Some final thoughts about Denmark

Last Monday, we defended our thesis projects and officially stopped being students. As our time in Denmark draws to a close, we thought that we would write one last blog (ignoring that we haven't written one in 9 months).

We're a bit short on time, so we're just going to reference an email that's been forwarded around recently:

YOU KNOW YOU'VE BEEN IN DENMARK TOO LONG, WHEN:

• You know the meaning of life has something to do with the word "hyggelig".
• You don't think it strange that no one ever comes by to visit without being invited and you never show up at any one's place unannounced either.
• You find yourself lighting candles when you have guests - even if it is brightly sunny outside and 20 degrees.
• You go to the supermarket and buy three good beers and 10 not too good ones.
• You can tell the difference between a Grøn Tuborg and a Carlsberg beer
• You honestly believe that the distance between Copenhagen and Aalborg is long.
• The first thing you do on entering a bank/post office/pharmacy etc. is to look for the queue number machine.
• You accept that you will have to queue to take a queue number.
• When a stranger on the street smiles at you, you assume that: a) he is drunk; b) he is insane; c) he is a foreigner or d) he is all of the above.
• The word "yes" is an intake of breath.
• You can't remember when to say "please" and "excuse me".
• You start to believe that if it weren't for Denmark's efforts, the world would probably collapse pretty soon.
• You can open a beer bottle with almost anything.
  

August to October (The Lost Chapters 2)

If anyone still checks this site, they might have noticed we haven't posted a single blog in the last two-and-a-half months. We might tell you we've been very busy with school, or that that nothing interesting has happened recently, or that we had a serious case of writer's block. But those would all be lies.

In fact, we haven't written anything for two reasons:

1. After a year in Denmark, things have stopped being quite so new and exciting. We're getting used to Danish life (and weather). We're beginning to accept the high prices, lack of friendliness and foreign language. We're settling in...
2. We're lazy.

Anthony has a particularly easy semester, so he has found a job. From 11pm-1am (Monday to Friday mornings), Anthony delivers newspapers in the local area. This isn't always the best experience (especially in the rain), but it has its benefits: two hours of quiet exercise and a whopping 35$/hour!

With this newfound wealth, we’ve decided to take a few weekend excursions. Two weeks ago, we visited friends in Munich and next weekend, we’re headed to Berlin. Anthony also bought himself a new digital camera and so we’ve got a lot of photos!

To check out where we’ve been, check out our “Travels Blog.”

Roskilde Festival

Roskilde Festival...What a blast! We'd been looking forward to it even before we bought our tickets in March. The festival lasts 8 days, with only 4 days being actual festival days with full music programs and stuff. Since we hadn't shown Etienne and Berns Copenhagen yet we opted to only come for the last 4 days. However, rumour had it that finding camping spots would be difficult if we didn't show up on the first day with everyone else to set up our tents.

So...Etienne arrived at Copenhagen Airport from London on the night of the 25th. After a quick stopover at our place we headed to Roskilde right away to grab our wristbands and wait until the gates opened up. In the morning, after having waited until the crazies had stormed the festival grounds we walked through an already mushrooming fields of tents and set up our tents. Little did we know then we ended up getting an amazing spot - right a the edge of the swimming area!

On Thursday we came back, in time to see Guns N' Roses. Guns N' Roses pulled a no-show for the first hour of their set. After a while people just assumed that they weren't going to show at all and begun yelling "Asshole" at the stage. When they finally did arrive, the first few songs were classics followed by a bunch of terrible, long solos. Partway through a few of us took off and checked out Sigur Ròs (which was an amazing show!).

Friday and Saturday didn't have very many bands playing. We really liked Morrisey, Tool, The Streets, Tool, Thäström, George Clinton Parliament/Funkadelic. Bob Dylan, was a suprising disappointment as he was just too old and had lost all stage presence. Despite being at the festival, we didn't have to miss the World Cup, as they showed the games on a huge screen.

