Off to London

I would like to begin this post by making a list of why I am in love with Denmark (a short, condensed list):

1. I can go to a bar and break out the coffee grinder in a dance circle without being publicly mocked immediately after.

2. Not only can I do the coffee grinder, but I can moon walk across the dance circle and still remain socially unscathed.

3. The ocean is literally frozen for 20 meters out and yet you still find Danes swimming in the water.

4. Their bread weighs 10 lbs because it actually contains grains, real grains, not refined, processed, synthetically manipulated grains.

5. They invented hot lemonade.

6. I can see a 70 year old man riding his bike down the street while smoking a pipe.

7. I can be blunt and not offend anyone. That's the name of the game here.

8. They show replays of the Olympics in slow motion set to Mozart.

9. You can call the Parliament and chat with the representatives. I can call the head of the biggest party in Denmark and he'll talk with me.

10. There are more people biking than driving, and more people walking than biking.

11. They charge you for plastic bags at stores.

12. Companies have the most incredible benefits. Many companies pay for the cars of their employees (the employees get to pick the car, too), the gas, the insurance, they all have fitness centers inside, they pay for the employees lunches everyday and buy them drinks (wine, beer, shots) a few times a week at the cantinas they have in the office, they have department meetings over a glass of wine and cocktails, they have 6 weeks vacation, days off if their kids get sick, maternity and paternity leave, and the benefits go on and on.

I can't exactly remember my past week beyond the fact that it made it above zero degrees celcius which was probably the greatest moment thus far. My week, in summary, included Danish X-Factor and Wine Parties (yes, I got tricked into watching X-Factor again), Friends marathons and danish candy eating binges, gym mishaps (relatively minor), breaking dancing and falafel, tests, reading, eating, drinking, sleeping. Although I did have an odd moment I realized in retrospect might have been more than I originally thought....

I was running on the treadmill, watching some bad MTV Danish music videos on the screen on my machine (each machine has a TV attached to it). I was on my third mile, quite sweaty and almost done and this guy moves to the treadmill right next to me, turns it on, and starts walking while watching the same MTV channel. He then points to my screen and his screen and then himself, pointing out that we were watching the same thing, a Nik and Jay music video. I'm sitting there a bit bewildered and quite annoyed thinking, 'I'm three minutes from finishing my run, unable to see straight and quite frankly, I don't give a damn that we're watching the same MTV channel'. I smile, blow him off quite blatantly and keep going. Later, upon reflection, I realize that he was pointing out that he was the one in the music video. Nik and Jay are the biggest Danish hip-hop stars and he was Jay. After talking with the owner of the gym (who has befriended me, I think for pure entertainment due to my multitude of mishaps), my suspicions were confirmed.

(this is them) If the situation were the repeat itself, I would do the same thing ( I think you can understand why as the photo speaks for itself).

So I am off to pack for London and then Amsterdam for the next week. I'll be touring Magnum Photo, many museums, Stonehedge, Bath, tea houses, the London Eye, Billy Elliot, the Red Light District and enjoying myself thoroughly. Look for more adventures soon!

Hej Hej!

Thoughts Thus Far

I returned on Sunday night from a wonderful trip to Sweden to see Amanda, my friend I met while in Ghana. It was her 22nd birthday and we got to catch up, I got to see Sweden, meet her friends, and, of course, celebrate our birthday's together! It was wonderfully relaxing and I discovered a Swedish alcohol that literally tastes like mouthwash, which turned out to be perfect for Amanda's roommate who is a dentist and no so perfect for me who has developed an involuntary habit of spitting my mouthwash out...

Today was a monumental day. Today I became a (pseudo)Dane. Last week I got my 'yellow card' and became a temporary citizen of Denmark with all of the rights entitled to a Danish citizen and some would consider that the moment they became a pseudo-Dane, but for me it was not. For me, it was today at the train station when a confused and disoriented man approached me and asked if I knew what train to take the Lyngby. I asked him whether he meant Lyngby in Denmark or the nearby Lundby in Sweden (they sound almost the same). He informed me he was looking for the one in Denmark and I replied, to his misfortune, that I only knew the train to the Lundby in Sweden (odd and not very useful, but hey), but showed him the map and the route. Then a woman approached me at the station about five minutes later and asked me in Danish something about a train, Østerport station, and Østerbro neighborhood. Understanding half of what she said (which I was pretty proud of) I told her what train to take and how to get there, giving her multiple options on S trains, regional trains, or metro. I walked away feeling pretty damn good, like I finally blended. Today was a good day.

