Intro to Copenhagen: The Euphoria Stage

We made it! After lugging our heavy suitcases through Italy for three whole weeks, we have finally been able to settle down a bit in our new city: Copenhagen, Denmark. First impressions so far? Copenhagen is fantastic! I am by no means a city girl, but I think I will be very happy here for the next 3.5 months.

Before coming here, we pretty much had only heard two things about this city: 1) It's expensive, and 2) It's impossible to find housing in August/September. Unlucky for us, money and housing were two things we didn't really have much of when we stepped off the plane, so I have to say we were a bit frightened that we wouldn't be able to afford anything, and that we'd end up homeless after our four-day apartment rental was up. We quickly learned though that it is impossible to feel too worried or frightened in Copenhagen for too long.

On our first day here, not only did we find a great little apartment only a bike ride away from my school, but we also discovered that our new neighborhood was chock-full of the city's cheapest and most delicious eats: kebab, shwarma, and these little corner cafes with amazing salad bars. So, we're pretty excited to be here so far. Ez calls this the "Euphoria Stage" where everything is perfect because it's all shiny and new. Since we aren't here for that long, I'm hoping this stage will last the whole time, and we won't even have to get to the "I'm-a-stupid-foreigner stage" or the "I'm-too-broke-to-do-anything stage."

Another plus--everyone here is so nice. It is an extremely pleasant place to be, with tons of people out walking, biking, and pushing their kids around in strollers. No, not strollers, GIANT prams. And it appears to be very safe-- the other day I decided to explore a 7-11 (one of my favorite places to look at and compare in other countries), and was confused/delighted to find a newborn baby in a giant pram all by herself right out front of the store, on a busy sidewalk of a main city street, no parents in sight. I kind of stayed there with her for a second, as in the U.S. I think this would be worrisome, but within a few minutes Mom walked out of the 7-11 with her bag of purchases and wheeled the baby away. I have seen similar happenings multiple times since then too.

After settling in to our apartment and getting our fill of licorice and hot dogs (both plentiful and delicious here), Ez and I have finally started to establish a routine. I started school this week, and am pretty ecstatic about my classes. Law is an undergraduate-type degree here, so classes are more lecture-style, and honestly much more enjoyable than having to memorize cases so that you can recite the facts when you're called on. The people I've told here about the "Socratic Method" think it's ridiculous, by the way, and I agree. Without having to worry about memorizing facts I can actually just listen to the professors and enjoy what they're saying. What a novel idea! I definitely feel like I've come to the right place academically. Not to mention the fact that Ez and I already have more travel plans in the works... so yes, "academically" I think I made the right choice to study abroad.

Also, we are living in a predominantly immigrant neighborhood, and within my two weeks here I have already had multiple discussions about immigration with immigrants to Denmark, which is pretty exciting considering that is what I came here to study (and the fact that I'm a type of immigrant here myself). In fact, the owners of the shop we bought our bikes from even had a little thing or two to say about U.S. immigration-- both were Danish citizens originally from Iraq, and a few years ago while en route to visit some family in Michigan, they were held in U.S. immigration detention for two days because the authorities found it suspicious that they were carrying a lot of cash on them. Jokingly, one of them commented to us that he thinks it must have been "because of the color of his hair."

They were amazingly good-natured about it, but the story was really frightening. They were really sweet guys and I cringed at the details of how horrible their 48-hour experience in jail was. One of them had to spend the night in a bathroom because the jail was overcrowded, and he said it was so dirty that he couldn't sit down anywhere and spent the whole night standing. Luckily after only 2 days (it can take weeks, months, even years) the Danish ambassador to the U.S. got them out and back home to Denmark, but understandably neither of them seemed too keen on trying to visit the U.S. again.

On the bright side though, after they told us about this, we all had a nice moment together as one of the men acknowledged that despite their experiences (and, you know, the general state of the world at the moment), Iraqis and Americans can become friends in Denmark. One of the other customers there was originally from Iran, and laughed that he got along with his Iraqi friends just fine. "Two Americans, two Iraqis, and an Iranian--it's like we're in a UN meeting!" he exclaimed. We all smiled and shook hands as we left with our new bikes.

All in all though, the Euphoria Stage has held strong thus far. The only hint of struggle I can see in the near future is with learning Danish. Of course everyone speaks perfect English here, but all the signage is in Danish only, and it is always super useful to know at least a little bit of the language of the place where you're living, so we're trying. And man, it is a hard language. The grammar is easy, but that doesn't really matter at this point because it is impossible to read and pronounce!

The trickiest part is that there appears to be no rules as to when certain letters are pronounced and when they're silent, when a "D" sounds like a "TH" or when it sounds like an "L" (but rarely does it sound like a "D"), etc. Also, there is the devilish letter Ø, which Ez and I affectionately call "slashy O." It is nearly impossible for native English speakers to pronounce, so naturally it is in almost every Danish word. Our neighborhood, "Nørrebro," tasty Danish sandwiches, "smørrebrød," the new title of this blog... okay that one wasn't necessary but it is a pretty clever pun (props to BG).

Anyways, the closest we can come to getting the Ø pronunciation right is if you purse your lips and say the letter "e" at the same time. So it kind of sounds like a cross between "uuhhhh" and "oooooo." I think. We're working on it!

That's it for now-- Gotta go enjoy the euphoria while it lasts!

I'll post pictures soon.