I procrastinated so much in keeping up with my blog, because there was so much to do in my very last month in Denmark. I'm home now, and it's time for reflection.
Saturday the 19th: The Royal Music Academy held it's annual commemoration a.k.a. "årsfest." So many people came in tuxedos and evening dresses and I felt vaguely underdressed in my jeans. Luckily there were other students who also didn't upgrade to black and white swag. When the conductor ascended the stage at precisely 7:00, the audience quieted, but nothing happened. After a while, I realized the queen was not in her box yet! So we were all sitting there for 10 minutes when she finally arrived fashionably late, or were we all unfashionably early? As soon as she came in, we all stood and I think the orchestra played some royal fanfare piece. The focus of the concert was Mahler, the composer who supposedly mastered the concept of music as a language. Thus ensued a twenty minute lecture by the director about Mahler....unfortunately it was all in Danish, so I napped. I can now say Mahler has verily achieved music as a language. His phrases and melodies portray exactly a certain mood or feeling, a certain atmosphere and each note is emotionally-charged in your mind. The only thing I don't like is that he rapidly switches to different scenes with illogical transitions, so that I'm busy constructing a silent film in my head for one section and suddenly it switches and I am left to pick up my bewildered ear and attempt to recreate a new scene.
Sunday the 20th: Today was the DIS chrismtas lunch, otherwise known as the "julefrokost" christmas parties held between coworkers or a group or sportsklub or some other gang of colleagues that are not your friend group or your family. In fact, the general rule is that you don't bring your spouse to julefrokost, and whatever happens at julefrokost, stays at julefrokost. But considering there were students and entire host families in attendance, the DIS version was very PG-13. A jazz band entertained in the background while we all devoured the traditional flaeskesteg (roasted pork with crackling rind on top), fried fish fillet with remoulade, frikadeller, warm leverpostej, potato wedges, and red cabbage (my favorite!!!!). Afterwards we had the pakkeleg, or the christmas present game. Everyone had to bring a small wrapped gift, and the game goes in 2 parts. 1) Everyone passes around a pair of dice in a cup and each person throws the dice. If they get a six, they can grab a present from the pile. This goes on until all the presents are gone. 2) With a timer set to however long you want, everyone continues passing the dice, but if you get a six now, you can steal someone else's present. When the timer ends, they who have presents have presents, they who have nothing have nothing. Considering how egalitarian Danish culture is, this unfair game is very strange. I am of the opinion that if you invested 10DKK in bringing a gift, you should rightfully get a 10DKK gift back. Ah well. Clearly no one was interested in sharing gifts. The final tradition of julefrokost is the rice pudding (ris a la mande). It is boiled rice in milk and cream and butter with chopped almonds. If you can find the one whole almond, you win a prize (obviously you can't stir or peer around looking for it when you take your portion). Also, the goal is that you don't reveal you have it until the end (so that the rice pudding gets finished!). It also comes with cherry sauce. Since I don't really like creamy mushy stuff, I only nibbled at my share.
Monday the 21st: First day at Fisketorvet! I was so excited and nervous (after today it became just a regular workday) but I had brought and printed a lot of music so that I wouldn't run out. Occasionally I had a fan who stayed a bit and clapped after each piece, but otherwise it was a relaxing two hours to just enjoy piano. I would have liked to put out a small hat on the piano for tips, but the piano was roped off. Since it has been converted into an art piece (the "Liquid Piano") they are very interested in protecting such an investment. Apparently during the housewarming party, people were kicking at the section where the piano drips, so they have had to fence off that part as well with heavy-duty potted plants. No faith in humanity.
Thursday the 24th: Well I had come up with an idea to decorate a box and hang it on the railing around the piano. I was feeling the flow that day with piano and certainly that was the most I had ever earned in tips (about $15). Afterward, I attended a Thanksgiving dinner with Caitlin's huge Danish family (many uncles/aunts/leetle cousins). They were very excited to experience Thanksgiving and debated about how to translate the dishes. Apparently they do have a dish called sweet potatoes, but it's really caramelized regular potatoes with cinnamon on top, hence "sweet" potatoes, not yams.
Friday the 25th: So since I was plotting my own Thanksgiving, I had to find some yams. Note that I have not nor ever cooked an American Thanksgiving (a Chinese Thanksgiving usually consists of Peking Duck YUMMMM), so internet recipes played a big part. I went to shop at the open markets at Torvhallen at Israel Plads (near Norreport)--they have all kinds of interesting foods and cakes and wares and even fish and chips, and they had yams. I stayed up til midnight doing prep cooking.
Did I mention DIS provides a Thanksgiving stipend? Well, you have to apply for it. The goal is to involve as many Danes with American students as possible and include some fun activity that is traditionally American and Thanksgiving. We had our host family and some other students as well as a hand-turkey competition! DIS provided 1000 DKK, which covered the turkey and all the ingredients and all the crafting supplies. Hooray!
Saturday the 26th: SO MUCH COOKING! We had to last minute pick up some bread for stuffing and Stuart (my falling-out-of-canoe partner). Together we prepped the stuffing, cleaned and stuffed the turkey, and then PIANO LESSON WHAT? Yes, I had a make-up piano lesson and the only possible time was randomly at 2 pm on my Thanksgiving Saturday. So I did abandon Stuart (my roomie Caroline would soon return to help) for 3 hours (1 for getting there, 1 for lesson, 1 for coming back). As soon as I came back the kitchen was crowded--Caroline had brought her friend to assist. Crackers with cheese and Christmas jam, roasted zucchini soup (blending the soup makes it delicious!), turkey, stuffing, green bean casserole, marshmallows on sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes with gravy, cranberry sauce with orange juice, sweet pepper cornbread, and sweet corn. EAT EAT EAT. I think we were all in a food coma. Afterwards it was making hand-turkeys and hats with construction paper, foil paper, feathers, sequins, color pencils, and glue. Several people paired up, so there were 4 lavish entries for 3 equal prizes of RitterSport choco. DESSERT was apple pie and pecan pie, both amazingly wunnerful. So stuffed, tired, sleep.
Sunday the 27th: Today was the DIS trip to Lubeck, Germany to see their world-famous Christmas market. So, I had to wake up at 4:30, jump on the train west towards Ringsted (only way to get to københavn on time but not too early is to go backwards to Ringsted and then eastwards to Copenhagen b/c it ain't stoppin at Borup). So I was in the city on a Sunday and I wandered the empty streets until bus time. Remains of a party night littered the cobblestones, but there were also city cleanup crews busy stashing the trash away. So that is why the city is pretty the next day. It was a LONG bus trip and when we got there, severe rain and wind awaited. Denmark itself was having a hurricane, so Germany had the edges. Still we went shopping shopping shopping. It is a very extensive market with some trite tourist things and some really interesting things. I think because it was so lauded as world famous I had imagined more, so I was minutely disappointed. The rain didn't help and also many of the other shops that had building space were closed for Sunday. In any case, we nomm'd a BIG SOFT PRETZEL, chicken and onion kebab, and muzen (little doughnuts sprinkled with powdered sugar). More rain and wind on the bus ride back such that a bridge was closed. Our Danish driver complained that the Germans get terrified over so little wind and braved across the bridge. Back in Jylland, we found that the bridge to Zealand was closed, so we drove an extra few miles north to find the other bridge. On the highway, we passed CAR ON FIRE OMG. It was entirely on fire, like the flames were inside and outside the car, fanned by the wind. I hope no one was inside. I was in bed at 1:30 am because the driver was nice enough to drop me at exit 32, closer to home, rather than me having to catch an hour train back from Copenhagen.
Tuesday the 29th: Twas the last class of Human Health & Disease, there was food, pictures, hugs, and last minute good-byes, and we all got to leave early. There was some talk about how some students in the US do not have the ability to go shadow doctors or find research. Often they have to resort to connections and friends in high places in order to get to do that. That is something I think I have taken for granted, how JHU organizes, promotes, and even give away opportunities to do research at a lab, do your own research, implement a community project, shadow doctors, and offer grants to accomplish these things. I guess JHU being founded as a research institution and having a small undergrad population makes it easier. Then it was to dinner at La Galette (105 DKK for drink and pancake). I chose the Asterix, which was egg with chives and ratatouille. They use special blue wheat to make their stiff and more filling pancakes, and the topping goes quite nicely. But I think you would be better off getting a cheaper galette in France. Then to ROLEPLAYING. Let me explain. Roleplaying or the modern form tabletop RPG like Dungeons & Dragons is an interactive and traditional form of storytelling, where everyone plays a character adventuring in the world created and controlled by a gamemaster (who also voices the NPCs). Some things are of course, up to chance or fate, so we figure them out using many-sided dice. For those who like fantasy/sci-fi books or enjoy RPG videogames, the world of roleplaying is necessary to experience at least once, and I'm so amazed our European Storytelling class was providing this.