Sunday was definitely the best day at the festival. There were so many good bands that we couldn't even fit them all in. We saw: Arctic Monkeys, The Strokes, Placebo, Franz Ferdinand, and the final act, Roger Waters performing Dark Side of the Moon. Roger Waters put on an AMAZING performance! Definitely the highlight of the festival.

Check out the festival website www.roskildefestival.com

Broløbet

At the end of June, we ran Broløbet - a race spanning the Øresund Bridge between Denmark and Sweden. It was the last time the race was going to be held so we decided to take advantage of an opportunity to cross the bridge on foot (normally the Øresund is only open to vehicular traffic). Since the entire distance of the race is a half-marathon (21.2 km), we divided the race up so that we each did roughly half of the distance.

The coordination involved for this race is pretty impressive. About 10,000 people participated, about half coming from each side of the bridge (Copenhagen and Malmö). For this they had two seperate registration centres and buses shuttling all the runners to the starting point. In addition, about 500 people were running the race as a relay so buses had to be coordinated to shuttle second leg runners to the halfway point and pick up the first leg relay runners from the halfway point to bring them to the finish line. On top of all this they had to close down a lane of traffic on the bridge and section off the rest of the course.

To see pictures and how we did in the race, check out www.broloppet.com.

Life in Denmark (the Lost Chapters)

So…After not having written a blog for months, we decided that we HAD to sit down and do one since most people have probably already given up on regularly checking this site. So much has happened in the last few months but we’ve had fewer opportunities to write blogs. Or rather, one of us would say “I’m going to write a blog today” but somehow it just never materialized. Anyway, it’s been two months and plenty has happened.

April was a pretty hectic month. Anthony went to England for Easter. He visited with relatives and family friends and had a really good time. Meanwhile, Marieke stayed in Copenhagen in a desperate attempt to salvage her first year project (having already kicked out one group member, she could then focus on coaxing the other member to actually do some work). The week didn’t turn out to be that terrible, since a friend of hers from the Queen’s Triathlon Club visited for 5 days from Maastricht (in the Netherlands).

Then, we both went into intense work mode, attempting to get our projects done. Anthony’s projects involved never-ending programming in Matlab to create a simulation of a wind turbine in changing winds. Marieke’s project had become a seemingly never-ending writing and revision process – investigating the computer industry’s preparations to phase-out several toxic chemicals from their production lines. Marieke made contact with an industry expert from the USA who was coming to Copenhagen for a conference. He provided valuable insights, and got Marieke into the conference, which ended up saving her project.

May was just a continuation of the hecticness. We were both finishing our projects and Anthony was starting exams. Despite the craziness, we did get our first taste of Danish summer weather and Danes coming out of hibernation. It was insane. If you think that Canadians love the summer, then you’ve never met a Dane. They literally go into social hibernation during the winter to the point where no one makes eye contact. Once the weather warms up, the neighbours, who you thought were completely rude and inhuman in the winter suddenly start saying “hej”. It’s still usually not much more than “Hej”, because after all they are Danish.

We planned a weekend trip to Paris for “Anthony’s birthday”. We stayed in this really inexpensive, cute hotel called Hôtel Bonséjour in the district of Montmartre. We did the obligatory site seeing: Notre Dame, Eiffel Tour, the Sewers Museum, the Louvre etc. and we also had the chance to meet up with some family friends of Anthony’s for lunch. We ended up staying with them for the whole afternoon and were able to practice our French.

On the Sunday morning Anthony and I went to go watch the sunrise from the top of Montmartre at the Basilique du Sacré Coeur. This was where Anthony proposed! Marieke finally realized why Anthony had been so adamant to go to Paris, while our projects were still not finished (May 14 represents 50 months as a couple). He had been planning this for months and had the ring custom-made by a jeweller in Florence (Marieke’s high-school friend Paula). We spent the rest of the day touring Montmartre to see all of the locations from the film Amélie (which we saw on our first date): the grocer near Amélie’s home, the café where she works, the adult video store where Nino works, the Metro station where they meet and the photo booth where Nino loses his album.

