing the same thing but later in life, more like what the old accountant-turned-farmer did. One elements of Timmermeister's writing that I really like is his many re...

Who You Are Matters I grew up in a small town in Sweden called Hällingsjö, located just outside the city of Gothenburg. I lived with my mom and dad in a house right next to a lake and I spent most of my days playing soccer on the local team and fishing on the lake with my dad. It really was a great place to grow up, but at the same time it was quite an isolated community and there wasn't a whole lot going on. After an unexpected turn of events, however, I found myself moving to Istanbul, Turkey with my family. As you can imagine, it was quite an overwhelming experience for a 15 year old Swede to move from a town of 2,000 people to a busy and charmingly chaotic city of 15 million or so inhabitants. Although challenging at first, the years I spent in Istanbul still remain among the best in my life so far, and it was this experience that set me on the path that eventually led me to move to the US. Right now I am just hustling to get through my last semester at USC so that I c...