Christmas, part 2

Usually Christmas anxiety starts to get me a week before Christmas but this year it started in early October. 

Understandable if you take into consideration that Christmas talks with my girlfriend started in late June.

I have never been a fan of that holiday and in the last couple of years I had the opportunity to opt out of it. That will be impossible this year and I don't want to, but I still feel a bit queasy when I start thinking about it. 

In order for you to understand my Christmas dislike i need to explain a bit of Croatian culture. Families in Croatia are very tightly nit and so was mine. Both mine and my ex-wife family live in Zagreb which made seeing each other very easy and it was quite often. My parents would crash at our place every Sunday and we would see her family once in 2 weeks, plus we would talk around twice a week. That was standard through the year. Visits often included lunches or we would just hang out with a coup of coffee or some drinks. In addition birthdays were celebrated as well, all of them, and those were considered as special occasions. Birthdays required something extra; lunch, dinner, booze etc. And then Christmas arrived and we would be bombarded with questions which Christmas lunch are we going to attend. 

What always confused me with Christmas, in a Croatian cultural surrounding was; why all the pressure! Why do I HAVE go to Christmas lunch with any of our families? Have we not seen each other within last 14 days more then once? Shall we not keep the tempo of seeing each other at least once every 14 days? What does make that day soooo different from other days of the year that not seeing your family on that day necessarily results in complete and utter disaster. It is the end of the world as we know it?

Some years later my German friend explained to me what is the deal with Christmas. His parents live in the norther Germany, his brother in western Germany and my friend lives in eastern Germany. He sees his family couple of times per year and Christmas is one of the few holidays when all of them know they will be free and not working. When he told me this the first time it was a Eureka moment for me. Well, ofc! In that setup Christmas makes total sense. You know all of you will be free and you haven't seen them in a while, so it is a happy occasion. After I moved to Denmark time with my family is much more valuable then it was before. Now I have the time to miss them!

http://i.huffpost.com/gen/4892592/images/o-CHRISTMAS-GIFTS-facebook.jpg

Second thing I never grasped with Christmas in general is the presents frenzy. My view of Christmas, in which I had problems fitting myself in, is spending a cozy time with your family and a part of that is gift giving. The purpose of giving presents should be to make someone happy with a gift as a token of appreciation. It should be a happy occasion, both buying/making a present and receiving it. When it turns into bickering about what should be the budget cap for presents, who should buy presents for who and what not, at that point I think that the purpose of whole gift giving for Christmas is misunderstood. 

Think about it, if you take a holiday that should be about spending cozy time with your family and you turn it into stressing over what you should buy to whom for what price, you stress over the event in general, you think about it for the greater part of the year, then I think you are doing something wrong. You knocked out all the spontaneity and coziness out of Christmas.

I don't think I will ever buy into that holiday. Fortunately it is only once per year in the darkest part of the year, so at least it doesn't destroy a nice sunny day.

I wonder if there is more of you out there who share my thoughts? P.S. I like the Christmas decorations :D

Christmas, Danish style part 1

Orange stage, Roskilde Festival

It was a beautiful sunny day in June, summer finally arrived and I was super excited about Roskilde festival that was starting in about two weeks. My girlfriend was lying in the sofa crocheting and I was fiddling with something in the kitchen and then the question came:

"Are you planning to go to Croatia this Christmas?"

My curtains rolled down and the feeling of dread loomed in, I am not the biggest fan of Christmas.

"Why are we talking about Christmas? Summer barely started, it is not even July jet?"

"Well, I need to know your plans for Christmas, so we can organize ourselves. This Christmas I am spending time with my dads family and I need to inform them are we coming together or not so they can prepare in time."

"But how much planning do they need? As I said, summer didn't even start yet?!?"

Christmas decorations in Roskilde

Christmas is huge in Denmark and it is not a topic it should be taken lightly. Plans for Christmas dinners are set in place for couple of years in advance. "This year I have Christmas dinner with my dad family and next year with my moms family" she said. I wouldn't be surprised, that now with my tiny Croatian family Christmas dinners will have to be planned on a three years cycle or on a four year cycle.

Conversations about Christmas dinner continued through the whole summer. At the end of August, after we came back from holiday and her dad and his wife came back from holiday we didn't share funny holiday stories and events. And why should we, it's not like we are full of fresh holiday impressions. We planned sitting arrangements for the Christmas dinner. Which was at the same time amusing and annoying because Christmas is just around the corner and summer is in the ancient past. I mean, who thinks about summer on a beautiful warm August night when you are having a cozy time outside in shorts until 22 and it's still daytime, it's time to buy Christmas presents and talk deserts and sitting arrangements.

But things start to get really interesting with Christmas dinners on a work place. So allegedly, (un)fortunately I haven't tried, Christmas dinners on a workplace can go really wild in Denmark. They can turn into an orgy?!!? So, after drinking and eating themselves blind, sometimes Danes can also fuck each others brains out on a Christmas dinner and never mention it afterwards, just like it never happened. I am not certain, should I be looking forward to experiencing one such Christmas dinner or not...

God Jul! What are your Christmas dinner plans for 2033?

Counting coppers

While living in Croatia in one aspect I had a bad reputation. A lot of people thought I was a cheapskate that is counting coppers and is flipping every kuna (Croatian currency) three times over. I will admit, I am guilty as charged on that count. I always liked to have control over my money. I like to know how much I am earning and what are my living expenses. I also like to know what are my needs and what is fluff, what is the stuff I can live without.

