COLUMN: From salsa to silence
The Danish preference for silence at first felt like a cold rejection, even anxiety-provoking, coming from a culture where salsa, laughter and vivid conversations make the soundtrack of your everyday life. Now, Sofía Pereira, an exchange student from Costa Rica, has learned to tame the urge to interrupt silence, and even to embrace it.
About the columnist
Sofía Pereira is an exchange student from Costa Rica. She studies Journalism at Aarhus University during the spring semester of 2025. She holds a bachelor’s degree of Journalism and Hispanic Philology from the University of Navarra, Spain.
During her stay at Aarhus University, Sofia Pereira will write columns for Omnibus about her encounter with Danish culture and the student life in Aarhus.
Back at my home university, I pursue a double major in Journalism and Spanish Linguistics. In one of our subjects, Universals of Language, the professor taught us about an often-overlooked aspect of language: silence. We learned that silence is not an absence of language, but a language in itself, complex and full of nuances. It shapes meaning just as words do. But it wasn’t until I moved to Denmark that I truly began to understand its weight.
Alien silence
In Latin America, silence tends to make us uncomfortable. We grow up immersed in sound: conversation, music, laughter, and even arguments. Our houses are filled with the rhythm of salsa playing on the radio while someone sweeps the floor or peels plantains in the kitchen. We talk a lot and talk fast. Words are the glue that binds us; the more, the better. A loud space is a full space, and fullness feels like love. Silence, on the other hand, often feels cold. It connotes distance, maybe even rejection. If someone is silent, we wonder: “Did I do something wrong?” So, when I first arrived in Denmark, the stillness made my anxiety go through the roof. People on the bus don't speak to each other. In group work at university, long pauses hang in the air without anyone rushing to fill them. Even at dinners, silence is normal, even appreciated, not awkward. For a while, I interpreted it through my own cultural lens: were they bored, angry, uninterested?
Danes don't fear silence, they respect it
But over time, I realized silence here doesn’t mean absence. It means space. It’s a way of showing presence without invasion. Danes don’t fear silence, they respect it. They understand that not everything valuable needs to be said out loud. I noticed that stillness wasn't empty, it could be full of intention.
COLUMN: Another kind of warmth
Little by little, Denmark taught me to appreciate silence. In this culture, silence is not a void but can be a container for thought, for presence, for respect. In conversation, it allows people to process ideas before speaking. In relationships, it gives room for individual autonomy. And in daily life, it creates a kind of calm I didn’t know I needed.
A different kind of company
However, there are days I crave the loudness of my family’s kitchen, where everyone speaks at the same time and laughter spills out into the hallway. I still miss the casual chaos of a Latin American gathering, where music, food, and conversation happen all at once, with no clear boundaries.
COLUMN: Life as an exchange student – not a tourist, nor a local
However, I’ve come to understand that silence offers a different kind of company: one that doesn’t demand anything of me, one that teaches me to enjoy my own company. In Denmark, I’ve learned that silence isn’t necessarily rejection. It can be a form of intimacy. Silence is not a pause that needs to be interrupted, just acknowledged. The presence of silence in Denmark has challenged me to slow down, to listen more, to speak less impulsively. And most importantly, in a world where noise is celebrated, correlated with vitality and joy, learning to embrace silence has helped me find a new kind of connection: one with myself. When my inner world calms down, and my outer world supports this calmness, there is space for peace, reflection, and growth.