I think “Ambassador Bream” has a certain ring to it…

It isn’t easy trying to summarize the US political system to a group of Danish students when you’re not sure how much of a language barrier exists and you’re worried about whether or not they think you’re some cool American or some dip whose only value is that he’s taking up class time.

But this past Wednesday, that is exactly what I did. I went in to each of my host brothers’ English classes and talked to them about life in America. Stage fright and fear of being judged by teenagers notwithstanding, I had a really great time. It definitely was a challenge, trying to communicate the entirety of my life in the United States my experiences as an American in a foreign land, but in a way it was surprisingly liberating, especially when I realized that there was very little structure to the entire set-up. Furthermore, I could spout misinformation and still be considered an authority figure. I now understand why my 11th-grade history teacher loved to throw little white lies and larger, technicolored lies into his lecture. He had enough authority, being the one standing at the front of the classroom, that he could tell a group of reasonably intelligent high schoolers that Niccolo Machiavelli, a 13th-century political philosopher, had a great outside jumpshot and the students would write down the information and take it as an undeniable truth. I had to fight off this temptation time and time again when the students would ask questions about life in the states. “How do you get to school in the morning?” “I ride elephants. No, really, everyone in America does it.”

In both classes, I talked about where I live, what I do with my time, what an American university is like, and, of course, what it means to me that Obama is now president. Unfortunately, I feel as though I offered a pretty bleak picture of the US at times, especially whenever I found myself drawing a comparison between Denmark and the States. For example, education in Denmark is free up through university. Education in the US is not free, and I was pretty upfront about the fact that because a year at college can cost up to $40,000 a year, it means a lot of students can’t afford to go to college, or if they can, they can’t necessarily study what they want to study because they have to study something that will help them earn a job to pay off student loans. The students were pretty stunned to hear this. And because I couldn’t help but talk about transportation, I told them how you have to rely on a car in the US to get around, which can be expensive and, at times, unreliable, whereas here in Denmark you have a wonderfully comprehensive and mixed-use transportation system that makes it much easier to go from one place to another.

So this was awfully cheerful. Of course, I tried to balance it out by talking about the hope we have for Obama and the new administration (I asked for the classes’ patience as we try to set things right from the past eight years). I told them how my university’s campus celebrated the night he was elected–dancing and singing in a huge crowd, because we were full of hope that things could get better (and kudos for Obama’s progressive budget, btw). I also talked about how fun university is, even though it can cost a lot, and I talked about the drive that Americans have to succeed even in the face of adversity. When my 12-year old brother’s teacher asked me about religion in America, I said how people disagree with each other about religion and whose religion is correct, which makes it difficult to get along, but I also said that we have pretty good dialogue about it, and that the religious differences aren’t as pronounced as they are here in Denmark (more about that later). I have to say, I found it REALLY difficult for some reason to remember all the different religions in America, which led to an egg-on-my-face situation since I tried to diagram them on the blackboard. I could only remember about four sects of Christianity and I couldn’t remember which ones were Protestant and which ones were Catholic. I would have felt better about this forgetfulness if I hadn’t gone full-steam ahead with the damn diagram. I think my confusion was pretty evident to the class, given the number of times I stepped back from the blackboard and stared at it with an audible “Uhh…”

Oh well. The students were a lot of fun. In my twelve-year old brother’s class, it was hard to say if they followed me most of the time–they’ve only been taking English for about a year and a half, and I don’t think I was sufficiently aware of this while I was talking. I didn’t feel like I needed to only use two-syllable words or less, but I think I spoke too quickly at times. On the plus side, the students had a lot of questions, mostly about my life rather than American institutions, like do I have any siblings and do I like Danish food and, best of all, do I have any pets. I got to talk about my cat. I love talking about my cat. But there were two students in particular who really impressed me. One asked about three or four questions and always nodded in a manner that made me feel as though I were reaching her, which was a good feeling. Another student asked a question more complex than many of the ones I’ve heard in my classes back home. She raised her hand and said the following: “It seems to me that you speak of your university as though you don’t have many freedoms about what you want to study. Would you say that you feel limited in your university, and does this keep you from enjoying what you study?” I was so stunned that I didn’t answer for a moment. I stayed for the rest of the class and I’m damn glad that I did. I didn’t understand any of the lesson (which was in Danish), but it was one student’s birthday and she passed out cupcakes. AWESOME.

The students in my fifteen-year old brother’s class didn’t really have any questions for me (or if they did, they asked them in Danish to the teacher, who translated), but they were a very engaging audience. Since theirs was the second class I went to, I felt a bit more comfortable talking in front of the students and so I made more attempts at humor. And whether they did so out of genuine amusement or considerate awareness of a confused American, the students laughed a lot, which certainly made me feel at ease (and, frankly, kind of awesome). They also applauded for me when I spoke in Danish to them, which made me feel oh-so-multicultural. You know, being able to order a piece of pastry really shows fluency.

My experience in US-Danish relations drew to a close, with me nervously asking my host-brothers at dinner that night if their classmates liked me. My twelve-year old brother nodded, and my fifteen-year old brother said they thought I was funny.

I am so going into the foreign service. I’ve got this diplomacy shtick DOWN.

And as a quick P.S. on the topic of US-Danish relations, I just want to say that last night, some friends of mine and I went to a Dominican club to learn salsa. It didn’t really occur to me that these salsa lessons would be in Danish (yay for US-centric mindsets…), but lo and behold, the charming man who stood in front of a group of surprisingly diverse salsa-learners spoke Danish into his headset as he walked us through the steps. But it is with great pride that I say that, knowing how to count to four (en, to, tre, fire) and left (venstre) and right (højre), I learned a couple steps. I was still the goofy American on the dance floor, but my partner and I held our own, at least, against most of the other Danes in the club. I’m definitely going back there.