Are you a good foreigner, or a bad foreigner? How the Danes categorize newcomers to Denmark

Published: Oct. 5, 2014, 5:25 p.m.

Have you ever seen the movie The Wizard of Oz?\xa0 It's a classic.\xa0 When Dorothy arrives in the land of Oz, the first thing she's asked is - are you a good witch, or a bad witch?

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I was having lunch with a friend this week, and, over club sandwiches she said, its a shame there's only one word for foreigner in Danish, when actually there's two types of foreigner here.

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I got her point, even though I think there's only one word for foreigner in most languages.\xa0 But what she's was really saying is, there's no single way in Danish to say,\xa0 Are you a good foreigner, or a bad foreigner?

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If you've been to Danish dinner parties, often later on in the evening, whenever a fair amount of wine has been consumed, you'll hear a Danish person complaining about foreigners in Denmark.\xa0 They come here just to take advantage of the our system.\xa0 All they want is free education, free health care and welfare payments.\xa0 They don't contribute to Danish society at all. And then, at some point, someone will turn to you and say, Oh, but we don't mean your kind of foreigner.

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You know, a good foreigner.\xa0 The kind who works or studies. \xa0The kind who is an trained carpenter, or engineer, or a doctor.\xa0 The kind who open restaurants with unfamiliar but unchallenging food.\xa0 Smiling, young, healthy, industrious, good foreigners.

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Good foreigners are highly sought after at the moment.\xa0 This week, for example, one of the big business groups said that Denmark should aim for at least 150,000 new immigrants in the next 20 years.\xa0 The Danish population is aging, so the country needs younger workers to drive Denmark's economy.\xa0 The business group held a conference on ways to attract them, and make them feel welcome. Danish Prime Minister Helle Thorning Schimidt came by to offer more international schools.\xa0 She promised less red tape. \xa0These are things we can do to attract good foreigners.

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On the other hand, in just the past couple of months, more than 20,000 Syrian refugees have arrived in Denmark. But no one's too worried about how to attract more refugees or make them feel more welcome. \xa0In fact, some Danish political \xa0parties are trying to change the asylum conditions and send as many of these people as possible back home to the battlefield.

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It reminds me sometimes of an old fashioned faucet, with the hot and cold knobs.\xa0 Denmark is trying to turn one knob on, and the other one off.