Oprah, you should fire your producer

Not all of them, mind you, but the one that produced the 'typical danish home' segment.

In the USA on Wednesday, October 21, Oprah aired a special on the Happiest Place on Earth. Denmark received that 'award' in 2007 and 2008. The 2009 honor goes to Costa Rica. According to this survey, Denmark didn't make the top 5 in 2009. Here's another source.

Ok, first, talk about a stale and out of date topic. But, more importantly, Oprah's team decided to showcase a 'typical danish home'. Now, the whole world (or those of you watch the Oprah show) have a distorted view of Denmark and danish living.

I'm not quite sure who on Ms. O's staff does the research, but goodness, they were WAY off base. So, now thanks to that episode, people across the globe think that Danes live just as Stine Holscher and her family of 5.

Yes, it is common in Scandinavia to have a minimalist approach. Walls are not covered with tons of art work and likewise, you won't find shelves that have miscellaneous chotskies. However, it is definitely not to the extent of the home televised on the Oprah show.

You will however, find...

• solid doors on the bathroom....seriously, glass doors and right next to the living room?
• duvet and pillows on the master bed...not just a black sheet and most beds have two single sized duvets (one for each person, no no hogging the covers)
• the master bedroom is a room, not just a mattress next to the kitchen sink
• children have a bedroom...not a cubby hole left over from the lift.
• small refrigerators, some with freezers, some without...and they are considerably smaller than American refrigerators
• a lot of white, from walls to trim, cupboards and cabinets, and even furniture
• hardwood floors in varying colors and types of wood
• not many closets...but lots of Ikea furniture/closets and storage units
• most homes (at least the ones I have been in) are not as sterile as Ms. Holscher's home...did you get a sense of any hygge (loosely translated...coziness) in her home???

Here is a short video of my kitchen, dining room, and living room in my 'temporary' danish home built in the early 1900s. We don't own the home, just 'borrowing' it during our 2 year stay in Denmark. It is larger than most danish homes I have been in, so I do realize that it does not represent 'typical,' and not everyone has an Arne Jacobsen table, but all Danes know who he is...this is another example of a danish home.


Disclaimer: the quality isn't the best as it was taken with my camera.

Updated: Apparently there are multiple Happiness studies (as was pointed out in the comments). The World Happiness Study was used as the base for the Happiest people study and that lists Costa Rica as #1 and Denmark as #2. There is also the HPI or Happy Planet Index which lists Costa Rica as #1 and Denmark does not fall in the top 5.