How to Live in Denmark – Détails, épisodes et analyse

Did you know that Copenhagen has its own color? It’s called Copenhagen Green, and it’s a dark emerald green, mixed with a fair amount of black. A little like the dark green we see on the leaves of trees here late in August. Pantone 3435C, for you designer types. 

You’ll notice that all Copenhagen benches are this color, an you will see Copenhagen Green on many wooden doors and window frames in the old city, as well as lamp posts, railings, even small bridges in the beautiful Ørestedsparken.

This was a conscious decision by city leaders in the early 1900s. They felt the combination of green and black blended well with both natural and urban settings, and that using it widely would create a sense of harmony.

Plus almost everybody likes green. 

Learn more about the design quirks of Copenhagen in this podcast, and find out how to take my self-guided audio tour of Danish Design in Copenhagen at voicemap.me/DanishDesign.

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Many countries have a fictional character who represents them. Uncle Sam for the USA, Marianne in France, Mother India. Others have a legendary figure, who was real at one point but is now shrouded in myth, like King Arthur in England.

For Denmark, Holger Danske is both. He was probably real, although he didn’t live in Denmark.

He was a Danish knight living in France in 8th century, serving Charlemagne and he appears in several of the epic poems of the time as Ogier the Dane. When those poems were translated into Old Norsk, he became Oddgeir danski, which gradually morphed into Holger Danske.

He has been a hero for centuries. And he is a sleeping hero.

The legend is that when Denmark is in trouble, Holger Danske will rise from his slumber and come to its defense. This is why during World War II, when Denmark was occupied by the Nazis, one of the largest resistance groups called itself Holger Danske.

If you’re not Danish, you may have experienced Holger Danske in the form of consumer products.

There is a Holger Danske moving company with trucks all over Denmark, a Holger Danske beer, Holger Danske Aquavit liquor, Holger Danske tobacco. There’s a Holger Danske bar. Holger Danske has appeared on the Danish national football shirt. 

And, very famously, there’s a statue of Holger Danske in the basement of Kronborg Castle, often known as Hamlet’s Castle, in Helsingør, Denmark – which Shakespeare referred to as Elsinore.

I go by the castle in my new audio tour of Helsingør for VoiceMap. Check it out at voicemap.me/hamlet. 

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When I first arrived in Denmark, you could shut down any dispute in Denmark by appealing to equality and the common good. Solidarity - “solidaritet” -  and “fælleskab”, or community, or even “samfundssind”, societal spirit, were magic words.

They still are with the older generation that built Denmark’s welfare state. If you want to convince this generation of anything, just make a reference to solidarity and community and societal spirit. Works like a charm.

I’m often asked if the younger generation is as dedicated to these principles as their elders, and if they still follow the "Jante Law".

Jante Law is not really a law – it’s like a legend, in which people living in Denmark are not supposed to act like they’re better than anyone else, or smarter than anyone else, or know more than anyone else. 

But young people aren’t too keen to put up with that, in particular in an environment where they are competing internationally. For many Danish young people, the idea that all Danes are equal and we must all move together, at the same pace, seems outdated.

And one contemporary example is the rise of the electric bike. 

What has now been accepted in Denmark’s bike lanes is a concept that is used to be very "uDansk", or un-Danish….that some people simply go faster than others. 

This is the 125th episode of the "How to Live in Denmark podcast", and originally ran in 2023.

Get all of Kay Xander Mellish's books about Denmark at http://books.howtoliveindenmark.com. Book Kay for a talk to your group or organization at http://events.howtoliveindenmark.com.

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 days are paid. 

And, of course, there’s the day care system.  It’s not free, but it’s reasonably priced, and it’s nice to be able to drop off your kid in a safe place with trained people while you go to work.  

In some countries, there’s a lot of controversy about whether very young children should be in day care or at home with their parents.  Not in Denmark.  97% of kids go to day care, even the children of the Royal Family.  Even the future king, currently known as the eight-year-old Prince Christian, went to day care. 

Everyone goes to day care partly because the Danish tax structure means both parents have to go to work. 

But Danish day care is also social engineering.  It’s about creating that equality and community spirit that everyone prizes in Denmark.  Day care is the first step in making your child more Danish than wherever you come from.

No elite education, no competition

The Jante Law is part of all Danish education.  There’s no elite education here, no advanced, or gifted and talented programs.  If you child is better than the others at a certain subject, his job is to help the students who are not as good. 

If you come from a very competitive society – the US, the UK, China, India – that can be a bit of a shock.  There’s no competition in Danish education.  The kids work in groups. There are no competitive schools you have to fight to get into.  There’s no standardized testing until the kids are 15 or 16. And there are relatively few tests within the daily school lessons. 

