Every country has similarities and differences, and you get to see this more as a resident in the new country than as a tourist. There's not much to say about the similarities, but boy do you take notice of the differences, some of which may even be shocking!
I'll try to list a few of the culture shocks I had when I first came to Denmark to live. It's been more than 10 years now, so I might not remember them all since you do tend to accept some of them eventually, or at least get used to them.
Please realise that my list is based on my comparisons against my own culture in Singapore and my own experiences. Someone else might have a different list, so there's no "right or wrong" in this, only what's different.
In no particular order:
1. Definition of an "invitation".
In Singapore, when a friend invites me over to her place for dinner, I am not expected to pay for the food (or anything else). I remember the first dinner invitation I had from a Danish ex-classmate. I accepted the invitation (together with other classmates), and towards the end, someone was going around collecting money on behalf of the host as part of the contribution towards the food! Was I shocked? Oh yes - it was definitely a first for me.
My mum had a similar incident happen to her. She was invited to a birthday dinner for a friend's husband together with 2 others, and at the end of the meal, the bill was divided amongst them. So on top of buying a gift for the birthday man, she had to pay for the meal, cake, and drinks too!
Conclusion: it is possible in Denmark to have a BIG party, invite 100 friends, and make your guests pay for it at the end of the fantastic, extravagent party. Thing is, I'll have no problem with this as a guest, but on 1 condition: that I am informed of any costs before I accept the invitation, not after.
2. Casual wear at the office
1 hot summer day in 1997, I arrived at work as usual, and for the 1st time in my young working life, I saw a Danish male colleague approaching the fax machine wearing.....BERMUDAS!!! Somethimg like this:
I almost fainted on the spot, and I wasn't even the general manager! However, since he came to work in bermudas again the next day, I slowly accepted the fact that this was an appropriate office attire in Denmark when we do not meet face-to-face with our customers... .
It has therefore been very normal now for me to come to work in jeans any day of the week if I wanted. There is of course some kind of limit, such as no bikinis, no hot pants, no pyjamas/nightgowns, no low-cut/revealing clothing ;o). And when we are expecting special visitors, we do dress a bit more formally for the occasion... .
Conclusion: I'm definitely not going back to Singapore to work!
3. Lunch time at work
In Singapore, lunch time usually lasts 1 hour, whereby you tend go out of the office together with your colleagues to eat at a food court or hawker center nearby, maybe do a bit of shopping if you still have time, and then go back to the office to continue working.
Not here in Denmark. My first day at work was a bit expensive, considering that I was still doing my internship without pay. I didn't really know when lunchtime really was, but eventually, I became hungry.
Me: "So...where do we go to get lunch?"
Colleague: "Hmm...what would you like to eat?"
Me: "Something quick, I guess...since we only have ½hr."
Colleague: "There's a café close by selling sandwiches." (she proceeds to give me directions).
Me: "Aren't you going to eat lunch too?"
Colleague: "Yes, but I brought my own lunch :o)."
Fair enough. I went out on my own to get lunch, which turned out to be a boring club sandwich that costed around 40 DKK (S$10)!!! Hence, I understood why nobody really went out to eat lunch together during lunchtime, and chose instead to bring their own lunch box to work. Plus, going out to eat with just ½hr to do so can be kinda stressful.
Next day at lunchtime:
Me: "Where's the microwave oven?"
4. Unmarried couples with kids
Unheard of in Singapore, and in all parts of Asia for that matter. But here, it's not unusual at all for live-in girlfriends and boyfriends to be parents of their kids without seeing the need to get married... . Those who do eventually get married after they have kids usually do so just to make life a bit easier in society (paperwork with schools, muncipality, etc, etc).
I won't make any judgements on this; just pointing out that this was a culture shock for me upon living here... .
5. Bicycles as a means of transportation
Nothing shocking about that, except when I found out that my ex-manager herself rode a bicycle to and from work! Now that's shocking, because in Singapore, managers usually drive around in their cars, so riding a bicycle to and from work was like many steps backward in the transportation chain.
In fact, it is very normal to see men in nice suits riding on their bicycles. I thought that was funny at first, but I don't even blink an eye now when I see such a thing.
Conclusion: the bicycles do not care who's riding on it, so why should we ;o)?
UPDATE! (25 October 2007)
6. Showering naked openly with strangers, friends, family, colleagues, etc.
I would say, this was 1 culture shock that has taken me a very long time to get over / used to. The 1st time I went swimming in the public swimming halls here in Copenhagen, I was speechless and embarrassed when I entered the ladies changing room. NAKED WOMEN WALKING ALL AROUND!!! If I were a guy, I would be speechless and salivating, but as an Asian girl from a very conservative culture, I wasn't sure if I should look at these women and pretend that they had clothes on, or if I should just look at the ground and avoid eye contact, or if I would be allowed to stare at their boobs and butts to compare and contrast... .
That was just a minor problem, though. The BIG problem was, should I strip like them too? I mean, I could just leave my clothes on and change into my swim suit privately in a toilet cubicle, but showering was a major obstacle. There were NO PRIVATE SHOWER CUBICLES! Everyone showered together in their birthday suits! I didn't even shower with my mum for all of my bodily developed life, let alone with total strangers! And after swimming, you usually want to shower. What a dilemma it was for me.
In the end, I did shower of course, but with my swim suit on. I was definitely the most overdressed girl there. There was 1 Christmas party at work where we had aerobics 1st, and eventually when we all had to hit the showers, it became showtime because that was the 1 time where all of us female colleagues got to see each other's "feminine assets". Also my manager's! No swim suits to hide behind in, that time.
But yeah...it was only around 2 years ago that I started to be a bit more open (pun intended) to this culture. I'm still not 100% comfortable with it, but at least we're only females in there...and ok, small boys too with their mothers.
And for you males out there: it's not exactly "heaven" in the female changing room. I'm sure you all have some kind of fantasy of "accidentally" entering the female changing room and being surrounded by beautiful naked women who look up at you and gasp in initial shock, but instead of chasing you away, they tell you to please come in and help them rub cream all over their soft bodies or something pornographic like that.
Seriously, stop dreaming. Not all women have beautiful naked bodies. I'm surprised that only a handful of women look sexy when they're naked - the majority either have very visible cellulite, out of proportioned bodies, bulging tummies, flat behinds, funny looking boobs, wrinkly skin, or a mixture of two or more of these. Don't believe the magazines or Hollywood. These days, Photoshop and whatever other editing programmes you can get your hands on can really do magic.
I guess that's probaby why it's illegal to walk around naked in public. Most of us women look better with our clothes on, trust me.
Anyway...I think I'll stop this list here. Not easy for me to think of anymore culture shocks after getting used to a lot of the differences here by now. I'll need to talk to newcomers to Denmark and hear what shocked them when they first arrived here in order to get my memory refreshed a bit ;o).
