Lyngby (or Notes on the Educated Cleaner)

There’s something eerie about a place that seems to have more concrete than people, something chillingly distant—as if it is a place that gives birth to seriel killers.
But I am sure Lyngby is a charming little town with a warmth present which I was not imaginative enough to find. I am also willing to admit that it is not fair to judge a town through early morning eyes. However, let it be known that even after a few hours of work, after being slapped awake by the maniacal fluorescent lights of my job and the sharp smell of cleaning liquids, I could never seem to stop thinking that Lyngby seemed to be plugged into artificial resuscitators, and why for chrissakes, couldn’t somebody just pull the plug? But let’s keep the perspective here—again I admit it’s not fair looking at a town from the sleep deprived eyes of an early morning cleaner—someone who takes the train in the semi-comatose state one finds oneself in at 6.30 am and have but a still sleeping city to greet her. But as I exit the train among the sprinkle of other living dead workers, and make my way towards Lyngby Shopping Center where I’ll clean a Stadium store, nothing seems warm along the concrete veins that pump cars through and to this town. And there’s something else too—I’m bitter. I’m bitter, cause I’m 32, have a college degree, but for some reason, the only job I could seem to get in Denmark at this moment is as a cleaner, 75 Kroner, off the books an hour. When I examine this bitterness further, I find that it is enmeshed in an unrealistic belief that education can get you somewhere.
When I was around 6 or 7, I remember my mother coming home after a full night’s work (I remember hearing something vaguely about the grave-yard shift), exhausted as usual. While she slipped her stockings off, I could smell the sweet perfume tingled with the smell of nylon and sour feet. As I got dressed for school, she would always tell us stories from the evening before and there is one that resonates now more than ever:
"You know", she said, her Trinidadian accent still strong even after 6 years of New York life, "You know", she continued, "our janitor has a Ph.D." I don’t remember if she ever said what he had had a PhD in, but I guessed once one had acquired a PhD. It actually didn’t matter what it was in.
“Can you imagine?” She sucked her teeth as she combed my hair, and I wasn’t sure if she was expressing disgust at the thought of this educated cleaner or my too-curly hair. “Can you imagine?” She continued, “Having a PhD and cleaning toilets? I tell you, education isn’t everything.” She sighed and shook her head, probably relieved that she never bothered to get one.
Of course it never entered any of our heads that perhaps the janitor willingly chose his fate-- that perhaps he preferred following the rhythm of his own pulse rather than withering away in some airless, plastic-planted office (that's another article).
But anyway, if there was one lesson that story should have imparted to me was that one didn’t necessarily get an education to better one’s lot in life, because it probably wouldn’t. But we were in America now, and one of the things my immediate family "lacked" was “education”, and always being one of the brightest students in my classes, it became an unspoken expectation that I would go as far in my education that my circumstances would let me. To be honest, although I was a bright student I was lazy—and it wasn’t difficult being one of the smartest students at my high school. I was, and still am what my friend Morgan in the earlier years of Flux would call, "A Lazy Intellectual." At that Irving was the worst high school in New York City. This fact, combined with my “do only as much as you have to” approach to schoolwork, I managed to collect quite a few scholarships to college. Much to my parent’s delight, I was soon a college student.
The weird thing about my parents was, they never really encouraged me to study much of any thing—my homework was never checked and questions about school never asked. From the time I was 6 I explained to my parents that I wanted to be a writer, something my artist father encouraged and warned, “You’ll have a life full of struggle ahead of you.” So, no one said anything when I undertook the completely useless degree of Writing and Literature at one of the most expensive universities in the U.S. I must also admit that I was fully aware that the degree I would eventually be rewarded with would probably not guarantee me a salary much above minimum wage, but as one of the most promising writers at my college, I was foolish enough to believe in instant success. Sure my degree helped in the long run in securing jobs in publishing (what did my first mentor call publishing? Oh yes, the female professional ghetto), but because of the low salary and my bad attitude I never really managed to earn much.
