The First Week

I went to a concert in high school to see a group called “Graham Colton Band”, they wrote this song call First Week about the first week of a relationship and how awesome it is. It is this special kind of feeling you never get again when you first start dating someone. The last verse in the chorus stanza was “why can’t it be like the first week?” This line really stuck out to me. I’ve often thought about that line whenever I had conflict within my own relationships with my boyfriend and close friends. I always think back to the excitement of a new love interest or a new friend in the first week, how enamored I was of them. And it always helped remind me of how much I care about them and gave me a little perspective.

That being said. In my relationship with Copenhagen, the first week was nothing like that at all. Moving to a new city, in a new part of the world, comes with a whole slew of challenges I anticipated, but was also a little naive about. The most basic things become scary because they are so unfamiliar. Even though I have lived in Copenhagen before, you forget these basic things.

For example,

My bike lock is a monster that I cannot get to work, but all the Danes have no trouble only proving that the problem is me and not the lock.
I cannot for the life of me pronounce the street I live on. How bout you try its: Dalslangsgade.
Going to the grocery store and trying to figure out the animal or origin in all the lunch meat, or read any label at all, but it’s kind of a good thing because all I buy is vegetables, as those are internationally recognizable. #healthyliving
Going up to school and trying to read the map in another language to find the International Student Center.
Every time I go to the embassy to get information or submit paperwork for my student visa, etc. they always look you up and down and you cannot help but imagine what they are thinking. Some of these assumptions are probably accurate but nevertheless your mind just races through different scenarios. Possibilities include, but are not limited to,

“She could be a very unsuspecting drug lord.”
“You radical left wing American trying to get in on our nationalized social services.”
“Your clothes are probably all way cheaper than mine because you bought them in America…bitch.”
“I wonder what all you brought into this country tax free, Face wash? Perfume? Whiskey?!?”
“Why would you EVER come to Denmark when Beyoncé lives in America!”

The experience, while stimulating for the imagination, is also terrifying as your ability to live in this country hangs in the balance of a public sector employee giving you elevator eyes.

Without many friends because I haven’t started classes I have caught myself zoning out at well-dressed Danish girls in cafes and on the street thinking about how we could be the best of friends, romping around Copenhagen in our gray scale together. Then they notice I’m staring at them and I don’t know if I should say “I am not in fact checking you out, I just like your clothes and am friend-crushing on you” or “Hi, nice to meet you!” or “I JUST WANT YOU TO LOVE ME”. None of which would result in a friendship so I usually just run away.

Yet, the first week is also filled with triumphs. When I first biked the 2 miles it takes to get to school I was totally out of breath and thought I could be having a heart attack. Now I can do the whole route to and from without too much exhaustion. Improvement!

I realize this post is full of “First World Problems” and you will probably read this and think, “Come on, you live in a great European city how bad can it really be!” And you would be right, I shouldn’t complain. I’m just putting the idea out there that while moving is exciting and thrilling, for those of you planning to traverse the Atlantic in the near future this is just an FYI:

Moving countries is not like the first week of a new relationship, it’s like ordering a dress from a catalog and when you put it on it is NOTHING like it looked in 2D and you can’t decide if you love it or hate it but either way, you know no one else will be wearing it and you’ll stick out like a sore thumb. Maybe it’s a good thing, and maybe it’s a bad thing. But you decide you just have to jump in the deep end, wear the dress, and stick out because at the end of the day you won’t fit in anyway. But then as they days go by you gradually start to see people wearing a dress kind of like this strange one from the catalog, and you think, “Huh, maybe I could fit in here after all.”

The first week.