It is not surprising that with my take on money I was considered a cheapskate. This take on money definitely isn't a cultural default in Croatia. As with a lot of other things, Croatians are relaxed with money. When you have money, you spend it, don't fuss about the future too much. When it runs out, we will somehow find a way. Live a little or why are you denying yourself so much was just some of things I would hear often. I was even keeping the budget, keeping track of my expenses and income and when people would see it, I would get a bewildering giggles about it.

When my ex-wife and me went on our own I started to run the budget. At first she was a bit reluctant but she went with it. But then, six years later when Croatia hit me on the head and I lost the job, she realized how useful it was, because we had savings and money wasn't an issue. Doing budget of course isn't something Croatians usually do as well. 

Another thing Croatians don't usually do is talk about money among family or friends or ever, except when they go bankrupt. Then they start but then is too little to late. In Denmark is quite the opposite. Starting position is that people are doing budget and talk about money. That way they know how much are they earning and where is the money going. Benefit of it is that it is much more difficult to find yourself in the situation where money just magically vanishes, a situation not that uncommon in my native country. But, of course these are cultural defaults, there are Danes who couldn't hold on to 1 krona if their life depended on it and Croatians who are careful with their kunas.

At first I was a bit surprised with this cultural difference. At first I was thinking, wouldn't it be reasonable to expect that Croatians will be more careful with money since they have less and it is harder to come by? But then I realized that my reasoning is going in the wrong direction. One of the reasons why Danes have more money is because they are much more careful with their spending, both on the individual level and the level of the state. Government debt in Denmark is around 35% of the GDP and in Croatia around 75% of the GDP.

I must say that in this aspect I fell more at home in Denmark then I ever did in Croatia where I was considered just as a cheapskate weirdo. My habit of "counting coppers" is taken as a given in Denmark. As my girlfriend told me: "Of course it is normal, what other way could we keep track of our money."

I will finish this entry with one Croatian proverb that goes: "It is easy to spend other people money." maybe that on it own says enough about the way an average Croatian take on money and the state of public finances in Croatia.

Is this winter depression?

The days got really short for what I am used to. Sun rises around 8:15 and sets around 15:40, but that is fine, at 21st of December there will still be 7 hours of daylight. What I find a bit more problematic is the weather. From 1st of September until 3rd December, there have been 3 sunny weeks, out of 13 weeks. For the rest of the time it was cloudy and sometimes rainy. And when I say cloudy I mean whole sky is just uniform dull and depressing grey. That is 10 weeks of gray skies from September 1st. I am not surprised that in the Danish language the word for cloud is "sky". A lot of times it certainly looks like that the uniform gray mass is the sky. 

Yesterday I started feeling a bit under the weather for no apparent reason. Life is good here and I like it very much. I love what my girlfriend and me built for ourselves in under a year (I moved in the middle of February) and we are working great together, oftentimes we are fooling around that together we make one competent housewife. Job-situation is good and I like my job. Staircase cleaning suites my character. It is completely stress free. I work alone (as I like it), my boss is great, we get along perfectly, money is good, with our 2 paychecks we have plenty and then some to put on the side. I cycle a lot which I love. Language school is going nicely and I meet some nice people there. Every Wednesday we are going to the board-games club which satisfies my introvert social needs. So all in all I have assembled my life the way I like it and in the way I can grow and develop further. And jet I started to feel a bit down with the beginning of December.

Winter depression

Allegedly this may be the winter depression. During winter time in Denmark there isn't enough Sun. Even during fall. As I said it is constantly cloudy. Exposure to sun is important because that is how we synthesis vitamin D. Even though it can also be taken in with certain foods: fatty fish (tuna, mackerel, salmon), egg white, cheese, liver paste. Interestingly enough this food is in abundance in Danish cuisine. Two symptoms of Vitamin D deficiency are depression and back pain and a lot of Danish people suffer from winter depression and are taking Vitamin D supplements. Since I am not taking vitamin D supplements it makes it more plausible that it may be winter depression. I even heard that when you go to the doctor in winter months, you will get a question "Do you take your vitamin D regularly?". Alas it is too late for me this year because you need to take it for a full month before you start to feel the beneficial side-effects. I can only imagine the horror of what winters look like in northern Norway, Finland and Sweden. One guy who was in my raid group couple of years ago lived in Hammerfest in northern Norway. One time I checked how longs are the days/nights there. Sun sets on 23rd November and rises on 21st January. That is almost 3 full months of continuous darkness! That is bad, I must say that I can't imagine how continuous darkness looks like. 

Anyway, if you moved to some of the Scandinavian country and life is good but you start to feel a bit down in December. Worry not, it is just the lack of sun that is getting to you. It is quite normal in this part of the world. Now, I'll go and make some tuna paste, it may help.

How to meet a Dane

I come from a country where socializing was very straightforward, or at least I thought so. You go to kindergarten, school, university, work and on the way you meet people that you like or don't. You hang out with the people you like, first in neutral territory, mostly cafe bars, sometimes nightclubs. When a relationship becomes a bit deeper, visits to each other homes become common. I guess some people go to restaurants but that was never a big thing in Croatia. Socializing with people you meet on work was never considered inappropriate. And that is it, pretty straight forward right.

In Denmark, it is a bit different. Picking up people from school or university is normal and of course it happens, just like in Croatia. Hanging out with people from work privately is looked down upon. They are first and foremost colleges and should be treated professionally.