Another observation. Danish Language & Culture class has often impressed on me how lax Danes are with work. Doctors work only 40 hours a week, to give an example. And rush hour happens between 3:30 - 4:30. And most things close Sunday. My observation is that my hostmum is an exception. She works 6 days a week often, and several nights have to stay there until late evening, like 10 pm. Now, this might be the description of the average postdoc slaving away to get published, but it is actually her work as manager? at the National Gallery cafe. Sometimes I think she is drowning in work.
Wednesday, December 21, 2011
Saturday, November 19, 2011
Day 92: Europe Sightseeing, Big Events, and Fooooood
It has been SUCH a long time!! It's amazing how fast 3-4 weeks go by! Here we go:
OCTOBER
Wednesday the 26th: Actually, there is little to say. I spent the day slaving away on my paper at the Black Diamond. I was in the West Reading Room, where there are all these nice table nooks each with lamp and individual outlet--perfect for laptops. I only just learned today (11/14th) that you can't use this room unless you have books reserved. Something to keep in mind for later :P.
Sunday the 30th: Consisted of packing and carving a pumpkin and buying flowers and making white chocolate cranberry walnut cookies. Hopefully I could cheer up host mum--she had tough days at work (coffeemaker breaks down, dishwasher breaks down, breaks down again, big parties, awful music from the visiting artists). All three of us DIS students wrote thank-yous to her, and I put this with the pumpkin (carved with tulips--her favorite--but not in season) and the cookies and the red gerberas and yellow spider mums. I am a big fan of SURPRISES! So I made sure to do this when she was gone from the house and I would be leaving before she came back, heh heh heh.
In any case, Grandpa Fleming (isn't that an awesome name???) drove me to the station, where I would catch the bus in the city to Czech Republic!! It's a DIS organized trip, so I knew it would be awesome. One student was late to the bus, and as punishment, he had to rap about why we shouldn't be late. Although he was terrified (he told me afterwards), he did a really awesome job, and another student dropped a beat for him. Fun way to start the trip!
Monday the 31: The bus was overnight, so I wake up in a different country! Our temporary home was the castle Hruba Skala in the beautiful mountainous countryside of Cesky Raj (Czech). The castle itself is on a mountain, so I was awake when the bus wound its way through great big beautiful yellow and red forests. Once there, we were immediately thrown into the activities: 1) rappelling down a small cliffside, which was different than Sweden because the 2nd half of the wall curved in really far, so that part was just sliding down the line without touching the wall. Also, the walk back up the cliff consists of passing through the goat/sheep area. They were rather tame to me, probably tired after chasing the previous students all the way to the gate. 2) zipline. I had had two other zipline experiences prior and none of them are alike. In North Carolina, you wear gloves and sit in the harness and control your speed by pressing down on where it connects to the cable. In Ecuador, you sit in a swing and hold on for dear life. In Czech, you wear an overall-like harness and shoot forward like Superman (hanging from your back). It was amazing in the 1st few moments and then I started spinning and heading for the landing backwards OHMYGOSHIMGOINGTOCRASHphew. 3) High rope bridging which is intensely SCARY and AMAZING. You are latched to a safety cable, but it's very slack, so it's like you're standing on that one cable clutching the two other side cables without a safety. One step at a time. Actually every movement wobbles the bridge, so I had the most fun NOT moving and enjoying the scenery. But I couldn't hold up the line, so I had to inch forward.
Then lunch with sauerkraut cabbage soup (unless you are a sauerkraut fan, I do not recommend), sour horseradish and coleslaw salad, pasta and mushroom and buttered steak. The vegetarians got a huge block of cheese (like massive cheesestick). It was tasty when I sampled it, but very much missing marinara. I think the Czech do not believe in vegetables (there were only like 4 mushroom slices in my plate). Then--instead of archery--I went for a run around the countryside. We followed the winding roads, saw awesome overlooks and cliffs and high glacier carved rocks. Ironically, we went on the exact same trail that we would hike officially the next day, so more description then.
Dinner was mushroom soup (the Czech are also really into soup), fried chicken breast and potato veggie salad and apple tart with french vanilla ice cream and raspberry sauce. There is also a lot of butter in Czech food. As delicious as it was, I also cannot handle that much butter (or that much potato for that matter--although the vegetarians have more to complain about--see below), so I am glad I do not LIVE in Czech.
The castle as a hotel is not bad. The view is beautiful, and the rooms are warm, but I think they don't understand the concept of a towel. The towels provided were only large enough to wrap wet hair (think half of a normal American towel). Hmmmmm.
NOVEMBER
Tuesday the 1st: But you cannot have everything in life, so I put the towel issue aside and shamelessly enjoyed the nature hike for this day. In the morning, mist lay over the valleys surrounding the castle. It looked like we are on an island, surrounded by a diaphanous white sea. The trails open into wonderful beautiful curtains of tangerines, golds, and fiery phoenix flames of leaves (I have a picture where it seriously looks like the cliff side is on fire), jaw-dropping cliff outlooks, and gullies awash in beams of sunlight streaming through the tall tall trees. And then throw in the occasional leaf swirling down from above--IT'S SO MAGICAL!!!! The tour guide often pointed out things from the "Middle Ages", but I swear everytime she said that, it sounded like "Middle Earth". I would have believed her haha. My camera could not capture it. I (biased) vote autumn as the best time to visit the Czech countryside. The cliffs were actually a seabed that cracked over time to form gullies. Everything is all sandstone that easily erodes or sweats (absorbs water, which, when heated, pops through the rock). At one point there is a passageway of DOOM, where the urban legend is that only good people can pass through (bad people will be crushed), so bad people have to closely follow good people in order to get through. As it were, the rocks didn't crush anyone. The Czech also have a unique trail system, labelling trees and paths with a pattern of bands and separate walking and cycle routes.
So now that I am done waxing poetic, I continue: we walked down to the 7 health-benefit springs, passing by the slow dripping "male virility" spring to go to the bubbling "good metabolism" spring and the "good circulation" spring. There was also a memorial for climbers who died, most recently an 80 year old man who went off climbing by himself, had a heart attack and fell off the cliff just as he was readying the belay. Man was that a good death (at least I say so in his opinion).
Home then for lunch of egg flower meat soup with chicken broth, and chicken leg with potatoes and red cabbage and sauerkraut. This sauerkraut is just not my thing.
Afterwards we had icebreakers. They were a lot of interesting games, such as blindfolded or silent self-organizing by age/height/first name. Have you tried the human knot? Everybody puts their hands in the center and grabs different hands with each hand and then attempts to untangle without letting go. We triumphed the first time, and got stuck the second time until we realized we had made 2 distinct intertwined circles. The biggest icebreaking was the trust fall, standing on a 3-4 foot high wall and falling backwards into the arms of your waiting friends. The best way is to go very stiff and straight so that your weight is better distributed, but it's most everyone's natural instinct to squat or bend their knees so they "fall" a shorter distance, although it's harder for them to catch you.
And then it was darkness by 5pm. Dinner of meaty goulash with duck leg and cabbage and thick "dumplings" (but seriously, I swear they were sliced up steamed bread pieces) followed by thick crepe pancake with raspberry sauce. They seriously spoil us.
But Tuesday was not over. They held a freakishly dark candlelit treasure hunt throughout the castle grounds. The problem with only using tealights as your guide is that it blinds your eyes so you really can't see anything out there, making finding the clues extremely difficult. Several of the clues were down on the beginning of the hiking path, down uneven stone steps. Not safe. So I gave in and took out my flashlight. The tour guides were really into this, happily playing their roles of a ghost witch who lost her recipe and the black knight who held the keys to the clock tower, where the "treasure" was. I was cold and scared, so I was not disappointed when other teams made it to the treasure first. Great, the game is finally over.
Wednesday the 2nd:
I woke up too early. Because I didn't stay up and drink with the rest of them, I missed the late night decision to push breakfast half an hour later. Hum.
We got on a bus to Mala Skala for cliff rappelling/climbing and canoeing---too many people wanted to rappel first, so the bus had to be randomly divided. Well, it was probably better that way. I got to go canoeing (although I wanted to climb first, because if my shoes got wet I was not going to be able to climb). It is slow running water with occasional small tides, but it begins with a small slope/fall. My partner Stuart was fiercely determined not to get wet and to go canoeing all day instead of climbing. Down the fall we went and survived...except we didn't paddle out of the basin. We were sitting there congratulating ourselves when the boat got sucked in by the basin tides and FLIPPED. Cold.. 5 minutes of scooping out some water and then off we were. Oh the irony. We, the only ones who audibly voiced their determination to stay dry were the ONLY ones to fall, but we were troopers, warming up with paddling and belting out Disney songs. More than halfway down the river, we were getting turned sideways by some tides, and I was trying to turn us back by paddling backwards, and I think I used too much force plus unbalanced weight (these canoes were shallow!) and FLIP! >.< Cold... We were clearly not thinking and didn't flip our boat over before dragging it on land, so on land it was too filled with water to flip over. So we required the guide leaders' help. Now it was too cold and we shivered our way to the finish line without much singing anymore.
