How to Live in Denmark

There have been very few international singing stars from Denmark, and that's a surprise, because Danish people love to sing. Joining choirs is very popular, and Danish schoolchildren often start the week with a song – in my daughter's school, all the grades get together and sing something from the school's common songbook.   There's actually a kind of common songbook for all the children of Denma...

I was on Danish morning TV recently, which isn't really something to boast about.   In a country of 5 million, 10 guests a show, 365 days a year – you do the math.   Just about everyone gets on TV sooner or later.    Some of my friends and colleagues mentioned that they had seen me, stumbling through with my imperfect Danish, trying to promote my book, How to Live in Denmark.   But just SOME of my...

I've just arrived back in Denmark after a couple of weeks in the US and the night I got back, my cat bit me. This was not just a little affectionate peck - Fluffy used her sharp teeth, her fangs, to create four bleeding puncture wounds in my leg. I suppose it was partly my fault – I put a call on speakerphone. Fluffy doesn't like speakerphone, because she can hear a person, but she can't see one,...

There was no How to Live in Denmark podcast last week, and I apologize for that.   I have been busy studying for my Danish citizenship exam.   As some of you may know, Denmark is allowing double citizenship as of next year.     That means you're are allowed to keep your home country passport   - in my case, USA - while also becoming a Danish citizen.   Personally, I'm a little concerned that this...

Hello, and welcome to the How to Live in Denmark podcast.   I'm Kay Xander Mellish.   Whenever I hear that Denmark is the happiest country in the world,   I think of Donald Duck. Donald Duck is extremely popular in Denmark, as he is in all Nordic countries. He is much more popular than Mickey Mouse.   He even has his own Danish name - Anders And.   Which means, basically. Anders the Duck. I don't...

It's been a beautiful autumn here in Denmark.   Warm, with golden sun, blue skies, red and yellow and orange leaves on the trees.   Just gorgeous.   And unusually warm for Denmark. It's always exciting when, instead of wearing your winter coat every day from October to April, you can wear it every day from November to April.   But this unusually pleasant weather can't help but spark conversation a...

Have you ever seen the movie The Wizard of Oz?   It's a classic.   When Dorothy arrives in the land of Oz, the first thing she's asked is - are you a good witch, or a bad witch? I was having lunch with a friend this week, and, over club sandwiches she said, its a shame there's only one word for foreigner in Danish, when actually there's two types of foreigner here. I got her point, even though I t...

I did a little crowdsourcing for this week's podcast.    I asked some of our listeners, and some people on Facebook - what were some of the small cultural mistakes   - the dos and don'ts, the faux pas - you made when you first arrived in Denmark? I got a whole selection of answers.  Don't keep your shoes on while entering someone's home was one thing.  Don't arrive even a few minutes late was anot...

You wouldn't know it, but Denmark and China have much more in common than both having red flags and a love for green technology.   Denmark and China have a surprisingly deep relationship.  It helps that the Chinese have a deep love for Hans Christian Andersen.      

I was in London this week, and did a little fall wardrobe shopping.    I got tired after walking for awhile, and it was lunchtime, so I sat down in a pub.   I had a beer and a fish and chips and a British guy next to me was also having a beer and fish and chips and so we just chatted through lunch.   We talked about politics, the weather, the job market.   After lunch, we waved goodbye and I went...

I get a lot of mail at the How To Live in Denmark podcast, and some of it is from people who want to move to Denmark, but they're not sure what to do to make money once they get here.   But, I do speak English, they say.   Can I make money in Denmark just off of just speaking English? Generally, no.   No you can't.   I mean, I do, but I was an experienced journalist before I got here. But English...

  When you think you're talking to the authorities in Denmark, you're often not talking to the authorities.  If  it comes to bus service, train service, unemployment compensation, homeless shelters, construction, even fire protection and ambulance services – you will be talking to a private company hired by the authorities. At any rate, some things are still run directly by the government, like th...