Unions

But if you move in to Denmark and you want to meet Danes and get some Danish friends none of the above is the way to go. Danes have something they call Unions. Unions are groups of like-minded individuals that share the same interests. They form a group around that interest and pursue it together. Imagine whatever hobby you like: darts, pool, cycling, role play, board-games, books etc. In Denmark, every middle sized city should have one. That is the way to meet Danes. 

I am currently a member of CIWIB. It is a union for board games. We meet once a week, every Wednesday and we play board games from 17 to 22. The thing with unions is that, nobody joins a union for hanging out, but for the pursuit of the common interest. Socializing comes in a package with it. In my group social mingling is happening while the group is forming, during a dinner break and while it is dissolving. In those moments people get to know each-other and chat about their lives and problems. It is also important to note that even that way it takes some time.

But even with that, people that move to Denmark potentially could have problems meeting Danes. With high Danish working ethics and a lot of time dedicated to work, after spending time with family, there isn't a lot of time to hang out with others. Meeting people on work, while it would be easy, isn't really an option because colleagues are just colleagues and not friends. Hanging out with them outside work is considered inappropriate.

There are two additional elements that makes meeting new people a bit hard. One is the so called Piper Act or privacy in public act. When you boil it down it basically says that when you are in public you shouldn't be a nuisance to anyone in anyway. To put it in other words, all people in public spaces have the right to their privacy. This rule translates into real life that people do not interact with anyone unless it is unavoidable. Fx. sometimes, when I am in a train I need to park my bike on somebody else bike, then I need to ask "Where are you going off", so we can figure out in what order to park the bikes and that is it, that is the only interaction people have with each other. Of course it is usually difficult to meet other people in public spaces. Piper act places an additional hurdle to it because people don't talk at all to each other in public spaces. So basically, chatting up others is virtually impossible.

Danish high paychecks heavily influence the social life. You, would think it makes it easier, but it actually makes it harder. Because everybody has high paychecks, including the waiters. That means, when you go out, you will pay for a beer around 50 kronas. One average night out could cost you around 1000 kronas and that is a lot even for danish pay-checks. And it is apparent in Denmark that Danes adapted to it. Most people are hanging out in private apartments through out the year, during summer months people barbecue a lot in the parks and there is a lot of small street festivals you can attend with your own drinks that you get from the stores. Going out to eat is reserved only for a very special occasions. 

So, when you take all these elements of Danish culture makes meeting new people a bit hard. So, how to approach it then? Well, if you want to meet foreigners, language schools is a good place. A lot of people there doesn't have a lot of contacts in Denmark so they are very open to make new acquaintances and mostly they find other Danish people very cold and distanced. But, you will not meet Danes there. If you really want to meet Danes, think hobbies, google them in the city where you live and go. There will most likely be a group that does it. Go there, meet Danes and be patient. They are a bit like a bottle of ketchup, you need to shake long and hard and for a while nothing will come out, but then suddenly so much will spill out that you will want to return some of it back into the bottle.

Second take on Danish parenting

Growing up and moving out

Portraying danish parenting in a way I did in the last post would be hugely unfair to Danes. They do love their children and take good care of them, even if it may sound harsh when you present it in a way I did. Every aspect of parenting that I mentioned has it's merit. I think that the best one is that the danish cultural default is to insist on their children moving out when they come of age. No matter that it looks harsh, especially if you take into consideration that children are asked to move out while still going to high school. With that single act they are doing them a huge favor in the long run. Kids become independent very fast. While it is a huge shock at the start and it is not easy, with this single act children will be fast-tracked into self-sufficiency. Couple of years ago I even read that, at the start, this custom severely reduces the living standard of children but within 5 years they surpass the living standard of their parents. So, at the age of 23 they are leading a better lives then they did while living with their parents!

Just as a point of comparison. A lot of children in Croatia move out of their parents in their late 20's, some even stay until their 30's. But, it shouldn't be forgotten that Denmark has a very strong labor market, full employment and amazing paychecks. If the same custom was practiced in Croatia, children would just end up on the streets and that is something Danes would never do to their children. I even asked this a couple of mine Danish friends. Would they ask their children to move out if they knew that kids couldn't find jobs and be self-sufficient and they gave me a firm no.

Curling parenting

Unfortunately, that Danish custom is slowly losing ground. Just like the rest of the world, Denmark is starting to have problems with too permissive parenting that results in incompetent young adults. Danes are calling it curling parenting. The analogy to curling is that parents sweep away the problems which their children are facing in the same way sweepers, clear the ice in curling in the stones path so it can travel further. That way, children grow up totally incompetent with facing the challenges the life presents. If family is a bit better of, the child will still move out but the parents will be financing it's life, so no life lesions will be learned. Allegedly some parents even go to their children's job interviews. The problem that I see is caused by the heavy Danish social state.

 

One problem that is present in all Scandinavian countries is that they are being too protective of their citizens, to the point that they are preventing them in making bad life choices. Don't get me wrong, that in itself is a good cause, but the consequences are not. The problem is that it is almost impossible for Danish citizens to fail. No matter what stupidity in life they do, what mistake they make, no matter the magnitude of it, the state of Denmark will always catch them. The risk of failure is reduced so drastically that there are no consequences and consequences are necessary for learning. If you don't know what the hardship is, how are you capable of valuing the plenty that you live in?

And people do rely on it. People in Denmark expect, even demand that the state solves some of their problems? Even some of the family problems, but that is the topic for another post. What happened to taking the responsibility for your own life? Calling the shots and living with consequences?