The two of us had to change under the bus---lol, getting close there, eh? At that point I didn't really care who saw me, and if the boys got a peep show through the driver's sideview mirror, lucky for them then. Those were my only pants, so now I was strolling along in shorts and flipflops.
At the local restaurant, there was HOT CHOCOLATE and HOT SOUP and meat and rice, again no veggies. It was very much needed, especially since it was followed then by a brave hike up to rappel cliff in the same socks and flipflops and shorts (although many nice people donated layers to me). Slip and slide up the mountainside. And cold. Watching the others rock climb, the rest of us had massage sessions under the Tuborg blanket. Oh mai. At some point I was warm enough to do more singing (Circle of Life). And more hiking back down in flip-flops in the treacherous twilight. But it was great exercise and was rewarded with a warm bus oh mai gosh. then dinnah. so sleepy. soupppp with leftover chicken and duck and doughy noodles, then delicious pork steak with cream sauce and wild rice and lettuce. followed by ice cream. and pickled plum, except not really. giving stuart the whipped cream. and taking oh so wonderful hot showah. and now sleep.
Thursday the 3rd: So I was not very coherent for that last part. Too exhausted.
This was the last day of the Czech Trek, and they were letting us loose in Prague for the day.
Bus to Prague (Praha). None of my clothes had dried (the radiators were not very radiative), so I continued in shorts and flip-flops....highly NOT recommended on the cobblestone streets.
I went with the tour leaders to the big shopping street with the intention of buying proper shoes, then discovering that all the shops were high-end shops. I was not here to spend $50 on shoes, so nope. Lunch at the chain store Pizza Factory (sizable chicken steak sandwich 109 CZK---about $6.00), then wandering to the street market on Havelska. So fun! They were all selling the same things but whatever. I really liked the berry boxes for 45 CZK ($3)--they provided a spoon and the box was filled with blackberries and raspberries and strawberries and blueberries! "Bohemian" glass/crystal, garnet, and puppets are the big thing in Prague. Czech it out! llollololololol Then to Old Town Square for city tour. It is so beautiful in the square!!!! clock tower with apostle puppets waving at the windows and bugler at every hour. How nice :D. These hourly buglers must be an Eastern Europe thing. Then down through to Charles Bridge with blackened sandstone statues (it's because they absorb pollution!). It was pretty crowded, but apparently it's impossible to move on the bridge in the summer. Their Saint John Nepomucnh? got thrown over the bridge for not revealing the queen's secrets to the king. Touching his statue = good luck.
Across the bridge to Mala Strana (little quarter). We climbed up the winding streets towards the castle, and the cathedral inside is half and half (half was built back in the day, but never finished. 2nd half built recently but they imitated everything...except for the blackened color of the old sandstone). In one of the office buildings was the 2nd of 3 Prague defenestrations: 3 royal officials of the Hapsburg kings were tossed out in protest of the king. Lucky for them they landed in a manure pile in the royal gardens, though their pride and reputation were certainly not so immune. Then we saw the Maria Teresa church, a place where people got interrogated and executed because it was STB headquarters (the Czech counterparts of the KGB). Across another bridge and we ended up at a big concert hall, which was Nazi 2nd in command Reinhard Heydrich's headquarters. All the statues on the roof are famous composers, and one was the Jewish composer Mendelssohn?. The Nazi, slightly miffed, sent a demolition team up to the roof to demolish the Mendelssohn statue. Unfortunately the statues were not labeled, so they just chose the statue with the biggest nose. Later it turned out that was Richard Wagner, Hitler's favorite. Hmmmmm. Then to the Jewish quarter, where the ghetto was in place back in the 13th century. Prague has the oldest synagogue still standing (it survived the Holocaust because it was supposed to be turned into the Musuem of the Exterminated Race). The tour finished and it was back to more shopping. I reconvened with the tour leaders and we went down a narrow alley to find dinnah at U Skirpu. Czech dark beer is not so bad, not like light beer, and with brewer's pork chop and green beans and bacon, it was a satisfying dinner. Also I got to nibble someone's Prague noodles (rather like normal thin flat noodles) and fried veggies (actually they seemed more like grilled veggies). Finally, the day was over and we would return on an overnight bus drive.
Friday the 4th:
The bus dropped us off in the middle of København, and it was a painful hike to the museum (to find my host mum), where I walked right past the guard (who was distinctly missing from his post) and carried my bags of doom into the cafe. Security?? (I have even walked into a hospital without getting a visitor's bracelet and no one notices... but I'm sure that won't happen with a govt building). I assisted with potato and carrot peeling, then having nothing else to do, I also swept the floor, cleared tables, put bacon sheets in the oven, folded napkins, and washed the tables and put up the chairs. Waitress experience! All in flip-flops and socks (the Danes are very good at MYOB). PARENTS!!! They came to Denmark!!! YAYAYAYAYAY!!!! SO tired though. We had a delicious dinner with cheese and wine afterwards and very quickly descended into sleeppppp.
Saturday the 5th: My parents and I flew to Riga, Latvia. Why? Because an overnight layover in Riga from Copenhagen to Rome is cheaper than a direct flight (and this includes the hotel fee!!!! What???) At least Latvia has cheap foooddd. We wandered around the forum area (Hotel Forum) and ended up in the Galeria mall. Inside, we stopped in dAdA restaurant for dinner--they stirfry your choice of stuff filled in bowl (you can pile the bowl as high as physically possible). The decor is very entertaining and all the tables have intentionally mismatched chairs, and they give you your bill in a baby shoe. SOOOO CUTE!! I recommend this place.
Sunday the 6th: Finally we fly to Rome. Their train system is like the rest of Europe, except no one NO ONE checks tickets -lame- The Roma Italians speed around in their tiny cars (someone speculated they have tiny cars in order to pull the tight turns necessary through all the twisty streets) and so far it looks like China (high rise squeezed apartments, little ground floor shops offer cheaper goods than chain grocery, dirty streets, graffiti). This is in Trastevere, the region south of the Vatican across from the Tiber River. Most shops closed on Sunday!!! With the parents, we had prearranged apartment from airbnb.com. No wi-fi though.... and we cooked our own dinner. According to the owner, apparently "wi-fi is not important to italians." What??? and rain....
Monday the 7th: We were rushing around the Vatican area like Robert Langdon in order to make it to the Vatican museum because our tickets had a timestamp (tip: buy online if you go in the morning, or just go in the afternoon---there are big lines in the morning). Inside is a great many halls and corridors of sculptures/busts/collections. The most popular trail is going towards the Sistine Chapel, through halls and halls of more sculptures, paintings, a hall of maps, a hall of tapestries, other stuff, and then FINALLY when your legs are very tired, you reach the chapel and it's CROWDED and the guards shush you constantly and you have to crane your neck to see everything and at the end, all I wanted to see was God touching Adam. Apparently if you go on the guided tours, they explain all the inside jokes and political rubbing hidden in all the paintings. Ah well. Afterwards we took a peek at the extremely royal/rococco Pontifical vehicles (so much gold and finery dedicated to this place of worship and the vehicles, but you would think as Christians all this stuff should be sold to generate donations for the poor or the starving in Africa and all that) sorry bit of cynicism there.
On the other hand, the Basilica was very much worth seeing. It's free just to go in. SOOOOO GRAND AND MAGNIFICENT. Of course overloaded with finery but the vastness of the basic structure itself is beyond words and and and and it must be seen. Period.
Gelato!! I dunno, not an ice cream conoisseur. ice cream is ice cream....is tasty.
Afterwards we wandered into Campo de Fiori and the decaying remains of the morning market (oh well). It was getting windy and cloudy (the morning was warm and sunny) and we nipped our lunch from Aristocampo, a slightly cheaper food place (we got paninis, except in italian land, they are simply called sandwiches). Then to Piazza Navona! It is a beautiful fountain area and filled with 1) tourists 2) caricature artists and 3) cafes. Definitely a must see, if only for the enormous grandly-sculpted fountains. Also there are the homeless musicians playing lovely background music, so it makes for a very nice place to sit or stroll.
