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25 - 31 January 2013 | Vol 16 Issue 4

B EFORE THE da� odils arrive this spring, the government hopes to introduce reforms to kick-start Denmark’s ail-

ing economy and get people back into work. But business and union leaders have already voiced their proposals, and they vary vastly.

Like the rest of Europe, Denmark is struggling to shrug o� the e� ects of 2008’s � nancial crisis before which only around 67,500 people were un-employed. Unemployment rapidly rose following the crisis and levelled o� at around 163,000 in early 2010 where it remains today.

Industrial jobs have been particu-larly slow to return to Denmark, which Nils Smedegaard Andersen, the man-aging director of shipping giant AP Moller-Maersk, stated is because Danish salaries are uncompetitive.

“In order to make it possible for more people to enter the job market, we need to lower salaries. � is will enable indus-try to remain in Denmark and provide work,” Andersen told Berlingske newspa-per. “Not everyone is highly educated or quali� ed enough for more advanced jobs, and Danish salaries are not competitive with those in India, Germany or Sweden. � at’s why jobs are leaving the country.”

His view is supported by Lars Løkke Rasmussen, the leader of the centre-right party Venstre, Denmark’s largest political party.

“We need to � rst and foremost en-sure that people increase their education and quali� cations in order to be able to

Disagreement over how to tackle unemploymentemployed are to blame for the struggling economy. � e confederation of trade unions, LO, argue that over 21,000 jobs could be created over the next two years if the government and pension funds in-vested in Danish infrastructure.

“� e lack of growth can be blamed � rst and foremost on the fact that we are not spending enough money,” LO’s chairman, Harald Børsting, stated in a press release. “We need to increase do-mestic demand in order to create more workplaces.”

LO’s proposals include building new public housing, investing in rail-ways and improving energy e� ciency, as well as halting proposed cuts to the tax authority Skat. It argues that employing 500 more full-time sta� members will result in a 300 million kroner annual surplus after their salaries are paid.

Unemployment continues on page 4

Flat fee a new � op for battered Danske Bank

Cameron’s way splits nation’s Euro MPs

153

Maersk cheif says cutting salaries will bring back industrial jobs, but union argues a better solution is to create jobs by investing in public infrastructure

compete for knowledge work, but we also need to ensure that our salaries do not rise faster than abroad, which would reduce our competitive ability.”

Venstre and other right-wing parties have also argued that there are plenty of low income jobs available, but that there is little incentive to take a job because un-employment bene� ts are too generous.

One Venstre MP, Hans Andersen, even argued that the unemployed should be forced to move to parts of the coun-try where work is available. Libertarian party Liberal Alliance (LA) argued that simply cutting unemployment bene� ts was su� cient, however.

“Our bene� ts are too generous,” LA MP Joachim B Olsen told tabloid Ekstra Bladet. “It would make more sense to cut it to a reasonable level rather than make them move. If there is the correct incen-tive, people will move on their own.”

But not everyone agrees that the un-

PETER STANNERS

FOCUS

Happiness is ... a shack where you can on a cold day drink beer together with your friends

10

NEWS

Economists expecting the worst as many homeowners prepare to start repaying mortgage principal

4

Manslaughter trial

7

Trial reopens old scars for students as court tries to place blame for 2010 boating accident

Greatness beckons

14

Big week for sport as handball teams and football manager Laudrup gear up for key matches

NEWS

SPORT

Immigration rule changes leave theatre school’s foreign students in a tight spot

All play but no work6

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Iceland travel supplement inside

travel supplement 2013

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2 25 - 31 January 2013The Copenhagen posT CphposT.dkWeek in revieW

TV Viewers will notice some-thing different about their chan-nel line-up starting on January 28. Public broadcaster Dr will be introducing two new chan-nels. The first, Dr3, will be mar-keted towards 15 to 39-year-olds – its first week schedule includes the Danish premiere of the Us series ‘Girls’. Dr ramasjang

Lille will feature programming for three to six-year-olds, freeing the current Dr ramasjang to air more programmes for older chil-dren. As part of the change, Dr2 will become a news channel. To create space for the new chan-nels, Dr will be eliminating Dr HD and headline news channel Dr Update.

FinAnciAL watchdogs at Fi-nanstilsynet are preparing to get rid of members of boards of financial companies – including banks, insurance companies and pension funds they feel are not competent. The authority has concluded that some executives are failing to live up to finance industry standards and should

be replaced. companies are ex-pected to address the issue dur-ing their annual general meet-ings this spring, and some have begun recruiting more board members with professional ex-perience. industry analysts said Finanstilsynet’s move indicated it had become impatient with the pace of change.

THE WEEK’S MOST READ STORIES AT CPHPOST.DK

Up in smoke: Notorious ‘coffee shop’ closes its doors

Intense criticism over planned Danske Bank fee changes

Being Mr Nice Guy

Concerns over possible Scandia Housing bankruptcy

Christiania crackdown yielding weapons and drugs

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Polar bears tested the waters in their new digs at Copenhagen Zoo earlier this week. The zoo’s newly-built Arctic ring pavilion opens in February, and the bears are gradually being given the chance to get used to the larger facility

New channel choicesBoards on notice

some 17 councils are under suspicion for concealing how some farmers bend the rules in order to gain eU subsidies. Farmers must meet requirements in areas such as health, animal welfare and the environment. if the councils report violations to state officials, it can result in sub-sidies being revoked. Although

it has no direct control over the councils, it is the state that is is-sued with the fine if the eU un-covers misdoing, which could amount to hundreds of millions of kroner. in one instance, offi-cials from Aabenraa council told off 195 farmers in 2012 without reporting a single violation, ac-cording to Politiken newspaper.

Cheating councils

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Afdragsfrilån (noun) – mortgage with deferred principal payments. Where have you heard it: From people blam-ing each other for the economic calamity the mortgages will cause when homeowners need to start repaying them CPH POST WORD Of THE WEEK:

TEN YEARS AGO. A critical shortage of qualified train conductors means central and western Jutland lines will not run free of delays for perhaps more than half a year.

fIVE YEARS AGO. The Danish men’s handball team wins its first ever gold medal at the European Handball Championship.

ONE YEAR AGO. Anti-Muslim organisation Danish Defence League announces plans for first major rally in Aarhus.

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325 - 31 January 2013 The Copenhagen posT CphposT.dk

Local councillors in Hvidovre are fuming that neighbouring copenhagen

plans to erect four wind turbines in a waterfront area on the border between the two cities.

Hvidovre council opposes the construction of the 148-me-tre wind turbines, which are four times the height of copenha-gen’s round Tower, arguing they will spoil the view from their new beach near Kalvebod syd,

while compromising an adjacent nature reserve.

While citizen groups have been battling wind-turbine placements for years, many of the newest disputes have emerged between neighbouring local governments. and in the case of Hvidovre versus copen-hagen, the conflict is one that pits members of the same party against each other.

a unanimous Hvidovre council, including four social-istisk Folkeparti (sF) members, has joined forces with a residents’ group to send a letter of protest to ayfer Baykal, the deputy mayor for environmental affairs in co-penhagen – and a member of sF – concerning the turbines.

“our nature areas, with our

new beach, and our many resi-dents living on the coast will be disturbed,” anders Wolf andres-en (sF), a Hvidovre councillor, told Jyllands-Posten newspaper. “i simply don’t understand that they can’t find an alternate site for the turbines.”

But so far, Baykal has dis-missed Hvidovre’s objections, contending that the turbines are going up in accordance with the capital’s goal of becoming carbon-neutral by the year 2025.

“We are not putting up the turbines in order to harass the people of Hvidovre,” Baykal told Jyllands-Posten. “and personal-ly, i don’t mind them becoming part of the city skyline.”

Hvidovre, however, cited other concerns, such as the im-

Not in your backyard, neighbouring council tells City Hall

Copenhagen’s plans to build wind turbines will disturb an EU-mandated bird sanctuary, critics in neighbouring Hvidovre say

Christian Wenande

Cameron’s speech has been called “a historic turning point” for the EU

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This will result in too much traffic. The roads are too narrow where the bicycle paths are planned

The proposed route passes directly through Christiania

Commune claims the route is unsafe and passes too close to its confines. City is open to changes, but not drastic ones

Christiania seeking to block bike path

R esidenTs oF chris-tiania are seeking to alter the path of a pro-posed bicycle route

they say passes too close to the commune.

The route, named ‘chris-tianshavnsruten’, is designed to be a shortcut for cyclists travel-ling between the city centre and amager.

But Fonden Fristaden chris-tiania, which represents the commune’s interests, has lodged an official protest out of con-cerns that it poses a safety risk.

“it’s like with windturbines. even if you support sustainable energy, you can still oppose cer-tain wind turbines being placed in certain locations, if they’re too noisy or pose some other problem,” Knud Foldschack, a spokesperson for Fonden Fris-taden christiania, told Politiken newspaper. “This will result in

too much traffic. The roads are too narrow where the bicycle paths are planned.”

Plans to build the new path have been discussed for sev-eral years and are part of the city council’s goal of mak-ing copenhagen a more bike-friendly city by building direct cycle routes and bridges that will help cyclists reach their destina-tions quicker.

F o n d e n Fristaden chris-tiania appealed without success last autumn to have construc-tion stopped. it is now looking into the possibil-ity of altering the route so that it doesn’t go straight through the commune.

The city said it was open to alternative routes, but said what ever the final path was, it should be as straight as possible.

a final decision about the path of the route could lie in the hands of Kulturstyrelsen, which manages the country’s historic

sites. The ramparts surround-ing the disused naval base are listed as historic sites, and any construction that affected them would need to be approved.

The city has already spoken with Kulturstyrelsen about al-ternative routes, but to no avail.

“if christiania can speak with Kultursty-relsen and come up with a differ-ent solution then we’d be willing to look at it,” Jens elmelund, the assistant head of the city’s public works de-partment, said. “But paths like these have to be

as straight as possible or cyclists won’t use them.”

aside from the route through christiania, new paths on Gothersgade and Kristian iX’s Gade/Bremerholm and new bridges across the harbour in christianshavn are expected to alleviate bicycle traffic over the two main bridges, Knippelsbro and langebro, connecting the city with amager.

THe eu Has reached a turn-ing point following British prime minister david cam-

eron’s highly anticipated speech about the union on Wednesday, according to legislators and policy watchers in denmark.

cameron said the uK would hold a referendum on eu mem-bership in the next five years once the country had renegoti-ated its relationship with the 27-member union.

at the heart of his speech was a call for the eu to allow more space for national differ-ences, while also reducing regu-lations he argued damaged com-petition in the single market.

“The eu must be able to act with the speed and flexibility of a network, not the cumbersome rigidity of a bloc,” cameron said. “[We] are a family of democratic nations, all members of one eu-ropean union, whose essential foundation is the single market rather than the single currency.”

cameron argued that the eu’s single market was its cor-nerstone, though MeP dan Jørgensen (socialdemokraterne) said that position ignored the value of other areas of european co-operation.

“i don’t think he can get what he’s asking for,” Jørgensen told The copenhagen Post. “He wants the eu to consist only of a single market, but we’ve made the union into something greater, which also protects the environment, social welfare and other areas. He is also calling for less regulation at the worst pos-sible time. The economic crisis showed us the need to regulate markets more, not less.”

The financial crisis and eu-

Danes: Cameron’s EU speech sets new vision for Europe

rozone debt crisis have led to european leaders – spearheaded by France and Germany – call-ing for increased economic and budgetary integration. The fiscal compact and banking treaties that were drawn up last year are hoped to prevent future crises by providing a greater central-ised eu oversight of country’s finances and banks.

But the uK under cameron seems to be moving in the op-posite direction. While cam-eron said he was currently in favour of remaining a member of the eu, the fear remains that if the uK is not granted the concessions it wants – such as staying out of the fiscal compact and securing opt-outs from jus-tice and home affairs decisions – cameron will support an exit that will throw the eu into even greater turmoil.

Professor Peter nedergaard, of the university of copenha-gen, argued cameron’s speech was an attempt to map out a new path for the eu.

“Flexible integration is a new discourse in the eu that is pre-sented as an alternative to one-size-fits-all solutions and instead

allows countries to choose what areas of co-operation they do or do not want to be part of,” ne-dergaard said. “This is the way ahead for europe, and i think it would be a failure to view david cameron as a lonely guy in this game. The major trend in europe is acknowledging that we have a common core of trade and busi-ness regulations, but also accept-ing flexibility about how integrat-ed countries want to be.”

MeP Morten Messer-schmidt (dansk Folkeparti) is a strong supporter of cameron’s demands for more flexibility within the eu and called his speech a “historic turning point for the eu”.

He added that denmark would be wise to follow the uK’s lead.

“We should examine which areas of european co-operation infringe on danish sovereignty, examine whether denmark ben-efits from the co-operation and demand a return of power if they do not,” Messerschmidt told The copenhagen Post.

MEP says British PM’s plans for more flexible EU are wishful thinking, though an expert argues Cameron is not alone in demanding greater leeway for member states

Peter stanners

Christian Wenande

pact on the environment, and recreational and property values in the area. The council also ex-pressed concern that up to 5,000 people risk being disturbed by the low-frequency noise and flashing lights emanating from the turbines.

an environmental impact assessment carried out by co-penhagen council did evaluate the effect of noise on residents, but according to Hvidovre offi-cials, the calculations were based on the speed sound travels over land, not over water.

Hvidovre council officials said the copenhagen report should have been based on swedish calculation models, which take into account the dif-ferent speeds.

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The history of the prehistoric inhabitants of Denmark will soon be ge-

netically mapped using the skel-etons of people who lived as far back as 7,000 years ago.

Genetic researchers from the Centre for GeoGenetics at the University of Copenhagen’s Natural history Museum say the project, named ‘The Genomic history of Denmark’, will make Denmark the first country to catalogue the genetic profiles of its inhabitants from its earliest known examples up until today.

The scientists hope the study will help identify early Danes’ genetic profiles, where they came from and which diseases they suffered from.

The team of geneticists who will take part in the five-year project specialise in extracting and analysing DNA from an-cient material, and some of the materials they are looking at in this project stem from the bones of hunter-gatherers who lived in present-day Denmark over 7,000 years ago.

“When we have analysed

all the material, new and old, we will, among other things, be able to pinpoint when various diseases arrived in Denmark,” eske Willerslev, of the Centre for GeoGenetics, told Politiken newspaper. “And we can see if large epidemics, like the plague, helped catalyse a unique and ge-netically-orientated ‘extra resist-ance’ against, for example, the hiV virus, which we see today in many northern europeans.”