We haven’t yet set a date for the wedding, but it will at least wait until we return to Canada. In the meantime, we invite all of our friends and family to come celebrate our engagement with us (the party will last from now until August 2007).

June has been pretty interesting so far. We are now completely done our projects and exams and did well for our first year. This has definitely become the month of guests. Janice was on a three week break from work and visited us twice on her way to Munich, Budapest, Belgrade, Vienna and Prague. Berns and Etienne are both coming with us to Roskilde Festival. Berns has travel plans before and after the festival to visit friends in Prague and Munich, while Etienne is coming with us for the first four days of our three-week Scandinavia tour. With Etienne we’ll be leaving the day after the festival and taking a night train to Oslo. From there we’ll be seeing the fjords around the Bergen area. When Etienne flies out of Oslo, we’ll be continuing north through Norway and traveling through Finland, Sweden and possibly some of the Baltic countries.

We’ll be back in Denmark in August and we’re thinking of going on a long bike ride to Legoland. Marieke’s family is also coming to visit, as well as Alex and Emily. So, our next blog posting may not be for a while…

Immigrants in Denmark

It's been a while since we posted anything, but unfortunately we are very busy. We do not finish school for another month, so right now is crunch time. Plus, we have to plan our holidays.

So, to tide you over, here are a few stories about immigrants in Denmark:

First, the poorest neighbourhood in Copenhagen (the “ghetto”) has decided that the best way to improve living conditions and property values would be to limit the number of non-Danes who live there.

Second, a recent study has shown that ONLY 30% on immigrant now feel actively discriminated against. This is a “great improvement” from the 43% five years ago. Politicians everywhere are proud, saying that this shows a new level of Danish tolerance. Actually, over the last five years, the Danish government has become distinctly anti-immigration, enacting several laws to limit new immigrants. In our opinion, this study could just be showing that the 13% of immigrants who felt most discriminated-against have left, and no new immigrants have been allowed to take their place…

Third, another study investigated the best traits for an immigrant to have in order to find employment in Denmark:

• At least second-generation immigrant (preferably third)
• Has worked previously in Denmark (for a Danish company)
• Has Danish spouse
• Has employed spouse
• Not a refugee (or a relative of a refugee)
• Fluent in Danish

The authors of the study commented that immigrants often wrongly feel that they cannot find work. Apparently ignoring the absurdity of their own results, they said that any immigrant can easily find work in Denmark (provided they possess all of the above qualities).

Springtime in Denmark

Spring has arrived and we have had two weeks of almost constant rain. As we talked to some friends back home, we started getting nostalgic for our days at Queen’s (and in Canada in general).

We miss living close to all our friends. We miss the diversity of a multicultural country. Anthony misses the blue skies and mountains of Alberta. We miss student clubs, and student bars. Marieke misses recycling (and hates that Danes wear fur). We wish we knew any of our neighbours or at least that they would smile once in a while.

Then, just as we’re starting to feel homesick, the skies cleared and the sun came out (literally). Suddenly, Denmark didn’t seem so bad and we realized that we’re really enjoying ourselves here. We both really like our university programs and we love our apartment. We’re having fun learning Danish. We get to bike everywhere, and the public transit is so good you really don’t need a car. The grocery stores sell tons of organic food, and super cheap beer. We get lots of holiday time, and are planning many trips. We’re loving it.

Speaking of trips, I’m off to England for a week to visit some relatives. Marieke will be staying here to work on her first-year thesis, so if you’re procrastinating, give her a call (with Skype, it’s only 4 cents/min). Her mobile number is +45 60 62 74 35.

Get paid to go to school

As if free tuition was not enough, Danish citizens receive a salary while attending university. Each month, students get about 4000 Kr (800$). This in intended to cover housing (2000 Kr), food (1500 Kr) and fun (500 Kr). As well, they receive money each semester to cover the cost of textbooks. And free printing at all university databars.
Of course, they'll pay 60% tax for the rest of their lives...

