Podcasts Culture How to Live in Denmark Making Danish friends: A few tips based on experience

Making Danish friends: A few tips based on experience

Published: Dec. 1, 2019, 11 a.m.

If you\u2019re newly arrived in Denmark, making Danish friends is not easy \u2013 in fact, surveys show that one of the main reasons internationals end up leaving is the difficulty of building a network.

The irony is that Danes are actually very good at friendship. Their friendships are strong, reliable, and deep-rooted. Friends can count on each other.

But because Danes take friendships so seriously, they like to keep their number of friendships under control. They don\u2019t want to take on more friends than they can keep their deep commitment to.

The statement \u201cI just don\u2019t have room for any more friends\u201d sounds perfectly sensible to Danes, and utterly stunning to foreigners.

When internationals ask me how they can make Danish friends, I have one primary piece of advice.

It is:\xa0find a Dane who did not grow up in the part of Denmark where you live now.