In this epilogue, the speaker offers a reflective guide for expatriates who feel frustrated with their work life in Denmark and are considering leaving. The advice blends practical actions—such as visiting older, “dusty” museums that reveal Denmark’s past poverty, and following official steps to deregister and notify authorities—with cultural analysis of Danish social norms like Jantelov and a deep‑seated group instinct rooted in historic hardship. Historical context is provided, noting 19th‑century mass emigration after military defeat and World War II occupation, which still influence Danish defensiveness and welfare barriers that can feel exclusionary to outsiders. The speaker acknowledges common reasons foreigners depart (expired contracts, broken relationships, cultural mismatch) and highlights the emotional side of leaving, urging listeners to focus on positive memories—Danish pastries, bike‑friendly cities, design, and natural scenery—while minimizing bitterness. The overall message is to understand Denmark’s cultural and historical backdrop, manage the logistical exit, and preserve a balanced, appreciative recollection of the experience.
Chapters
Epilogue: The Bad News About Working in Denmark— Why Many Internationals Leave. If you're frustrated about your working situation in Denmark, take an afternoon off to visit one of the country's dustier museums. I did a lot of this in the year that I was unemployed in Denmark. The Workers' Museum in Copenhagen is a good choice, but so is the Gamleby in Aarhus or the Esbjerg City Museum. Don't go to anything fancy like the Aarhus Art Museum in Aarhus or the new high-tech Hans Christian Andersen Museum in Odense. These are museums that show Denmark as hip, cool, and wealthy. Instead, choose an older museum that gives you a sense of how poor and desperate Denmark used to be. Denmark was once among the poorest countries in Europe. Most of the country was dependent on agriculture in a harsh climate with a short growing season, or on fishing from dangerous seas. Learning to work together as a tight-knit group of fishermen or farmers often made the difference between starvation and survival. It's this same group instinct that can make internationals feel like outsiders today. When you're dependent on the group for food, shelter, and safety, as the Danes were for generations, you need to be able to trust the other members of the group. An outsider, by definition, needs to earn that trust. The Danes don't always make it easy. The yin of the Jantelov, the well-enforced law of personal humility, is matched by the yang of deep national certainty that the Danish way of doing things is generally best. This can be true on an office level, Or on a societal level. It's always worked this way for us before. Why should you, an outsider, propose anything different? The reason, of course, is that the outsider has arrived from a world of 8 billion people, many of whom have great ideas that a country of 5.8 million might not be familiar with. But convincing a Danish employer of this, especially a Danish employer that is successful in its field, Can be difficult to impossible. Denmark may be a destination country for now, but it wasn't long ago that its own citizens were so poor and hungry that they were forced to leave home. On your trip to the Dusty Museum, you will see some of the poverty that prompted hundreds of thousands of Danes, about 15% of the country's population at the time, to flee the country in the late 1800s, mostly to the U.S. and Canada. Much of this immigration was set off by a humiliating military loss to Germany in 1864, which was the last time the Danish military really tried to defend its territory. This sense of helplessness is still part of the Danish DNA, as is the country's occupation by Germany during World War II. Danes feel in many ways that their small country is defenseless from the outside world. Instead, they set up small and medium-sized barriers to try to defend what seems to them to be a good and worthwhile way of life, as evidenced by a generous social welfare state. Some of these barriers may feel like they're designed to keep you out on a legal basis, a personal basis, or both. If you've chosen to leave Denmark, you're not alone. Many foreigners leave because their job contracts have run out. their relationship with a Dane has ended, or just because they don't believe they'll ever feel at home here. The Danish government has helpfully prepared a page full of practical steps you need to take when leaving Denmark, such as deregistering your CPR number and notifying your child's school and the tax authorities. But it is just as important to manage your own feelings about leaving Denmark. Online forums feature plenty of expats who are still stewing about their bad experiences. People who are bitter about everything from the supposed unfriendliness of the Danes to the lack of public service websites in English to the overabundance of calcium in the tap water. The best thing you can do for yourself when leaving Denmark is to depart with good memories. Even if something went wrong, or several things went wrong, you have the power to focus on the good things and the good times. Something must have been good, right? The wonderful fresh Danish pastries, the green city parks on one of the few days of warm sunshine, the windy Danish beaches with their pale clean sand. Maybe it was the colorful lights and excitement of Tivoli at Christmas time, or the ease of riding your bike through the city in a safe, well-paved bike lane. Maybe it was the sleek, practical design of the Danish housewares and home fixtures. Maybe it was the friendliness shown to your children at even the fanciest restaurants. If you decide to leave Denmark, the best thing you can do for yourself is to focus on the good memories and expend less energy on the bad ones. And to think about how lucky you are to never again have to shiver through a chilly, gray Danish November. Or a chilly, gray Danish July.
