Expat Advice: Relationships in Copenhagen, Denmark

What is the name of the city or town that you are reporting on?

Copenhagen

What is your current status? Are you single, dating, in a long-term relationship, married or divorced?

Married for 2 years. I was single for 6 years after I came to Denmark, before I married.

What is it like in your country of residence for someone with your relationship status (married/divorced/dating)? If you're single, how do you meet other people? Do English-speaking people tend to gravitate to certain parts of your city?

The singles' life is different than I experienced in the US. Girls are relatively easy to meet and down to earth. You get what you see. They "size you up" through conversation, on the spot, not the other way around. I had to learn new conversation skills: how to take an interest in the people I was talking to; how not to brag about myself, and how to keep the conversation focused on important things, not just work. Danes learn the art of communication at an early age and really are quite good at getting to know people this way. Also, the girls here are generally pretty strong and they make a lot of the relationship decisions that guys in the US maybe used to, especially regarding sex and intimacy.

If you have children, what advice would you give to others making a similar transition to your country of residence?

No children. Mine are all in the US. My daughter came here when she was 15 for a year. It was quite a shock for her, particularly the freedom teens have and their casual attitude towards sex. But she adjusted well.

If you do not have children, do you generally spend your social time with other expat couples? If not, what else do you like to do as a couple?

No. My social life has never involved meeting ex pats. Most of my friends - girls and guys who were friends with them - I met while I was dating. In Denmark, serial monogomy combined with casual attitudes about sex, seem to be the major practices from the early teens on, so it's quite easy to meet quite a few people in a romantic - intimate context.

If you are married or in a relationship with a person of another nationality, how has this experience enriched you as a person. What kind of challenges do you face?

Inter-cultural relationships are hard to manage, because each person comes at it with a different cultural perspective about the functions that romantic relationships should perform and how two people fit into the right roles to do this. I got plenty of experience learning how not to treat a Danish woman, before I found "a keeper" - one who would keep me. I think, more than anything else, I have learned how important it is to respect your partner, here, and how quickly she will leave you, if you don't.

If you are a single parent, what advice would you give to others considering moving abroad?

Not a single parent, but I would say that it is much much easier to be a single parent in Denmark than in the US. First of all, marriage is not that popular here and relationships fail at a pretty high rate, anyway, so there are relatively many more single mothers here than in the US. Second, Social Democracy in the last 30 years has built a strong institutional system of state nursery schools and kindergartens and filled them with well trained pædagoges (teachers). So, single mothers don't need to worry about day care here. Their children will actually start being educated socially from an early age.

What would be the best advice you could give someone with your relationship status that lives in your country of residence? Any other thoughts?

As a single guy, like I was when I came here? I could write a book about how to treat Danish women. They are the major attraction of this country.

As a man married to one? Marry the right Danish woman and she will make you very very happy. Denmark is a very strange country. If your stay is short, don't try to understand it and don't try to act the way you think you should. That will drive you crazy. Besides, the way you think you should act isn't the right way anyway, becuase Danes are much too polite to tell you all about your mistakes. Be yourself. Look for things to enjoy instead of things to complain about. Take it a day at a time and look for the little surprises.