Country of common sense: what Denmark surprised the Ukrainian programmer

Copenhagen. Photo: Depositphotos

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Ukrainian programmer Alexander Skakunov went on a business trip to Denmark and was so fascinated by this country that he decided to move there with his wife and child.

His goal was to discover new horizons, to gain the experience of living abroad and to give it to his son.

For four years he lived in the homeland of Andersen, worked, raised children, led blog in which he talked about his impressions and discoveries. And then he returned to Ukraine.

«Columnist» asked Alexander about the pros and cons of Danish life and why he finally decided to return. ForumDaily publishes the text with the permission of the editors.

Why Denmark?

On my first visit, I noticed two striking things:

1. Unmanned subway, that is, completely without a driver. Automation.

Metro train in Denmark. Photo author

2. A group of smart young people who went to a party. The girls were wearing fur coats and heels - and they all rode bicycles!

I realized that this is a different world - by technology, by the way people behave and how they relate to others. I call Denmark a country of common sense.

As a result, my wife and I moved to Copenhagen.

Copenhagen. Photo: Depositphotos

I worked as the head of the development department in the same startup as in Ukraine, only in the Danish office. After a couple of years, the startup had faded away, and since I decided to devote myself to online education, I began to look for a company where IT and video overlap. So I ended up on Danish television, on TV2.

From 1050 employees, I was for a long time the only foreigner on the staff. Now my friend from Kiev has joined me. Another Ukrainian delivers the mail, and when we chat at the coffee machine, my colleagues always ask what language we speak (in the midst of the dominance of the Danish speech, we look exotic).

About the adaptation and attitude of the Danes to visitors

Since my wife and I immediately decided that we would return to Ukraine, we didn’t invest much in learning the Danish language - although the courses are free, you still have to work hard. And here everyone speaks English, that’s all.

But then it turned out that without the Danish language you are always not at home. And it should also be noted that before the Maidan, Europeans had little idea where such a country as “Ukraine” was, and this made adaptation a little more difficult. Maidan did good PR and media-coverage our country.

Previously, the dialogue in the bar looked like this:

- Where are you from?

- From Ukraine.

- Where is it?

- Well, this ... Between Poland and Russia.

- (uncertainly) Ah ...

But immediately after the Maidan, it looked like this:

- Where are you from?

- From Ukraine.

- Dude!! I have a drink !!

- (my colleague from the Czech Republic) Oh, then I am also from Ukraine !!

And the adaptation is complicated by the fact that the Danes as a nation behave more mature than we do. We, Ukrainians, are still drawing each other - relatively speaking, we buy iPhones and cars on credit to look richer, and then there is no money for calls and gasoline.

We have nothing meaningful diplomas. We do not learn English. We are still every man for himself. We have not mentally survived the times of shortage, but the Danes did not even know it. They walk in simple jeans, ride bicycles, girls can walk in torn tights with a mess of dirty hair - but they have traveled half the world, on average, they speak 2-3 languages ​​and feel like one big family.

Despite the difficulties of the initial period, you take root in a couple of years, and if you find a good social circle, then you don’t want to change the situation. People here are very sociable, comfort is complete, there is a barbecue in each yard. It is nice here.

Accomodation

In Denmark, the apartments fly away in an hour, and they really turn. At the same time, the price is not related to whether the apartment is far from the center, to the subway 5 minutes or 15. It seems to me that this is because here wealth is distributed evenly. Everywhere there are bike paths, parks, benches; purely. The only thing that, in my opinion, can greatly influence the price, is a view of the sea. What's more interesting, the Nazis did not bomb Denmark, so the new buildings are listed on a par with the houses of the end of the XIX century.

All the apartment options we looked at were around 8000 CZK per month ($ 1380) - but these were either small apartments, or far away, or not at all Feng Shui. We rented a newly renovated apartment the size of a Ukrainian treshka in Amager (a good coastal area) without bargaining for 10 000 crowns ($ 1700).

Copenhagen. Photo: Depositphotos

Amager (simply “Ama” in Danish) has always attracted me with its proximity to the sea and modern Danish architecture.

Education

My son was 6 years old when we moved, and he learned Danish in a year at a special preparatory school. To be honest, there was a moment at the very beginning when we thought about sending him to a Russian school. There are no Ukrainians here yet, but everything happened before the Maidan and the seizure of Crimea by Russia, and the adjective “Russian” has not yet caused such negativity. But we were made to understand that there were no places, they were reserved for the children of Aeroflot employees and diplomats.

