Post title translates to: "Come back to me, American style..," which is what I found myself thinking tonight.
It is now 2:37am, Denmark time (CET). I just biked the 20 minutes home from old city Copenhagen. I can't wait 'til my bike-home-time is halved on December 1st when I move. Anyway, I had an experience biking home that made me realize/believe I am becoming more Danish with each passing day. I had intended to go out to Globe or Dubliner tonight for some good ol' Guinness and Irish craic, but after dinner Libby and I decided we were tired so we lame-d out, went to 7-11 and purchased a bottled of Bailey's Irish Cream (Hey, that'd be ninety craic, except that it cost 130 kroner, which rapidly deducts from craic scores) and a carton of Matilde chocolate milk. We heat the chocolate milk, added a substantial amount of Bailey's, and settled onto the couch to watch Nynne, subtitled.
Apparently it was too much for us. We fell asleep and awoke 2 hours later. My hot chocolate + Bailey's had long grown cold. I pulled on my white knit scarf and hat set (really cute), thanked Libby for a "hyggelig aften," grabbed my bike from the courtyard, and headed home. Biking home in -1 degree Celcius temperatures, sleepyfaced, and perhaps a little whacked from the bit of Bailey's I actually drank, I had an experience that is now prompting me to think that nationalities are like liquids in beakers that you can transfer back and forth, making up people. I will probably read this in the morning and wonder what the fuck I was thinking when I was typing it...
I was biking down H.C. Andersen's Boulevard, near the lakes. There is a lake front restaurant there. I've never been, but it looks pretty nice. Problem is, there isn't much sidewalk, so people leaving the restaurant/bar late tend to congregate in the bike lane. I have seen this dozens of times biking home. This is not okay. This is especially not okay when two drunk retards cross my [clearly straight and unwavering] path, causing me to swerve and cut off a fellow cyclist. Now, getting to the title of this post. Back in the days when I affiliated 100% with being American, a finger probably would have been raised (and, no, not my pointer finger in a "No, No, No, naughty, naughty" manner...), and I probably would would have yelled something from the adjective-noun or adjective-pronoun families. Examples include "fucking retards!" or "Goddamn idiot!" But, tonight, I didn't yell anything of the sort. Surprisingly, no fingers were flipped, and I yelled "Pas på!," which is fairly polite and translates directly to "Watch out!" in Danish. I didn't even think about it. I just yelled in Danish without thinking. Very strange indeed. My Danish has greatly improved since I've been here, but I usually don't reflexively think and speak/yell in Danish inadvertently and simultaneously.
I contemplated this the whole way home. In my tired, stupified state I had regressed to an extraordinarily civil, Danish behavior. How was this!? Somewhere between Rosensomething Alle and Godthaabsvej, I came up with my beakers of national affiliation idea. I was inspired enough to write a post. Where have my American ways gone? Will I ever get them back? Perhaps I will return to the US and be a more civilized person. Perhaps I will continue asking very Danish questions, such as "Is that right?" in English, and using words like "rather" as adjectives. Strange.
One thing is for certain... I will probably look back on this post in the morning/in a few days/weeks time and wonder what the fuck I was talking about. And I'm glad I'm ending the post in a very American way, using terms like WTF. Good.
