Something that I also learnt from the Europeans, which I greatly admire, is how people here seem to seek opportunities all the time, and from such a broad landscape. As someone who settles in comfort and familiarity, I’m lucky enough that the comfort I choose, such as staying in Singapore, comes with many great opportunities for me. But being here, meeting new people, and seeing how they live their lives has made me realise that the world has so many great things to offer. Many of the people in my class aren’t from Denmark, but they came here because they held hopes in the fact that they would get better opportunities and exposure. This seems common sense, but I really admired it because I could see for myself how much more independent, free-spirited, and individualistic they seemed. How they so easily uproot themselves and built a life in a foreign place, juggling between work and school. They made me realise that the world is truly my oyster, and the only limits that exist are the ones I set for myself. Although at this point I’m pretty sure comfort is still what I’ll choose, I hope that the courage to seek, explore, broaden my horizon, and seize opportunities will always be ingrained in me.

To conclude, these 4 months have definitely been one of the best experiences of my life and a significant part of my youth. I sometimes wish I was able to experience life with the Europeans more instead of just living vicariously through them. Other than that, I only have fond memories that I’ll now hold dearly. My days were filled with so much joy and excitement, nothing could stop us from having fun! I remember constantly wishing to forge a fort and linger here for a while more, and I think this is a rather nice feeling to have. Life is invigorating. I am so lucky!

Navigating the academic landscape at CBS brought about refreshing experiences and unique challenges. Nonetheless, I’m thankful for this experience!

Classes

Classes at CBS were conducted in-person with no recordings. They were also structured to be engaging and collaborative, often with discussion sessions in-between to bounce ideas with our table mates. Although there wasn’t any class participation points, questions were often posed and classmates willingly shared their perspectives. This was really refreshing for me, as most of my lectures in NTU are predominantly passive where we sit and absorb the lecture content given by the professors. This made sense, because Bio is largely theory-based and didn’t really require discussions to begin with. More emphasis was placed on having accurate and updated information, which the professors are qualified for. There was less need to argue and question Scientific principles. However, I really appreciate the style that CBS incorporated, as I felt it was best suited for the content that we were learning. After all, learning about Business should be backed with industrial application, so having various inputs from our classmates really shed light on real-life applications.

Lessons were always fun and interesting, serving as a catalyst for making friends and group mates that we quickly identified to work with. The professors were nice, approachable and full of wit – skilfully engaging with us in a fun and exciting manner. Despite no pressure to contribute in class, the interesting content naturally sparked buzz and discussions among students. Going through the rhythm of attending classes and doing readings in the library became something I looked forward to and enjoyed. I also learnt how to do readings the efficient way (we had over 6h worth of readings for each class, with 4 classes a week), and quickly adapted my needs to the classes by identifying what worked best for me.

Another thing I really liked about the classes were the group projects. This was a necessary evil despite the workload and pain of going through it. I felt that I learnt the most when I had to put my knowledge of frameworks, product life cycle management, and marketing mix, to name a few, to real-life applications using companies of our choice. By contextualising our learning, I was able to identify things that were not taught in class and nuances I had overlooked. Things that seemed straightforward turned out to be more overlapped and layered than I thought, testing my fundamental knowledge of the frameworks at hand. Working with and not only from the Master’s students provided a unique learning opportunity, reinforcing my belief in my capability to lead and contribute meaningfully. I too am capable of this as long as I put my heart and thought into it. 

Exams

The exam format at CBS differed from what I was accustomed to, with three out of four exams being oral discussions lasting 10-15 minutes. This took me a while to get used to, as the oral component gave it an added layer of stress. It also seemed absurd that the entirety of my 2 months worth of effort was attributed to a 10 minutes “chit-chat” with the professor. After talking to my classmates, I realised that most of the Europeans preferred this method – I quote, “Quick and easy, I can get over it fast”. As a conscious planner who finds the need to ponder on the structure, flow and coherence of my arguments, I definitely felt the pressure of working under a short time limit. After the first exam, however, I realised that “rightness” mattered more than the strength of the argument. In short, knowing and understanding the content well was pretty sufficient.

However, not all of the exams were that simple. There were some where I felt could be structured differently, such as the question to better reflect the learning objectives. However, the high stakes of the exams (100%!) forced me to grit my teeth and tell myself that “grades are temporary, knowledge is forever”.  A lot of the exams boiled down to luck, so this became an almost ridiculous, but painfully true way of telling myself that the knowledge I gain is truly more important than the grades that I got. And to be honest, I really did learn a lot – from theoretical frameworks, industry sharing, real-life applications, to simply getting inspired from the work that they do. There is still a lot to be grateful for, and I’m glad the hurdles I encountered and shortcomings I faced didn’t stop me from seeking knowledge. To live is indeed to learn. 