I got an email a couple of weeks ago at howtoliveindenmark.com from a Danish woman who now lives in Germany.   She says that this podcast helps her keep in touch with life back home, but that she doesn't really like it.   She writes: " I have to tell you, that almost every story has a negative ring to it when you portray your thoughts on Denmark and Danes. I cannot shake the feeling, that you real...

If you’re in Denmark right now, you’ll know that we’re coming up on the year’s longest day this week.    June 21.    You know it because it starts getting light at 4 in the morning, and the sun doesn’t go down until 10:30 or 11 at night and then you’re up again at 4 in the morning. In between it never gets really dark, just like in December it never gets very light. During the dark times, I know t...

Hello, and welcome to the How To Live in Denmark podcast.   I'm Kay Xander Mellish. I don't regret many things in life, but I do regret not going to a party I was invited to almost 14 years ago. That was in 2000, when I first arrived in Denmark.   It was a party to mark the opening of the Ørseund Bridge, which connects Denmark and Sweden.    There were no cars on the bridge yet, so you could easil...

Ordinarily don’t get my technology news from the local newspaper sold by the homeless in Denmark, but I did this week.  First of all, I learned that you can pay your homeless newspaper seller by text message.  If you don’t have loose change, as I often don’t, you can send a text to the newspaper seller’s registration number, along with the amount you want to give him, and the seller gets paid righ...

Danes and Norwegians were part of the same country for hundreds of years, and they're still family.   Written Danish and written Norwegian are very similar – so similar that I once tried to find a Danish-Norwegian dictionary and was told there was no such thing.   The spoken language is a little more different, but still Danes and Norwegians can understand what the other is saying.   Danes and Nor...

If you live in city or a big town in Denmark, you may notice that the weekends are getting very quiet just about now. The streets outside my home in Copenhagen are empty.   The streetlights just change from red to green and back again, but no cars ever pull up.   Nobody comes to cross the street. It’s a little like a scene a movie right after the zombie apocalypse. This is because all the Danish p...

When you go back to your country of origin, it's alarming sometimes to realize how Danish you are becoming. I've been on vacation in the USA for a couple of weeks.   But I'm back now, and it only takes a few minutes after I arrive at Kastrup airport before something happens to destroy the relaxing effect of 2 weeks off and several thousand kroner spent on spas, hotels and tasty dinners. The jolt b...

If you've seen it, you know the Little Mermaid is only about four feet tall – that's 1.25 meters.  You probably own pillows that are bigger than the Little Mermaid.  At any rate, all the Copenhagen tourist boat trips go right by it, so your tourists can get  the photos they need for their Instagram or Facebook feeds.  If they want, they can climb out of the boat and onto the slippery rock where th...

Denmark is a pretty good place to raise children. Working hours are shorter, and it’s perfectly OK to leave work at 3 or 4 o’clock to pick up your kids.  There’s a good system for early childhood health. A nurse visits to your home when your child is a baby, and then there are regular checkups with doctor. If your child has the sniffles, you can take off work and stay home with her – the first two...

There was big news this week for foreigners in Denmark.   It looks double citizenship will soon be permitted.   Previously, if you wanted to be a Danish citizen, you had to give up citizenship in your home country.  Meanwhile Danes who had moved abroad, say to the US or Australia, and became citizens there had to give up their Danish citizenship. There's now been a proposal to get rid of all that....

There's a new mosque opening down the street from me this spring, a big one.  It will be the first mosque with minarets in Denmark, although the minarets are legally prohibited from calling to prayer.  The people behind the mosque are doing everything they can to blend in with the local neighborhood – they even went to observe at a local church service a couple of Sundays ago.  They were probably...

As an American in Denmark, I get to experience Danish stereotypes about Americans on a regular basis: we are superficial, too outspoken and direct, and are apparently controlled by a small cabal of right-wing nutcases.  But the Danes have stereotypes about other nationalities as well.  Spaniards and Italians are seen as fun and sexy and romantic, but unlikely to arrive on time. Eastern Europeans w...