I love the Danish social state, I think it is great, but at some points I also think it is going a bit too far. It is being too protective.

Growing up in Denmark

If one would want, one could make Danes look like a horrible parents. (DISCLAIMER: this is a composite of different educational practices of parents in Denmark I have come across separately. I do not think that Danish parents are bad, but I do find it amusing when you compile it this way that they can sound so.)

As I wrote last week, very shortly after children are born, they are being tucked away at the baby-strawlers and put outside in the cold and rain to sleep at least once per day. Kindergartens have a whole baby parking installations outside where children are put to sleep.

Six to nine months after childbirth, mothers go back to the working market and children are left full time in daycare institutions. Even Danes acknowledge that because children are taken care of by professionals a lot, parents often miss on their children's important development steps like when they start to crawl, walk, talk etc.

From the age of two, danish children are starting to get education in kindergartens. First through play,but by the age of six or seven children are expected to sit and pay attention to their teachers for 45 minutes straight. If we take into consideration that attention span of an average adult is 15 minutes, I guess you can imagine that this is a very demanding task for children. But I have to be fair and say that this is a problem of education in general. If children fail at this they will be diagnosed with ADHD and treated for it. Couple of pedagogues I talked to told me that ADHD diagnosis is given out way too lightly in Denmark and that a number of children who actually have ADHD is low.

As children continue to develop, they should feel super lucky if their teeth and jaw develop as they should. If they don't, they will get external braces and they will walk around looking as space-man. With that, every shred of self-confidence they may have developed is completely ruined.

When they turn 13 they join the labor market and ofc they are being exploited. When children in Denmark start to work, they are being paid only half of what adults would be earning for the same position. 

When puberty kicks in and hormones start raging, when kids start to mature and ask questions about life, meaning, purpose and all other kinds of philosophical questions, their parents point them to the psychologists. Why? Because there is only so much personal problems with which parents can't be bothered, for everything else there are professionals who are there to help children to grow up. Did I say problems? Sorry, I meant to say normal part of development. Yes, for normal part of development, children in Denmark are sent to the psychologists.

Hmm... but maybe they do need professional help, after all from 13 to 18 they are expected to develop working habits and go to school and excel at both because in Denmark you can't be less then perfect. At the same time they are constantly being reminded that they are nothing special, that they shouldn't stand out, that is the way of the Jante Law that is deeply ingrained in Danish culture. And as an icing on the cake children are supposed to take their emotions and bury them deep down and never show them, because that is also deeply ingrained in Danish culture. All of that is expected from them while nothing in life makes sense and hormones are raging. And just at the moment they got the hang of their emotions, answered some of the questions, finished school, their loving parents thank them for cooperation and ditch them out of the apartment because that is expected when you turn 18. 

Of course they can visit from time to time, but only if announced a month in advance. After all, parents have their lives as well.

Don't you just wanna be a kid growing up in Denmark?

Freezer baby parking

This time I will write about what I consider the most unusual Danish tradition I have seen, parking babies out in the cold.

I moved to Denmark at the end of February. Temperatures were hovering around 0 degrees for the next three weeks with a more or less constant drizzle, so weather was far from ideal. With that kind of weather, one day I am coming home from work and I see 5 or six baby-strawlers parked at the courtyard of the building where I lived in Copenhagen. I was totally out of myself! I even saw a mom coming out with a baby-strawler, parks it outside and casually goes back up to her apartment. So she just left her baby outside in the cold and rain!

When I entered the apartment I described the horror that I just witnessed but Al'Shadar was completely un-phased by it. She just shrugged it of and said: "What of it? We do it constantly and it is healthy for the babies to sleep out in the cold." I must say that at first I took it as something completely mental. Throughout march, Copenhagen was littered with babies sleeping out in the cold.

I became curious about the custom and was asking people what is that all about. I was trying to figure out why are they doing it, for how long in the year are they doing it, how and where did the custom start. From Danes I got the first part and second part of the answer. It is consider that it is healthy for children to sleep out in the cold, they also managed to convinced me that it is quite safe. Babies are tucked in good and they are not freezing, on the contrary, parents often overdress them, they are under constant surveillance with the help of the baby monitor and parents instantly reacts when the baby starts crying. Also, babies sleep out in the cold for as long the temperatures outside are lower then the temperatures indoors and that is the case for at least 6 months in a year, from October to March.

But nobody could tell me how and when did this unusual custom start. Also, the claims that it is healthy for the children was always only on the level of common knowledge and as something that everybody does and knows. When I said that in Croatia I could imagine social services going out if they found out you are doing it, Danes were quite surprised. Since I couldn't get an answer I had to look it up.

The custom started on Iceland in early 20th century during a tuberculosis epidemic. Pedagog David Thorsteinsson in 1926. suggested that putting healthy children out in the baby-strawlers could be a good way of isolating them from the sick children so they don't get infected. From there the custom spread to all Scandinavian countries. Today it is a common practice among parents it is even considered as a bullet-proof evidence of good parenting. 

 

But still is it healthy for real? As it turns out it actually is. In 1990 a study was conducted by the Swedish National Board of Health and Welfare. The study showed that children that spent six to nine hours outside per week were significantly less sick when compared to children that spent between one and five hours outside per week. Finnish scientist Marjo Tourula did a study on infants sleeping outdoors and she realized that children are sleeping significantly longer when sleeping in the cold compared to when they are sleeping on room temperatures.