The researchers are nego-tiating with the National Mu-seum to be able to use the re-mains. The project has received a 36 million kroner grant from the University of Copenhagen, but Willerslev expected the to-tal cost of the project to exceed 80 million kroner.

When completed, the pro-ject will have mapped the ge-nomes of 100 Danes from the hunter-gatherer period through the Bronze Age, iron Age, the Viking era and the early indus-trial Age.

it is expected that the DNA of the oldest remains will be heavily decomposed, but the team was confident that it would be possible to map the genome. in 2010, Willerslev led a team that reconstructed the complete genetic blueprint of a 4,000-year-old Greenlander based on DNA samples from a single tuft of hair.

Prehistoric Danes to be genetically mappedThe project, which is expected to take at least five years and cost 80 million kroner, would be the first of its kind anywhere

Christian Wenande

News

HoMeoWNers who ten years ago became the first people in the country to take advan-

tage of a new kind of mortgage, which gave them the option of only making interest payments over the first decade, are going to try something new in the com-ing months: paying back the principal – if they can. For these homeowners, the end of these interest-only periods means drastically higher payments – about six times their current monthly payment – not only be-cause they need to start paying back the principal of their loans, but also because they will have ten fewer years to do it.

About 5,600 afdragsfrie mortgages kick in this year, but many more will follow in the years to come.

“We are not worried about 2013,” Christian hilligsøe heinig, the chief economist with mortgage lender realkredit Denmark, told Jyllands-Posten newspaper. The first real increas-es come in 2014 and 2015, and

we will advise customers of the options they have.”

The mortgages, which of-fered an optional ten-year pe-riod of paying only the interest, were introduced in 2003. With the end of those periods near-ing, considerable focus has been placed on what might happen when people have to start pay-ing the full amount.

had housing prices contin-ued to rise, homeowners would be in less of a fix, since they could have refinanced and taken out another afdragsfri mortgage. But with precipitous drops in recent years, some homes are worth considerably less than what the owners bought them for, leaving mortgage-holders with one option: start repaying.

Nordea Kredit, a mortgage lender, has about 5,000 afdrags-frie mortages due to enter the principal repayment phase next year, while realkredit Denmark has 11,000 on its books.

realkredit Denmark said in a statement that most of the homeowners who are due to start making their principal payments this year had sound enough finances to refinance their loans should they choose.

“These households generally have solid finances and relative-ly high incomes. Many will be able to establish new interest-only loans,” read the statement. Many such homeowners also benefited by taking out their

Interest free to servitude: homeowners face repayment misery

While some worry that the expiration of ten-year interest-free periods will plunge the housing sector into a crisis, a former prime minister shrugs off blame for causing the current economic downturn

ray Weaver

Your dream home has become your biggest nightmare

mortgages before the housing prices really exploded, meaning their properties have maintained their value.

The interest-only loans, cou-pled with a freeze on property taxes, are blamed for created a housing bubble between 2000 and 2005 that eventually burst. While foreclosures have risen in the wake of the collapse, the wave of mortgages that are about to enter their principal payment phase could have an even greater impact, economists worry.

Lenders have been criti-cised for inflating the bubble

by not adhering to guidelines that required homeowners to prove they could repay the full amount in order to qualify for the afdragsfri mortgage. This disregard opened up the market to hordes of new buyers.

The lawmakers who ap-proved the introduction of the afdragsfri mortgage have also come under attack for their role. But the then-PM, Anders Fogh rasmussen (Venstre), the current secretary general of NAto, said in a recent in-terview that the responsibility lies in the hands of the lenders

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and homeowners, not with the economic policies put in place between 2001 and 2009 while he was PM.

“People are responsible for their own decisions regarding what loans they took,” rasmus-sen told Jyllands-Posten newspa-per. “We must have confidence that individuals and families take steps that are possible and reasonable within their own fi-nancial framework. i am not a nanny politician who believes that you should hold people by the hand; i believe in personal responsibility.”

Unemploymentcontinued from front page

Liberal think-tank CePos, on the other hand, argue that re-ducing the tax burden would be a more effective means of increasing private consumption.

“The public sector freeze in 2013 freed up eight billion kroner that can be used to re-duce taxes on corporations and energy as well as levies on soft drinks, candy and other items that are sensitive to cross-border trade,” CePos chief economist Mads Lundby hansen told The Copenhagen Post. “These will stimulate the Danish economy by increasing private consump-tion because of price reductions. Decreasing corporate tax rates will make investing in technol-ogy and research more attractive, while reducing taxes on energy will increase competition.”

hansen argued that Lo’s proposal to increase public in-vestment was not going to work because it took too long for the money to actually get spent.

“This is because architects need to first design the projects, and neighbours need to be con-sulted, before it all goes ahead because this is public money we are talking about.”

so far the government has remained quiet about what sorts of reforms it is planning to make. But a statement on tuesday by economy minister Margrethe Vestager (radikale) suggests that strengthening the private sector will be the focus of its efforts.

“We are going to look at ways of making Denmark an attractive country to bring workplaces,” Ve-stager stated. “employees of pri-vate businesses create the wealth of the welfare state we all enjoy. More private jobs is a prerequisite for ensuring that we can maintain our children’s education and access to healthcare, and that we can con-tinue to take care of people that cannot manage on their own.”

Vestager added that Den-mark also needs to become a more attractive country to invest in. however, Andreas højbjerre, a labour market economist at the think-tank Kraka, argues that it is not realistic to lower salaries in the short-term because wages are agreed through the three-party negotiations between employers, unions and the government.

“The most realistic approach is to look at reforms that increase labour supply in order to in-crease competition in the labour market in the long-term, and thereby suppress the rate that salaries increase,” højberg told The Copenhagen Post, adding that the government also needed to find ways of moving people from unemployment benefits back into the labour market.

“There are different ways of achieving this through the tax system by, for example, creating a special tax credit for low sala-ried groups such as single par-ents. They could also find ways to motivate young people to find work by forcing them to apply for more work in exchange for receiving their unemployment benefits.”

New customer service centre for applicants for work or study-related residence

Njalsgade 72C, Copenhagen S

Ryesgade 53, Copenhagen Ø

Offers assistance with the following types of residence:

• Work

• Study

• Green Card

• Au pair

• Internship

• Working Holiday

• Extension of residence permit (above-mentioned case types)

• Accompanying family member (above-mentioned case types)

• Residence card (work or study)

Offers assistance with the following types of residence:

• Family reunification (spouses and children)

• Extension of residence permit (family reunification or asylum)

• Visa (short term)

• Permanent residence (all types of applications)

• Residence card (family reunification or asylum)

• Greenlandic or Faroese visa or residence permit

On 25 February 2013, the Danish Agency for Labour Retention and International Recruitment will open its own customer service centre. Located at Njalsgade 72C, the Danish Agency for Labour Retention and International Recruitment’s customer service centre will be open to offer assistance with work or study-related residence.

After 25 February, the Danish Immigration Service’s customer service centre at Ryesgade 53 will no longer offer assistance with work or study-related residence.

For futher information please visit newtodenmark.dk/contact

6 25 - 31 January 2013The Copenhagen posT CphposT.dkCover story

I fear that we’ll miss out on the talent from outside Europe, which is part of the school’s foundation

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For 30 years, aspiring story-tellers, clowns and mimes have flocked to Copenhagen to study at the Commedia school for

physical theatre. But thanks to a change in Immigration service policy, the school’s future may be in doubt.

The Commedia school is one of the few private schools in Denmark that is granted a special dispensation that al-lows it to enrol non-european students. But Immigration service (Udlænding-estyrelsen) decided in 2010 that the dis-pensation does not give the students the right to work 15 hours a week on top of their studies – a right that non-eu-ropean students in state-funded higher education enjoy.

But despite the rule change, many non-eU students are still given the promise by Danish consulates that they can work in Denmark while studying at the Commedia school. These students then find themselves in a difficult situa-tion when they arrive and find out that the promise of work has been reneged.

The dilemma has already circulated ministerial offices once before, which resulted in the employment Ministry setting up a committee at Udlænding-estyrelsen to look into the problem. But when a stage artist who is a for-mer student, Thomas Nygaard, called Udlændingestyrelsen months later, they couldn’t give him a timeframe for their decision.

after several more months of wait-ing, Nygaard met with one of the managers at Udlændingestyrelsen, who informed him that the committee was unable to reach a decision and that he should take the matter up with the politicians.

“But we’ve already been through that process. We’ve tried the Foreign Ministry, who sent us to the Culture Ministry, who sent us to the em-ployment Ministry, who sent us to Udlændingestyrelsen, who sent us back again,” Nygaard said. “so enough is enough, and the absurd thing is that the school has existed for 30 years and there have not been any problems until recently.”

although Udlændingestyrelsen has told Nygaard several times since 2010 that the work permits would be halted, he says that some of his non-eU stu-dents continue to receive them.

“as recently as December 20, one of our students was awarded a work per-mit. so they can’t even organise their own system, and they actually told me that they’ve made mistakes in 25 per-cent of the cases since they discovered that the students shouldn’t be granted work permits,” Nygaard said. “They seem rather disorganised.”

Nygaard, who graduated from the same school in 2011, has been work-ing pro bono next to his job as a stage director at Norse Productions for the past year in order to help the foreign students of his former school gain the work permits that they were promised by the Danish state before they arrived.

The Commedia school is an inter-national, english-language artist and theatre school that has been teaching

students the craft of physical perfor-mance in Copenhagen since 1983. The school offers a two-year creative entrepreneurial performer education in which students learn to write, direct and act in their shows.

Most of the students today are for-eign. Many come from scandinavia and the eU and thus don’t require work per-mits, but there are also students from nations like Cuba, Nepal, the Us, Brazil and Burkina Faso.

David roby, a current student at Commedia school, arrived from seat-tle, Washington in august 2011 and was among the students not allowed to work despite being promised he could by the Danish consulate in New york.

“I’m a saver, but all my savings are gone. Fortunately, I was lucky and able to live for free with some friends, or I would not be here now. I was consider-ing going home because I simply didn’t have any more money, except for a ticket home,” roby said. “I was lucky, but I see so many students have to leave because they can’t afford to stay.”

roby’s reapplication for a work visa was also recently denied, and despite applying for his residence visa in april of 2011, roby didn’t even receive that until March the following year. and he is, by far, not the only one.

Numerous non-european students have had a hard time in Denmark and some of the students have had to re-turn home again because they simply couldn’t live here without some source of income.

Immigration circus leaves theatre students in limboDespite promises by the Danish state, the foreign students of a theatre school are denied the ability to work part-time while they study. Many are forced to return home due to a lack of funds

Christian Wenande

“That is a shame, especially since many of them have been promised by Danish embassies or consulates in their home countries that they would be granted work permits as well as resi-dence permits,” Nygaard said. “It’s very problematic because the funds they brought along were inadequate to live off in Denmark.”

But while the school and a number of students have made official com-plaints, the reality is that most of them will have finished their two-year courses before any sort of ruling is made on their cases.

While the state-sponsored aFUK (akademiet for Utæmmet Kreativitet) –

which made its way into the headlines in December thanks to the nepotism allegations made against the former cul-ture minister, Uffe elbæk (radikale) – specialises in the ‘hard’ circus disciplines such as trapeze, Commedia school con-centrates on the ‘softer’ genres within physical performance, like storytelling, clowns, mime and mask-theatre.

The school has produced a number of outstanding physical actors and cir-cus artists, like scott Nelson (who won the World Championships of Magic in 2000 and has performed with the Big apple Circus), Kristjan Ingimarsson (‘Blam’), Linnea Haponenen (‘Krep-sko’), Dansk rakkerpak and sigrid Husjord, who won a prestigious re-umert award last year for her support-ing role in ‘oliver med et twist på’ at Nørrebro Theatre.

The ability to work 15 hours a week while studying is imperative for many of the foreign students who come to the school, and the rejection of the dispensation by Udlændingestyrelsen has meant that the school has already begun to experience a drop in foreign

students from the Commedia school search in vain for their promised work permits. Many are forced to return home because they can’t find one

talent. and that, according to Nygaard, is a great loss for the Danish physical performance scene, as well as the stu-dents’ home countries.

“Many of the graduates from de-veloping countries work in social thea-tre projects in their homelands, where physical performance and storytelling are essential tools for promoting de-mocracy, the freedom of speech and decent work environments,” Nygaard said. “I fear that we’ll miss out on the talent from outside europe, which is part of the school’s foundation.”

another unknown in the case for Nygaard is that he was trying to arrange a meeting with elbæk, but has not made any progress setting a time with elbæk’s successor, Marianne Jelved (radikale).

“The Commedia school is the longest existing professional education for physical actors in Denmark, and we hope that the new culture minister can find a spot for us in her tight schedule so that our students can achieve equal treatment with other students in gov-ernment-sponsored higher education programmes,” Nygaard said.

The City Council Culture Depart-ment has expressed appreciation for the school’s international profile and has promised to look into the matter. It has sent an inquiry to the employ-ment Ministry, although Nygaard said that the school was yet again waiting for a response.

Neither Udlændingestyrelsen nor the Culture Ministry has responded to The Copenhagen Post’s inquiries.

Commedia school’s Nygaard said it’s unfair that students are falsely promised the ability to work in Denmark

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725 - 31 January 2013 THE COPENHAGEN POST CPHPOST.DK NEWS

R etailers will face sti� er pen-alties for selling tobacco or hard alcohol to anyone

under 18, according to a proposal currently before parliament. In addition to doubling � nes, the measure would also outlaw to-bacco advertising and require stores to prominently display no-tices that customers are required to show a photo ID before they can purchase cigarettes and beer.

“We know that it is unfortu-nately easy to buy tobacco and al-cohol – even if you are not of age,” Flemming Møller Mortensen (So-cialdemokraterne) said. “� e law is very clear, but the checks and sanctions have been weak points.”

Mortensen acknowledged that parents must play a major role in curbing teen consuption. He said the law was designed to help both parents as well as retailers by introducing stricter control.

Only two � nes for violat-ing the rules governing the sale of alcohol to minors were issued during 2011, according to Dan-marks Statistik.

For many teens, obtaining cigarettes or alcohol is as easy as � nding a store with a clerk willing to look the other way. But the law, which has broad political support, would seek to change that by putting the onus back on the owner of the shop.

A � rst o� ence would cost a shop 5,000 kroner, the second 10,000 and the third 20,000.

“� e new law is a clear sig-nal that it is not okay for shops to sell alcohol and cigarettes to those not of legal age,” the health minister, Astrid Krag (Socialis-tisk Folkeparti), told Kristeligt Dagblad newspaper. “We expect that by doubling the amount of the � nes, it will make the sellers very aware of the law.”