Tuesday the 8th: We began at Palatine Hill, which is filled great awesome structures: I have fun imagining the Romans in their togas and stuff strolling up these great stairs that you can walk on but are not allowed to sit on (I guess they prefer dirty shoes over cloth-covered tushies---it's not even a religious place!!!). There are also these fruit stands---I read in a magazine that these square vans convert into the fruit stands like a Transformer. Then to Colosseum---the bathroom is very crappy (point to note, we could not find public toilets in Rome, although there were plenty of potable fountains. Their philosophy must be water in, water no out). The Colosseum is also disappointing from the inside. The stadium seats are all gone (or covered by weird moss carpet) and the gladiator fight floor is gone, revealing the underground tunnels. HOWEVER, the surrounding exhibits are interesting. Apparently the Romans engineered pulley systems to pull up the gladiators from underground through a trap door to emerge onto the stage. Very cool. Next to the archaeological area or Roman Forum, basically a park filled with grass, olive trees, and ruins. I was very tired (why is traveling so tiring?), so I probably didn't enjoy it as much as I should have. A quick exit and we were walking to Bocca de Veritas: a large face in the stone wall of a Maria church. The myth is that if you put your hand in its mouth, it will do nothing if you are truthful, but it will chomp down if you are a liar. There is a neatly bordered line and boxes for donations, and the only exit is through the church. I think the ploy is to get you to donate more in order to see the crypt. We had no interest and quickly left. By the way, you may be fooled by the center city signs of free Wi-Fi, BUT it requires a complicated registration and calling to verify Italian phone number process that, while free, is too time consuming and annoying and asks too much private info. So we just jumped a bus to Trevi fountain in the cloudy rain (once again, Rome is sunny and warm in the morning, dreary and freezing and rainy in the afternoon). Taking sanctuary in another church for 20 minutes, we took some rainy pictures of the fountain and made our way to the Pantheon (this one is beautiful, with an interesting hole in the ceiling, so the center of the Pantheon was transformed into a lovely fountain puddle) and the Spanish steps (not particularly impressive in the rain).
Wednesday the 9th: Here is a bit of Italian for Asians: senza formaggio! "No cheese" for mum. We flew out of Roma, taking some not very good Italian pastries (they are beautifully layered but tough and chewy, not light and crispy and fluffy, and wayyyyyyy too much creme). A quick flight to Paris, a city that is totally tourist friendly. We got so many maps handed to us, the train systems are ON TIME and list which stops it stops at and all the free and self-cleaning public toilets have maps of the local area and all the bus stops have maps of the bus routes and and and and Paris is just more accessible (for some reason other people don't like cities that are too touristy. I just appreciate the convenience).
We had another apartment from airbnb, so much warmer (the Rome one was chilly and there was no way to turn on the radiators......despite being beautifully warm in the morning, it was frightfully cold at night), and this one had WIFI!!! So--unfortunately--needed. Throw in an epic 7th floor sunset view over the city (along the canal) and YES. We visited Quai Gourmand (across canal) for dinner of la Galette---otherwise known as crepes for meals as opposed to dessert/breakfast. They have the enormous Nutellas EVERYWHERE!!! It makes me rather jealous since I don't have the luggage space to bring one back to the US. We strolled around and discovered the major chain grocery "marche franprix," as an FYI to you tourists. ALSO, although you can buy pastries at all specialty patisseries, I still recommend the packaged wholesale cheap pastries at the grocery. Save some money and still enjoy delicious French master baking. 1 pain au chocolat for 1-2 euro or a pack of 8 pain au chocolat for 2.50 euro. HMMMMMM. We also found an organic chain called Naturalia and purchased some fruit/nut/fig rolls. They are hard as rocks outside and, ironically, my dad nearly broke a tooth on a pebble inside one of them. They are VERY organic.
Thursday the 10th: Everyone here seems to drink coffee from tiny cups and saucers. We jumped on the super easy/every 2 minute metro to the Arc de Triomphe. Everyone was taking pics from the middle of the street. Tip: the underground entrance to the Arc is right at the metro stop. We missed that one and walked ALL THE WAY AROUND to the opposite side and then found the entrance. Arc de Triomphe close up is extremely impressive. I am awed (although the inside ceiling decoration is eerily like the kind inside the Roman buildings, a square pattern with a flower in every center). Going up to the top of the arc is not necessarily a must-see (although I have heard you should do this at night), but just standing beneath the arc is amazing. Then a quick metro to the Eiffel Tower!!!!! You wait at the crosswalk and see this old building, and once you pass the building BAM big huge metal thing rising into the cloudless sky. The Eiffel is awesome. Imagine watching the Eiffel being built back in the 1880s, when you don't even have the telephone! (not sure my history is correct, but go with it) and climbing the stairs in bonnets and long petticoats. Yes, it is much worth it to climb one of the tower legs rather than wait forever for the tightly packed elevators. Did you know? They repaint it every 7 years (taking 18 months with 25 painters---you would think they should hire 300 painters or something like that...).
Then we strolled along the Seine---but it's not like the San Antonio river walk. You walk above and slightly separated from the river (the docks are closed to the public). I think they should invest in a river walk. As if they didn't get enough tourism. OH apparently selling junk on the streets is illegal. There are signs encouraging you to support real businesses and museums rather than the underground organizations selling street junk (dangers of exposing yourself to unregulated chemicals, etc).
The weather was beautiful all day, so unlike Rome. Next was a quick bus ride to Notre Dame. I think if you want to see the gargoyles close up, best to climb the towers. Otherwise, a walk around the inside is good enough for me. After seeing the Basilica, I think this was a little less impressive for me, but it did bring back some awesome Disney memories.
By the way, prior to reach Notre Dame, we paused by the restaurant Le Quasimodo for lunch. It's not particularly French---has lots of French fries and steak and filets and other normal things (although the French fry IS French). I tried this "croque-monsieur,"a toasted ham sandwich with the cheese on the OUTSIDE. It's tasty but extremely filling and heavy. I was glad for the side salad.
After Notre Dame, we walked up hills to find the French Pantheon. It costs money to enter! We decided that, having seen the Roman Pantheon for free, it was not necessary. Ah well. Couldn't pay our respects to Victor Hugo.
At night, we returned to visit the Eiffel Tower, but the sky had become extremely cloudy, and you couldn't even see the top of the tower anymore. The light reflecting on the clouds made a halo around the remaining half of the tower. A very holy picture.
Friday the 11th: Today was not sunny. It was cold and grey. So it was perfect that it was museum day! First to the Louvre. We got there at like 10 am, and the line was not particularly long and it was fast-moving. European Union residents get free entrance! (which sucks for the people living in Switzerland). The museum is HUGE! I think it would be impossible to stay interested for such a long time that you can cover everything. So we made a beeline to the Mona Lisa. Why so small??? It is the size of a normal school curriculum painting. Also, the Mona Lisa was the only art piece who had glass plate shielding and three guards on either side. Hmmm. I also thoroughly enjoyed the Egyptian exhibits (not the Roman ruled period--it is my personal opinion that Roman occupation ruined Egyptian culture and quashed whatever might have been left of the ancient speaking language).
So after three hours of Louvre (one of the entrances is actually connected to a mall!), we went to Musee D'Orsay. Now that one had a HUGE line. I think we waited 20-30 minutes. The museum only has exhibits on the 5th, the 2nd, and the ground floor. Strange. We came there because my mum is a big fan of impressionism (Monet more than anyone else) and nearly the entire 5th floor is dedicated to that. It is very cool to see in real life what you only saw from textbooks or overhead slides in class. There are, of course, many other interesting things to see there, but you must go there to enjoy it yourself. I was also recommended to visit the Rodin Museum, but alas, no time. Therefore I pass on my recommendation to you.
Saturday we flew out and Sunday I practice piano the entire day.
Monday the 14th. I have been catching up with work while my parents roam Copenhagen :D. They leave tomorrow :( but then again it is only less than 5 weeks until I go home too.
Tuesday the 15th: I was invited to see the Liszt Festival concert at the music academy. Some of them were exceedingly skilled, but the one piece I had played before, Les Cloches de Geneve, it was performed so...disappointingly. The pianist had skill, he had interpretation, he had expression, he just didn't have strength. So for the climactic section, he played it very melodically, just without...climax. No inspiring trumpeting of greatness. Disappointing. But on the other hand, the following piece Vallee d'Obermann was performed so beautifully I realized why my previous piano teacher had been obsessed with this piece. So I'm glad it ended well.
Wednesday the 16th: Handball game!! DIS organized a very subsidized trip ($5) to a handball game (a sport whose fandom is only surpassed by soccer). I drowned under the overwhelming noise of thousands of people smacking their paper fans provided at each seat. The crowd is so involved! Every moment of the game some upbeat music was playing and everyone was fan smacking to the beat. Whenever the visiting team was haggling on the hometeam's side of the court, there was a three beat pattern accompanied by drums. Whenever the home team scored, some pop music played. Whenever the home team stole the ball and dribbled it back to the visiting team side, a different beat played. Whenever there was a time out, we had to give the beat to the middle school jump-roping cheerleaders. It was a lot of fan smacking, and definitely made it more fun and engaging. Maybe that's why I think watching baseball is boring. It was AG København (the national champs) vs. Nordsjaelland. It was a close game in the first half, but the second half the visiting goalie got worse and worse, so at the end, AG won 29-19....something like that. The halftime show was Sound of Sunday...if you knew them.
Friday the 18th: I had RSVP'd for DIS's Networker's Lounge. I came dressed to studenterhuset to properly network, but instead it was more like chilling and 'laxing with a beer (soda for me) with my friends and some Danes they knew. The Danish tradition is not to introduce people to other people (reveals inequalities, read prior posts), so being American and desiring to be social, I demanded introductions and the evening passed much more fun than I had expected.