So to conclude, weirdish custom that could terrify my Croatian relatives if I were to practice it is actually very healthy and beneficial to children. 

 

So please, if you visit Denmark or any other Scandinavian country and see baby parking on the streets at sub-zero temperatures please compose yourself and don't call the social services, you are witnessing a very normal Danish custom.

Work, work

Arbejde, arbejde (work, work) are the words you hear far too often when talking to Danes. Arbejde means work and work is an integral part of Danish identity, without it Danes wouldn't be what they are. It pops out in every conversation, it is in every corner of every street, it is a part of family life, it is ever-present and unavoidable... it is work. What's up with Danes and work and why do they find it so important?

They have a worker bee hive mind mentality. They say that if they work hard they will produce enough value and that will be good for everyone. Basically they think that with hard work, value is produced that can go back to their social state and their social state will provide to those in need. So hard work is the thing that makes Danish social state, that provides the safety net, run around and Danes want and like their social state. This is where the first paradox in Danish culture arises - and they have a number of them. Their amazing social state can run around only if Danes continue working hard and if they use it only in circumstances when it is simply unavoidable: when they loose a job or for some reason they are unable to work. But at the same time, ideally and if possible, services of the social state should never be used.

Also, working market in Denmark is very flexible. It is very flexible because on the one hand the demand for workers is huge and on the other hand there is a safety net I have been mentioning that kicks in when people lose jobs, quit jobs or are not able to work, because of all that taken together people are not afraid to change jobs. That also makes staying in one workplace for life not that common, at the same time job hopping is looked down upon. So, changing jobs is considered ok, as long as that doesn't happen too often.

Danes start working when they are 13. Not a lot of course, couple of hours per week, on a bit lower wage because in those years people will not be put in positions that require a lot of responsibility. By 18 they developed their working habits, they did a number of starter jobs and at that time the default Danish family expects that their kid should, find their own place to live and go. 

One good consequence of this is that there is no jobs that are looked down upon. It isn't shameful to work as a garbage man, cleaner, delivery man etc. The first thing that gets you respect in Denmark is that you are working. It is always more important to earn your own money, be independent, pull your own weight and contribute to society in general then to be picky with jobs and mooch from the social state and your family. Social state is there only in case of emergency and it is not to be used lightly.

And hard work pays of!

In Denmark, connections will not get you very far, not compared to hard work and skill. Hard work also pays of at a much more fundamental level. Political consensus in Denmark is that the lowest salary should be so high that you can make your own living. You wouldn't get rich from it but you could make your life run around without help from others. Something completely unimaginable from where I come from. That hard work pays of is seen everywhere in Denmark. It is something for one of the following blog posts.

Cut-throat world of the danish bike lanes

It is a cut-throat world on the danish bike lanes. On some days it feels like everything is out to get you. Children, elderly people, other cyclists... especially other cyclist and they are creative about it. Everybody except the car drivers, they, are super considerate to cyclists. And of course they are, if there is a crash with a cyclist and driver being a part of it it will be drivers fault by default unless cyclist went through red light. But at the same time, deep down, drivers hate cyclists.

"Copenhagen cyclists are the worst", one of my friends said.

And I must say that I understand the sentiment. 

When I just arrived I was working with a friend who isn't a passionate cyclist. Also, we both recently moved to Copenhagen and we didn't know the city so we were relying on a GPS a lot and we weren't riding fast. We were definitely slower cyclists out there. Oooo boy, I was feeling like a moving target! Other cyclist were just swooshing past us, often angrily using their bells, somehow you can just hear the frustration from the way the person uses a bike bell. We were just a slow crawling nuisance that was reducing Danish commuting efficiency.

That lasted for two months. My friend and me learned the ropes of our job and we started working independently. Since, by that time I got to know the city as well I started riding my usual style, fast and determined, like a well integrated immigrant.

Since then I saw the other dark side of Copenhagen cyclists. They don't care for pedestrians at all and sometimes they really should. Danish cycling infrastructure is great but it has it's flaws. For example bus stations are in between the road and the bike lane, so when passengers are going on or of the bus they must go across the bike lane. On multiple occasions, when bus would stop and passengers would start going of, I would either stop or crawl so people can normally get of the bus. I thought other cyclists would do the same, I was wrong. They don't, they just go into mode; moving obstacles... avoid... avoid, so they just go zig-zaging through the passengers getting of the bus and almost colliding with me, since I am letting people go over the bike lane. Even though the default is, squeeze through the pedestrians and try not to hit them, I still stop and let them through and risk being ran over by a determined Dane on the bike. It is the same with crosswalks. You would think when people are crossing the road on the green light that cyclists would let them through, they don't. I guess their reasoning is that if someone ends up under their wheels, it is their fault.

Position of the bike lane in between the road and the sidewalk causes other problems as well. When people are getting out of the car, or fetching stuff from the car they have to be on the bike lane. That is what is causing a lot of potentially dangerous situations. On multiple occasions I was in a situation where I thought that I will slam into the person getting out of the car, or into the person going across the bike lane. Two times I was in a situation in which the person going across the bike lane saw me, looked me straight into the eyes, acknowledged that I am approaching and still made a step unto the bike lane even though I was just 2 meters away approaching in high speed. Fortunately for me, disk brakes had enough power to stop me before I hit the person.