Krag also stressed that laws alone would not stop young peo-ple from drinking and smoking.

“We also need young people and their parents on board, and

Increased � nes a “clear signal” that illicit sales to teens must stopNew law would create tougher penalties for shops that do not enforce alcohol and tobacco laws. Businesses say mandatory IDs would work better

CHRISTIAN WENANDE

Survivors broke down and walked out of court dur-ing the trial of a school headteacher who faces in-

voluntary manslaughter charges, for his role in the 2011 Præstø Fjord dragon boat disaster.

Two teachers and 13 stu-dents, aged 16-18, from Lundby Efterskole were in the � at-bot-tomed dragon boat that capsized in Præstø Fjord on 11 February 2011, spilling them all into the two-degree water.

One of the teachers, 44-year-old Michael Jørgensen, died and seven of the students ended up in arti� cial comas after su� er-ing heart attacks due to spend-ing hours in the freezing water. Many of the students su� ered brain damage after their body temperatures dropped as low as 15 degrees.

A September 2011 report by Havarikommissionen, the acci-dent investigation board, found the school had underestimated the risk of boating in February.

“[� ere was] a considerable risk of an accident by going out in the dragon boat on Præstø

Fjord given the conditions,” the report stated.

Headteacher Truels Truelsen was away in Austria at the time of the tragedy, but is the only individual facing involuntary manslaughter charges.

He and the school are also being charged with violating maritime safety laws for not en-suring the students were wearing life jackets that would keep their heads above water in the event they lost consciousness.

Several of the children were found � oating upright in the sea with their heads below water be-fore they were lifted to safety by a helicopter.

Truelsen, assistant head teacher Lars Schou Jensen and many of the students have giv-en their testimony at the court on Nykøbing Falster about the events leading up to and following the capsizing of the dragon boat.

Pr o s e c u t o r Michael Boolsen has focused on d e t e r m i n i n g whether the stu-dents received su� cient safety training and whether Jørgensen was ade-quately experienced to take the children out on the boat.

Truelsen stated he found it surprising the students had been taken out so early in the year. But he added that he thought Jør-

Manslaughter trial underway following boating tragedy

Teacher who took children on dragon boat in freezing conditions died after boat capsized. His school and headteacher now on trial for involuntary manslaughter

PETER STANNERS

Most of the surviors will testify, though some had to leave the courtroom as the events were retold

Legal? An ID would help answer that question, businesses say

gensen was su� ciently quali� ed to be trusted in his judgement.

Several days before the ac-cident, Jørgensen took di� erent students out on another dragon boating trip with-out incident.

But on the day of the acci-dent, the weather conditions dete-

riorated as they paddled further into the � ord. Jørgensen then decided to turn back, and it was during this manoeuvre that the boat capsized.

According to Karoline Klit, one of the students who testi� ed on Tuesday, Jørgensen ordered

the children to swim the several hundred metres back to land.

“I asked Michael whether we should try to � ip the boat but he said he couldn’t,” Klit told the court. “� en he told us that if we didn’t swim for shore we would die.”

Students who made it to land managed to walk two kilo-metres to a petrol station to call for help.

While Jensen also stated that Jørgensen was a competent and hard-working teacher, one of the students testi� ed that he was highly demanding.

� e students were train-ing for a dragon boat race and, according to student Nick-las Bøhm, Jørgensen was not

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we need to discuss with young people how they can limit teen drinking,” she said.

While it supports the e� ort, Dansk Erhverv, a business inter-est group, was disappointed that parliament had rejected its sug-gestion that young people be is-sued an ID card. Such cards do exist, but under current practice, young people have to contact their local council and pay 150 kroner for the card in order to obtain one.

“An ID card for anyone under 18 will make it easier to enforce the rules at checkouts, where clerks are already dealing with many di� erent sets of rules and age limits,” So� e Findling Andersen, a spokesperson for Dansk Erhverv, told Kristeligt Dagblad.

If the law is passed, the new rules would take e� ect in Sep-tember.

Then he told us that if we didn’t swim for shore we would die

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pleased with their performance.“He was a bit angry and

shouted at us because he didn’t think that we were rowing hard enough,” Bøhm said, adding that he respected his teacher. “But he had a tendency to be tough and could push people’s boundaries.”

Bøhm supported the testi-mony of student � yra Hvass, who told the court that they were not given any safety train-ing before getting into the boat.

While Bøhm was able to make it to shore and su� ered few permanent di� culties after the spell in the freezing water, student Casper Weigel was less fortunate.

Weigel is unable to remem-ber anything about the accident or the weeks before and after. While he has returned to school, he has had to endure months of physical therapy.

� e second teacher onboard the boat, 35-year-old, Rikke Jensen, told the court that she knew he was unable to swim be-fore they set out.

Jensen, who said that Jør-gensen cared about the safety of his students, broke down in tears during her testimony. Several other students became distraught having to relive the tragedy.

All but three of the students are expected to testify during the trial. � e remaining three are reportedly too injured by the ac-cident to testify.

Præstø accident timelineOn Friday 11 February 2011, a boat carrying 13 students and two teachers from Lundby School capsizes in Præstø Fjord about 1.7 kilometres from Præstø Harbour.

• One of the students alerts the authorities at 12:47.

• Seven students and a 33-year-old female teacher manage to swim to shore on their own.

• At 15:20, 14 out of the 15 people involved are out of the water and taken to hos-pital. A 44-year-old male teacher, Michael Jørgensen, is later found dead.

• Seven of the students are placed in arti� cial comas and some of them su� er brain damage to varying degrees.

• After the accident, the school is heavily criticised for not following safety regulations.

• � e administration of Lun-dby School dismisses the criticism, pointing to an investigation the law � rm Bech-Bruun carried out on its behalf.

• In September 2011, accident investigators � nd that Lun-dby School was not properly aware of the risks involved with dragon boats.

• On 1 October 2012, a year after investigators issue their report, the police decide to charge head teacher Truels Truelsen with involuntary manslaughter. � e school itself faces a � ne.

8 25 - 31 January 2013THE COPENHAGEN POST CPHPOST.DKOPINION

A country cannot just re-negotiate such things. These concepts are carved in the stone tablets that the goddess Europa handed down to her pro� ts amid the rubble of the Second World War.

with a � ne or a sanction and put them in their place. As it is, we already see two layers within this group itself: those who owe, and those who are owed to.

Orbiting this group will be a more loosely connected constel-lation of countries. To the elit-ists of the inner group, life here will be barren and parched. But

this group will slowly be wean-ing itself o� agricultural subsi-dies, structural funds, regional development funds, micro-man-agement, cultural homogeneity and a general disregard for laws passed by sovereign states. � ese countries can chose, instead, to join together in a relation-ship centred around free trade, economic co-operation, realistic agreements, a willingness to live up to their word and mutual re-spect. � is will invariably be the outcome if the European elite refuses to accept that British sup-port for the EU has vanished, leaving widespread Euro-scepti-cism in its place. Many in Britain

the wishes of the electorate who selected him as their leader, po-litely warns the EU that a ma-jority in his country have had enough of the union’s bulldozer tactics, it is taken as a slap in the face of European unity. A coun-try cannot just renegotiate such things. � ese concepts are carved in the stone tablets that the god-dess Europa handed down to her prophets amid the rubble of the Second World War.

In my mind though, Cam-eron’s address could go down as a historic turning point for the EU. It could be remembered as the day that member countries realised they could think for themselves, the day they swept away the old traditions, and the day they began to reclaim their money, their power and their authority from the faraway glass palaces where they never should have wound up in the � rst place.

Unless we accept what Cam-eron and the British have to say, we lose all hope of creating a smaller, less dominant EU that al-lows free European states to work together on common interests. If we don’t accept what Cameron says, the inevitable result will be a ‘two-speed Europe’, and two types of European co-operation.

At Europe’s core, we would � nd an ever more centralised po-litical and economic union made up of the Eurozone countries. � ere, at the heart of Europe, the Germans, the French, the Greeks, the Berlusconites and the Span-iards would duke it out as mem-bers of an alphabet soup of newly-created European organisations. Every now and again, the EU Court of Justice would exercise its growing power by slapping them

W E DANES have a lot to thank the Brit-ish for. When the Nazis’ Atlantic wall

stretched from northern Norway to southern France, it was the British and Churchill who stood their ground and insisted on the war that eventually crushed the Nazis. During the Cold War, it was again Britain, this time led by Margaret � atcher, who proved Europe’s most staunch defender of Western principles as she maintained that eastern Europe would not be free until its social-ist dictatorships were defeated.

But now Britain once again � nds itself on the outside of Eu-rope’s political elite, the media and experts in Brussels and lead-ers in other European capitals. If you believed what they said, you’d think that Britain was a self-cen-tred nation that was about to tor-pedo Europe’s future by seeking to revise a 40-year-old agreement that has outlived its purpose.

� at is why, when Britain’s current prime minister, David Cameron, clearly in� uenced by

Cameron’s speech a turning point for EU

Foreign ministry accused of suppressing coverage of pirate captives

Actually, there is some wisdom in what the government is do-ing. Terrorism only works if those committing the acts get coverage in the news. When you take away the coverage, you dis-arm the terrorists, � guratively speaking. Granted, piracy and terrorism are not one-and-the-same, but there are parallels. � is is highlighted by the fact that the pirates want coverage in the Danish news. � ey are try-ing to create awareness in order to generate public sympathy and therefore get a greater ransom. If the case is out-of-sight/out-of-mind, then there is a lower ur-gency for ransom and more time for diplomacy or a military-style rescue.� e1youlove2hate By website

� e land of the free and the home of the ... Danes?

If you’ve noticed what has hap-pened in the last few years in Denmark, beginning with the COP15 incidents and all the laws that have essentially turned

Denmark into a police state, you will start to understand the level of control the government has and what they can (legally) do whenever anyone steps out of line. Also, since the crisis started, the Danes have begun to show their true colours when it comes to their attitude towards foreign-ers. And they’re not anywhere near as tolerant or friendly as the media would like you to believe.joemiangelo By website

Opinion | Lessons learned by an American in Amager

Danish legal limits on what per-centage of vegetable matter can be rotting and still be allowed for sale are much higher than in the USA. Ever see a bunch of carrots with three or four rot-ting carrots in a bunch for sale in the US? I never have. It hap-pens all the time in Denmark. � is principle applies across the board food-wise, including Dan-ish grocery chains repackaging meat after its expiration date (it still happens.)I submit that your healthier lifestyle is possible in either country, and the only dif-ference has been your awareness.Tom By website

Absolutely amazing that because this writer’s experiences and opinions do not match the gen-eral shower of s**t that pervades the comments, the insults and snide remarks, and the general low-brow quality of the dialogue bursts instantly forth. His experi-ences may not match your own. Or perhaps, he has a better out-look on life in general than the sad sack, woe-is-me, ‘I am stuck in this horrible place’ crowd that clogs up every thread here. May-be he realises that happiness is an internal e� ort and he creates his own sense of well-being. Oldfolky By website

Up in smoke: Notorious ‘co� ee shop’ closes its doors

� e question of cannabis be-ing harmful is irrelevant. It is up to the individual to decide for themselves if they want to subject themselves to the risk of harm or pleasure. � ere is a limit, but can-nabis does not reach my subjec-tive idea of what that is. I come down on the side of cannabis being potentially harmful, but so is mountain climbing. I choose to do neither. What you choose should be up to you. However,

Khodr is not so cool: rolling up on a plane subjects others to his smoke, and so does smoking on the streets. Growing his own pre-vents him from giving money to criminals, gangsters and even ter-rorists. However, this is not the case when it comes to his friends – one of whom mentions buying it from Christiania. Of course, if it was legal there would be no problem.Traiilertrash By website

� e Danish FA hails the Su-perliga as the “most tolerant” league

It never ceases to amaze me how every single news story in this country seems to have been fab-ricated by a spin doctor. So, the Danish FA proclaims the Danish league to be the most tolerant in Europe, thanks Danish journal-ists for not reporting any racist incidents that do occur, and the very modest conclusion is: there is no racism to be found here! I suppose that if those White Pride skinheads and the neo-Nazi symbols seen at most Danish sta-diums are not reported by the sheepish press, they do not exist.DanDansen By website

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have moved beyond scepticism and into outright resistance and, for the � rst time in 40 years, led to a majority calling for the coun-try to secede from the union, as a recent opinion poll showed. Should that happen, I know which Europe I want Denmark to be a part of.

� e EU’s frontier is also laden with threats. Starting next January, emigrants from Roma-nia and Bulgaria will have free access to all EU countries. Many regions of Romania are already depopulated. Since 2002, three million people – 12 percent of its population – have left the country. Will this next wave of emigrants have their sights set on Greece, Italy or Spain? No. � ey will head to Denmark, Britain, Sweden, Finland, Aus-tria and the Netherlands. � e British were already caught o� guard once by the enormous in-� ux of eastern Europeans from countries like Poland. Now the Romanians and the Bulgarians are coming, but this time, the British have had enough.

David Cameron has been blamed for pandering to his country’s Euro-sceptics. But, one could just as well say that he is a statesman who takes his peo-ple’s concerns seriously and who is even willing to let them speak their minds in a referendum – un-like in other EU countries, Den-mark included, where the EU elite fears a vote that would clear the air about whether Denmark is a member of the Eurozone.

� e author is an MEP for Dansk Folkeparti, which is a part of the Europe of Freedom and Democracy group in the European Parliament.

MORTEN MESSERSCHMIDT

Crisis 2: this time, it’s homemade

JUST WHEN you thought it was safe to venture back into the economy, we’re now being told that the worst may in fact be yet to come. But this time, it’s not the banks that we’re

going to have to blame. Unlike with the economic downturn that started in 2007,

and which now goes under the name ‘� nancial crisis’, the fault for the approaching economic storm can be placed squarely at the doormats of the tens of thousands of people who accepted interest-only mortgages as a shortcut to homeownership.

As any mortgage-holder in Denmark knows, before signing a loan they are presented with a list detailing the exact projected cost of their quarterly payments. For someone taking out a 30-year, � xed-rate mortgage and taking advantage of a ten-year in-terest free period right o� the bat, this list probably shows some-thing in the order of a six-fold increase from payment 40 to 41.

We can understand if homeowners hell-bent on � nding a place to call their own chose to ignore year 11 and beyond. It’s also understandable if they feel duped by a loan o� cer who sold them on the belief that housing prices would continue to rise. But neither absolves them from the responsibility they assumed when they signed on the dotted line.

But while common sense may dictate that people be held responsible for their own � nancial decisions, in this case, there are two good reasons why they shouldn’t be – at least not in the short-term.