There is a scene in Marjane Satrapi’s Persepolis that I cherish. The family is discussing whether they should migrate out of Iran—the Islamic fundamentalists have taken over and life for the somewhat liberal family has become tragically altered. There is a “brain drain”—all of those who have the resources escape their beloved homeland and Islamic fundamentalism to such “free” nations such as the U.S., France, and in the author’s case, Austria. But the father is unyielding. No, he insists, he is not moving to another country where he, although an engineer, would have to drive taxis and his wife a cleaner. My heart skipped a beat as I read this scene. I’ll never forget the drawing: the discussion was taking place in a car. It made me think of the thousands of displaced immigrants who wind up in God only knows where and have had to start from scratch. It made me think of Hammid, another Iranian who landed here in Denmark by accident. The way he tells it, it is one of the most comedic experiences in his life.
“I was a terrorist.” Hammid laughs as I look confusedly at him. “A terrorist?” I ask, intrigued at his ability to laugh at his fate: living here in Denmark.
“I left Iran because I got a job as an English teacher in Turkey. One of my students was apparently involved in a political party that was illegal in Turkey and one day they arrested him. They rounded up every one listed in his phone book and imprisoned them. As his teacher, my number was naturally in his phone book. I spent six months in a Turkish prison, and then a Danish organization, I still don’t know why up to this day, arranged for my and some other’s release. I landed up in --.” And he laughs again, entertained greatly by what I would otherwise think a tragedy. If only we all could laugh at life’s unforeseen twists and turns, some of them lashing out at us and crushing us. If only I was equipped with such medicine. So Hammid, like me, is here in Denmark, except I am here by choice and he is here by force-- and I wonder how many more are like him? How many of the men who drive me around in taxis, who mop floors in sleeping malls and women who clean hotel toilets have University degrees and technical qualifications that are rendered useless here?
I suppose that was the fate I had tried to postpone for as long as possible. For the first few years in Denmark, I stayed at home with my child and attended Danish school. There I would meet others, some like me, others much different. There were Americans who suffered from nervous breakdowns, punk rockers who hid themselves in black clothes from the reality of the society in which they lived, Pakistanis who were overqualified but whose names forever besmirched whatever chance they ever thought of at true integration. I raced through the first school that I attended, not because of my fluency of the Danish language, but as a westerner my friend and I soon realized who the students were that the teachers felt had most promise. The lines were clear: Westerners got bumped up as quickly as possible, the others, mostly those from the Middle East whose Danish, by the way, was always much better than ours were left to languish in even duller classes where they would have to listen to listen to Ole and Ulle talk about the groceries or constipation or something that would supposedly help these students in the outside, real, Danish world. There was another distinction between the two groups that I didn’t fail to notice, and it lay in our attitudes. For us, the other Westerners, we didn’t learn Danish basically because we felt ourselves too good to. We were Americans, Canadians, French or what have you, and to us, although we never openly said it, we felt it was a waste of time to learn such a provincial language. I’m not saying that all of us felt that, but it was present. The others on the other hand, the non-westerners seemed enthusiastic to be here, enthusiastic to learn a language that would perhaps better their lot in life. Some seemed grateful to be given the opportunity to learn, to be in school all over again. It didn’t matter if it was the Iraqi engineer who married and had two kids and was scrambling for an apartment (he couldn’t find a place to live!) or the Egyptian who wanted to return to university—there was a desire to be there that was eventually stomped out by the drab courses and “activation” process that made it more and more difficult for them to balance getting ahead here and having some peace time, some coming down time, at home, and ponder the many conflicts so inherent in the culture shock that we all, no matter where we came from, was definitely experiencing.
Many say that the recipe for immigrant success here in Denmark is simple—learn the language! Wrong! As an American my accent is tolerated, ridiculed or even ignored, but I tremble at the fate of those who come from lands deemed less sophisticated by the ignoramus’ at large (Hello, we got a lot of “our” culture from these people, ok?). I remember once practicing my Danish and some arrogant, spoiled shit face little Danish teenager says, “Oh how I hate to hear someone speak bad Danish.” You’ve got a lot to offer your country honey.
Sure my fate here, thus far has not been great. But that’s the sum total of my lazy ass and lack of connections. But what of the hard working, committed immigrant worker who is without a network? Who speaks “bad” Danish? I’ll give my cleaning stint another year—due both to my laziness and the fact that I genuinely derive some sort of creative kick from it. And if things don’t work out here for me in Denmark, guess what? I can always go back to great America, “land of the free” ha ha. But that’s my luxury. What about those whose fates have already been doled out by other’s disinterest and ignorance? Let’s just hope that like Hammid they can learn to laugh about it. Otherwise, the alternative might be some kind of cultural madness.
Nørrebro, 2004