Cyclist are also a menace to other cyclists. A lot of them is making turns without signaling, joining the bike lane without any thought of the incoming traffic, squeezing in past you in places where there is enough room for just one bike, people riding children bikes overtake when it seems there isn't enough space. On occasions it can really feel like: "Ok, this one will crash into me, but then they don't." I will conclude that I am the inexperienced one.

To conclude these 2 cycling posts. Danish bike lanes are amazing. If a person lives and works in Copenhagen there really is no reason to commute by car. The fastest way of commuting is using the bike, but it isn't the safest one. So, in a tame country of Denmark, where everything is regulated and controlled, if you want to get some adrenaline, get a bike and jump in! Who knows, maybe that is the reason why are Danes doing it, so they can feel alive at least while they are in their daily commute.

Cycling in Denmark

Cycling is a great hobby of mine. In the second year of studies I was mugged in a tram in Zagreb and for a short period of time I was afraid of using Zagreb public transportation. That didn't last long but it lasted long enough for me to notice the crappy old green bike in front of the apartment. I think dad bought it when I was a kid, but nobody ever used it. That time I thought, why not, let's try. Oooo the freedom.... being independent from public transport, not wasting your life away in traffic jams and the commuting speed. It was love on the first sight and it just grew from there. First it led to me working as a bike courier as I was wrapping up my studies. And I loved that stupid job. Roaming around the city on the bike for the whole day, beautiful! 

After I got into the grove I was doing between 50 and 80 km a day and then one day I woke up and asked myself: "How far could I go if I just cycle in one direction?" The answer was the coastline. Zagreb is located a bit less then 200km from the coastline. And that was it, eternal love between my bike and me was sealed.

As it turned out my dear friend was equally crazy about cycling as I was. From 2010 to 2016, 4 out of 6 summers we spent on cycling trips around Europe: Berlin, Tirana, Lake Ohrid, Swiss Alps, Krakow, Sarajevo, Dubrovnik, Prague; to name just a few places we have seen with our best 2 wheeled friends.

Cycling is just a part of me and it will always be a part of my life in a smaller or larger degree.

Before I moved to Denmark I knew that Denmark has an amazing cycling infrastructure and that the cycling is a big thing there. Even with that knowledge I wasn't prepared for reality, which was just WoW.

First time Al'Shadar took me to the center of Copenhagen I felt like a small child, full of awe and wonder for the new world. Bike lanes were everywhere and they were wide enough so you can overtake and they were packed! First group of people commuting was around 70 bikes large! Up to that point the largest group of other fellow cyclist I was waiting for the trafficlight in Zagreb was 5! So I recon you can understand my surprise when I saw a group of that size.

Danish cycling infrastructure is just amazing. There are not two places in Denmark that are not connected with a bike lane. Bike lanes are just everywhere in Denmark even between nowhere and nowhere. For real! There are even bike lanes in rural area with just couple of people living in them.

But, cycling lanes is one thing but bicycles are something else. Before I moved I expected that in a country with such a great infrastructure, quality of the bikes will follow but it doesn't. Most of the bikes you can see in traffic are crappy old city bikes and when I say crappy I mean crappy! If bikes were supposed to pass some road safety test, most of the bikes on Danish roads would fail. At first I was surprised with that but as I started to get to know Danish culture it started to make sense. People in Denmark don't cycle because it is there hobby, they cycle to commute. Bicycle in Denmark is a transportation device and Danes treat them as such. Bicycles are tools to be used for commuting and not hobby items you will pamper.

But that can also be seen on the Danish streets. During workdays most of the bicycles looks like they will fall apart if you look them in a bad way. Weekends are a different story though. Then avid cyclists pull out their babies out of storage and these bikes are something else. Sexy roadies worth 10000 dkk or more. Mountain bikes are a rare sight in Denmark. When you get to see one, you will remember it, and that makes sense. Of course mountain bikes are not popular and why would they be. Denmark is FLAT and the usefulness of mountain-bikes is very limited. You just don't need mountain-bikes in a flat country.

But there is a lot of weird looking bike-things that are used for transportation of people and/or things. On multiple occasions I have seen a parent transporting their two or more children in children-bikes. Some of them are three wheeled with a transport spaces on the front axle, some of them have two wheels with transportation space between the wheels, but these are made just to carry cargo. The most interesting one I have seen is for transportation of blood.

To conclude, biking is huge in Denmark and you can see it everywhere. But it isn't huge because Danes are passionate bicyclers, it is huge because it is a mean of transport. But if you are a passionate cyclist, moving to Denmark will be a huge quality if life improvement.

In the next blog entry I will talk a bit about how it is to cycle on danish bike lanes.

Danes in public spaces

Denmark is a bit over regulated country. 

Laws are set in place and people adhere to them and everything is working like clockwork. Problems arise when there is a part of everyday life that is not regulated in that way, then Danes get a bit lost. Great examples is open public space that isn't strictly regulated: behavior in daily commute and in shopping.

But let's start with road traffic. That will offer a great contrast to the point I am trying to make, because it is highly regulated activity. When Danes are driving cars they are borderline boring, in a good way. When you are driving in Denmark you should feel safe. Like any other regulated aspect of life in Denmark, this one is also working spotlessly. People don't speed, during peak hours, if there is no traffic obstructions everything is flowing. If you need to change lanes, you just need to turn on the blinkers and they will immediately allow you to change lanes. Totally, non stressful and safe. My favorite element of road traffic is when Danes are using a lane that is obligatory turn. You will see ten or more cars standing in a obligatory left lane for example and all of them blinking that they will make the left turn, like they have any other options. Why is this aspect of everyday life working like clockwork? Because it is regulated and the fines for infringement of traffic rules are very high. So, Danes are not given any freedoms and nothing is left to interpretation. Speed limit is 110, you will not drive faster. When you turn left, you will blink. Easy peasy! Danes excel at following rules.