� e � rst is precedent. In this day of government lifelines (Danish banks were issued four of them), homeowners can rightly demand that they be extended a similar hand if they � nd themselves struggling to make their mortgage payments.

� e second is economic stability. Critics will reject a home-owner bailout as simple social welfare for members of the middle class who failed to live within their means. � is may be true, but successive governments extended corporate social welfare to banks with the argument that if they failed, they would bring the economy down with them. Should we believe the econo-mists, the pending wave of mass defaults risks pushing any hope of economic recovery even further over the horizon.

Help from the state shouldn’t be a hand-out. Banks like to repeat that not only did they pay back the money lent to them to help keep them a� oat, but the government has actually prof-ited from it. Struggling homeowners should follow their exam-ple once they too reach sturdier � nancial ground. In order to get there, though, they’ll need a lifeboat, even if it is their own responsibility for getting in over their heads.

For many families, having to repay the principal on their mortgages will be a calamity of their own making. But it is in all of our interests that they get help

925 - 31 January 2013 THE COPENHAGEN POST CPHPOST.DK

NEXT WEEK IN 2 WEEKS IN 3 WEEKS IN 4 WEEKS

OPINION

Özcan Arjulovski Stuart LynchTHE WORDS OF ÖZ THE LYNCH REPORT

You’re Still Here?BY KELLY DRAPER

Kelly Draper is a British teacher who came to Denmark four years ago for work. She has been acting informally as a critical friend to Denmark. This has not gone down particularly well with Danes, who often tell her she should like it or leave it. Her blog is at adventuresandjapes.wordpress.com.

Born in 1942 on the Isle of Wight, Englishman Frank Theakston has been in Copenhagen 32 years and is on his second marriage, this time to a Dane. Frank comes from a di� erent time and a di� erent culture – which values are the right ones today?

To Be Perfectly FrankBY FRANK THEAKSTON

CPH POST VOICES

A RE THE DANES RACISTS?’ a new book by Henning Bech and Mehmet Ümit Necef asks. As with all titles that are ques-

tions, their answer is “no”. Which is just as big a generalisation as it would have been had their answer been “yes”. So how did they arrive at “no” and why are they even asking if there are no prob-lems in Denmark?

Unfortunately for the social sci-ences, those interested in equality, and people of foreign backgrounds living in Denmark, they arrive at their conclu-sion using shoddy logic (if their public-ity material is anything to go by).

One problem for young men of col-our in Denmark is that they cannot be sure that they can go out for an evening like their white peers. � is is because nightclubs feel it is justi� able to refuse them entry. � e authors of the report excuse this and try to rebrand it as a purely economic consideration because as soon as white customers see there are ‘too many’ people of colour in a night-club, they do not want to give their cus-tom. So if this report had been written by nightclub owners, the answer to the book’s title would have been a resound-

ing “Yes, our customers are racist.”White guys also cause problems in

nightclubs, but nobody ever suggests turning them away at the door due to the colour of their skin. � is is because patrons apparently do not feel threat-ened by a nightclub full of white guys. For the kids at the back, this is what rac-ism is. Racism is pre-judging � e Oth-ers while giving your group a free pass. All the while ignoring it is a minority from both groups causing problems.

Another ‘non-racist’ thing they talk about is a father being concerned about his daughter dating a dark-skinned young man. Apparently, this is justi-� ed because certain groups are known

for subjugating their women. Now, the irony of a father forbidding his daugh-ter to date someone because he might repress women aside, just saying “� is is not racist” does not make it not racist. It is, indeed, racist. It is the de� nition of racism. Looking at a young gentleman caller and worrying that he will mistreat your daughter because of the colour of his skin, or his religious background or his culture, is racist.

It’s only natural that parents will worry about controlling and abusive people dating their children, but I’m afraid racial pro� ling is not a fool-proof method of catching them. White people can also be guilty of domestic violence, emotional abuse and control-ling behaviour. Domestic abuse (and violence against women in particular) is widespread everywhere. Making it a crime that only � e Others commit is what helps it become so ubiquitous. Some commentators in India have been recently blaming the West to avoid con-fronting the problems in their own cul-ture that lead to violence against wom-en. Danish fathers blaming “the Arabs” or “the Muslims” for the mistreatment of women are likewise sidestepping and

‘Are the Danes racists?’ignoring the scale of the same problem in their own culture.

Saying “it is not racism if some of them are like that” is faulty logic. It justi-� es every racist action throughout history and concludes that no humans in the his-tory of humanity have ever been racist. After all, no stereotype came out of no-where. When stereotypes are used to de-cide what treatment someone gets, this is discrimination. Doing it on the grounds of race is racial discrimination. � e issue with stereotypes is not that they exist, but when they are used to ruin lives.

Can’t date certain people, can’t get into a nightclub, can’t get a job, can’t drive without being stopped, can’t walk the street without getting searched. � is is intolerable and unfair.

If those were the conditions of your life because the minority you be-longed to had a bad reputation, you could side with your oppressors and blame � e Others for ruining it for you. Or you could make them see that you are an individual and deserve a fair chance like everyone else. Trying to re-brand racial discrimination as ‘under-standable concerns’ only worsens the conditions we all have to live under.

AS SOMEONE who’s lived in Denmark as long as I have, I like to hear newcomers’ impressions of the country and its inhabit-

ants. � us I was most interested to read Sarita Rajiv’s column a couple of weeks ago. She, with her fresh eye, immedi-ately sensed on arriving in Denmark that something was not as she had expected. And her description of the behaviour of Danes towards people they don’t know is spot on: you really do feel invisible. No, they don’t intend to be rude, but on the other hand they don’t intend to change. � at’s the nature of boorishness.

ED Clarke, travelling through Den-mark by horse and cart in 1799, de-scribed the carter as a pleasant enough fellow, though tending towards the boor-ish. It seems that things haven’t changed much in the last 200 years! ‘Boor’ and ‘boorish’ are words that are not com-monly used in the English language these days, but a boor is generally understood to be a rude or insensitive person. � e word apparently stems from the Dutch word boer (farmer or peasant), ie an un-sophisticated person, and this provides an interesting association with the tradi-tionally rural Danish way of life. Add to

that other boorish qualities, such as (so-cial) clumsiness and clownishness, and a somewhat familiar picture emerges.

Clarke also remarked on how back-ward life seemed in Copenhagen at the time, describing it as a city where “every thing being found as it existed in [Lon-don] a hundred years before”. He con-cluded that the Danes were averse to in-troducing innovative ideas from abroad. In fact, this had already been noted by Mary Wollstonecraft in 1796. “� e Danes, in general, seem extremely averse to innovation,” she wrote. “And if happi-ness only exists in opinion, they are the happiest people in the world; for I never saw any so well satis� ed with their own situation.” Ring a bell?

But can that really be true today? Surely Denmark is a paragon of mod-ern, open, progressive society. Well, yes, if you don’t scratch the surface or you succumb to the subtle propaganda. Take DSB, for example (yes, please do take DSB). Everybody, including the Danes, knows that it’s totally useless at running a railway. It costs the state a fortune to pro-vide the country with a third-rate railway system that would not have been toler-ated in most other countries a century

ago. And it’s getting worse! What sort of public service company actually removes the (already sparse) amenities from sta-tions by, among other things, reducing waiting rooms to 7-Elevens and locking the toilets? But DSB is a state institution, and the country would lose face if it were to admit that the company was a failure. And the fear of losing face is a symptom, in my book, that there really is some-thing rotten in the state of Denmark. � e Brits had no such compunction in doing away with British Rail when it was found to be too costly and ine� cient.

And what’s this rejsekort system that DSB is plugging, but doesn’t work? If you know the London underground,

Am I booring you?you’ll know that it’s a copy of the Oys-ter card system that has successfully catered for millions of passengers every day for ten years now. But instead of openly announcing that it’s introduc-ing an Oyster card-like system, DSB pretends it’s developing its own. � at’s because it’s important for the national ego that things are seen to be invented, discovered or developed in Denmark. Another example is that of Vestas: wind power is perhaps one of the least e� -cient ways of generating ‘green’ energy, yet it’s promoted as the saviour of man-kind because it’s Danish!

We know you’re su� ering under the burden of the jantelov, but come on Denmark, join the ranks of the open societies that you pretend to be part of. � is boorish behaviour just won’t work in the long term. Pulling the wool over your own eyes and that of others has limited life expectancy. Maybe you’ll lose some of your ‘happiness’ (read: smugness and self-satisfaction) in the process, but just think how much there is to be gained in not having to pretend all the time. Open up to the world, admit you’re not perfect and see how much real happiness that brings.

Stephanie Brickman Tendai TagariraBRICK BY BRICK GRAIN OF SAND

Clare MacCarthy Christian WenandeCHRISTIAN VALUESMACCARTHY’S WORLD

And if happiness only exist in opinion, they are the happiest people in the world; for I never saw any so well satis� ed with their own situation

When stereotypes are used to decide what treatment someone gets, this is discrimination. Doing it on the grounds of race is racial discrimination

Justin Cremer Vivienne McKeeSTILL ADJUSTING CRAZIER THAN CHRISTMAS

10 25 - 31 January 2013THE COPENHAGEN POST CPHPOST.DKNEWS

Happiness depends on what criteria you use. For me, it’s all about feeling good about yourself and the people around you

T HE BLACK labradour barks � ercely for about three seconds before giving up and returning to the warm spot next to the

propane heater. “Don’t worry ‘bout Bella. She just

has to let everybody know she’s the queen here,” says Michael as he invites � e Copenhagen Post into Skuret (� e Shack).

Made from a disused changing room the local football team discarded, the 50 or so people who hang out at Skuret have transformed the structure into a kind of clubhouse and low-cost watering hole.

Located in the Islands Brygge neighbourhood, the ramshackle hut clashes with the surrounding luxury apartment complexes, where monthly rents start at 14,000 kroner. And where just a few blocks away, ‘the world’s hap-piest people’ � ock to the popular har-bour park on warm summer days for a

swim or to enjoy a BBQ on the lawn.Skuret reveals a di� erent reality on

the chilly January day we visited Mi-chael, and brothers Svend and Leif, to discuss what their life in ‘the happiest country in the world’ is like.

“� e happiest people on Earth? � at sounds like a bit of an over-statement, if you look around here,” says Leif, who takes a swig from his bottle of Maribo pilsner.

After a thoughtful pause and a long drag on his ciga-rette, he adds: “And when you think about it: how should I know what it’s like to live

in Ecuador or Canada? � ere’s no basis for comparison.”

He explains he hasn’t been able to � nd work since his job at the cigarette factory in nearby Gladsaxe got shipped out of the country a few years back.

“You got a job for a 57-year-old?” he asks.

His brother Svend, who also hangs out at Skuret, used to work as a har-bour hand, sailing out to incoming boats to check their cargo. But he has likewise found it hard to � nd work since the big container ports changed the shipping business.

Michael, who regularly opens Skuret around noon, was maimed when he was hit by a motorcycle as a teenager, making it impossible for him to hold a job involving manual labour.

� eir stories weigh heavily on the atmosphere in the shack, but there is little sign of bitterness or resentment in their voices as they describe their lives.

� e three men explain how Skuret has become a home away from home for anyone looking for a place to enjoy a beer and some camaraderie.

� e rules are simple: no � ghting. Anyone caught � ghting is shown the red card that hangs on the wall and banned for three months.

“Otherwise we’d be breaking up � ghts all the time,” says Svend.

A bottle of beer goes for six kroner, making it more a� ordable than the local pub, “and warmer than sitting on the steps over by the park”, explains Mi-chael, a lifelong resident of ‘Bryggen’.

� e three explain how Skuret came to be when a group of drinkers was displaced when the playground they congregated at was being renovated a few years back.

� ere was talk of seeking funding from the city, but the group realised they would be better o� if they could take the shelter and make it their own.

“Otherwise the city would send someone to check up on us once a month. We don’t get any funding, and nobody makes any money on this. But it’s our own place.”

Skuret is neither well-lit nor clean – there is no electric-

ity and the bric-a-brac on the

shelves could use a dust-

ing – but the shed’s small

Down, but not out

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kitchen is tidy, and on Wednesdays, a meal is cooked up for 25 kroner.

“Michael’s brother Olfert makes the best frikadeller,” explains Leif.

In the summer, they bring out a grill and cook sausages.

Leif takes a look out of the frost-encrusted window: “Summer is always nice.”

� e conversation returns to the subject of ‘the good life’ and what are

some of its essential elements.“For some people

it’s enjoying a good meal, for others it’s getting plastered,”

says Leif. “ O t h e r

peo-

De� ning happiness is di� cult, but for those who’ve seen their share of hard knocks, it starts with a cold beer and good company

UZI FRANK

The happiest people on earth?Everyone knows it – even Oprah. Danes are the happiest people on Earth, or so they say anyway.

� is is the third and fi nal article in � e Copenhagen Post’s series looking at what is real and what is myth when it comes to happiness in Denmark.

� e previous two articles in the series, ‘Emotionally compromised or happy with their lot?’ and ‘Being Mr Nice Guy’, can be read at cphpost.dk.

We’ll be running further articles about happiness and Denmark on an occasional basis.

ple are happy counting their money.”“And good health is of course an

important part of being happy,” adds Svend.

� ey don’t hesitate to praise Den-mark’s social welfare system that en-sures everybody has access to decent medical care.

“We could of course take steps to being more healthy,” Leif says, as he empties his bottle.

Despite their satisfaction, the men are well aware of the disapproving looks the parents from the nearby daycare centres send them as they walk by with their children, but Leif shrugs them o� .

“� ey don’t really know anything about us, who we are or what we do.”

� ere don’t seem to be any real job prospects on the horizon for these men, but Leif argues that those who hang out at Skuret make a positive contribution to the neighbourhood by keeping an eye on the hardcore alcoholics among them who are really down and out.

“I think the city is happy we can give those people a place to drink and keep them o� the street corner. With-out us, the city would have to pay some fancy social worker to take care of them. We look after them and make sure they get home safe.”

During our visit, it becomes clear that while Skuret might not � t the shiny, happy image pitched by Den-

mark’s o� cial media channels, the shelter provides a ragtag but important form of community.

As Svend puts it: “Happiness de-pends on what criteria you use. For me, it’s all about feeling good about yourself and the people around you.”

