Missing planes, honest danes
When I first tried to leave Denmark, I missed my plane. But I got to live out an experience that I had only heard and witnessed through other people. One of the great things that I'll miss about Denmark is the comfort of being fairly sure that your wallet, or computer (in this case), will turn up again when you accidentally leave it somewhere in a public place, like a post office.
On return of a wallet, a 50kroner (US$10) finder's fee can be simply removed by the finder, so I've heard. That sounds quite antithetical to the notion of decency that I know of in Denmark, but I guess, if absolutely everyone is doing it, then it doesn't detract so much from the act of returning what is not yours to keep. That there is claimed to be a standard amount, though this is not verified by half of the maybe 4 people I've asked about, gives some credence to not detracting from being wholly decent behaviour.
Unfortunately my computer can't be divided into 50kr denominations. So when I happily picked it up, just as my empty seat on the plane was somewhere over the North Sea, I went next door to the Føtex (like a Marks and Spencers superstore) to get danish pastries (of course, the Danes call them Viennese pastries, "Wienerbrød") and buns and pineapple-flavoured cheese. It was a bit crazy because it's unlikely that employees at a post office can take sufficiently long breaks to all sit down and spread cheese together. So I threw in a bar of fairtrade chocolate with licorice pieces.
On having stuff returned, my Lithuanian friend experienced quite the opposite. Slowly after several phone calls to her own phone, which she thought had been lost and found honestly, it became apparent that the possibly-Arabic-speaking holders of her phone had stolen it, and fooled her, so that she left her account open long enough for them to call the Netherlands, Germany and other Danish numbers throughout the night until the balance went negative enough to be locked. There will be other posts on "integration" of other "cultures" in Denmark.
On return of a wallet, a 50kroner (US$10) finder's fee can be simply removed by the finder, so I've heard. That sounds quite antithetical to the notion of decency that I know of in Denmark, but I guess, if absolutely everyone is doing it, then it doesn't detract so much from the act of returning what is not yours to keep. That there is claimed to be a standard amount, though this is not verified by half of the maybe 4 people I've asked about, gives some credence to not detracting from being wholly decent behaviour.
Unfortunately my computer can't be divided into 50kr denominations. So when I happily picked it up, just as my empty seat on the plane was somewhere over the North Sea, I went next door to the Føtex (like a Marks and Spencers superstore) to get danish pastries (of course, the Danes call them Viennese pastries, "Wienerbrød") and buns and pineapple-flavoured cheese. It was a bit crazy because it's unlikely that employees at a post office can take sufficiently long breaks to all sit down and spread cheese together. So I threw in a bar of fairtrade chocolate with licorice pieces.
On having stuff returned, my Lithuanian friend experienced quite the opposite. Slowly after several phone calls to her own phone, which she thought had been lost and found honestly, it became apparent that the possibly-Arabic-speaking holders of her phone had stolen it, and fooled her, so that she left her account open long enough for them to call the Netherlands, Germany and other Danish numbers throughout the night until the balance went negative enough to be locked. There will be other posts on "integration" of other "cultures" in Denmark.
Labels: danish norms, integration, lost
posted by whobenefits at 8:17 AM
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