But behavior in trains, shopping malls and bike lanes is not regulated, Danes are left to their own devices and than things start going a bit wrong.

Trains and shopping malls sometimes look like battlegrounds where speed and relentless determination are essential for survival.... no wait do you need them in order to board a train or buy groceries? Of course you don't, but it certainly looks like you do.

When Danes are boarding a train they will form a narrow passage way around the doors and eagerly wait to jump on its pray. At the moment the doors open if foot does not peak in a split of a second the relentless stampede will start. If someone does want to get of, but he did not react fast enough, the Danish stampede will stop and reluctantly give only minimal space for the person to get of the train. They are on a mission! Board the train like your life depends on it! It is the same with getting of the train. If a woman with a child, person with a bike or a person in a wheelchair wants to get of the train, the Danish stampede does not care. Tightly packed line is formed and if you are not in it you must wait until they pass or you will be trampled. Women with baby carts receive help to get of the train usually from the conductor, or the first person that is trying to get on the train. I recon that a woman with a baby cart is seen as an obstruction that reduces the efficient boarding so it should be removed fast. Train rides are ruthless and should not be taken lightly in Denmark.

It is very similar in the supermarkets. When waiting in line at the cash register, you can feel them breathing down the back of your neck. If you want to take a slight step outside of the line, you are running the risk of losing your space. In general, if you display any hesitation while trying to get in line or while you are waiting in line you are doing it at your own risk, after all there is only so much food in the store, it just might run out.

If you are looking at something on the shelves and another Dane is looking at it as well but he got there before you, do not expect it will give you any space so you can look as well. The only thing you will get is a mute angry stare that says: "I got here first! I will move when I am done and not a split second before!" Ooookkkk.... it is not like the milk will run anywhere by the time you are done. There are counters to this behavior. Option I usually go for is just wait. Relentless Danish shoppers are usually done within half a minute. Second option is that you could ask them to give you some space. It would be acknowledged as demonstration of force and if you would leave the impression that you are the alpha hunter in this isle the weaker shopper could retreat and acknowledge defeat and wait it's turn.

Third alternative is to ask them for some space. With popping this question you are putting a Dane in a state of internal conflict between making a scene, if he decides not to give you space and pulling back. The last thing a Dane in public wants is to be noticed by others, so he will give up and let you look. They just can't stand being noticed by strangers.

Why is it like that? Because Danes are great at following rules. Whenever they see a rule, by default and without thinking, they oblige. That is why, if rules are set up in a smart way, that part of life will function without a glitch. But there is a negative side effect of this behavior as well, it creates boiled up frustrations inside. These frustrations surface on weekends or in non-regulated activities. That is when Danes give in to their urges that are buried deep down inside and that is what makes them to see a lady with a stroller just as an obstacle that needs to be solved in the shortest possible time!   

New Croatian caste system

Today I read another typical Croatian horror story. A lady works as a cook in a school. Couple of years into her employment a new main cook is employed. After the first year of his employment, sexual harassment starts. She goes to the school principal to report it, and the response that she gets is, that she is making it all up. The school immediately filed a counter lawsuit against her for stealing school property. She won that case and the verdict is final, she was declared innocent of the charges. One time she asks the offender: "but why do you do it? "Because nobody can touch me, I have the school principle under my control". The harassed lady filed the law suit against the harasser and won, but the verdict still isn't final. There is still the right to appeal to the supreme court. Since the harassment began, years have passed. The harasser is still working in the same school - still doing his thing.

Major of Split between 2009 - 2013

This is only one of many stories of the same type from Croatia. The pattern is the following; a person of influence - be it a politician, a business man or their family members - commits a serious crime on the level of; murder in the first or second degree, embezzlement of the huge amount of money, fraud, harassment, blatant ignoring of laws etc. Institutions do the work and file a lawsuit - no need to mention the case is clear as daylight, even to someone with the IQ of the room temperature.

Consequences? None. In most cases years or even decades later, judicial proceedings are still not over, the final verdicts still haven't been reached or the trials have been rolled back to the start. In some cases, there are verdicts with a laughable punishment (fx. one of the former ministers was charged with embezzlement of tens of millions of HRK Čobanković, and the sentence was one year in jail that was replaced with volunteer work). In other cases, people in power just blatantly breach the laws and nothing is happening (fx. second person in command of University of Zagreb refuses to go to retirement after he passed all the legal limits of the age when you must retire by law).

On the other hand, you have normal, every day people that are not in a position of power; that do some minor infringement of the Croatian law, people who suffered injustice, people in need of a special care or just normal young people fresh out of school trying to make a living.

Consequences? Severe! If you live in Croatia and you are not in a position of power, you don't want to be in a situation where you need the "services" of the Croatian legal system. Just to mention some short examples. In 2015, lady in Osijek was arrested and taken to a police station because she crossed a street on a red light. 

Son of a businessman that was financing the strongest political party in Croatia, killed two high school girls because of speeding. After two years and annulled judicial proceeding, the killer got a reduced sentence by six months - that was later reduced even further - that needed to be served in a open correctional facility. Justice for the families of the killed girls? Who cares when they are not coming from a good Croatian family, right?