Brothers Leif (blue jacket) and Svend Rasmussen (centre) enjoy a beer and a smoke together with Michael Risberg and dog Bella

1125 - 31 January 2013 THE COPENHAGEN POST CPHPOST.DK COMMUNITY

The fair provides a tremendous opportunity for the city’s embassies to draw attention to their homelands – most particularly their biggest tourist attrac-tions. Among those present were (left-right) Burkina Faso’s ambassador Monique Ilboudo, Indonesian ambassador Dr Bomer Pasaribu, Armenian ambas-sador Hrachya Aghajanyan, Bolivian ambassador Bishop Eugenio Poma, KUKS president Eleanor Bomholt, Argentine chargé d’a� aires Marcelo Joaquin Pujo, and the Indonesian Embassy’s Parbadiani Poppy Tobing

There’s nothing like some bucking bronco to get you in the mood, and judging from the reaction of the thousands of visitors to the Travel Fair at Bella Center last weekend, the holiday spirit was alive and kicking all over the venue

Beyond the touristy stands, there were plenty of things to watch, including the CPH Diveshow

Bolivia may be land-locked, but its ambassador Bishop Eugenio Poma wasn’t tongue-tied when it came to espousing its virtues

Rumour has it that the secrets of Cuba’s tourism appeal have been rumbled. In attendance to talk about all things rum and rumba was the Caribbean island’s ambassador Caridad Yamira Cueto Milian (right)

No crying for Argentina, just sighing at the enormous choice it has to o� er, on which its chargé d’a� aires Marcelo Joaquin Pujo (left) was happy to � ll us in

As the ambassador of the world’s largest and, some would say, most interesting archipelago, Indonesian ambassador Dr Bomer Pasaribu had a pretty easy task in front of him

We didn’t � nd out if Armenian ambassador Hrachya Aghajan-yan (second left) knows that Kim Kardashian is half-Armenian, although her surname does means ‘son of a stonemason’ – apt for somebody who probably says “Let he who is without sin, cast the � rst stone” a lot

Among those making their debuts at the fair was Palestine, whose tourism is � ourishing. Bethlehem, its most popular des-tination, attracts over a million tourists a year

Did you know that Albania was the number one destination on Lonely Planet’s top ten list for 2011. Albania ambassador Arben Cici (right) was at hand to explain why

They gave the world Alexander the Great, who in turn gave the world a good thrashing. Former Yugoslavian Republic of Macedo-nia ambassador Asaf Ademi (right) now wants the world to come back to its former capital

Gorgeous Georgia − no not the US state, the eastern European country! − was well represented

Once again the Bella Center could proudly salute another well or-ganised and attended fair. Among those present were (left-right) Bella Center chief executive Arne Bang Mikkelsen, Turismens Vækstråd chairman Mads Lebech and the fair’s organiser, Malina Lebrecht Hye

Part of the fun of visiting Burkina Faso is pronouncing the place names, starting with the capital Ouagadougou, followed by Koudougou, where you can � nd the sacred crocodiles of Sabou, creatures so docile you can sit on them, or at least that’s what ambassador Monique Ilboudo promised

As was magical Malta, although given its size to visitor ratio, it’s di� cult to know how they could � t any more in

While the kids were well catered for by two worlds: Legoworld … and Pippiworld, just a short hop across the Øresund away

Where dream-destination delights dissipate our dark-day doldrums

PHOTOS: HASSE FERROLDWORDS: BEN HAMILTON

Where dream-destination delights dissipate our dark-day doldrums

PHOTOS: HASSE FERROLDWORDS: BEN HAMILTON

12 25 - 31 January 2013THE COPENHAGEN POST CPHPOST.DK

And then there was one ... Swapping New Zealand for Zealand for her second tour of duty, Emily McLean isn’t, as far as we know, getting hitched anytime soon. She’s out there kissing frogs to � nd her prince - nobody ever said Dating the Danes was going to be easy.

DATING THE DANES

Know thyself … Know thy Danes

THERE SHOULD be a small handbook given to any foreign woman who comes

here and attempts to date the Danes. Along with your ‘How do I get a CPR card’ brochure, you should also receive the ‘How to date Danish men’ lea� et.

Now I don’t consider myself an advice-giver in the arena of Danish men. My past credentials clearly prove that. However, in the past month, several women have approached me around town … not to comment on what I’ve written, but to ask for advice. So on behalf of those women, and for all of you still stumbling in the dark, I will attempt to impart a few small and very humble pieces of advice.

1. It’s not you. Because there are no dating rules here, you may be tempted to second-guess yourself ALL the time. Stop. � e equations we use at home don’t work here. Two dates + two smi-ley faces on a text + one ride on the back of his bike do not

equal what we think it does. Even six months of ‘hanging out’, as Danes call it, may not even mean he’s into you. Danes have a dif-ferent way of doing things. � e solution? See #3.

2. Don’t try to be Danish. He probably likes you because you’re not. You don’t have to go and dress in an oversized black tunic or wear those little ear warmers. Only you can in-troduce him to new phenomenon such as ‘talking to checkout op-erators’, and for heaven’s sake, don’t try to play the Danish dating game − you’ll end up more confused than the last time you � lled in your SKAT form.

3. Make it obvious. If you’re from the motherland or a subse-quent colony, you’ll feel pretty brazen doing this. Don’t worry. Even though you may feel like a harlot, you don’t come across as one to a Danish guy. � at extra

‘xo’ you put on your text message does NOT translate in Denmark to “I’m ridiculously into you, think you’re hotter than Oliver Bjerrehuus and can’t wait to see you again.” Here it means an ‘x’ is sitting next to an ‘o’.

4. Learn something about Denmark. At the heart of every Dane is an introverted patriot. So while I stand by point #2, you have to make yourself at least credi-ble here. Learn

how to say “du er for lækker” or at least learn the di� erence be-tween Mikkel Kessler and Mads Mikkelsen. You’ll not only score extra points for being interested in a country that very few people are, but your poor Danish ac-cent will actually come across as ‘charming’.

Ny i Danmark is clearly in need of my services – expect to see a lea� et around town very soon.

Thousands of Francophiles � ocked to Øksnehallen over the weekend to attend the Paris-København Festival, which was organised by French Art Day. The joint venture between French and Danish artists presented the best of both cultures – sometimes, like in the installation (see left) created by Frédéric Dilé (left) and Jean-Marie Babonneau (right) where it was possible to ‘cycle’ down a street located both in Copenhagen and Paris, at the same time. Pictured centre left (photograph: Ann Charlotte Vengsgaard) are the organisers (left-right) Kristo� e Biglete, Fanny Le Gall, Julie-Marine Guérin and Nicolas Bonvalet. Behind them is Danish photographer Anders Askegaard, whose photographs of exotic women in Paris proved popular with visitors, as did the metro line exhibit (centre right)

Among the new exhibitions opening across town over the weekend was ‘The Room’ by Marcel van Eeden at Galleri Bo Bjerggaard …

French-born Princess Marie on Monday was the apt choice to present the Francophone Ambassadors’ Literature Prize for 2012 to Sissel-]o Gazan − who is best known as the author of the 2008 book ‘Dinosaurens � er’ (‘The Dinosaur Feather’) − at the residence of Belgian ambassador Jean-Francois Branders on Monday. Pictured here (left-right) are Czech ambassador Zdeněk Lyčka, Swiss ambas-sador Denis Feldmeyer, Estonian ambassador Katrin Kivi, Princess Marie, DR culture journalist Tore Leifer, Benin’s ambassador Arlette Claudine Rita Dagnon Vignikin, Canadian ambassador André François Giroux, Gazan, Ivory Coast ambassador Mina Balde Laurent, French ambassador Veronique Bujon-Barre and Branders

On January 10 it was the turn of parliament to hold a reception for the city’s Diplomatic Corps. It might look like hundreds turned up, and a fair number did, but if you look closely you’ll see a fair proportion of the attendants are actually in a painting

And Koloristerne at Den Frie Udstillingsbygning, featuring several artists including Carsten von Wurden

ABOUT TOWN PHOTOS BY HASSE FERROLD UNLESS OTHERWISE STATEDPHOTOS BY HASSE FERROLD UNLESS OTHERWISE STATED

COMMUNITY

Even though you may feel like a harlot, you don’t come across as one to a Danish guy

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American Photograpy by Torbjørn Rødland at Nils Stærk (featuring Ronald Reagan) …

1325 - 31 January 2013 THE COPENHAGEN POST CPHPOST.DK COMMUNITY

COMING UP SOON� e Plant Hunters: Explorers, Botanists & Forgotten HeroesFolk Universitet, Niels Bohr Insti-tut, Blegdamsvej 17, Bldg D, Cph Ø; � ursdays 17:15-19:00, starts Feb 14, ends March 14; www.fukbh.dk � is course, taught in Eng-lish, will explain how our ex-otic house plants travelled across Asia, Australia and the Americas to � nd homes in European gar-dens. Participants will meet the plant hunters, a group of adven-turing botanists who endured vast hardships and illnesses to explore remote areas of the world, with the sole purpose of discovering new plants for home gardens. Professor Toby Mus-grave will tell their stories and investigate the impact of their plants on Europe’s gardens.

Vertical Wine TastingKent Ka� e Laboratorium, Nørre Farmiagsgade 70, Cph K; Wed 18:00-20:00; 250kr, 30 spots avail-able, sign up at mail@martinus-nielsen.com; www.omnielsen.dkJoin Copenhagen International Expats at a tasting featuring OM Nielsen’s newly-arrived ‘Domaine Pascal Bouley 1. Cru’ wines. � is will be a guided wine tasting in which participants ex-plore the regional di� erences between these unique wines, as well as di� erences between the 2009 and 2010 versions.

Empowering quali� edexpats in DenmarkIT Volunteers of Denmark Infor-mation Session, Symbion Science Park, Fruebjergvej 3, Cph Ø; Jan 31, 17:00; register at www.itvd.dk/registration-form.php; www.itvd.dkAre you an expat in Denmark looking for a professional ca-reer via alternative options? Join IT Volunteers of Denmark (ITVD), a non-pro� t organisa-tion working to facilitate op-portunities for internationals in Denmark. ITVD endeavours to nurture expats’ knowledge while searching for a job, generate income opportunities and ca-reer possibilities, and maximise expats’ exposure to prospective businesses. � is seminar will discuss how a self-driven, busi-ness-minded person can create opportunities to secure a better living. � e seminar will start at 17:30, but ITVD will begin wel-coming guests at 17:00.

Copenhagen Tour for new expatsStarts at Vor Frue Kirke, Nør-regade 8, Cph K; Feb 2, 10:00-13:00; 150kr, free for children under 14; max 20 people, regis-tration required at www.copenha-gentours.dk/expatConsider this your personal in-troduction to Copenhagen. � is walking tour will cover some of the major sights in the city and is a perfect way for newcomers

to get a sense of Copenhagen and its o� erings. � e guides maintain a leisurely pace, leav-ing plenty of time to stop and marvel at sights like Nyhavn and Amalienborg.

Family and SuccessionLaw in DenmarkEuropean Professional Women’s Network Seminar, O� ces of Lund, Elmer and Sandager, Kalvebod Brygge 39-41, Cph K; Wed Feb 20, 18:30-21:30; 150kr for non-members, register at www.epwn.etheryl.net/events/4382Lawyers Janne Køster and Pernille Ørskov team up with the European Professional Women’s Network to share their combined expertise about the challenges of border marriages and inheritance law in Den-mark. � is seminar will focus on the international principles regarding prenuptial agreements and divorce settlements as ac-cording to governing Danish law. � e event will largely be based on participants’ questions and speci� c challenges.

English Book ClubØsterbro Library, Dag Ham-merskøld Allé 19, Cph Ø; Feb 6, 17:30; contact Aishwarya Ga-waskar at aishgawaskar@gmail.com to sign up; www.expatinden-mark.comJoin Expat in Denmark’s next JESSICA HANLEY

DAVE SMITH

Join the book club !JESSICA HANLEY

Books & Company’s latest endeavour aims to bring together readers of all backgrounds

BOOK a� cionados, inter-nationals and Danes alike need look no further than

Hellerup’s Books & Company. After years of requests from cus-tomers, the international book cafe is launching its own book club in February

Lara Miller, the newest ad-dition to the team at Books & Company, will be heading the new club. A native Australian who moved to Denmark ten years ago, Miller describes her-self as a “happy customer” of the bookshop who wanted to get involved.

“I asked Isabella Smith, the owner, if there was a book club at the shop,” Miller said. “She said that there wasn’t, but it was something she would like to do, so I o� ered to help start one.”

According to Miller, the re-sponse has been overwhelming already.

“We had to post online after one day of advertising that the response had been very positive and that places were full and we were already starting a waiting list,” Miller told � e Copenha-gen Post.

Although details and num-bers are still being � nalised – and will largely re� ect the desires of the club members –12 partici-pants have already signed on, and the shop plans to hold monthly meetings. All of the book discus-sions will be in English.

Miller and the others at Books & Company � nd it im-portant for the new club to pro-vide an opportunity for all lovers of literature to share their ideas in a relaxed, positive environment.

“Books & Company focuses as much on the ‘company’ as the ‘books’,” Miller said. “� e book club creates a space for in-ternationals and Danes to meet together and share their love of books.”

According to a new survey, the country’s YIPs (young international professionals) can � nd plenty of socialising opportunities if they know where to look

DEVELOPING a social network as a young in-ternational professional (YIP) in Denmark can

be challenging, according to a new survey carried out by In-ternational Community, an in-ternational organisation that was established by Erhverv Aarhus (Aarhus Business Network) in 2008 to provide a shared plat-

form for businesses, educational institutions and public authori-ties that deal with international employees in Jutland.

However, there is hope. Ac-cording to the survey’s conclu-sions, learning Danish, joining an association, becoming a vol-unteer and attending interna-tional events provide excellent opportunities for socialising with other internationals and Danes.

� e primary focus of the YIP Survey by International Commu-nity – which was carried out via a focus group, interviews with HR employees and interviews with internationals at several informal events – was how international companies, organisations and pub-lic institutions can become better

at attracting and retaining YIPs. “At International Commu-

nity we felt the need to take a closer look at the wants of this speci� c group within the expat community in Aarhus, since they clearly value other things than the typical expat family or ac-companying spouses,” explained International Community’s pro-ject manager, Tiny Maerschalk.

“Both in order for us to target our services to them even bet-ter, but also to the bene� t of the companies and organisations within our network that seek to attract and retain the most tal-ented employees and need the tools to do so.”

According to the survey, YIPs like the 37-hour working week that leaves them with plenty of time to socialise and other pas-time activities. However, accord-ing to the International Com-munity’s Molly Durham, who is herself American, establishing a network can be a challenge, es-pecially if you don’t know how to approach Danes and their some-times closed-o� behaviour.

“YIPs are characterised as young international knowledge workers who came here by them-selves,” she said. “Not surpris-ingly, they emphasise networking more than people who bring their family and are very interested in connecting with other interna-tionals as well as Danes, which often demands an e� ort from you. � e survey participants

director, Lene Skyttegaard, inter-national diversi� cation creates better conditions for innovation.