Today, Saturday, is catching up on work day.
Enjoy your days even if you are not traveling! There is adventure in the quotidian (i.e. how to secretly feed the cat table scraps when no one else is looking).
OCTOBER
Wednesday the 26th: Actually, there is little to say. I spent the day slaving away on my paper at the Black Diamond. I was in the West Reading Room, where there are all these nice table nooks each with lamp and individual outlet--perfect for laptops. I only just learned today (11/14th) that you can't use this room unless you have books reserved. Something to keep in mind for later :P.
Sunday the 30th: Consisted of packing and carving a pumpkin and buying flowers and making white chocolate cranberry walnut cookies. Hopefully I could cheer up host mum--she had tough days at work (coffeemaker breaks down, dishwasher breaks down, breaks down again, big parties, awful music from the visiting artists). All three of us DIS students wrote thank-yous to her, and I put this with the pumpkin (carved with tulips--her favorite--but not in season) and the cookies and the red gerberas and yellow spider mums. I am a big fan of SURPRISES! So I made sure to do this when she was gone from the house and I would be leaving before she came back, heh heh heh.
In any case, Grandpa Fleming (isn't that an awesome name???) drove me to the station, where I would catch the bus in the city to Czech Republic!! It's a DIS organized trip, so I knew it would be awesome. One student was late to the bus, and as punishment, he had to rap about why we shouldn't be late. Although he was terrified (he told me afterwards), he did a really awesome job, and another student dropped a beat for him. Fun way to start the trip!
Monday the 31: The bus was overnight, so I wake up in a different country! Our temporary home was the castle Hruba Skala in the beautiful mountainous countryside of Cesky Raj (Czech). The castle itself is on a mountain, so I was awake when the bus wound its way through great big beautiful yellow and red forests. Once there, we were immediately thrown into the activities: 1) rappelling down a small cliffside, which was different than Sweden because the 2nd half of the wall curved in really far, so that part was just sliding down the line without touching the wall. Also, the walk back up the cliff consists of passing through the goat/sheep area. They were rather tame to me, probably tired after chasing the previous students all the way to the gate. 2) zipline. I had had two other zipline experiences prior and none of them are alike. In North Carolina, you wear gloves and sit in the harness and control your speed by pressing down on where it connects to the cable. In Ecuador, you sit in a swing and hold on for dear life. In Czech, you wear an overall-like harness and shoot forward like Superman (hanging from your back). It was amazing in the 1st few moments and then I started spinning and heading for the landing backwards OHMYGOSHIMGOINGTOCRASHphew. 3) High rope bridging which is intensely SCARY and AMAZING. You are latched to a safety cable, but it's very slack, so it's like you're standing on that one cable clutching the two other side cables without a safety. One step at a time. Actually every movement wobbles the bridge, so I had the most fun NOT moving and enjoying the scenery. But I couldn't hold up the line, so I had to inch forward.
Then lunch with sauerkraut cabbage soup (unless you are a sauerkraut fan, I do not recommend), sour horseradish and coleslaw salad, pasta and mushroom and buttered steak. The vegetarians got a huge block of cheese (like massive cheesestick). It was tasty when I sampled it, but very much missing marinara. I think the Czech do not believe in vegetables (there were only like 4 mushroom slices in my plate). Then--instead of archery--I went for a run around the countryside. We followed the winding roads, saw awesome overlooks and cliffs and high glacier carved rocks. Ironically, we went on the exact same trail that we would hike officially the next day, so more description then.
Dinner was mushroom soup (the Czech are also really into soup), fried chicken breast and potato veggie salad and apple tart with french vanilla ice cream and raspberry sauce. There is also a lot of butter in Czech food. As delicious as it was, I also cannot handle that much butter (or that much potato for that matter--although the vegetarians have more to complain about--see below), so I am glad I do not LIVE in Czech.
The castle as a hotel is not bad. The view is beautiful, and the rooms are warm, but I think they don't understand the concept of a towel. The towels provided were only large enough to wrap wet hair (think half of a normal American towel). Hmmmmm.
NOVEMBER
Tuesday the 1st: But you cannot have everything in life, so I put the towel issue aside and shamelessly enjoyed the nature hike for this day. In the morning, mist lay over the valleys surrounding the castle. It looked like we are on an island, surrounded by a diaphanous white sea. The trails open into wonderful beautiful curtains of tangerines, golds, and fiery phoenix flames of leaves (I have a picture where it seriously looks like the cliff side is on fire), jaw-dropping cliff outlooks, and gullies awash in beams of sunlight streaming through the tall tall trees. And then throw in the occasional leaf swirling down from above--IT'S SO MAGICAL!!!! The tour guide often pointed out things from the "Middle Ages", but I swear everytime she said that, it sounded like "Middle Earth". I would have believed her haha. My camera could not capture it. I (biased) vote autumn as the best time to visit the Czech countryside. The cliffs were actually a seabed that cracked over time to form gullies. Everything is all sandstone that easily erodes or sweats (absorbs water, which, when heated, pops through the rock). At one point there is a passageway of DOOM, where the urban legend is that only good people can pass through (bad people will be crushed), so bad people have to closely follow good people in order to get through. As it were, the rocks didn't crush anyone. The Czech also have a unique trail system, labelling trees and paths with a pattern of bands and separate walking and cycle routes.
So now that I am done waxing poetic, I continue: we walked down to the 7 health-benefit springs, passing by the slow dripping "male virility" spring to go to the bubbling "good metabolism" spring and the "good circulation" spring. There was also a memorial for climbers who died, most recently an 80 year old man who went off climbing by himself, had a heart attack and fell off the cliff just as he was readying the belay. Man was that a good death (at least I say so in his opinion).
Home then for lunch of egg flower meat soup with chicken broth, and chicken leg with potatoes and red cabbage and sauerkraut. This sauerkraut is just not my thing.
Afterwards we had icebreakers. They were a lot of interesting games, such as blindfolded or silent self-organizing by age/height/first name. Have you tried the human knot? Everybody puts their hands in the center and grabs different hands with each hand and then attempts to untangle without letting go. We triumphed the first time, and got stuck the second time until we realized we had made 2 distinct intertwined circles. The biggest icebreaking was the trust fall, standing on a 3-4 foot high wall and falling backwards into the arms of your waiting friends. The best way is to go very stiff and straight so that your weight is better distributed, but it's most everyone's natural instinct to squat or bend their knees so they "fall" a shorter distance, although it's harder for them to catch you.
And then it was darkness by 5pm. Dinner of meaty goulash with duck leg and cabbage and thick "dumplings" (but seriously, I swear they were sliced up steamed bread pieces) followed by thick crepe pancake with raspberry sauce. They seriously spoil us.
But Tuesday was not over. They held a freakishly dark candlelit treasure hunt throughout the castle grounds. The problem with only using tealights as your guide is that it blinds your eyes so you really can't see anything out there, making finding the clues extremely difficult. Several of the clues were down on the beginning of the hiking path, down uneven stone steps. Not safe. So I gave in and took out my flashlight. The tour guides were really into this, happily playing their roles of a ghost witch who lost her recipe and the black knight who held the keys to the clock tower, where the "treasure" was. I was cold and scared, so I was not disappointed when other teams made it to the treasure first. Great, the game is finally over.
Wednesday the 2nd:
I woke up too early. Because I didn't stay up and drink with the rest of them, I missed the late night decision to push breakfast half an hour later. Hum.
We got on a bus to Mala Skala for cliff rappelling/climbing and canoeing---too many people wanted to rappel first, so the bus had to be randomly divided. Well, it was probably better that way. I got to go canoeing (although I wanted to climb first, because if my shoes got wet I was not going to be able to climb). It is slow running water with occasional small tides, but it begins with a small slope/fall. My partner Stuart was fiercely determined not to get wet and to go canoeing all day instead of climbing. Down the fall we went and survived...except we didn't paddle out of the basin. We were sitting there congratulating ourselves when the boat got sucked in by the basin tides and FLIPPED. Cold.. 5 minutes of scooping out some water and then off we were. Oh the irony. We, the only ones who audibly voiced their determination to stay dry were the ONLY ones to fall, but we were troopers, warming up with paddling and belting out Disney songs. More than halfway down the river, we were getting turned sideways by some tides, and I was trying to turn us back by paddling backwards, and I think I used too much force plus unbalanced weight (these canoes were shallow!) and FLIP! >.< Cold... We were clearly not thinking and didn't flip our boat over before dragging it on land, so on land it was too filled with water to flip over. So we required the guide leaders' help. Now it was too cold and we shivered our way to the finish line without much singing anymore.
The two of us had to change under the bus---lol, getting close there, eh? At that point I didn't really care who saw me, and if the boys got a peep show through the driver's sideview mirror, lucky for them then. Those were my only pants, so now I was strolling along in shorts and flipflops.