Overall, schooling in CBS was a really pleasant experience. The idea that gaining knowledge is more important than grades really nicely wrapped up my goal to be more forgiving with myself. I am not defined by numbers. Here’s to more growth!

When people ask me what my greatest takeaway from this exchange is, many assume it’s the travels or living abroad, along the lines of being able to explore the world and its beauty. However, to me, this open-ended question remains unanswered, but toggles between the friendships that I’ve made and built, or the simple mundane/routined life I had (going to school, cooking meals together, chit-chatting during dinner). Both were priceless to me, but I realised that all of the beautiful moments only seemed so because of the people that I shared them with. With that, I lean on the idea that biggest takeaway from this exchange is the people.

Reigniting the beauty of childhood friendships

I came across a video that talks about how a lot of adult friendships are based on telling people about your life rather than actually experiencing it together, such that it takes substantially more effort to sustain them. The magic of childhood friendships, however, like going on little adventures with your friends and simply experiencing life and its quirks together – thrives on a sense of spontaneity and shared experiences. I think being here and having to navigate this new chapter of my life with all its unfamiliarity, uncertainty and of course, beauty, with my friends, allowed me to indulge in this childhood-friendship-like whimsy (albeit with more responsibilities). When I had to cohabitate with Markers, suddenly all of life revolved around them – we did every activity together, had the same group of friends, attended classes together and hung out 24/7. Thanks to this, I now see that there’s just so much good in simply existing together. These people gave me comfort and a safe space amidst the uncertainties, allowing me to be myself and thrive even in unchartered territories. Adjusting to a new environment (making friends, building a nest for myself) wasn’t easy, but I’m more me when I’m with them. More than that, we were a positive echo chamber, pushing each other to live life to the fullest while finding joy in the mundane. We got to try so many new things together! From attending our first-ever CrossFit class, exploring Copenhagen by bike, visiting countries we never would’ve considered flying to from Singapore (Baltics!), weekly pottery classes, beads-making event, cutting each others’ hair and baking during our free time. The days felt so light. We often talk about how good we have it here and how even the days we stayed at home or spent our time in school still felt so special to us. Mundane moments felt grand and filled me with warmth. The thing I looked forward to the most morphed into something shaped like a meal, shared with the people at the table, filled with peals of laughters and meaningful conversations.

Us during meal times. Fun fact: We ate every lunch and dinner together 🙂

Bidding farewell to the place we spent the most time in: The common kitchen.

Our name tents for Biomarkets.

Doing our favourite activity (apart from cycling/cooking): Grocery shopping!

The day we plunged into the canal (it’s a Danish culture!). We would later on continue to do so in increasingly colder weathers.

Making friends with the Europeans

Of course, the beauty of friendships didn’t only extend to the people I already knew. In fact, many of the close bonds I forged were made with the people I met there. I remember vividly transitioning from having to constantly code-switch during conversations, to starting to see semblance in the things I find lovely, in them, to having close friends that I now text on a daily basis. I recall how, at the start, even brief interactions with them used to linger in me because I would note them down on my journal in hopes of documenting the rare moments I felt a connection with someone not from my country. But life grew to be so packed with beautiful and meaningful interactions every day that I find it hard to put into words how full they make me feel. I’ve really came so far. Love is a universal language, and being able to find that in a circle outside my own is a rather sweet thing. I won’t describe every single person that have touched me, but I will say these friendships truly made me believe in fate – like how lucky must I’ve been for our lives to intersect so beautifully? That some people felt like they were meant to be in our lives. I think it’s also pretty cool to have friends from many different parts of the world! This definitely had an impact on our travels, as we had personalised itineraries from the locals. For example, our new Estonian and Lithuanian friends very kindly gave us a list of places to visit and food to try. You could even say the main reason we visited the Baltics was because we grew close to them, that we collectively decided it would be a good idea to go (also, that finding people to go with from Singapore may be difficult since these places were less well-known). We took the risk of visiting these less touristy countries, and had absolutely no regrets.

Our amazing group mates and the people who made classes more enjoyable.

Ice skating with our CBS friends!

Our favourite Portuguese friend from our housing – Andre!

Our new best friend, Carita from Estonia.

Bidding farewell to our CBS friends, and our Italian friend from our housing. Fun fact: We visited Italy and got him a Moka Pot from Italy 🙂

Went for our first-ever CrossFit class held by CBS Mercury. Wouldn’t have gone if it weren’t for our Lithuanian friend David who invited us.

Last breakfast together and tearful goodbyes. Peep the long arm of our Danish friend Lucas!