“� e needs of the YIP are of course important to us, and since we don’t have the resources to be updated on the latest knowledge all the time, we turn to Interna-tional Community when need-ed,” she revealed.

recommend learning Danish, attending social events, joining an association or doing volun-teer work as great ways to get a network outside your o� ce and make your stay more enjoyable.”

� e survey also highlights how YIPs are focused on getting a headstart when arriving in Den-mark. � erefore, they appreciate all the help they can get with their paperwork − for instance, at the International Citizen Service. Moreover, they suggest that a ‘so-cial buddy’ could be helpful upon arrival and that practical online information should be a ‘one point of entry’ instead of being scattered across various websites.

“� e idea of a buddy who can assist you with practical stu� and connect you with other inter-nationals and Danes outside the workplace is great,” said Damien Castaignet, a loads engineer at Vestas.

“For example, I wish someone could have talked to my landlord in Danish and supported me with other practical and social matters. I would de� nitely have settled in quicker if someone had pointed me to relevant events and network opportunities.”

International Community also supports the many interna-tional companies that seek to at-tract YIPs in order to stay com-petitive. Both large international companies and SMEs are part of International Community’s net-work. According to DuPont’s HR

“We consider International Community as an extension to our HR department. For in-stance, we participate in seminars where we can network with other internationally-minded compa-nies, get access to valuable knowledge and best practice so-lutions, and be inspired by the latest knowledge in the � eld.”

Yippie Kai-Yay ! Here’s hope for internationals seeking to network

Fact� le | International Community

• A network for interna-tional employees, their families, international-ly-minded Danes and companies that work to attract and retain inter-national talents. It o� ers events, seminars, practi-cal info and personal sup-port to all its members.

• Established in 2008 by Erhverv Aarhus (Aarhus Business Network) – an independent business organisation working to strengthen the business community in the Aarhus area – in co-operation with Aarhus Council as

an independent and non-political organisation.

• Supported by some of the biggest companies and organisations in Denmark such as Du-Pont, Vestas, Arla Foods, Bestseller, Grundfos and Aarhus University.

• Lead partner of a region-al frontrunner project, which includes all 19 councils in the region and is partly � nanced by the European Social Fund. � e project was initiated by Central Denmark Re-gion’s Department of Regional Development.

• Won the Integrations Award from Aarhus Council in 2012 for build-ing bridges between in-ternational residents and companies.

Molly Durham recommends Danish lessons, social events, joining a club and doing volunteer work as great ways for YIPs to network

book club meeting, which will cover Rachel Joyce’s ‘� e Un-likely Pilgrimage of Harold’ this month. Co� ee, tea and cookies will be o� ered while participants discuss the book. � e discussion will be in English, but partici-pants should feel free to read the book in any language. Contact Aishwarya Gawaskar if inter-ested to ensure there are enough arrangements for all.

Mindfulness course for expatsMBSR Course, Østerbrogade 56D, Cph Ø; eight-week course on Mondays, 18:30-21:00, not April 1, starts Feb 11; 4,500kr; contact Carina Lyall at kontakt@mindfulground.dk or 3142 4404; www.mindfulground.dkStressed-out expats now have a chance to reclaim their calm and relaxation with a new mindful-ness course in English. A course in Mindfulness Based Stress Re-duction (MBSR) can help aid you in decision-making abilities and increase your awareness and perception. Participants will be introduced to Hatha yoga, com-munication and other awareness exercises during the eight-week course. � e course is 26 hours long overall, and the price in-cludes training materials and an additional all-day silent work-shop on Sunday March 17.

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14 25 - 31 January 2013The Copenhagen posT CphposT.dk

Thorbjørn olesen has handed rory McIlroy a lesson in how to adapt to a set of new nike clubs by finishing second at the Abu Dhabi hSbC Golf Championship on Sunday – a tournament at which the northern Irishman, and new fiancé of Caroline Wozniacki, failed to make the cut. “rory’s had a long break, ”olesen told the Irish Independent. “next time he’s back, I’m sure he’ll do great.” After a stuttering start to his final round, olesen shot three birdies on the back nine, but was unable to sink a putt on the last to force a playoff. The result sees him officially become Denmark’s top golfer, as he is now number 42 in the world rankings, five places above compatriot Tomas bjørn, and 23 above Anders hansen.

KAnAl 6 on Sunday revealed the identity of ‘The Secret Footballer’, the pseudonym for an unknown English league-based footballer who since early 2011 has written a blog for british newspaper The Guard-ian, as Dave Kitson, a forward with Championship club Sheffield United, who previously played in the Premier league − most notably for reading. The segment showed Danish journalist Kian Fonoudi eliminating all the potential candidates one by one until only Kitson remained, and K6 duly translated it into English. When the news reached Sheffield United, it immediately threatened legal action if the channel didn’t retract the segment, which is has subsequently done. Fonoudi said the club’s action “just further proves my point”.

CArolInE Wozniacki bowed out of the Australian open on Monday, losing 2-6, 6-2, 7-5 to russia’s unranked double grand slam champion Svetlana Kuznetsova, a player the tenth seed lost to earlier in the month in Sydney. Wozniacki disputed a decision by the umpire at a critical moment in the final set, but in the end she could have few complaints, firing 23 winners to Kuznetsova’s 52, losing 23 of the 25 points that Kuznetsova contested at the net. In total, Wozniacki hit 53 winners in four matches, compared to 133 by her opponents, and 62 unforced errors – barely a third of her opponents’ 178. her elimination will see her lose 180 ranking points for failing to match her quarter-final appearance in 2012.

Big tick from NikeK6 outs ‘secret footballer’ Woz’s woes in Oz continue

SpOrtS NeWS IN BrIef

Mikkelsen wants a world gold to underline his world #1 status Laudrup never played in England, but has taken to its game like a swan to water

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Mikkel’s eyes are on the crown … as are Michael’s, Wembley-bound

AT ThE TIME of going to press, Denmark were heavily favoured to beat hungary in the quarter-

finals of the World handball Championship on Wednesday night. russia, Iceland, Macedo-nia, Chile and Qatar all fell to the red and white sword in the group stage, and on Sunday, they easily beat Tunisia in the round of last 16 knockout phase.

Denmark, undefeated thus far, are 3/1 second favourites (ladbroke’s), behind hosts Spain, to lift the trophy, and they are 2/9 (bet 365) to beat hungary – the shortest price of any of the quarter-finalists. heading into the tournament, they were the fourth favourites, but since then the draw has opened up for them. While their group was the easiest of the four, they’ve so far managed to avoid the toughest nations: France, Germany, Croa-tia and Spain.

If they beat hungary, they will probably face France on Fri-day in what will be a replay of the 2011World handball Cham-

forGET loCAl Danish legends hummel and jan Mølby. At the time of go-ing to press, Michael la-

udrup was on the verge of break-ing into the very highest echelons of his host city’s folklore, right up there alongside Dylan Thomas and Catherine Zeta-jones. And even if his side fails to capitalise on their 2-0 win away at Chelsea in the first leg of the league Cup semi-final on Wednesday night and doesn’t make the final, rest assured: a Swansea sainthood is in the post.

Quite simply, laudrup and Swansea City look to be a match made in heaven. The Dane has led the Welsh team to a solid placing in the Premier league, and immortality is his for the taking.

nevertheless, the Danish legend was his usual mod-est self when commenting on whether the Chelsea match was the most important in Swan-sea’s history.

“I don’t know,” he admitted to the bbC. “I’ve only been

pionship final, which Denmark lost in heartbreaking fashion 37-35 in overtime. The potential rematch offers a mouthwatering battle between two of the world’s best handball players: Denmark’s Mikkel hansen and France’s nikola Karabatic.

but let’s not get carried away! Although hungary lost to Spain and Croatia in the group stages, they won’t be a walkover, particu-larly if their beast of a playmaker, the 2.09m, 113kg lazlo nagy, has anything to do with it!

“I think he is the world’s best left-handed player. Kim An-dersson is good too, but because laszlo also plays defence, he is a more complete player and valu-able to his team,” Danish player jesper nøddesbo told Ekstra bladet tabloid.

nøddesbo is one of just five remaining players from the squad that won gold at the 2008 Euro-pean handball Championships – an encouraging sign for the future. The Danish squad this year is one of the youngest in the competition. Aside from its handful of veterans, 11 of the 17 Danish players are under 29, and seven of them are under 25. but while they may be young, coach Ulrik Wilbek is adamant that his team is up for the challenge.

“It’s a young team, to be

here seven months. obviously for me it is: it’s a cup semi-final, the last step before a final. but I think that question should be asked to people who have been following this club for five, ten or 50 years − they could put this game on Wednesday into perspective.”

A glance at the club’s history would appear to suggest that this is indeed one of the most impor-tant games in Swansea’s 101-year history. Founded in 1912, Swan-sea have won neither the FA Cup nor the league Cup and never even made a final. The closest they have come are the FA Cup semi-finals in 1925 and 1964. Considering 43 of the 92 clubs in the English league have won one of the big three, that’s quite an omission.

but now they’re on the cusp of their first final appearance after disposing of barnsley, Crawley Town, liverpool and Middles-brough in that order before beat-ing mighty Chelsea two weeks ago. It was their first win at Stam-ford bridge for 87 years and puts the Swans firmly in control ahead of the second leg in Wales.

Should the Swans make it to the final, they will face league Two outfit bradford City, a team that will be bidding to become one of the biggest underdogs in

sure, but it’s not an inexperienced team. Many of these young play-ers have been here before, but it is a much younger team than we’ve had before,” Wilbek told Dr news. “And it’s also a team lacking the defensive specialists − the players that only play at one end of the pitch.”

It’s impressive how Denmark have managed to switch genera-tions with little attrition to their results. Sweden and russia, for example, who dominated the handball scene in the 1990s, win-ning between them four Worlds and five Euros, have failed to make a final since Sweden won the Euros in 2002. They have simply failed to make the transi-tion.

Denmark, on the other hand, have already enjoyed a decade as one of the dominant forces in the game and now look set for another one. Since finishing third in the 2002 Euros, they have won the Euros twice and finished third twice, and also finished fourth, third and second in the Worlds.

Denmark look a good bet to make a second consecutive final. With the likes of hansen, nik-las landin, nikolaj Markussen and rasmus lauge patrolling the Danish line for the next six to ten years, the future looks very bright indeed.

English Cup history. Should they make it, Swansea would be strong favourites to win.

As well as the Cup, la-udrup also has another record in his sights: Swansea’s high-est ever placing in the English top flight. The current record is sixth (1982), and Swansea, in ninth place, are just five points behind Everton who sit in the Euro league-claiming fifth po-sition.

but despite the glowing ev-er-growing reputation, laudrup wouldn’t be drawn into judging the season until all 38 league games are played.

“In regards to myself over here, I am naturally very satis-fied with the season thus far. but there are still four months left, so the final evaluation will not be until May,” laudrup told The Copenhagen Post.

When that appraisal comes, laudrup faces tough opposition becoming the most influential Dane in the history of Swansea City. The aforementioned jan Mølby took the Swans to the Division Three playoff final as player-manager in the 1996-97 season. And hummel sponsored the club during the 1984-85 sea-son.

only joking! laudrup has already eclipsed them both.

Christian Wenande Christian Wenande

Bidding for the final four, Denmark’s handball team is hungry for more success

Bidding for the final two, Laudrup is quickly becoming a Swansea legend

1525 - 31 January 2013 THE COPENHAGEN POST CPHPOST.DK

I’m not � eeing to Barbados with the company’s money. We’re not � ring anyone. And we’re not going bankrupt

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BUSINESS

B EGINNING this au-tumn, it could cost cus-tomers as much as 480 kroner a year to have an

account with Danske Bank.� e nation’s largest bank

has already begun the process of replacing its various banking fees with a � at quartely fee that will see customers pay up to 120 kroner every three month by the end of the year.

Tonny � iery Andersen, the head of retail banking – the bank’s largest division – said last week on Friday that customers would be placed in one of six groups based on the size of their accounts, and those with the least amount of activity would pay the most.

“� at will increase both customer satisfaction and pro� t-ability going forward,” Andersen told media. He said 40 percent of the bank’s customers had been “unpro� table” for the bank.

Customers who do business with the bank worth 750,000 kroner or more – for activities like mortgages, car loans, retire-ment savings or deposits paid – will not be charged. Students are also exempt from the new fees.

In recent years the country’s biggest bank has been dealing with a bad debt problem caused by the manily burst property bubble and writedowns on loans to struggling farmers. � e bank issued new stock worth seven bil-lion kroner and cut over 1,000 jobs as recently as last October in an e� ort to turn itself around.

� e bank has also been try-ing to rebuild customer trust following the � nancial crisis and last year launched its ‘New Standards’ rebranding pro-gramme.

� e campaign – which fea-tured a range of imagery that included athletes with amputat-ed limbs, children using tablet computers, solar panels being installed in Africa and protest-ers throwing stones at the police – drew international ire for its use of an image of a man with a dollar bill taped across his mouth with ‘#OCCUPY’ writ-ten on it.

� e bank was criticised for using the image as it appeared to undermine the fact that the orig-inal #OccupyWallStreet move-ment was driven by outrage at the irresponsible risks taken by banks that contributed to the global � nancial crisis. Danske Bank has apologised to the Oc-cupy movement and removed the image from its campaign.

Now, the new fee structure has the bank again at the centre of a PR storm.

Questions have been raised about whether it is fair for banks to charge customers for basic accounts, particularly when the state requires individuals to have a bank account.

� e bank’s customers blan-keted its Facebook page over the weekend, expressing their anger at the fee plan.

“So now you introduce an-other way to take money from small customers – no wonder they do not feel welcome with you,” wrote one poster.

“We will remember this when it is time to buy a home,” wrote another.

A third expressed outrage over the discrepancy of the

Bank panned over plans to introduce quarterly chargeMost customers will have to pay to keep their money in Danske Bank once it replaces various fees with a single charge in the autumn

Danske Bank will actually bene� t from losing some of its less well o� customers, analysts say

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charges between high and low volume accounts.

“� e less money you have in the bank, the more you have to pay? So the rich don’t pay any-thing? Not smart.”

More than one customer threatened to change banks. Pro-fessor Finn Østrup from Copen-hagen Business School said that losing some customers could actually be the best outcome for the bank.

“� ey are probably happy to lose the smaller customers,” Østrup told the freesheet Me-troXpress. “If they are not will-ing to pay a fee and leave, Dan-ske Bank will pro� t.”