At the local restaurant, there was HOT CHOCOLATE and HOT SOUP and meat and rice, again no veggies. It was very much needed, especially since it was followed then by a brave hike up to rappel cliff in the same socks and flipflops and shorts (although many nice people donated layers to me). Slip and slide up the mountainside. And cold. Watching the others rock climb, the rest of us had massage sessions under the Tuborg blanket. Oh mai. At some point I was warm enough to do more singing (Circle of Life). And more hiking back down in flip-flops in the treacherous twilight. But it was great exercise and was rewarded with a warm bus oh mai gosh. then dinnah. so sleepy. soupppp with leftover chicken and duck and doughy noodles, then delicious pork steak with cream sauce and wild rice and lettuce. followed by ice cream. and pickled plum, except not really. giving stuart the whipped cream. and taking oh so wonderful hot showah. and now sleep.
Thursday the 3rd: So I was not very coherent for that last part. Too exhausted.
This was the last day of the Czech Trek, and they were letting us loose in Prague for the day.
Bus to Prague (Praha). None of my clothes had dried (the radiators were not very radiative), so I continued in shorts and flip-flops....highly NOT recommended on the cobblestone streets.
I went with the tour leaders to the big shopping street with the intention of buying proper shoes, then discovering that all the shops were high-end shops. I was not here to spend $50 on shoes, so nope. Lunch at the chain store Pizza Factory (sizable chicken steak sandwich 109 CZK---about $6.00), then wandering to the street market on Havelska. So fun! They were all selling the same things but whatever. I really liked the berry boxes for 45 CZK ($3)--they provided a spoon and the box was filled with blackberries and raspberries and strawberries and blueberries! "Bohemian" glass/crystal, garnet, and puppets are the big thing in Prague. Czech it out! llollololololol Then to Old Town Square for city tour. It is so beautiful in the square!!!! clock tower with apostle puppets waving at the windows and bugler at every hour. How nice :D. These hourly buglers must be an Eastern Europe thing. Then down through to Charles Bridge with blackened sandstone statues (it's because they absorb pollution!). It was pretty crowded, but apparently it's impossible to move on the bridge in the summer. Their Saint John Nepomucnh? got thrown over the bridge for not revealing the queen's secrets to the king. Touching his statue = good luck.
Across the bridge to Mala Strana (little quarter). We climbed up the winding streets towards the castle, and the cathedral inside is half and half (half was built back in the day, but never finished. 2nd half built recently but they imitated everything...except for the blackened color of the old sandstone). In one of the office buildings was the 2nd of 3 Prague defenestrations: 3 royal officials of the Hapsburg kings were tossed out in protest of the king. Lucky for them they landed in a manure pile in the royal gardens, though their pride and reputation were certainly not so immune. Then we saw the Maria Teresa church, a place where people got interrogated and executed because it was STB headquarters (the Czech counterparts of the KGB). Across another bridge and we ended up at a big concert hall, which was Nazi 2nd in command Reinhard Heydrich's headquarters. All the statues on the roof are famous composers, and one was the Jewish composer Mendelssohn?. The Nazi, slightly miffed, sent a demolition team up to the roof to demolish the Mendelssohn statue. Unfortunately the statues were not labeled, so they just chose the statue with the biggest nose. Later it turned out that was Richard Wagner, Hitler's favorite. Hmmmmm. Then to the Jewish quarter, where the ghetto was in place back in the 13th century. Prague has the oldest synagogue still standing (it survived the Holocaust because it was supposed to be turned into the Musuem of the Exterminated Race). The tour finished and it was back to more shopping. I reconvened with the tour leaders and we went down a narrow alley to find dinnah at U Skirpu. Czech dark beer is not so bad, not like light beer, and with brewer's pork chop and green beans and bacon, it was a satisfying dinner. Also I got to nibble someone's Prague noodles (rather like normal thin flat noodles) and fried veggies (actually they seemed more like grilled veggies). Finally, the day was over and we would return on an overnight bus drive.
Friday the 4th:
The bus dropped us off in the middle of København, and it was a painful hike to the museum (to find my host mum), where I walked right past the guard (who was distinctly missing from his post) and carried my bags of doom into the cafe. Security?? (I have even walked into a hospital without getting a visitor's bracelet and no one notices... but I'm sure that won't happen with a govt building). I assisted with potato and carrot peeling, then having nothing else to do, I also swept the floor, cleared tables, put bacon sheets in the oven, folded napkins, and washed the tables and put up the chairs. Waitress experience! All in flip-flops and socks (the Danes are very good at MYOB). PARENTS!!! They came to Denmark!!! YAYAYAYAYAY!!!! SO tired though. We had a delicious dinner with cheese and wine afterwards and very quickly descended into sleeppppp.
Saturday the 5th: My parents and I flew to Riga, Latvia. Why? Because an overnight layover in Riga from Copenhagen to Rome is cheaper than a direct flight (and this includes the hotel fee!!!! What???) At least Latvia has cheap foooddd. We wandered around the forum area (Hotel Forum) and ended up in the Galeria mall. Inside, we stopped in dAdA restaurant for dinner--they stirfry your choice of stuff filled in bowl (you can pile the bowl as high as physically possible). The decor is very entertaining and all the tables have intentionally mismatched chairs, and they give you your bill in a baby shoe. SOOOO CUTE!! I recommend this place.
Sunday the 6th: Finally we fly to Rome. Their train system is like the rest of Europe, except no one NO ONE checks tickets -lame- The Roma Italians speed around in their tiny cars (someone speculated they have tiny cars in order to pull the tight turns necessary through all the twisty streets) and so far it looks like China (high rise squeezed apartments, little ground floor shops offer cheaper goods than chain grocery, dirty streets, graffiti). This is in Trastevere, the region south of the Vatican across from the Tiber River. Most shops closed on Sunday!!! With the parents, we had prearranged apartment from airbnb.com. No wi-fi though.... and we cooked our own dinner. According to the owner, apparently "wi-fi is not important to italians." What??? and rain....
Monday the 7th: We were rushing around the Vatican area like Robert Langdon in order to make it to the Vatican museum because our tickets had a timestamp (tip: buy online if you go in the morning, or just go in the afternoon---there are big lines in the morning). Inside is a great many halls and corridors of sculptures/busts/collections. The most popular trail is going towards the Sistine Chapel, through halls and halls of more sculptures, paintings, a hall of maps, a hall of tapestries, other stuff, and then FINALLY when your legs are very tired, you reach the chapel and it's CROWDED and the guards shush you constantly and you have to crane your neck to see everything and at the end, all I wanted to see was God touching Adam. Apparently if you go on the guided tours, they explain all the inside jokes and political rubbing hidden in all the paintings. Ah well. Afterwards we took a peek at the extremely royal/rococco Pontifical vehicles (so much gold and finery dedicated to this place of worship and the vehicles, but you would think as Christians all this stuff should be sold to generate donations for the poor or the starving in Africa and all that) sorry bit of cynicism there.
On the other hand, the Basilica was very much worth seeing. It's free just to go in. SOOOOO GRAND AND MAGNIFICENT. Of course overloaded with finery but the vastness of the basic structure itself is beyond words and and and and it must be seen. Period.
Gelato!! I dunno, not an ice cream conoisseur. ice cream is ice cream....is tasty.
Afterwards we wandered into Campo de Fiori and the decaying remains of the morning market (oh well). It was getting windy and cloudy (the morning was warm and sunny) and we nipped our lunch from Aristocampo, a slightly cheaper food place (we got paninis, except in italian land, they are simply called sandwiches). Then to Piazza Navona! It is a beautiful fountain area and filled with 1) tourists 2) caricature artists and 3) cafes. Definitely a must see, if only for the enormous grandly-sculpted fountains. Also there are the homeless musicians playing lovely background music, so it makes for a very nice place to sit or stroll.
Tuesday the 8th: We began at Palatine Hill, which is filled great awesome structures: I have fun imagining the Romans in their togas and stuff strolling up these great stairs that you can walk on but are not allowed to sit on (I guess they prefer dirty shoes over cloth-covered tushies---it's not even a religious place!!!). There are also these fruit stands---I read in a magazine that these square vans convert into the fruit stands like a Transformer. Then to Colosseum---the bathroom is very crappy (point to note, we could not find public toilets in Rome, although there were plenty of potable fountains. Their philosophy must be water in, water no out). The Colosseum is also disappointing from the inside. The stadium seats are all gone (or covered by weird moss carpet) and the gladiator fight floor is gone, revealing the underground tunnels. HOWEVER, the surrounding exhibits are interesting. Apparently the Romans engineered pulley systems to pull up the gladiators from underground through a trap door to emerge onto the stage. Very cool. Next to the archaeological area or Roman Forum, basically a park filled with grass, olive trees, and ruins. I was very tired (why is traveling so tiring?), so I probably didn't enjoy it as much as I should have. A quick exit and we were walking to Bocca de Veritas: a large face in the stone wall of a Maria church. The myth is that if you put your hand in its mouth, it will do nothing if you are truthful, but it will chomp down if you are a liar. There is a neatly bordered line and boxes for donations, and the only exit is through the church. I think the ploy is to get you to donate more in order to see the crypt. We had no interest and quickly left. By the way, you may be fooled by the center city signs of free Wi-Fi, BUT it requires a complicated registration and calling to verify Italian phone number process that, while free, is too time consuming and annoying and asks too much private info. So we just jumped a bus to Trevi fountain in the cloudy rain (once again, Rome is sunny and warm in the morning, dreary and freezing and rainy in the afternoon). Taking sanctuary in another church for 20 minutes, we took some rainy pictures of the fountain and made our way to the Pantheon (this one is beautiful, with an interesting hole in the ceiling, so the center of the Pantheon was transformed into a lovely fountain puddle) and the Spanish steps (not particularly impressive in the rain).
