Copenhagen: “They get to see the top and the bottom”
Copenhagen is known to be one of the best cities to live in. With its beautiful architecture, cozy cafes and fashionable people, the population of Copenhagen is the happiest in the world. Still, people fall on the outside of society, and struggle in a city where everyone is expected to have a good life.
In May of this year, the Institute of Quality-of-Life crowned Copenhagen as the world's happiest city as they ranked the Danish capital first overall in the Happy City Index. Copenhagen is renowned for being one of the most developed cities from a cultural, economic and human standpoint. Free health care, free education and a high standard of living are key pillars to Copenhagen’s thriving society.
Transparency creats a happy population
The Happy City Index lists transparency as one of the reasons why the citizens of Copenhagen are so happy. They have access to a lot of the state's documents, meetings and politics. The citizens have the right to know what is going on and have access to the information they are entitled to. This creates trust between the citizens and the Government.
The Government gives the people of Copenhagen the opportunity to understand every aspect of its society, even the less glamorous sides.
For example, recently, non-profit organisation Gadens Stemmer unveiled their project “The Walk of Fame”. This exhibition is not to honour celebrities, but to celebrate and recognise the people who are rarely honoured in Copenhagen's society. The plaques carved into the ground of the Vesterbro district depict former drug addicts, sex workers and alcoholics, recognising their life and their achievements in overcoming their struggles.
Voices of the street
Gadens Stemmer translates into the voices of the street and was started in 2011. It's a cultural touring organisation that does tours around cities in Denmark. The guiders are people who have had a rougher life, such as being alcoholics, sex-workers, drug abusers, homeless and criminals. They guide you around, telling their own stories of how it is to fall on the outside of society. Their goal is to spread awareness and educate on psychological vulnerability.
The project was set up in Copenhagen as a small project, and since then has expanded into a socioeconomic business operating tours in Odense, Aalborg and Vejle.
Network co-ordinator, Julie Holst Pedersen, touched on the importance of giving employment to people outside of the job market and in addition to that, she said, “Our other goal is to let the audience understand people in vulnerable positions and by that hopefully contribute to the co-existence in our society.”
Pedersen also described the importance of these tours for Copenhagen's society, as she said, “It brings hope, it brings empathy, respect. They are the humans behind the statistics.”
This sense of transparency is personified in the concept of Gadens Stemmer.
Clean for 30 years, now a tour guide
Tour guide, John Louis Jensen, highlighted the importance of this transparency in Copenhagen’s society, saying,
“It’s common for high schools in Copenhagen to do a tour of the parliament building and a tour with us in the same day, so they see the top and then they see the bottom.”
Jensen started with the company as a guide in 2017. His story with drug addiction began decades before, when he was working as a sailor in his teenage years. He started using heroin at the young age of 16. After a youth full of interesting stories and a long struggle with heroin and amphetamines, it has now been over three decades since he has used a needle.
Jensen uses his own story to inform the people on the tour about the lesser known, even less glamorous side of Copenhagen. “It’s important to tell people things that they haven’t heard before, and it’s best that it comes from the horse’s mouth.”
Hosting 500 - 1000 intakes of drugs each day
Copenhagen has changed a lot since Jensen was using drugs, most would argue for the better, but there are still people using drugs in the same area Jensen was back in the day, but in a different way. Vesterbro is an area in Copenhagen that has recently gone through serious gentrification. This area was once considered the epicentre of drug activity in the city and still is today.
Instead of people using drugs out on the streets, Mændenes Hjem, a non-profit organisation, operate drug consumption rooms in this area. There are always two rooms in operation, and they host 500-1000 intakes of drugs each day. The use of these rooms can be done completely free the only condition is that you must sign an agreement allowing staff to provide first aid in case of an emergency and.
Operations like these allow addicts to use drugs in the safest way possible while keeping them off the streets and allow them to use in a clean and safe process.
Approaches like these, drug consumption rooms, walking tours, and the Walk of Fame allow the people of Copenhagen to coexist and understand one another better, whether they are on the bottom or the top of society. So, with this openness and transparency it comes as no surprise that Wonderful Copenhagen is considered the happiest city on earth.