"Do you dream of spending the summer in Canada?"

A big poster has been put up in one of my classrooms, advertising the exciting possibility of working in Canada this summer. Successful applicants could help develop new course materials and laboratory exercises for the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario.

Fastelavn (i.e. Danish Carnival)

The Danish are really confused when it comes to holidays! Halloween doesn't involve costumes or candy. Christmas decorations are set up by the beginning of November.
And their take on "Carnival" or "Mardi Gras" is just plain weird: a mix of European, Mexican and Viking traditions. Like many other European countries, they dress up in costumes and have a big party. And, similarly to Mexico, there is a pinata, but it's a little different: it is a wooden barrel with a black cat outline painted on the outside. They take turns beating the barrel until it breaks open. There is no candy inside the pinata, but the person to break open the barrel is declared to be the winner and gets some prize (often beer, or candy for kids).
The winner is said to have "killed the cat." This is because this tradition is a tribute to their Viking past, when they used to put a live cat inside the barrel. The "winner" was the person who broke the barrel and revealed the dead cat inside. This was supposed to somehow ward off evil. The weirdest part is that Danes don't see anything wrong with this...
Stay tuned for their St. Patrick’s Day celebrations.

Green-land vs. Canada-land

Unrelated to the cartoons controversy, Queen's Golden Words published this article about our Canadian "War on Denmark" over Hans Island (click to enlarge).

And Suddenly No One Asks, "Where's Denmark?"

So...You must all be wondering what it's actually like to live in a country which is now under the scrutiny (well, maybe that's an understatement) of the Islamic world, not to mention a lot of other countries around the world. Anyway, this whole cartoon deal only really became known to most people within the past few weeks. Apparently when they were published in September, some Islamic clerics wanted apologies from the paper (Jyllands-Posten, a name which I'm sure has become a household name around the world by now) and from the Danish government. After not getting an apology from either group, these clerics sought out support from Islamic states around the world. I'm kind of confused about why it took 4-5 months for the the Islamic states to respond...But anyway....The rest is history...Everyone has heard of riots in Iran, Afghanistan, Syria and Lebanon as well as the boycotts of Danish goods that are happening in many of the Islamic states.

So...What's the attitute in Denmark, you ask? Well it depends who you ask I guess...Some would applaud the editor of the paper (Flemming Rose) for trying to express freedom of speech and for attempting to break down taboos, while others think it's completely unacceptable and many people who have opinions somewhere in between. A lot of the Muslims in Denmark are trying to not rock the boat at all when it comes to the sensitive politics, others are taking to the streets. In fact when I was at a group meeting today, I saw a protest rally going on down one of the major streets in Copenhagen. I'm not sure if the rally was peaceful or not. I guess I'll find out in the news soon enough....

Winter in Denmark....ooh, aahh

Well, as turns out we were right to assume that we didn't need to bring winter jackets to Denmark. I think the coldest that it's gotten here is -5, whereby everyone thinks it's FREEZING and we just laugh and think of how cold it used to be in Kingston. Yesterday I went for a walk with some friends in the deer park near the sea. Somehow it came up that everyone was wearing two pairs of pants. Everyone was shocked to find out that at ~0 degrees Celcius I was only wearing one pair of jeans! Hilarity!

That's not even getting into the snow part...So far it's snowed 3 times this winter. The first time it snowed here, we were in Holland so we didn't actually get to experience it. The last two times were in the past two weeks and each time couldn't have yielded more than 10-20cm of snow. Well as it turns out, snow is a HUGE deal here - the trains stopped running, the airport closed and people were urged not leave their homes to go to work. And there we were thinking that we'd only use the trains to go to DTU in bad weather. Apparently our backup plan is a failure...I think we'll just take our bikes.