Wednesday the 9th: Here is a bit of Italian for Asians: senza formaggio! "No cheese" for mum. We flew out of Roma, taking some not very good Italian pastries (they are beautifully layered but tough and chewy, not light and crispy and fluffy, and wayyyyyyy too much creme). A quick flight to Paris, a city that is totally tourist friendly. We got so many maps handed to us, the train systems are ON TIME and list which stops it stops at and all the free and self-cleaning public toilets have maps of the local area and all the bus stops have maps of the bus routes and and and and Paris is just more accessible (for some reason other people don't like cities that are too touristy. I just appreciate the convenience).
We had another apartment from airbnb, so much warmer (the Rome one was chilly and there was no way to turn on the radiators......despite being beautifully warm in the morning, it was frightfully cold at night), and this one had WIFI!!! So--unfortunately--needed. Throw in an epic 7th floor sunset view over the city (along the canal) and YES. We visited Quai Gourmand (across canal) for dinner of la Galette---otherwise known as crepes for meals as opposed to dessert/breakfast. They have the enormous Nutellas EVERYWHERE!!! It makes me rather jealous since I don't have the luggage space to bring one back to the US. We strolled around and discovered the major chain grocery "marche franprix," as an FYI to you tourists. ALSO, although you can buy pastries at all specialty patisseries, I still recommend the packaged wholesale cheap pastries at the grocery. Save some money and still enjoy delicious French master baking. 1 pain au chocolat for 1-2 euro or a pack of 8 pain au chocolat for 2.50 euro. HMMMMMM. We also found an organic chain called Naturalia and purchased some fruit/nut/fig rolls. They are hard as rocks outside and, ironically, my dad nearly broke a tooth on a pebble inside one of them. They are VERY organic.
Thursday the 10th: Everyone here seems to drink coffee from tiny cups and saucers. We jumped on the super easy/every 2 minute metro to the Arc de Triomphe. Everyone was taking pics from the middle of the street. Tip: the underground entrance to the Arc is right at the metro stop. We missed that one and walked ALL THE WAY AROUND to the opposite side and then found the entrance. Arc de Triomphe close up is extremely impressive. I am awed (although the inside ceiling decoration is eerily like the kind inside the Roman buildings, a square pattern with a flower in every center). Going up to the top of the arc is not necessarily a must-see (although I have heard you should do this at night), but just standing beneath the arc is amazing. Then a quick metro to the Eiffel Tower!!!!! You wait at the crosswalk and see this old building, and once you pass the building BAM big huge metal thing rising into the cloudless sky. The Eiffel is awesome. Imagine watching the Eiffel being built back in the 1880s, when you don't even have the telephone! (not sure my history is correct, but go with it) and climbing the stairs in bonnets and long petticoats. Yes, it is much worth it to climb one of the tower legs rather than wait forever for the tightly packed elevators. Did you know? They repaint it every 7 years (taking 18 months with 25 painters---you would think they should hire 300 painters or something like that...).
Then we strolled along the Seine---but it's not like the San Antonio river walk. You walk above and slightly separated from the river (the docks are closed to the public). I think they should invest in a river walk. As if they didn't get enough tourism. OH apparently selling junk on the streets is illegal. There are signs encouraging you to support real businesses and museums rather than the underground organizations selling street junk (dangers of exposing yourself to unregulated chemicals, etc).
The weather was beautiful all day, so unlike Rome. Next was a quick bus ride to Notre Dame. I think if you want to see the gargoyles close up, best to climb the towers. Otherwise, a walk around the inside is good enough for me. After seeing the Basilica, I think this was a little less impressive for me, but it did bring back some awesome Disney memories.
By the way, prior to reach Notre Dame, we paused by the restaurant Le Quasimodo for lunch. It's not particularly French---has lots of French fries and steak and filets and other normal things (although the French fry IS French). I tried this "croque-monsieur,"a toasted ham sandwich with the cheese on the OUTSIDE. It's tasty but extremely filling and heavy. I was glad for the side salad.
After Notre Dame, we walked up hills to find the French Pantheon. It costs money to enter! We decided that, having seen the Roman Pantheon for free, it was not necessary. Ah well. Couldn't pay our respects to Victor Hugo.
At night, we returned to visit the Eiffel Tower, but the sky had become extremely cloudy, and you couldn't even see the top of the tower anymore. The light reflecting on the clouds made a halo around the remaining half of the tower. A very holy picture.
Friday the 11th: Today was not sunny. It was cold and grey. So it was perfect that it was museum day! First to the Louvre. We got there at like 10 am, and the line was not particularly long and it was fast-moving. European Union residents get free entrance! (which sucks for the people living in Switzerland). The museum is HUGE! I think it would be impossible to stay interested for such a long time that you can cover everything. So we made a beeline to the Mona Lisa. Why so small??? It is the size of a normal school curriculum painting. Also, the Mona Lisa was the only art piece who had glass plate shielding and three guards on either side. Hmmm. I also thoroughly enjoyed the Egyptian exhibits (not the Roman ruled period--it is my personal opinion that Roman occupation ruined Egyptian culture and quashed whatever might have been left of the ancient speaking language).
So after three hours of Louvre (one of the entrances is actually connected to a mall!), we went to Musee D'Orsay. Now that one had a HUGE line. I think we waited 20-30 minutes. The museum only has exhibits on the 5th, the 2nd, and the ground floor. Strange. We came there because my mum is a big fan of impressionism (Monet more than anyone else) and nearly the entire 5th floor is dedicated to that. It is very cool to see in real life what you only saw from textbooks or overhead slides in class. There are, of course, many other interesting things to see there, but you must go there to enjoy it yourself. I was also recommended to visit the Rodin Museum, but alas, no time. Therefore I pass on my recommendation to you.
Saturday we flew out and Sunday I practice piano the entire day.
Monday the 14th. I have been catching up with work while my parents roam Copenhagen :D. They leave tomorrow :( but then again it is only less than 5 weeks until I go home too.
Tuesday the 15th: I was invited to see the Liszt Festival concert at the music academy. Some of them were exceedingly skilled, but the one piece I had played before, Les Cloches de Geneve, it was performed so...disappointingly. The pianist had skill, he had interpretation, he had expression, he just didn't have strength. So for the climactic section, he played it very melodically, just without...climax. No inspiring trumpeting of greatness. Disappointing. But on the other hand, the following piece Vallee d'Obermann was performed so beautifully I realized why my previous piano teacher had been obsessed with this piece. So I'm glad it ended well.
Wednesday the 16th: Handball game!! DIS organized a very subsidized trip ($5) to a handball game (a sport whose fandom is only surpassed by soccer). I drowned under the overwhelming noise of thousands of people smacking their paper fans provided at each seat. The crowd is so involved! Every moment of the game some upbeat music was playing and everyone was fan smacking to the beat. Whenever the visiting team was haggling on the hometeam's side of the court, there was a three beat pattern accompanied by drums. Whenever the home team scored, some pop music played. Whenever the home team stole the ball and dribbled it back to the visiting team side, a different beat played. Whenever there was a time out, we had to give the beat to the middle school jump-roping cheerleaders. It was a lot of fan smacking, and definitely made it more fun and engaging. Maybe that's why I think watching baseball is boring. It was AG København (the national champs) vs. Nordsjaelland. It was a close game in the first half, but the second half the visiting goalie got worse and worse, so at the end, AG won 29-19....something like that. The halftime show was Sound of Sunday...if you knew them.
Friday the 18th: I had RSVP'd for DIS's Networker's Lounge. I came dressed to studenterhuset to properly network, but instead it was more like chilling and 'laxing with a beer (soda for me) with my friends and some Danes they knew. The Danish tradition is not to introduce people to other people (reveals inequalities, read prior posts), so being American and desiring to be social, I demanded introductions and the evening passed much more fun than I had expected.
Today, Saturday, is catching up on work day.
Enjoy your days even if you are not traveling! There is adventure in the quotidian (i.e. how to secretly feed the cat table scraps when no one else is looking).