Given that... I am going to reflect a bit on my past five weeks here in Denmark and what I have learned thus far:

1. If you want to blend in, wear black. Do not wear yellow, or green, or God forbid, orange. Wear black, boots, and some kind of poofy black jacket. Luckily for me, I only own black clothing. Unlucky for most of my American classmates, orange and yellow are dead giveaways that you don't belong.

2. Semi-socialists states brew some kind of political homogeny, but with seven political parties, all of which have a chance in power (except maybe the Unity Party which embodies the ideals of the 1960's hippie movement), there is a definitely diverse political landscape and openness for cooperation and compromise, it's not so "either or" like in the States and not as one-sided as people seem to think.

3. Trains don't run so well when the tracks are pure ice, I also don't run so well on ice.

4. The metric system rocks.

5. I thought that the cars would hit you if you got in their way, but those bikers are the scary ones. They will hit, they will not only hit you, but they will break your nose and give you a concussion (information courtesy of my friend Kelli)

6. Denmark is beautiful. The atmosphere, the natural environment, and the people. The people are especially beautiful thanks to the Viking who raided nearby lands and took the most beautiful women to be their wives and reproduce, thus creating a beautiful gene pool.

I keep adding to this list, but I do have another gym adventure to share with you...

Today I went to the gym, did a circuit training class (so much better), and then went back to the locker room, opened my locker, and proceeded to the sauna and steam room to relax. It is important to note that I went to the steam room and sauna only in my towel. I returned to the locker room only to find that the code I punched in my locker wasn't working and I couldn't open my locker. I tried three times. Didn't work. Finally I go upstairs to the main desk which is in the center of the gym (and the gym in the center of a busy square with every wall being comprised entirely of windows)... I did all of this in my towel. The desk assistant came to the locker room, opened my locker only to find out the locker I had been trying to open was in fact not mine. Sh opened the one next to it as I sat there bright red, that locker was also not mine. Turns out my locker was across the locker room and my code did work, I am just a dummy.

Delirium

I would like to let you know a blog entry is soon to come... but currently I am in a state of complete delirium, exhaustion, and I really should shower for everyone's sake, so instead of blogging tonight I will be sleeping and bathing. I'm getting too comfortable with this blog thing, my apologies.

Oh, but I do have one short story I feel inclined to tell for purely self-sacrificing purposes...

Wednesday morning I wake up early and head off to the fitness center I joined (the most posh fitness center I have ever seen, Danish designer chandelier, juice bar, ridiculous). I decided I was going to try the High Puls class which can best be described as a mix between bootcamp and turbo kickboxing. I arrive only to find six Danish women who can be described as nothing short of beasts. Now I use the term 'beast' often enough that you may not really understand the magnitude to which these women embodied beastliness- but trust me, these women can kick some ass. So I get all of the equipment and am relieved to see this pregnant woman, probably eight months along walk in, thinking maybe we're on the same level. We start the class with these combination turbo kickboxing moves that involve kicking your leg while simultaneously crunching your abs and pulling your arms in and moving from right side kick, to center, to left side kick. Then we do it at twice the tempo. Well turns out I am far more uncoordinated than I thought, I'm about five times worse at kickboxing than at dancing. Take a moment and let that sink in. Worse than dancing. Five times worse. So just imagine... Here are seven Danish women kickboxing just like the Bally Fitness commercials and then there's me... My leg is kicking to the left while my arm is flailing to the right and I'm crunching my abs to the center and my body is so contorted I look like some disabled teenage mutant ninja turtle. After a bit of watching this torturous attempt the teacher then comes over to try to help and after two tries she shakes her head, laughs, and walks away.