Marks

The Danish have a very strange marking system. Rather than percentages, letter grades or GPAs, they have a 13-point system:

00 – no work submitted
03 – work completely unacceptable
5 – failure
6 – barely sufficient
7 – below average
8 – average performance
9 – slightly above average
10 – excellent, but not particularly original
11 – excellent
13 – exceptionally excellent

Part of the logic seems to be that there is no way for anyone to change their grade to improve it (for instance, you can’t put a 1 in front of 03 to make 13). As well, markers base all of their marks on the “average” 8. There is no bell curve to raise marks, even for particularly hard tests. Everyone could fail if the professor feels it is justified. To receive a 13 is a real accomplishment, professors will only hand them out every few years… Of course, in Denmark, you don’t necessarily want that much prestige (everyone is equal).

And, if you want to know your mark, you can always check the professor’s office door, where they post everyone’s mark (complete with your name and student number).

Joining Spin Class at DTU

So...After a month of unsuccessfully trying to make it to a DTU spin class I finally went. Most of the time the classes conflicted with Danish or school. The one time I was able to make it, I spent about 20 minutes trying to find the place and then when I finally did the door was locked. After knocking a few times I decided to give up rather than relentlessly knock and make a fool of myself in front of a bunch of Danish strangers.

Last Friday I finally was able to make it to class. It was a beginners class, which I figured was a good idea even though I'd done a winter's worth of spinning in Canada. Well...I turns out that going to a beginner's class didn't really make much difference considering that all instructions were in Danish. To boot, the instructor was an Italian guy who knew Danish but no English (so clarification was kind of out of the question). After struggling to figure out all the bells and whistles on the spin bikes with the help of the lady beside me (which were way too complicated for what they were), I proceeded to follow an our long class in Danish.

One thing that surprised me was the demographics in the classes. At Queen's, a sports team or clubs mostly have undergrads, and a handful of masters/PhDs/law/medicines join them. Here it's common for professors and university staff to join clubs, so basically I was the youngest person in the classes!

Exams at DTU

There are no weekly assignments or midterms in any class at DTU. Apart from leaving me with lots of free time, it also means that several of my marks are based 100% on my final exam. To make them even more daunting, they're four hours long. Still, I had looked over some old exams and they seemed very similar to Queen's.
I was in for quite a surprise when I headed for the gym for my first exam. The desks were abour four times bigger than the ones I was used to. Why would you need such a big desk? Because the exams were open to "all aids." That means you could bring all your notes, and the textbook. It also means you could bring your laptop (there was an electrical outlet at each desk). Or anything else you wanted (people wrote their exams while listening to music on their cd players). As well, they let you eat and drink whatever you want (unlike Queen's rules that even prevented Nalgene bottles).
And, I later learned, the professors are instructed to write exams that can be completed in three hours, so the fourth hour is to allow you to verify all your work.
It was the most comfortable exam I have ever written.

Julefrokost

A 'JuleFrokost' is literally a 'Christmas Lunch.' However, it is often held in the evening, so it would more appropriately called a 'Christmas Dinner.' Or, more appropriately still, a 'Chance to get drunk at your company's expense.' People get very drunk.
To avoid having drunks driving home, the train service is extended until 4am. Below is an advertisement for the service extension. The purple characters are the mascots for the public transit system, and some of them obviously enjoyed themselves too much at their 'JuleFrokost.'

Christmas is a very big deal here, and there are JuleMarkeds (Craft Bazaars) everywhere, even in Christiania. Continuing our tradition of weekend visits to Christiania, yesterday we went Christmas shopping. The market was full of hippies selling their wares. There were interesting recycled decorations, 'Free Tibet' books, and warm beer. Rather surprisingly, the quality of these items was very good and there were many stalls with regular goods - hats, jackets, shirts, furs, etc.
We are going to spend Christmas with Marieke's relatives in Holland, but we have decorated our apartment a bit. We bought a small Christmas tree (fern) and made traditional Danish decorations. We even have Christmas stockings and some presents. We've posted some Christmas Photos.
Glædelig Jul og Godt Nytår.