Andersen denied that the bank is looking to get rid of marginal customers, adding that he believed � at fees were easier to understand than transaction fees. � e bank, he said, was not looking to pro� t from the charg-es, only to cover its basic costs to run the accounts.

“I have no doubt that some people will leave, but I hope they look closely before they do,” he told MetroXpress. “Other banks charge fees, and we believe that our new model is the most trans-parent.”

Some industry analysts sug-gested other banks could follow Danske Bank’s suit, but so far, most major banks had said they did not plan such a move.

Danske Bank’s single-digit pro� tability in the third quar-ter last year leaves it far short of Swedish and Norwegian rivals, which have all produced double-digit returns.

Andersen said that regain-ing the trust of customers would take time.

“We have two million cus-tomers – you don’t � x this in one week.”

RAY WEAVER

BJARKE SMITH-MEYER

DESPITE REPORTS to the contrary, property manage-ment agency Scandia Hous-

ing is reassuring clients that it is not on the brink of bankruptcy.

Fears of the company’s de-mise were stoked last week by a statement on its website that it had “stopped payments” and was reorganising.

“� ere’s been a huge over-load of business that simply became unmanageable,” Peter Høyer, the company’s managing director, told � e Copenhagen Post. “So in order to contain the situation, I decided to strategi-cally freeze company activity.”

“Whether that was a bad idea or not, we’ll see. I’ll have time to re-evaluate my actions after we’re up and running again.”

Reports in the media had stated that 50 employees had been laid o� as a result of the compa-ny’s � nancial situation. Høyer, however, was quick to refute that claim as well as other speculation about the company’s health.

“I want to be clear: I’m not � eeing to Barbados with the company’s money. We’re not � r-ing anyone. And we’re not going bankrupt.”

Despite those reassurances,

many of the company’s 9,700 clients remain uncertain about their situation.

Renters have reported be-ing unable to get into contact with the company’s o� ce, while homeowners letting their prop-erties through the agency said they had not been paid for months.

“We’ve not received any money since N o v e m b e r , ” Tony William-son, who owns a suburban Co-penhagen home being rented out through the company, told � e Copenhagen Post.

According to the terms of Scandia’s agreements with prop-erty owners, tenants pay rent to Scandia Housing, which with-holds 15 percent as its fee and then transfers the remaining amount to the owner.

“� ey have power of at-torney over our rent � nances,” Williamson explained. “� ere’s a huge amount of � nancial trust that goes into these sorts of agreements. And the fact that we have received no explanation, no reassurance and no apology is just scandalous.”

Høyer, however, insisted that everyone who is owed money by his company will be repaid, and that all client queries will be an-

Scandia Housing “not going anywhere”

Managing director apologises and reassures renters and property owners the company is still in business

swered as soon as possible.“We’ve received a huge

amount of emails and calls,” he explained. “It is simply impos-sible to address each individual inquiry in one go. Everyone will get a reply once we’ve been able

to restructure the company accordingly.”

W h i l e Høyer reassured tenants and landlords that they are in no danger of losing their money, he admitted it was understandable if clients had become upset.

“I know it has antagonised people and I am very sorry,” Høyer said. “It’s an unacceptable situation, but we’re doing our very best to sort everything out as soon as possible and regain the clients’ trust.”

In the event that a property management agency goes bank-ruptcy, Jan Schøtt-Petersen, a lawyer and spokesperson for Danske Boligadvokater, an as-sociation of lawyers specialising in property law, said renters were “very protected”.

In such cases, rental contracts would remain valid and tenants’ deposits would still be returned to them. � e expense of paying them, however, would fall to the owners themselves, and not the property management agency.

16 25 - 31 January 2013THE COPENHAGEN POST CPHPOST.DK

SPOUSE: Chia-Pei CHEN FROM: TaiwanSEEKING WORK IN: Business Chinese/ Tutorial Chinese teaching in corporations, institutions or International schools.QUALIFICATION: A certi� ed teacher of teaching Chinese as a second language. A degree in Social Science discipline. Continuously participation in training program (organized by Beijing Hanban of CHINA and CBS) to teach Chinese to foreigners in western context. Enrolment to distance Chinese teaching education system that keeps professional Chinese teachers resourceful. EXPERIENCE: I am a certi� ed teacher of teaching Chinese as a second language to foreigners. And I have started teaching Chinese with English in my class for 2 years. I design suitable materials to teach Chinese with di� erent phonetic systems (PinYin for China and Hong Kong, and Mandarin Phonetic Symbols for Taiwan) as well as to interpret di� erences between simpli� ed and traditional Chinese characters. My past positions were Chinese language-related, such as: reporter, translator and social science researcher. Students who I taught before regard me as a sincere, discreet teacher who helps learners to progress in short time.LOOKING FOR: Business Chinese/ Tutorial Chinese teaching.LANGUAGE SKILLS: Chinese (mother tongue), English (Fluent), French (basic), Danish (beginner).IT EXPERIENCE: Word O� ce, SPSS statistic software, Basic Video and Audio editing, Blog writing.CONTACT: teacherchen@live.com, Tel: 25 81 65 18

SPOUSE: Mohammad Ahli- Gharamaleki FROM: IranSEEKING WORK IN: CopenhagenQUALIFICATION: Master degree in chemical engineering.EXPERIENCE: 5+ years as a chemical engineer in R&D oil/gas projects as a team leader or member in Iran.LOOKING FOR: A position in an Intrnational company to expand my experience and expertise.LANGUAGE SKILLS: Azeri (native), English (� uent), Farsi (� uent), Arabic (good), Turkish (good), Danish(beginner).IT EXPERIENCE: Professional (MATLAB, Hysys, Aspen plus, Auto Cad, others (O� ce, Minitab).CONTACT: mohammad_ahli@yahoo.com, Tel: (+45) 71 63 12 85

SPOUSE: Anisha Kanjhlia FROM: IndiaSEEKING WORK IN: Arhus in Teaching/Training/Administration/Media/Public RelationsQUALIFICATION: Post Graduate in Advertising & Communication.EXPERIENCE: 6+ years of professional experience in Training, Customer Service, Promotions, Brand Marketing, Content Analysis and Team Management. Strong experience in planning and executing initiatives. Extensive training experience and in� uencing skills that will assist me in building a high potential, motivated and an e� ective team. Hands-on training in soft skills like crucial conversations and people management Branch Manager & Head of Training for Cosmo Aviation Training School in New Delhi, India. Pro� cient in analysing market trends to provide critical inputs for decision making and formulating training strategies.LOOKING FOR: Part time or full time in Aarhus.IT EXPERIENCE: Comfortable with all the basic computer knowledge like Excel, Word, Power Point, Internet browsing.CONTACT: anisha.feb@redi� mail.com, Tel: 4522305837

SPOUSE: Rita Paulo FROM: PortugalSEEKING WORK IN: Great CopenhagenQUALIFICATION: Architect .EXPERIENCE: I am an architect and I have experience in Project and in Construction Supervision. In the past 7 years, I have worked mainly in housing, master planning and social facilities buildings. My last employer was a Project and Construction company where I had the opportunity to complement my experience in projects together with construction related tasks, developing myself as a professional.LOOKING FOR: Job in Architecture or Construction Company.LANGUAGE SKILLS: Native Portuguese, Pro� ciency in English, Basic user of Spanish and DanishIT EXPERIENCE: Strong knowledge of AutoCad and ArchiCad. Experience in Studio Max, CorelDraw, Photoshop, O� ce tools.CONTACT: rita.vaz.paulo@gmail.com, Tel: +45 2961 9694

SPOUSE: Isaac P Thomas FROM: IndiaSEEKING WORK IN: East Juthland preferably ÅrhusQUALIFICATION: Bachelor of Engineering (Computer Science).EXPERIENCE: Process Consulting, Quality Assurance, CMMI, ISO, Quality Audit, Process De� nition, Software testing, software development, data analysis, best practice sharing, quality gap analysis and “sharepoint” expertise.LOOKING FOR: Process Consulting, Quality Assurance, CMMI, ISO, Quality Audit, Process De� nitionLANGUAGE SKILLS: Danish beginner, English, Malayalam, Hindi and Tamil.IT EXPERIENCE: 8 years experience in IT Industry in software quality assurance, software quality control, software development.CONTACT: isaacpthomas@gmail.com, Tel: +4552225642

SPOUSE: Nitisha Sinha FROM: IndiaSEEKING WORK IN: CopenhagenQUALIFICATION: Masters in Geography and B.EdEXPERIENCE: 4 years 3 months in teaching geography in schools for the middle to senior level. I was also a foreign expat teacher and General Education O� cer at Ministry Of Education,of Singapore in Singapore.LOOKING FOR: Full time / Part time jobs in International School/Colleges/Universities to teach Geography.LANGUAGE SKILLS: English, Hindi and Bengali ( reading, writing and speaking)IT EXPERIENCE: Familiar with MS O� ce (Word, Powerpoint,) and Photoshop.CONTACT: nitz84@gmail.com, Tel: +45 71496579

SPOUSE: Geet Shro� FROM: Bangalore, IndiaSEEKING WORK IN: Midtjylland / Copenhagen / OdenseQUALIFICATION: Bachelor’s degree in Communicative English from Bangalore University, India.EXPERIENCE: 8+ years of experience as Senior Copy Writer, Assistant Manager – Marketing Communications, Executive – Customer Loyalty & Communication, Customer Service Associate respectively. Through these years, I have developed content, handled complete marketing communications, organized numerous corporate (internal & external customer), private and institutional events ranging from 50 to 1000 people and also handling special projects that have included training & internal communication campaigns.LOOKING FOR: A Corporate or Marketing Communication (Internal or External) position or that of a Copy Writer at an advertising agency or a corporate house. Also open to a position at an event management company.LANGUAGE SKILLS: English, Danish (Beginner).IT EXPERIENCE: MS O� ce, Adobe In Design CS3 (Basic).CONTACT: geet_shro� @yahoo.co.in, Tel: +4550834024

SPOUSE: Erik Metzger FROM: San Francisco, CA USASEEKING WORK IN: Drug & Alcohol CounsellingQUALIFICATION: Masters degree in addiction counselling from Hazelden Graduate School of Addiction Studies; Currently preparing for the IC&RC counselling exam.EXPERIENCE: Drug & Alcohol Counsellor; Masters in Addiction Counselling from Hazelden Graduate School in Minnesota, USA, August 2012. Ten years of active work in various 12-step programs. I can meet with you and/or your family to develop a custom recovery plan; all ages welcome. Registered Yoga Teacher through: www.yogaalliance.org since July, 2010. I can supply yoga mats and supports; my apartment or yours! Teacher of business English with training from Berlitz, Virksomhedsskolen and Denmark’s Library School (Cand.scient.bibl., 2007). *All diploma’s and certi� cations available upon requestLOOKING FOR: Part/Full/Freelance/Volunteer work at treatment center and/or outpatient clinic.LANGUAGE SKILLS: English: Native; Danish: Fluent verbal skills and intermediate reading and writing.IT EXPERIENCE: PC and Mac – trained in many software packages and databases.CONTACT: erikmetz@gmail.com

WHY: The Copenhagen Post wishes to help spouses looking for jobs in Denmark. We have on our own initiative started a weekly spouse job page in The Copenhagen Post, with the aim to show that there are already within Denmark many highly educated international candidates looking for jobs.If you are a spouse to an international employee in Denmark looking for new career opportunities, you are welcome to send a pro� le to The Copenhagen Post at aviaja@cphpost.dk and we will post your pro� le on the spouse job page when possible. Remember to get it removed in case of new job.

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SPOUSE: Malgorzata Tujakowska FROM: Poland SEEKING WORK IN: Aarhus and the surrounding areaQUALIFICATION: Masters in Ethnolinguistics with major in Chinese and English, Chinese HSK and Business Chinese Test certi� cates, 2-year long studies at Shanghai International Studies University and National Cheng Kung University,Taiwan.LOOKING FOR: Working for companies hiring Polish and Chinese employees, teaching Chinese, Polish, Business English, linguistics, translation and interpretation, proofreading, Chinese business and culture consulting, administrative work.LANGUAGE SKILLS: Polish (native speaker), Chinese – simpli� ed and traditional (� uent), English (� uent), German(intermediate), Danish (intermediate-currently learning).IT EXPERIENCE: MS O� ce.CONTACT: Tel:+45 28702377, m.tujakowska@gmail.com

SPOUSE: Christina Ioannou FROM: GreeceSEEKING WORK IN: Central CopenhagenQUALIFICATION: MA in HRM London, UK. Bsc. American College USA.EXPERIENCE: Worked as a manager for 11 years in the retailing sector - fashion industry for a big international corporation. I had budget and personnel responsibility. I was in charge of the purchasing department.LOOKING FOR: Any kind of industry.Not simply in fashion.Where I will apply my leadership, sales, communicative and purchasing skills.LANGUAGE SKILLS: English, Swedish,Italian, French, GreekIT-EXPERIENCE: MS O� ceCONTACT: EMAIL: christina_ioannou@yahoo.com, Tel: +46768435211

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National coach Morten Olsen’s new contract will keep him in the job until after the 2014 World Cup.

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Dane unable to obtain family reunifi cation for his � ai girlfriend says residency rules are a Catch-22

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Supermarkets are scammingtheir customers under the guise of the new national ‘fat tax’

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C AN YOU HAVE your cake and eat it too? Conventional wisdom says no, but with their � rst budg-et plan since the shift of power,

the new Socialdemokraterne-Radikale-Socialistisk Folkeparti (SRSF) coalition appear to be giving it a shot.

Many of the elements of the new budget – which is expected to be re-leased in its entirety on � ursday – will increase state spending at a time when the budget de� cit has increased. But where the money would come from re-mained a mystery.

A number of the new budget items reinstate spending cuts made by the pre-

vious Venstre-Konservative (VK) govern-ment. Here are a few of the major points:

Families: VK limited the state’s monthly child support handouts (bør-necheck) to 35,000 kroner per fam-ily. � at limit has now been abolished, meaning that many families will get larger child bene� ts. � e government will also pay for fertility treatments and voluntary sterilisations.

Welfare: VK and Dansk Folkeparti (DF) introduced specialised welfare pro-grammes that reduced the cash bene� ts for new immigrants. � ose programmes have now been eliminated and going forward all residents in need of state support will receive the same welfare bene� ts.

Higher education and research: Universities will get an extra one billion kroner over two years to cover costs as-sociated with a predicted increase in

the number of students. Moreover, stu-dents will no longer pay administrative fees, and prospective Master’s students will have prerequisite course tuitions paid. � e government will also fund 1,500 more state-supported internship positions.