Well, okay, we thought, immersion is so immersion, what's the point to move abroad and create your own ghetto? We must learn from the Danish experience. We identified the son in a Danish school in the community. But first he had to unlearn in the preparatory class, where the training takes place mainly in the form of a game.

There were many children from different countries, from India and Somalia to Japan and the USA. Son evaluates that school on 10 of 10 points.

The son went to and from school by taxi at the expense of the Danish commune (a mix of housing offices and the district executive committee that resolves such issues). Taxis are very expensive here, so we were pleasantly shocked. I emphasize that this is not an ordinary district school, but a special preparatory school for foreign children.

The son was transferred to the main school later than the other children, although he already became very good at Danish language and mathematics. The reason was a lack of sociability: he preferred to play alone, and the wise Danes saw this as a much bigger problem than if he did not know the basics of arithmetic.

Two psychologists were assigned to him, who, without interfering with the games, watched his behavior. Then we were invited to the director, where psychologists and an accredited Ukrainian translator were waiting for us. We were advised how to adjust the home climate so that our boy would be more involved in communication with other children. The consultation was also free.

The comprehensive school here is completely different from the Ukrainian one. For example, on Wednesdays, children go for walks - either to the aquarium, or to the forest, burn charcoal with a forester.

Medical service

Our daughter was already born in Denmark. We thought for a long time what to call it. I decided to go with a Disney princess name. We immediately crossed out Pocahontas and Mulan. Ariel and Jasmine remained on the shortlist. But the mother-in-law authoritatively declared: “Ariel is washing powder!” So we named our daughter Jasmine.

By the way, in Denmark there is a list of permitted children's names. It is impossible, for example, to name a child Monkey (monkey), Facebook, etc.

In the maternity hospital, our daughter was given a taxpayer code (analogous to a tax identification number) 10 minutes after birth, and this was done by the doctor who delivered the baby - she simply pressed a couple of buttons. She wrote the birth resolution legibly, included a smiley face, and since we hadn’t yet come up with a name, our daughter was written down as “Little Girl of Love” (my wife’s name is Lyubov).

I made a video about the hospital in Denmark, you can see how everything differs from our clinics.

Danish medicine is conventionally divided into 2 level - Front Front and real medicine.

Front Front. Reception. Photo author

The task of the Front Front is to prevent real medicine, so if you have a non-critical condition (for example, your child has a temperature lower than 40), you will be told to drink tea and rest in order for the body to fight itself.

But real medicine is the cutting edge of science and technology. And all the latest equipment and specialists will help you. For example, a company Novo Nordisk - the leader of insulin production in the world.

So we’re joking that it’s better to have cancer than a cold.

For us, “health” is the absence of a disease that we fight with pills. For the Danes, “health” is the body’s reserve of strength, which they try to increase by all means. So there are no pharmacies here, like ours, at every turn.

Well, sport is a lot of sport. People run in any weather, all year round, one at a time, in groups and with baby carriages - until you get home from work, you meet a 5-6 person.

That’s why, for example, our people quickly become flabby after 40 years, while Danish women look great even at 60, you can even meet them in a nightclub. In Denmark, the average life expectancy is 80 years.

Dentistry is a bit more complicated. It is more profitable to fly to Kiev to cure all your teeth than to put one filling in Copenhagen. In Denmark, everything is either free or very expensive. Dentistry for children is free, and for parents it is very expensive.

Roads and cars

Copenhagen is a city of bicycles. In the morning there are small traffic jams - cycling. For this type of transport there is the entire infrastructure: dedicated lanes in each direction, often individual traffic lights, drivers of cars are trained and drive very carefully.

Bicycles are various, even with a cradle for children, albeit with a stroller for an adult. If your way to work and back is more than 20 km (and the Danish system knows where you live and where you work), then you will be given a tax break.

As for cars, they are very expensive - due to taxes, the real price increases 2 times. And I hardly see any jeeps here. But the rich Danes are buying really beautiful expensive cars.

Copenhagen. Photo: Depositphotos

Leisure

We spent our free time more diverse than in Ukraine. In the evenings, some classes for children, agreed to go to the forest with friends for the weekend, and the next two weeks flew to Paris.

This is from Ukraine. Azure shores seem far away. Here, in Europe, sometimes you can fly to Italy for the price of a scarf.

In summer you can go to the beach in Copenhagen - the main thing is not to miss these two days (here you need a smiley). I was sorely lacking in sun, summer. Danes catch every ray at every opportunity.

Food and prices

One characteristic of Denmark national dish does not exist. Even if you take a simple burger and try it in several different places, it will be several different burgers, and everyone will be delicious.