Jeg kan tale lidt dansk

We passed our first (of five) Danish language tests!
We are now officially DAS students (Dansk er en Anden Sprog, or Danish as a Second Language). I now feel comfortable telling Danes: "Jeg kan ikke tale dansk. Kan du tale engelsk?"
In theory, we can carry on more complicated conversations, but all attempts so far have been disastrous. We walked into our local pizza place, and asked the man behind the counter, in Danish, for "a Number 9 and a Number 35." The man walked off, and came back looking confused and speaking in rapid Danish. He didn't speak English, so we just stared helplessly. Eventually, another man in the restaurant explained that you should normally call with your order before walking in to pick it up.
We have had similar experiences in grocery stores, bakeries and the library. As pathetic as it is, it seems the best option is just to answer questions with "Sorry, I don't speak Danish." Hopefully, the situation will improve as we plan to continue taking Danish classes for the rest of the time we're here.

Peanut Butter and other "Canadian Delicacies"

When we first arrived in Denmark, we were completely shocked by the limited selection of products at the local grocery store. There is no Loblaw's, Superstore, or Costco in Denmark. Instead, there are dozens of small stores (about the size of a Canadian convenience store). In our local Netto, there are four aisles, as well as a small cooler section, and some fruits and vegetables.
On our first shopping trip, we noticed the lack of peanut butter. There was also no frozen juice, pasta sauce, tortillas, or beans. We were unable to make many of our regular recipes. We went into almost every grocery store we passed, hoping to find these "staples.”
Our menu soon adapted to the limited choices. And, after much searching, we would eventually find the ingredient we were looking for, in one Copenhagen's many small, ethnic grocery stores. (When we found peanut butter, we bought 15 jars).
Still, Marieke will not be satisfied until we can make every meal we could back in Canada. Every time we head for Copenhagen, she has a new list of "common" ingredients we need to find. So far, we have found: garam masala, bok choy, balsamic vinegar, sesame oil, tahini, wasabi powder, coriander, tempeh, tofu, miso, poppy seeds, black beans, chick peas, rhubarb, whole wheat flower, real maple syrup (Canada no. 1, medium), rice noodles and basmati rice.

Elections

I hear Canada is set for another election, so I’ve decided to write about my experience with Danish elections. For whatever reason, the Danish government decided to let me vote. In Denmark's last election, there was a swing towards right-wing, anti-immigration parties. Since this is having a direct impact on us (as “immigrants”), I figured I should take a stand.

Not knowing much about the political parties, I turned to the internet for guidance. Finding no English content on the parties' websites, I entrusted my vote to Wikipedia.org. There, I learned some interesting things (summarized below mostly for Berner’s benefit). Based on this research, I chose the Socialist People’s Party (not really communists) because they seemed to hate immigrants the least and support environmental initiatives.

At the polling station, I was handed two enormous ballot papers (about 1m long and 50cm wide). For the municipal election, there were 120 candidates and on the regional ballot, there were 340 choices. Thanks primarily to my votes, a coalition of the three most left-wing parties won both the municipal and regional elections.

For Berner:

• They have no senators (or other “second chamber”)
• They use proportional representation.
• There are seven large parties (listed from left to right): Red-Greens, Socialist People’s Party, Social Democrats, Social Liberals, Liberals, Conservatives, Danish Folkparty.
• The Liberal party is called “Venstre” in Danish, which means “Left.” They haven’t been left-wing for about a century, but they haven’t bothered to change their name. The Social Liberals (“Radikale Venstre”) are also not very left-wing.
• Since there are many parties, they always have minority governments. The party with the most seats does not necessarily get to lead the country, if a larger coalition is formed.
• The current federal coalition is between the Liberals and Conservatives. They have succeeded in implementing several anti-immigration policies, like tuition fees, language requirements for work permits (you have three years to become fully fluent in Danish) and restrictions on foreign marriages (you have to be over 24 to marry a foreigner).