Danish News, 27 July

Several news articles caught my eye this morning:

1. The new iPhone 4 is expected to be released in Denmark on Friday, 30 July.  This is over a month later than the US and UK release dates.  Why Denmark got such short-shafted treatment, who knows, but a lot of Mac-philes here are certainly happy. Then again, they probably already ordered it from German stores, which have also had the phone since 24 June.  The article says that attempts to replicate the infamous antennae problems here in DK have shown no antennae problems.  My guess is that the country's average sea level of 31 meters has something to do with that.

What will that pretty little thing cost?  4,699DKK for 16G or 5,499DKK for the 32G.  According to xe.com, that's $820 and $959.

Of course I had been hoping to have a job by now, so that I could finally get an iPhone, but that is not how it's worked out.  I am finally open to getting another brand of mobile.  $820 is just ridiculous.  And I am a hard-core Mac fan.

2. Nearly half of all Danes are on vacation this week.  I still do not fully understand what the vacation system is (see above: lack of job), but everyone seemingly takes their 5 weeks' worth in the month of July, with some spillage into June or August. This has stupefied me, as July usually brings the best weather of the year to this country.  "Hey! Let's go to southern France/Italy/Greece/Turkey and fry in the sun, instead of enjoying the breezy 75-80˚F back home!" 

3. In 2002, the Danish government passed a law that is referred to as the "24-year rule". Basically, if someone wants to 'import' a spouse (like my lovely husband did!), that person must have lived in Denmark for 24 years.  This age limit was made in order to limit the number of foreigners moving here at a younger age, er, scratch that, it was made to prevent the number of forced marriages in this country (which are, of course, made up of people from non-Western countries).  The rule has worked so well that the Danish People's Party (don't get me started on them!) has proposed raising the age limit to 28.

4. Well the Danish People's Party must be celebrating, because immigrants from non-Western countries have had a steep fall in birth rates in the last few years. The article states:

Twenty years ago women from ethnic minorities had twice as many children as their Danish sisters, but by 2009 their birth rate had fallen to just 1.6 children per woman, below the 1.9 rate for Danes.

Reasons given are the 24-year rule and improved integration, which means that the women are going for education first, family later.  I love this article, because it throws the stereotype of non-Western women having scads of kids (and glomming off the social system) on its head (hear that, Danish People's Party??), and women getting an education is never a bad thing. 

There it is, your wrap up from Denmark on Tuesday, 27 July 2010.