Denmark exports pork, so there are many familiar dishes - lard / bacon, and cracklings in the form of long sticks. Soups, as a rule, do not eat here - this is already delicious.

In the area of ​​Butchers (Kødbyen) Danes remade old butchers for restaurants, and there, for example, you can try meat that has been baked for 16 hours. This is incredibly tasty, I drive all Ukrainians guests there. The pleasure is not cheap, but, firstly, it is worth the money, and secondly, the butchers give to try every kind of meat you like. While you try everything, consider, already, ate.

Denmark is a very expensive country. If in Ukraine we were saving a decent amount, then in Denmark we began to live from paycheck to paycheck - high taxes, prices, too. How do you like a $ 30 men's haircut?

Beer in a supermarket costs 8-10 CZK ($ 1,5), in a bar - 50-70 ($ 9) /

We were looking for a piano tutor for a son. One lesson is $ 15-40. And there was an option to engage in the Royal Conservatory on the piano Steinway worth 1 million crowns ($ 150 thousand), because there all pianos are.

The most ordinary, familiar services cost crazy amounts of money: taxis, sushi, beer at the bar, pastry chef. Again, because the “taxi” here is brand new Mercedes, the “beer in the bar” is the Danish “Carlsberg” (which differs from the Ukrainian one for the better), the “confectioner” is also like that, after which my favorite eclair cake (which in Kyiv is called “tastechko custard”) seems like a dry loaf. But all this takes a significant toll on your pocket.

About return

We initially wanted to return, we knew that being eternal immigrants is not for us.

My wife and I are from Sevastopol, but for the last 6 years before leaving we lived in Kyiv and, of course, had no intention of returning to occupied Crimea. But I didn’t want to go to Kyiv either. After Denmark, I realized that Kyiv, although good, was not for me. For example, in Copenhagen there are almost no high-rise buildings - Danish architecture students told me that this was done deliberately so that a person could relate himself to the people in the windows - those guys are cooking dinner, and those are watching TV, there is a feeling of “I am a man among people.” In Kyiv - the feeling “I am an ant among ants.”

And still there is not enough spirit of unity, not enough politeness - every rude taxi driver or aunt in the subway with a glass look eats away a piece of creative energy from you, so you don’t want anything in the evening.

But Lvov captivated me immediately. He's different. He's not huge. There is a lot of music, a lot of youth and some kind of peaceful joy. When you sit in a restaurant, its interior and the view of the paving stones from the window creates a 100% Copenhagen feeling, only the Ukrainian language is spoken around. So I jokingly call Lviv “Lvovenhagen”. Of course, there is also a “scoop” in Lviv. But overall, I feel comfortable here and want to work. It's important to me.

My son is worried that the Ukrainian school will be more demanding in terms of exact sciences. But I’m an engineer, I’ve been working with him for a long time, and in the end we discovered that he knows what “aerodynamics” is, but has no idea what “notebook” is. It's okay, we'll break through.

Not without pride, I want to note that Lvov, as a place for our family, I derived mathematically. Took data from a crime map in Ukraine and correlated these figures with programmers' salaries by city.

Western Ukraine has the lowest crime rate, while Lviv is second after Kyiv in terms of salaries for IT specialists. And the cherry on the cake is that there is an airport, and Europe is very close.

In Ukraine, I want to use my new worldview, a new mindset. I do online courses for programmers, and over time I want to make it an international project.

How to create Denmark in Ukraine?

On the one hand, Ukraine lags behind Scandinavia by several paragraphs of a history textbook. In Kiev, the metro still shows the time after the train leaves (and not before arrival), while in Copenhagen, the metro is fully automatic, without a driver.

We are still trading ore, and they are already developing computer science and nanotechnology with all their might. This greatly affects the economy, the social sphere, how people behave, how they make decisions. Financial pyramids like MMM will not work here so easily, and the Danes will not charge water from the TV.

We need to understand many things about ourselves. We must unite - for a start, at least with our neighbors in the house, in order to defend our interests together. And why do we, for example, give way to the procession of deputies, but do not ask them about the results of the work of parliament?

And another thing: we are so used to walking along the broken streets and painted porches, that we no longer remember how it could be different.

I am a programmer, and after walking along the chic streets of Copenhagen, I simply physically cannot work poorly at my workplace. We do not even understand how much the effect of broken windows affects us.

You can estimate the losses only in tourism due to the fact that all our houses and cities are similar to one another (remember the plot of “Enjoy Your Bath” - a person is in the wrong city, but the same street, the same house, the same key).

We have to grow beauty in ourselves - it pays off financially!

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