Infrastructure and job creation: Some 17.5 billion kroner will be in-vested over two years in infrastructure projects, such as a new rail line between Copenhagen and Ringsted, a project to widen the Holbæk motorway, erosion protection e� orts along Jutland’s west coast, and renovations to public hous-ing. Prime minister Helle � orning-Schmidt has said that these ‘kickstart’ projects will create 20,000 new jobs from 2012-2013. � e Danish Construc-tion Association predicts 10,000.

Tax break: � e unpopular ‘mul-timedia tax’ introduced by VK will be

abolished, saving some 525,000 Danes with business laptops and mobile phones 3,000 kroner per year.

Not everyone, however, can look for-ward to a cash infusion. Smokers and junk food lovers will be taxed higher on their vices, while international corporations will also see higher tax bills. SRSF plans to raise revenue by closing a number of tax loopholes going back nearly 20 years that allowed international corporations in Denmark to escape paying corporate taxes (see more on page 15).

All told, the spending increases in the new budget are not as big as the minister of the economy and interior, Margrethe Vestager (R), would like. She noted that VK under-reported the de� cit for 2012, making it imprudent to spend more. But Denmark will still meet the EU’s � nan-cial responsibility benchmarks, despite the larger de� cit, she added.

A new budget to ‘kickstart’ the economySRSF’s � rst budget will spend 17.5 billion kroner on infrastructure and abolish previous taxes and restrictions

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BLUESS e e f u l l p r o g r a m m e : w w w . c o p e n h a g e n b l u e s f e s t i v a l . d k & w w w . k u l t u n a u t . d k

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18 25 - 31 January 2013The Copenhagen posT CphposT.dkculture

Who is …Thorkild Grosbøll

He is a former Church of Den-mark vicar popularly known as the priest who didn’t believe in God.

Bad career choice, huh?Well, saying he didn’t believe in God is something of an over-simplification. In his 2003 book ‘En sten i skoen’ (‘A stone in the shoe’), he wrote that he didn’t believe God created or played an active role in the world.

Doesn’t that still go against some kind of church teaching? It does, but it wasn’t enough to get him kicked out of the church – at least not right away. He was given the chance to explain him-self to his bishop, who then made sure his sermons stuck to church dogma.

Did they? Not really. He wound up being suspended in 2004 and relieved entirely of his priesthood the next year, despite having the full support of his parish. He really didn’t do much to help his own case though – especially not when he repeatedly fed the press with quotes like: “God belongs in the past. In fact, he’s so old-fashioned that it astounds me that modern people can even believe in his existence.” At the same time, he blamed the press and his supe-riors for taking his quotes out of context. He was eventually allowed back, but only after he reaffirmed his faith, including the parts about God being the “all-powerful creator of Heaven and Earth”. He retired for good in 2008.

Is he trying to make a comeback?No, but his moment of public doubt has apparently made such an impact that a church in Vi-borg, Jutland recently advertised an opening for a vicar, includ-ing as one of the requirements was that the successful candidate needed to be ‘a believer’.

Are there more like the rev Grosbøll?According to the church look-ing to hire, yes. Given the stink put up by the vicars’ union and the church minister over the re-quirement, they would appear to be right. Tolerance is apparently divine.

THErE Is No document-ed proof that watching a video of an artist swing-ing a brush at his canvas

makes more people want to visit an exhibition. still, the region’s museums, competing to extend our art experience beyond the exhibition walls, are producing web-TV like never before.

Louisiana is just the latest in a line of museums that are allow-ing you to keep updated on the work of artists without ever pass-ing their doorsteps. Following in the digital footsteps of major international museums such as MoMA in New York and the Tate Modern in London, free online video and TV channels are in-creasingly becoming a ‘must’ on museum websites, even though no evidence suggests it affects how many people actually pay the entrance fee to see an exhi-bition.

“We didn’t launch the chan-nel to make more people visit the museum,” explained Chris-tian Lund, the head of Louisiana Channel, which was launched by Louisiana at the beginning of De-cember. “The channel is not sup-posed to offer the same content as the exhibitions. It is supposed to offer something different − an extra bonus.”

The viewers of Louisiana Channel can access a wide range of content from the museum, which is located half an hour’s

drive north of Copenhagen: from a 15-minute interview with the British artist David Hockney to a live performance by American poet and songwriter Patti smith – all just a click of your mouse away.

In Denmark, Louisiana is playing catch-up. Arken Muse-um in Ishøj has been distributing free video via its channel, Arken Channel, since 2011. “The vid-eos are made for people who want to keep up-to-date with what is happening at the museum and who want to get more in-depth with some of the artists or themes that are represented here,” ex-plained Karin skipper-Ulstrup, the marketing and online man-ager at Arken Museum.

And statens Museum for Kunst in Copenhagen already has four years of experience in the web-TV field. The head of its web-TV department, Mathilde schytz Juul, agrees with the other museums that the video produc-tion has a different purpose from making more people pay to visit the museum.

“our goal is to stimulate peo-ple’s appetite for art,” she said. “A click has as much worth to us as a visitor.”

Louisiana accordingly meas-ures the success of its new web-TV channel in clicks instead of ticket sales. The goal is to reach a much bigger audience than the museum’s usual activi-ties. By tracking the clicks on the channel’s website and social media platforms such as Twitter and YouTube, they have found out that people in the UsA and Canada are actually the most fre-quent users of their videos.

“What we want to do is to communicate the values that Louisiana stands for,” said Lund. “Maybe sometime while watching one of our videos on YouTube, people in the Us will become curious about what this place ‘Louisiana’ is besides being a state in their own country.”

Louisiana’s new channel cur-rently attracts between 600 and 800 views a day, compared to 4,000 visitors on a very busy day through its doors.

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Video’s cool and all that, but there’s no substitute for experiencing the beauty of louisiania’s surroundings first-hand

Now you see it, now you don’t

‘Skyfall’ is the most popular ever Bond film in Denmark

amy strada

LAsT YEAr saw the highest number of cinema tickets sold for 30 years. In total,

14.2 million were purchased – nearly three per every person in the country and a 12 percent rise on last year.

Cinema-goers rushed to see blockbusters like ‘skyfall’ – the year’s most popular film, with 914,000 tickets sold – ‘The Dark Knight rises’ (566,000 tickets) and Peter Jackson’s adaptation of Jrr Tolkien’s geek-pleasing ‘The Hobbit’.

Meanwhile, Danish films also prospered, selling 4.1 mil-lion tickets – their second highest tally since 1981, just 100,000 adrift of the 2008 figures. Lead-ing the way were two films by female directors. Anne-Grethe Bjarup riis’s second World War resistance film ‘Hvidsten grup-pen’ (‘The village: one family’s sacrifice will let a country live’)

was the most watched, selling 765,000 tickets, followed by su-sanne Bier’s ‘All You Need is Love’ (645,000 tickets). In third place, Nikolaj Arcel’s ‘En Kongelig Affære’ (‘A royal Affair’) sold 528,000 tickets – the first time three Danish films have sold over 500,000 tickets since 1986.

“The films also showed their strength internationally, win-ning awards at major festivals such as in sundance, Berlin and Cannes,” Henrik Bo Nielsen, the CEo of the Danish Film Insti-tute, told media.

From 272 festival nomina-tions, Danish films won close to 30 percent of them. No fewer than four Danish films were fea-tured in sundance’s World Cin-ema categories; ‘En Kongelig’ won the awards for best actor and best script at the Berlin International Film Festival and is nominated for ‘Best Foreign Language Film’ at next month’s oscars; and Thomas Vinterberg’s ‘Jagten’ (‘The Hunt’), which will be eligible for the oscars next year, won the best actor award at Cannes.

digitally. Analogue signals will still be able to be seen, even on older model televisions.

An easy way to test whether a set can receive MPEG-4 broad-casts is to tune into DrHD (which becomes Dr3 on January 28). since the channel is broad-cast in the MPEG-4 format only, any set that can receive it will be able to receive Yousee broad-casts when they switch over to MPEG-4.

In another sign of the chang-ing television times, the decades-old forced marriage with local an-tenna associations, which many people are required to enter into, may now be coming to an end.

The environment minister, Ida Auken, announced she will introduce a bill next month that will put an end to the law re-quiring people living in certain areas to pay for a connection to a common antenna – something that has been a part of municipal planning since the 1970s.

“of course people should be able to decide which TV pro-vider they want to use without having to pay for a communal antenna,” Auken told Jyllands-Posten newspaper.

There are no official figures on exactly how many households are currently paying to be mem-bers of an antenna association. According to official estimates, it is between 50,000 and 100,000

households, but a study conduct-ed by members of the consumer electronics industry indicated that 650,000 households were currently locked into what they called “television handcuffs”.

Dansk Energi, the lobby group for the energy industry, has fought against the common antenna requirement for years on behalf of a number of major utili-ties companies that have invested billions in broadband and TV services.

Although the group was hap-py the change was finally taking place, they were angry the bill calls for a two-year transition period.

Both the European Commis-sion and Konkurrence og Forbru-gerstyrelsen, the national con-sumer watchdog, have pushed for years for the abolishment of the common antenna rules, saying they hurt competition and con-sumers. Broadcasters like Viasat, Canal Digital and Boxer TV all supported that position.

Carsten Karlsen, who heads antenna association group Forenede Danske Antenneanlæg (FDA), said he welcomes the new rules, even if they mean war for some of his association’s mem-bers.

“We have no interest in be-ing perceived as a prison by our members,” Karlsen told Jyllands-Posten.

No longer just a US state thanks to its new TV channel

Museums are spreading their wings online, demonstrating that art appreciation needn’tbe a preserve of just the eliteand exhibitions

PLANs BY cable TV pro-vider Yousee to change its broadcasting format could

force as many as 50,000 of its cus-tomers to buy a new television.

The company is planning to switch from the MPEG-2 format to MPEG-4 by April 30 in order to be able to carry more high-definition content. The change means that those who purchased early-model digital televisions or receivers equipped with only MPEG-2 receivers will be un-able to receive Yousee’s signal. since 2010, virtually all devices can decode the MPEG-4 signal.

“We have been reluctant to make this decision because it may force a small number of custom-ers to buy a new TV,” Lars Techen Nielsen, a Yousee spokesperson, told Jyllands-Posten newspaper.

Nielsen said Yousee, which has 1.2 million customers and is the nation’s largest cable com-pany, wanted to upgrade all of its digital broadcasts to high-definition by 2015, and to do so it needed the bandwidth now consumed by broadcasting some programmes in both formats.

The change will affect only those channels that are broadcast

Changes on the way for some TV owners

Soon-to-be obsolete digital signal and decades-old antenna fee on the way out

Mad for the moviesCinemas salute their best year since 1982

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1925 - 31 January 2013 The Copenhagen posT CphposT.dk

Jaya Rao

How an Arctic hero’s documentation of the geography of Greenland went unheralded in Denmark until 134 years after his death

Like sands through the hourglass, so are the days of our lives, and when they run out, few of us leave

a visible trace. But in the same way that extreme weather might suddenly expose a forgotten set-tlement in the desert, the foot-prints left in the sands by 18th century danish explorer Peder Olsen Walløe lay unseen for cen-turies until a historian in 1927 republished his diaries, bringing renewed attention to them.

The entries championed the efforts made by Walløe in Green-land between 1751 and 1753, during which time he docu-

mented much of the geography of the southern part of the island’s east coast – information that has since proved to be invaluable to those working and settling in the region.

Walløe first came to Green-land in 1739 as a colonialist – one of five recruited to the country by noted Lutheran missionary Hans egede. aged 23, he be-gan an apprenticeship as a coop-er – a traditional employment choice in pre-industrial Revo-lution europe. He learned to speak the Greenlandic language of kalaallisut and qualified as a trader with permission to operate outside the Godthåb colony. He then worked for Cooper Colony Christianshåb from 1740-1742 before becoming a trading assis-tant in 1743.

But great explorers aren’t cut out to sit indoors all day. Walløe grew restless, and when an op-

portunity came to work for Ja-cob severin, a dano-norwegian merchant nearing retirement, and actively take to the seas, he jumped at it.

it put Walløe in the right place at the right time. The same Mission College in Godthåb that had brought him over to the country in the first place re-cruited him to lead a five-man exploration team tasked with discovering the former eastern norse settlement on the eastern coast of the island.

Walløe, along with two dan-ish sailors and two inuit rowers, left Godthåb in august 1751 in an umiak – a native boat known for its ability to navigate the shallow waters commonly found between the coast and the sea ice. it enabled the expedition to successfully locate the norse settlement identified by egede along with the remains of other

hitherto unknown settlements. The team were greatly assisted by inuit locals who helped guide them to the settlements as well as brief them on the weather pat-terns of the region.

Over the first year, the team explored the area that later came to be known as Julianehåb dis-trict and the regions of Tunul-liarfik Fjord and Hvalsey. and in 1752, they crossed Cape Farewell and travelled further up the east coast to an island, which Walløe called nenese. They then went further north past the Lindenovs inlet but not much further due to the constant drift-ice and bad weather. The team ruled against returning the way they came and subsequently decided to return through the Prince Christian sound – the shortest route for ships to avoid the rough waters around the tip at the southeastern point of the islands – to Frederik-

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shåb. However, when Walløe re-turned to denmark shortly after-wards, his mission was branded a failure, most hurtfully by the Greenland Trade Company. He sought solace on his home island of Bornholm where he started a grocery store and settled down into family life. He never went back to Greenland again.

in 1765, he finally put pen to paper, making use of the extensive diaries he kept during his travels to document the nature and ice conditions on the east Coast. despite waiting over a decade, he became the first european to describe the region in print – the observations regarding the movement of goods through ice were of particular interest to the maritime industry. and likewise anthropologists and historians have learnt a lot thanks to his insights regarding Greenland’s indigenous population and their

living conditions under nordic colonialism.

nevertheless, his treatment in denmark did not improve. When he returned to Copenha-gen and applied for a small pen-sion, he was unsuccessful, and his remuneration for his memoirs was minimal. He lived the rest of his days in miserable conditions, eventually dying at the age of 77 in the workhouse of the Vartov Church Hospital in Copenhagen in 1793.

Little did he know that 134 years later, his dairies would fi-nally receive the recognition they deserved when they were published by the renowned dan-ish archivist and historian Louis Theodor alfred Bobé. This led to renewed interest in his work. Walløe’s footsteps, lost in the sands of time – or snowy waste-lands if you like – had finally been discovered again.

Denmark through the looking glass

The explorer who came in from the cold to wallow in squalour

a umiak, just like the one Walløe used on his expedition. it was ideally suited to navigating shallow water and creeping up on unsuspecting harbour masters to ask for directions

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