Life is meant to be enjoyed

There is a lot to learn from living abroad, and this not only entails learning directly from my immediate surroundings – people, places, situations, but also figuring out and discovering new things about myself as I adjust to a new environment. Riding on the vein that “you only live once (or rather, you are only young once)” have led me through a series of character developments, where I now place importance in not just my studies but also in simply enjoying life. There’s something about knowing that I’ll never be the same person in the same time and place doing the same thing again, that pushes me to live life to its fullest and maximise my experience here. This switch wouldn’t have been possible within the confines of Singapore’s routine-centric lifestyle dominated by relentless studying, because that was just how I’ve lived my life for many years. Here, the transience of youth pushed me to be more forgiving on myself, letting myself find new balance and indulge in fun even during hectic times. Surprisingly, adapting this mentality has enhanced my productivity, as I kept myself busy not just with academics but also other meaningful activities (cooking, pottery, CrossFit, cycling, grocery-shopping). Because I wanted to have fun and wanted to make the most out of my experience, I had no choice but to plan my days meticulously, ensuring I had enough time for both play and academics. This experience has also made me realise that happiness is indeed omnipresent, we just have to look for it. While the things we did might be short of anything exceptional, I think that was just the way I liked it. I hope I look back at this and see a tint of youthfulness, and feel glad that this was how I spent my time.

Our weekly pottery class.

Beads-making event by CBSKrea.

The day the weather was so lovely we decided to lie on grass and snap some pictures.

Gnocchi-making on our day in! Kneaded shapes and experimented with funny faces.

Making gingerbread cookies with our European friends.

The art of a slow-paced life

Simply watching how others live their lives have shed light on the way I would want to live mine. Here, life is characterised by a more relaxed and pleasant rhythm, where people simply seem happier. I used to think that superiority lies in working and hustling more, and any signs of diversion seemed like a shortcoming. However, I realised that the slower pace of life here is actually how life should be lived, and it is not inferior, it is normal. A personal anecdote I had occurred during one of our initial group projects, where I felt like I was putting in more effort than others. I questioned how these people seemed so chill, and how even when their peers were lacking, they could easily separate work from friends. They had an entirely different work ethic from me, where good is enough and perfection isn’t necessary. Yet, a part of me knew that they were onto something right, and though these people seemed so laidback with their work, I could feel they were going to be successful anyhow. They were confident, somehow had their lives figured out, and were simply on a roll. This was a concept I struggled with to understand, because what was I lacking? I thought I was doing the most. Nonetheless, I now know that success is multilayered, as opposed to the “hustle-only” mindset that I once embodied, and it also also depends on how you define success. Is hustling and struggling more the only the way to reach it? Who knows. But at least I now know that suffering need not be a prerequisite for success, and though I may still not know how to figure this one out, I’m thankful I got to realise that it’s possible to deviate from an unwanted fast-paced life. Life is truly what you make of it : )

This post will consist of three things, the first being adjusting to living abroad, the second being Denmark’s friendly culture and lastly the realisations that I’ve made since living here.

Adjusting to living abroad

The first major transition that I’ve experienced involves being more independent, which includes learning how to cook, budget my expenses, buy groceries and fend for myself in areas beyond just being a student. As we all know, food in Denmark is expensive. Restaurant prices are pretty equivalent to those in Singapore, but Denmark doesn’t have cheaper alternatives like our hawkers or kopitiam. Thankfully, groceries here is pretty cheap! It was soon apparent that if I wanted to live a sustainable lifestyle, I had to learn how to cook. Cohabiting with three fellow Singaporeans – Chin Yong, Zachery, and Sue-min – made meal times more delightful and something I’d look forward to. Learning how to cook came naturally, as we would try different recipes and lent helping hands whenever needed. We were able to unleash our inner Singaporean aunties and created an excel sheet to compare grocery items prices. Initially, we would spend nearly 3 hours in the kitchen every day, but we later mastered the art of meal prepping, which we fondly called “economies of scale“. Cooking is a skill that gets better with experience, and a tip I would give to anyone learning how to cook is to truly enjoy the process. Cooking for myself has also led me to adopt a healthier lifestyle, as I would ensure I ate a balanced diet at a prescribed timing every day. This became a routine I thoroughly enjoyed, and you will come to understand more why.