A number of my friends, fresh out of university, were looking for any jobs for years and couldn't find any. Finally they left and guess what? They got on their feet fast and are living successful lives in whichever country they decided to go - but there was no place for any of them in Croatia. 

Conclusion, when you are not in a position of power in Croatia, legal system will not protect you, police will not protect you and your career opportunities are very limited if you are not from a good family.

All of this made me thinking; didn't Croatia somehow develop a caste system? There is a clear pattern in Croatian society: if you were born in a family with a position of power, all the doors will be open for you and no matter what shit you cause, there will be no consequences. You are just beyond the reach of the law and Croatia is your playground.

On the other hand if you are an average Joe, or God forbid, skilled or talented without connections, your life options are crippled. There are loads of stories of talented Croatians who just would not get the lucky break in Croatia... but when they left all the doors opened for them. The last one I read was about a young opera singer. In Croatia he struggled. After he finished his education he couldn't even get a small and insignificant role in an opera. Then he applied for the scholarship in La Scala, Milan. Now he is singing with the most famous opera singers in the world. At the same time Croatian national opera is in the free fall. Guess what? Talent doesn't matter, but family does. 

I could tell a million similar stories. Is it really surprising that the quality of all institutions is going down in Croatia? Of course not! In a new Croatian caste system, family is all and talent and skill are nothing.

Agency for legalization of illegally built buildings

More then 300.000 Croatians left the country since 2013, all the doors for them were closed. Number of employed people in public and state companies rose since cousins need to work. How will it end? Either it will snap at the point when the money runs out or Croatia will become a pleasant country for cousins and summer holiday. I mean, isn't administrative personnel in Croatia, just a really expensive kind of social support?

But let's end this entry on a positive note. Do you know why there is no sex in Croatian state administration? Because everybody is related.

Come what may but I need to leave this place

It was the winter morning on 27th of January 2019 and 3 months passed since I started torturing my ex-wife, my soon to be new girlfriend and myself and I have finally decided. I have been finally deciding a lot of things often and all were final in these last three months, but this time it was final for real:

"So, have you made up your mind?"

"Yes, all my instincts are telling me that I need to go without you."

With these words I erased everything we have been building together for the last 18 years and this time I was sure, but my words had so little weight at that point. I have changed my mind so many times, I have been tearing myself apart for three weeks:

"I am sitting in the car now and leaving now, because I have to! But you can't, you have your friends here, you have your family here, everything you have built is here, your wife is here and everything is ok with you two, you can't do it to her, you just can't abandon it all." Every day, for three weeks, two times a day, these were the thoughts going through my head. After a while I would be so worn out by it that I would just throw myself on the floor crying in despair and then compose myself by the time my wife, at the time came home.

Since I was so insecure in these three months and changed my decisions so often, I told myself that I need to prove it to myself and to others, especially to Al'shadar, that this is it now, I am doing it for sure. I told her that I will start with preparations to leave for Denmark sometimes in the middle of February and that I will prove every step of the way and document it to her, or to me? I needed to do this for me as well, since my words had so little weight at the time.

And I did it, every day something: documents, apartment in Copenhagen, planning the trip, getting rid of stuff, packing, seeing friends, losing friends, disappointing friends, making my family cry. It was insane, scary, devastating, destructive, ugly, beautiful, exhilarating all at the same time. But finally after two and a half years I had a goal, a purpose, I finally knew what needed to be done and I did it! I am leaving for Denmark on 10th of February.

And that morning came, my whole life was in that car, it was so unreal and purifying at the same time. You actually realize, at moments like these, how much useless stuff you have and with how little you can actually live and be happy.

I was driving of to Denmark on February 10th but I was leaving the old apartment on February 9th. My ex-wife asked me to leave on that day I wanted to respect her wishes. I was the one who messed it up and made the call and she was the one who was super supportive to the very end. That last hour was devastating, I was aware that this is the last time I will be in this apartment, that I will see, I guess my ex-dog, that I loved soo much, my turtles that will get a new home in two weeks! My heart was broken but my determination was unquestionable. First you must destroy the old if you want to build something new. And I did! And it hurt like hell but it was necessary!

I sat in the car and drove of to a gas station first: "What have I done! I have destroyed everything and there is no turning back now!" But there was no turning back now for good 2 weeks and I new this. Off to a coffee with a friend: "OMG this is great! The best decision ever! Let's do this!" All of this was going through my head in a time span of 10 minutes but after the horror of leaving passed, there was peace and just the brave new world and a new life for me to build as I please. That's why all the destruction of everything was worth every second and I would do it again.

I said goodbye to a friend, my grandparents and went to spend the night with my parents for the last time... still feels surreal and that feeling will stay with me for some time. The more time passes the less frequent it is but it still pops up from time to time, both for me and Al'shadar.

The moment has come, last "systems check", fire up the engine and go... after 50 meters: "Oh shit, where is the passport!" I am stopping the car on a step hill... ufff it's ok it is here. Let's go! IIIII am DOING IT!!!! After 2 kilometers all the lights on the control panel lit up! "O c'mon! Don't give up on me now! We have been to so many places together, you can't fail me now! Ok, ok I will stop at the bus stop, turn it off and on again, it just needs a reset, it will be ok." Gravel crunching as the car is stopping and the gentle hum of the diesel engine dies, the car is off... One click, two clicks, crank it all the way, engine sputtering and... IT'S WORKING!!! IT'S WORKING!!! Bye, bye Croatia, see you... sometime but not soon.

Denmark here I come!!!