In Danish school, your child’s social life is considered what’s most important.  Does she have friends?  Can she get along with the other children in the class?  Does he like to go to school?  Does he fit in? 

The idea is that if a child is socially comfortable in school, if he or she wants to go to school, then academic success will follow. 

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.  It hasn’t been finally approved, but all the Danish parties say they’ll vote for it, with the exception of our anti-foreigner friends in the Danish People’s Party.

Now having been here for 14 years, I will probably apply for Danish citizenship.  I realize I’ll have to do a lot of studying about Danish history, and learn things like the difference between King Christian the Fourth and King Christian the Seventh. 

But that’s true of any country.  I’m sure people wanting to be American citizens have to learn the difference between, say, George Washington and George Bush.

I want to be a Danish citizen for a lot of different reasons.  Right now, my ‘permanent’ residence permit expires if I’m out of the country for more than a year.  That could easily happen if I travel, or have a family crisis back in the US.

Also my daughter has no rights here.  She was born here, and has only lived here, but she has no residence rights here, or right to attend university here.  Under the current law, she’d have to apply for a Danish residence permit when she turns 18, and there’s no guarantee she’d get it.  If I’m a double citizen, she can become a double citizen.  And if she’s a double citizen, it means she can hold the Danish flag in her girls marching band.  Right now she’s not allowed.

Most importantly, I’ve been paying Danish taxes for 14 years, and I want a say in how those taxes are spent.  I want to vote.

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 the only ones there.

There are a lot of Muslims in Denmark, about 250,000 out of a population of 5-and-a-half million, most of who have arrived here in the past 40 years, or their descendants. 

And contrary to what the Danish right-wing parties might say, they’ve brought a a lot of good things to Denmark, and not just Shwarma shops.

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 work too hard, at wages that are much too low, at least by Danish standards. Asian immigrants are seen as OK because they work hard at things Danes aren’t interested in, like high-level engineering degrees.

Danes also have stereotypes about other Nordic people. Norwegians are seen as happy, friendly people with a humorous language.  Everything sounds funny in Norwegian because everything sounds like singing.  Swedes are seen as kind of stiff, humorless types who can’t dance, and can’t hold their liquour.  Finns are silent, angry drunks that carry knives. Oddly, given their history, Danes really like Germans.  Really, really like the Germans.  Many Danes will say that Berlin is their favorite town.

Danes also have stereotypes about each other, something that amazed me when I first arrived here.  You have 5 million people, and you’re dividing yourselves into groups!  But Danes themselves see a big difference between people from Sjelland, the island with Copenhagen on it, and Jylland, the bigger part of Denmark that is connected to Germany.

As the stereotype goes, people from Jylland are seen as quiet, reliable, trustworthy, and likely to marry young and start families. They are also sometimes seen as stubborn, and very tight with money. They want to drive a hard bargain. People from Copenhagen are seen as slick. Smart-ass, fast-talking, prone to exaggeration- everything’s the biggest and the best.  The men wear expensive business suits, and everyone wears overpriced eyeglasses. They have jobs that are non-jobs, like Senior Communications Consultant or SEO specialist.  People from Jylland have real jobs, like pig farmer, or Lego designer. 

Danish names are very strongly stratified by age. Ole and Finn and Knud and Kaj and Jørn and Jørgen and to some extent Poul and Per, are over 50. Their wives and sisters and secret lovers are Inger and Karin and Kirsten and Ulla. Or Bente. Another guaranteed old ladies’ name is Bente. Bent is the male version.  Being named Bent is a problem for Danes who travel, because in many English-speaking countries, ‘bent’ is old-fashioned slang for ‘gay.’ In those countries, if you hold out your hand and say, ‘Hi, I’m Bent,’ you may get an unexpected reaction.

Finding a job anywhere is a headache, and Denmark is no different.  And let's be frank, if the employer has a choice between a foreigner and a Dane, they're probably going to hire the Danish person.  The Danish person knows the language, the Danish person knows the culture, the Danish person knows what type of cheese to bring for the Friday morning shared breakfast.  Nevertheless, it is possible for a foreigner to find work in Denmark. Here are my tips for a successful job search in Denmark. 

If you are a romance novelist, the Danish man is not your dream man. He will not write poetry and pursue his beloved to the ends of the Earth. He won't send flowers, he won't buy chocolates. He won't even help carry packages. 

That said, if you’re a feminist, a Danish man IS your dream man. He will cook and help with the housework, and spend time with the kids.  He'll respect your opinion, and he won't force himself on you. In fact, you may have to force yourself on him.  But if you do, he’ll usually be really grateful.