Another significant experience that I got to try is cycling, and cycling a lot. For context, the 4 of us (Chin Yong, Zachery, Sue-min and I, let’s call us Markers) stayed further from CBS than the rest of our course mates. Since public transport is rather expensive (about ~8 SGD for a 2-way trip daily), we decided to take up cycling as our mode of commute. This was a new and interesting experience for all of us, because even as an avid cyclist, I was only used to cycling at parks and park connectors. Thankfully, Copenhagen is a really cyclist-friendly city! You could say cyclists rule the road here, with a noticeable 10:1 ratio between cyclists and cars. Everywhere was cycle-able, and there will always be a cycling path at every road we go to. This made cycling a really convenient mode of transport, and a cheaper one too. However, cycling here is a totally different ball-game than in Singapore. In Singapore, people do it out of leisure and enjoyment. In Copenhagen, people cycle with a purpose – always in a rush, frenzied, but surprisingly organised. We got used to this pretty quickly, and learnt the cycling signals fast. What also helped was that we could bring our bikes on the trains as they had special carriages where we could park, allowing us to go hybrid on days where we felt tired. The routine of cycling 7.5 km to and from school, a total of 15 km, became a rewarding and fun habit. As winter approached, we started to grow a love-hate relationship with cycling – it’s still a very beautiful place to cycle in, but it was too cold to be enjoyable. However, time and time again we pulled through despite contemplating every morning as we were too attached to return our bikes. This led us to cycling even in the coldest of winters, and only returned our bikes on 13 December. What a feat!

Cycling in the city.

Beautiful sunset on our way home.

Getting caught in the rain and had to bring our bikes on the train.

Gearing up to cycle home in 8 degrees weather.

Returning our bikes.

Friendly culture

The first time I arrived at my student housing, I was so pleasantly surprised at how friendly everyone was. People here really take the effort to make you feel welcomed, even if they don’t live in the same floor/building or frequent the same kitchen. It became an unspoken rule that we would greet everyone, and I really mean everyone, that we came across. One particular encounter stuck with me; while cooking in the common kitchen, everyone who passed by on the outside (we were partitioned by a large glass) would deliberately look in to make eye contact with you just to smile and wave. This really took me by surprise, because it felt like they didn’t do it out of convenience (they were outside!), but really because they felt a sense of connection and camaraderie from simply being in the same housing. This made all the difference, and these were people I had just seen for the first time! It took me a while to get used to their friendliness, but I later embraced this culture myself and took the effort to make our living place a friendlier one.

This friendly culture extended beyond the confines of our housing. In CBS, our classmates were remarkably amiable – striking conversations when we bumped into each other, and taking interest in our lives and cultures. Our group chat was also pretty active – people openly asking everyone out for meals, sharing current deals and affairs, mindless chit-chats. This was rather surprising to me given the relatively large group size (67). I couldn’t help but notice the openness and proactiveness of Europeans. People in Singapore are nice too, but we are not nearly as proactive as they are, especially in public spaces. Europeans will gladly help you carry your luggage when you are struggling, usher people to give way when you are on your bikes, and greet you even when they know they’ll probably never see you again. It’s the way they put effort into these little things, whether out of habit or deliberately, that made the world seem like a better place. I really loved the interactions I had with strangers be it in my housing, school or even public spaces, where people are genuinely so happy to strike up conversations and make small talks. It made me feel closer to humanity, and, in the same vein, made me become more proactive in offering and asking for help. Life is better when we have each other.

Free education in Denmark

A big shock that I encountered was how higher education is free in Denmark for domestic students and students from the EU, EEA and Switzerland. In addition to that, Denmark offers a unique educational model called SU (Statens Uddannelsesstøtte, meaning State Educational Support) which grants financial aid to students enrolled in approved higher education programs – essentially being paid to study! This has prompted me to reflect on my own experience as an Indonesian living in Singapore. Throughout my education journey, I’ve always felt privileged to be able to study here, so much so that paying for education, no matter how expensive it is, felt like a given. Hence, it was pretty surprising to me how good they have it here (of course, this large investment comes with a higher income tax rate, but that is a different discussion for another day). Denmark’s approach to higher education was truly eye-opening. The notion that university education is free for all, regardless of socio-economic background, challenged my preconceived notions about the accessibility of quality education. Moreover, the fact that students are financially supported during their studies adds another layer of support that goes beyond the classroom.

Returning to my roots in Singapore, a developed country with a thriving economy, I couldn’t help but wonder about the potential benefits of a similar investment in education. If Singapore were to allocate a higher percentage of its budget to education, perhaps it could alleviate the financial pressures on students. Currently, students in Singapore often find themselves juggling various part-time jobs in industries such as grab, retail, and F&B to make ends meet. While there is no inherent flaw in students gaining work experience through part-time jobs, there is a profound difference when it becomes a necessity rather than a choice. By investing more in education and reducing the financial burden on students, Singapore could foster an environment where students focus on their academic pursuits and personal development without being burdened by financial constraints. Essentially, allowing students to deal with student-problems only.

In conclusion, my journey in Denmark so far has been a tapestry of personal growth and eye-opening experiences. Adjusting to life abroad involved embracing independence, mastering the art of cooking, discovering the joys of cycling in a city designed for it, and stepping out of my comfort zone to give and receive help.