This embarrassment continues for a bit until we start to incorporate punching into the set and I find a way to make even more of a fool out of myself. Turns out I can't punch either. All I could think was, 'It's a really good thing I just slapped that guy in the bar because punching him would have been far, far worse, assuming I was even coordinated enough to hit him.'

I somehow made it through the class and scrounged up enough dignity to thank the teacher and then go run and hide for the next few hours. But it did inspire this list...

Things I learned from High Puls Class:

1. Danes are beasts, don't mess with them.

2. Pregnant Danes are even beastlier

3. Danes like to be naked in the locker room

4. They like to have long, intimate conversations with you in the locker room while naked.

5. I do not feel comfortable with naked conversations in locker rooms.

6. I feel even more uncomfortable after realizing my coordination is equal to that of a five year old.

7. I should never punch anyone, for my own sake

8. If you ever come to Denmark... never, never take a High Puls class.

And the travel adventures are in full swing

So I intended upon updating you on the rest of my week as my short blog entry was quickly turning into a short novel and increasing in vulgarity, but I never seemed to get around to it and now I don't even remember my week. So sorry to disappoint all of you hanging on to my every moment, but we're going to have to accept my state of temporary amnesia and skips a few days.

Let start Wednesday...

Wednesday night I cooked a delicious meal for my host family in honor of my birthday. Potato, kale, and leek soup (amazing), bruchetta, and mango cranberry salad followed by my favorite childhood dessert, dirt cups. Unfortunately, the Danes aren't as sophisticated as us Americans and I had to settle for chocolate mousse instead of pudding, dark chocolate cookies instead of oreos, and I just skipped the worms for the sake of my own embarrassment when I tried to poignantly explain why I had just placed gummies shaped like bugs in their chocolate mousse.

Thursday I was off at six in the morning for my study tour to Western Denmark. We drove two hours to Jelling (pronounced Yelling) to stand and look at the two Jelling rocks, Viking historical landmarks in the beautiful Jelling, population 200. One of these great landmarks was hidden in a wooden box for fear that it is "loosing its structural integrity" and the other was an equally exciting rock covered in snow. We then went to an old inn and from there headed off to Ebeltoft. Ebeltoft is renowned for their beautiful beaches, their lively summer cottages, and their wonderful festivities... in the summer. In the winter they are renowned for grey skies, bleak, flat landscapes, and the epitome of stark direness. That's harsh, but true.

We hung out at this folkhjskole which is a kind of a commune of sorts in which students come to take time to study philosophy and the humanities, this particular one focused on film. An although this school is focused on free expression, breaking out of the mold of ordinary life, and exploring the existential questions of life through film, the movie they happened to be showing the night we were there was none other than "Twilight: New Moon". So on my birthday I was forced to watch one of the most painfully horrible films in the history of my twenty years in a school dedicated to preserving the sanctity of film.

From there we went to Odense and visited a museum on modern art and mass media called Brandts and then visited TV2 the largest media group in Denmark. We met the "Anderson Cooper" of Denmark, Johannes the host of News at 7 and were off again to Kolding. We arrived at our hostel and were promptly provided with beer, courtesy of our school (gotta love Europe), and had a lovely, drunken dinner. From there we went out to each of the three bars located in Kolding, only to find that everywhere we went there were either other American students from our school (there were 100 of us in a town with a population of 500, or so it seemed) or middle aged men playing ballads from the jukebox. We ended the night with pizza slices the size of my upper body, literally, and found our way back to the hostel with the help of some seriously inebriated Finish boys who only could say, "America... it's good. McDonalds and Desperate Housewives. That's good, real good. Cheers to America!"

The next day we went to this incredible art museum called Trapholt and saw this incredible artist (check him out at http://www.petercallesen.com/) who makes art out of single sheet of white paper which are beyond incredible. Oh and there was an exhibit on Danish chairs, too. Lots and lots of chairs, none of which you could sit in.

