An important part of joining the European Solidarity Corps is that you have the opportunity to meet a lot of other young people from around the world!
Firstly, living in a foreign country, you obviously get to meet the locals. As much as I love to make fun of them, the Danes are really welcoming and helpful when you’re an international. Unlike France, almost everyone here speaks English. Being able to communicate with the cashier, your co-workers or the bus driver highly facilitates everyday life! Truth be told, it can be hard to build real relationships with them, because Danes tend to be very private and have the same friends circle for years. Yet, as someone once told us “once you’re friend with a Dane, you’re friends for life”!
So far, I was not very successful, neither was I persistent nor motivated, in meeting with the Danes. However, I was much more successful in meeting with other internationals living in Denmark.
The first group of international I got the meet was the Dear Neighbors. As mentioned in previous articles, I’m sharing my apartment with another volunteer from Spain. In our building are also living 5 other volunteers coming from Portugal, France, Austria, and Germany. If I especially bounded with 2 of them, we are all getting along pretty well, and meet all together at least once a month for a nice dinner.
Even if, we are the only European volunteers living in the city center of Aarhus, there are many other volunteers living near Aarhus and all over Denmark. Our coordinating organization – Dansk ICYE – organizes regular events for us to meet while experimenting Danish tradition (Christmas or New Year’s Eve dinner, ice skating…). There we were able to meet people coming from Europe, central and south America, and Asia.
The European Solidarity Corps program itself enables the volunteers to meet each other, during 2 training events – the on-arrival and the mid-term trainings. During those events, organized by the Danish National Agency, trainers are giving us advice and inputs to have the best experience as possible and giving us the opportunity to bond together. If like any other social context, it is impossible to bond with everyone – despite what some can tell you – I got to meet great people I really got along with.
Finally, Denmark being such a hard country to settle in regarding social integration (this time, it’s not my conclusions, but the ones from a serious study from Internation), there is a real internationals’ community with a lot of events dedicated to us. One of the initiatives that was really useful for us to meet other internationals is Swap Language. I really enjoy the swap Mondays, even if neither I or Maria put much effort into learning languages, we just go there to enjoy a beer with our fellow swappers!
Overall, contrary to what I was expecting before coming to Denmark, I don’t have a huge group of Danish friends, but I am part of a great internationals’ group that I’m really happy about!