Needless to say the trip was awesome, although gave us all a rather bleak view of the Danish country-side. There was some bonding among communication students (it was a trip designed for each "core class", mine was communication and there were 36 of us) and some breeding of severe dislike as well. Most of my group was great, but I did manage to find three girls who epitomized everything you should hate about the picturesque sorority girls because they were it. They complained about not having their Blackberries, God forbid, and how they were going into withdrawals from not being able to check Facebook whenever they wanted. And they chatted about how they hate the water in ketchup and proceeded to ask the waiter for "less watery ketchup" and "new fries because the ketchup water touched them". Needless to say, it's been good. As we speak I am planning my trip to Berlin, Prague, Greece, Crete, and maybe Istanbul in March and then some weekend trips to France, Budapest, Amsterdam and getting my visa for Ghana! Oh man, this is heaven.

Oh man... What a Week.

Let me start by saying that people watching here is fantastic! Today I sat on the bus on my way home and watched a woman, probably eighty, ride her hot pink bike next to her friend, also eighty, while she scootered along the road. Yes, rode her Razor scooter. You can't beat that.

The weather here has been ridiculous. We are currently in a blizzard, a full-blown blizzard and chaos is ensuing. It snows here about as much as it does in Seattle, and they handle equally as well as Seattle did. The trains are delayed, cancelled, the busses are fishtailing and sliding, not driving, around. Today I got on the train (a ten car train) by squeezing between two people right in the corner where the doors close. There was not a inch to move from one end of this train to the other. Chaos. I love the snow, I must admit. It is so so beautiful but I like it far less when I spent hours each day standing in blustery winds and blowing snow.

Last Friday I spent the evening with some Danes, we watched X-Factor (American Idol pretty much, except in Danish) which turns out is worse than American Idol, mostly because the only thing I understood were the bad lyrics of the American pop songs they were singing and I wasn't able to tell who moved on because they cried if they lost, they cried if they won, they cried before they performed, they cried after. This led to into a state of complete disarray, resulting in my strong dislike of X-Factor. But besides that it was quite fun I must admit. Good beer, even the cheapest.

Saturday I went to my host mom, Lotte's, brother's farm. Her two brothers, their families, her mom and dad were all there for a nice gathering. The farm country is beautiful. Lots of pigs. More pigs than people. In fact, five times more pigs than people (yes Stephanie, your dream come true...) This gathering was quite extraordinary actually... we arrived and were served beer from the local brewery and Danish candy (quite good). Then we sat down for sweet rolls and butter, followed by more beer and Danish cake (which is white cake filled with berried and topped with heavy cream). After that they brought out chocolate... chocolate mints, chocolate nuts, chocolate chocolate, hot chocolate. Lots of chocolate. That was our appetizer... a child's dream. After that we ate rice, vegetables, bread, stew, a full blown meal. So, at that point, I thought we were done. No. Wrong. It's then time for more chocolate. Then gelato. Then tea. Then beer. And then... you're done. Finally done. You're on a sugar high coupled with a state of complete lethargy, but done. It was actually really fun! We played cards, watched a movie, talked about politics, had a snowball fight, watched the sunset and, of course, ate.

Saturday night, though, was not so wonderful. As a forewarning: This content is not suitable for children or those weak and feeble souls.

So Saturday nights I went to this bar in Copenhagen, known for being fantastic. They have live DJ's and play great music. We arrived and the music was great, reggae techno, and it was pretty slow, not too many, although it started to pick up. After a while my friends and I go to dance (which is quite difficult because the beat keeps changing, like I can hear a beat, and the Danes do this convulsion type dancing where they move their shoulder in quick, seemingly irregular ways, leaving the hips to just follow). Needless to say I looked more ridiculous than usual, convulsing off-beat, trying to continually adjust to the changing rythms but failing miserably. After a while the dance floor gets crowded and this guys ends up in front of me. Unfortunately he keeps slamming into me and elbowing me so I start pushing him off me. After a couple times he turns around, looks me in the eye, and backhands me in the face. I stood there stunned... then slapped him back. Then a screaming match ensued in which he yelled in Danish and the occasional English 'Fuck you' and I just repeatedly said 'Fuck you. What the fuck?' because I was so shocked, disoriented, and had no idea what the man was saying that the only thing I could muster was a 'Fuck you' (surprisingly, I know).

Needless to say...no more of that bar for me.

This is too long already but I'll update soon. The fun continues...

Hej Hej!