Tuesday, October 25, 2011
Day 66: Politics, Holidays, and BIG EVENTS
It's been a long while :P
Tuesday the 11th: It was a friend's bday party, and we went to a Cafe Dalle Valle next to Frue Plads. Apparently they have 50% off the entire menu Mondays, Tuesdays, Saturdays, and Sundays. For this reason (and they have good food), I highly recommend this restaurant. It's also very popular, so either wait a bit in line or make a reservation.
Thursday the 13th: I forgot to mention a story that my Danish teacher told us...
Several years ago, a group of small girls escaped their school by climbing over the fence. They then proceeded to the nearest Netto (grocery chain), took a shopping basket, and started loading it with candy. An adult realized they weren't actually shoppers and returned them to the school. In a separate incident, a group of 3 small boys escaped their school by digging under the fence. They made a similar trip to Netto for candy and was returned to their school as well. The moral of the story is that 1) kindergarten teachers do not watch their students like their hawkeyed American counterparts and 2) nobody seems to steal kids in Denmark. :D
Friday the 14th was Kulternatten! It's a special night when many buildings in Copenhagen normally closed to the public open and host special events and stuff (example, visit the zoo at midnight, run around Rosenborg Castle in the dark with a flashlight, etc). I and some friends went to see Parliament (Folketinget) first [there were long lines everywhere!!! rather like Disney World]. Inside we saw the main room for debate--it was like for a miniature Congress, and different rooms had events by different political parties. My friend was really into politics, so every room she bugged a politician with questions. I think just wandering around would have been boring (because everything was in Danish), but listening to the politicians and my friend debate was much more interesting. There were also free balloons from each party. I wanted a red balloon, but then I realized it belonged to Enhedslisten---the super extreme socialists--and I didn't want to be walking around as if I supported them. So instead I settled for the Konservative and Radikale balloon--who are close to US moderates.
Our next stop was food. In Gammel Torv, we found free potato and walnut soup and pancake making over an open fire. We were standing in line to visit the prisonhouse (for detainees about to enter court in the next building) and passed by a sushi place selling zongzi: chinese rice cakes wrapped in palm leaves. It took an hour and fifteen minutes to get into the prisonhouse, so we were glad for snacks. The prison had open cells for us to peek into, and down in the basement they held the most infamous (and probably one of the extremely rare) serial killers, an insane woman who adopted/temporarily held orphaned children, except she strangled them, chopped them up, and buried the pieces in the graveyard. At one point she moved far away from the cemetery, so she resorted to burning the pieces in a woodstove. But it got to the point where the pieces came in faster than she could burn, so she stacked them like a logpile. After 26 victims, she was finally discovered and arrested (although in court she was only charged with 8, not sure what got lost in translation). On a happier note, at the end of the tour they were selling crafts made by the prisoners. I bought some beads to support them.
Saturday the 15th: This day was reserved for hanging out with some Chinese friends, shopping and making dumplings (entirely by hand :D )! It was at a kollegium (like apartment-ish dorms reserved for students) in Ørestad, right outside of the largest mall in Denmark: Field's. It's an international kollegium, so my friend's roommates were Danish and Scottish!
Random interjection: my host mum got a Macbook!!!!! --celebration dance-- Sorry, as a Mac person, I celebrate all converts.
Monday the 17th: I keep hearing the most interesting things in Danish class. It was about janteloven: the belief or idea that no one should try to be superior than anyone else, and anyone claiming to be better or etc (such as a dictator) would only get laughed at. In this context, we learned that the Danes saved 98% of the Jewish population in Denmark--silently and secretly resisting the Nazis, but no one is celebrated today (only 1 tiny museum dedicated to the resistance) because of the janteloven: no hero recognition here. And it's the complete opposite of France, who trumpet their resistance efforts like nothing else--though my prof says it's all a lie, hehe. Lots of food for thought.
Tuesday the 18th: A BIG RAINBOW THAT YOU COULD SEE THE ENTIRE ARCH!!!! So awesomes but rain and hail are not exactly welcome. Someone got a picture and says it was a double rainbow. Well, it was interesting because you could clearly see one half of the sky grey and miserable with this rainbow and the other half of the sky blue and sun and clouds.
Wednesday the 19th: Our Danish class went on a field trip to Christiansborg Slot--the old palace no longer in use as a residence (but still used for royal events and connected to Parliament). Underground are the ruins (because several castles were built one on top of the other as they got destroyed). The tour is very interesting and the tour guide is both excellent in English and entertaining, and the ruins are cool to look at. They also took us inside the current palace. It's baroque and grand like the best of them. In the throne room, the two chairs are of different size--the queen's being taller than the king's! This was because these two chairs were originally in two different rooms and only had to look similar, nothing else. Now that they are together, the differences are clear. Anyway, because the monarchy is only symbolic, when the Queen receives dignitaries in this room, they put a nice screen in front of the chairs and the Queen stands in the center of the room on a special snowflake pattern on the woodfloor. Symbols of diminishing power :(. Also, there is a interesting painting which shows one of the kings as a small boy, except he's wearing a white dress with a blue ribbon--so he looks very girly. When this king ruled, he had the doors to this painting closed, but back in the day, the fashion was that all small children wore white dresses, only that girls had a pink ribbon sash and boys had blue. :D
That Wednesday was also the HALFWAY POINT OF MY STAY IN DENMARK (cries in a small corner). Therefore I took this day to do many fun things. I went to an interview at Fisketorvet (2nd shopping mall in the city) for possibly playing the piano sculpture that was to be installed in the middle of November. It's very exciting!! Hopefully someone will take pictures, because I certainly cannot narcissistically take pictures of myself while playing. Also, it means I will have to teach myself Danish Christmas music (their request for the month of December). Looks like my 13 years of lessons will finally pay off XD.
Afterwards, I met up with my roommate Lauren to visit Tivoli for Halloween! They went all out on decorations. You have to see it for yourself. They even replaced the central fountain with a hugenormous sculpture scene. And all these little vendors and stalls had sprung up where there was definitely empty space before. ALSO, we caught a show at the pantomime theatre! (I was lied too once more). It's about Kassander, a rich old man, his servant the clown Pierrot, his two sexy maids, his ballerina daughter Columbine, and her lover/fiance Harlequin. This particular show was entitled Kassander Loves $$. It has some suggestive scenes--so I guess Danish children are freely exposed to sex and stuff. Kassander is introduced counting his money, peeping at his maids, and storing his money in a cabinet. In a park, Columbine and Harlequin are searching for each other, and upon finding each other, Harlequin proposes. Outside the house, a macho thief has broken out of a prison, armed with a gun. He is about to break into Kassander's home when Columbine and Harlequin suddenly return home. The thief takes the opportunity to follow them inside discretely. Inside the house, we see the maids polishing Kassander's bar of gold, except that he's holding the bar of gold at his groin and the maids are crouching and rubbing on it. As soon as his daughter comes in, he shoos them away and welcomes her home. She presents the engagement ring. Seeing Harlequin in his colorful overalls, he tries to convince Columbine out of it and even attempts to give Harlequin the bar of gold so that he will leave Columbine. Pierrot scolds Kassander for trying to interrupt true love and Columbine runs outside crying, Harlequin following. While they're gone, the thief pops up, holds Kassander and Pierrot at gunpoint, and forces the maids to fill his trashbag with the money. He then leaves with the maids and the money. Harlequin and Columbine spot the thief taking off and the entire group goes searching for them. The chase is long and the thief has a good headstart. The thief arrives home and forces the maids to chug glasses of alcohol while he (turning his back to the audience) pulls at his pants (hmm, I wonder what he could be doing...) The good guys catch up and Harlequin and the thief fight. Kassander and Pierrot dive in to help and end up distracting the thief until Harlequin jumps in from behind and snaps the thief's neck (also rather graphically portrayed, with an audible crack in the soundtrack). They all return home in celebration and Kassander shows his support for true love. The show was all very fun--especially since it was pantomime.
Thursday the 20th: BATMAN LIVE OMG OMG OMG OMG. Batman Live World Arena Tour is stage performance of a Batman story touring throughout Great Britain, but they also happen to come to Copenhagen! And so very conveniently at the Forum venue, which is across the street from the music academy. Tickets were $70!! But it was very well worth it. A good show, with good use of technology and excellent acting and overpriced souvenirs and the Batmobile onstage!!! Interestingly enough, they styled the Batman actor in the manner of Christian Bale's Bruce Wayne. ALSO, they clearly had not mastered the art of fighting in the air hanging by wires. It had to be done in slow-mo, where Catwoman punched Batman in the chest, 2 second delay, and then Batman was flying very slowly backwards. Otherwise the ground battle scenes were very well coordinated.
And once more, Danish class exposes me to such interesting concepts. THE OPEN PRISON! Essentially, you can have money, you need to work, you can go out to the city and visit the library etc etc do shopping because you have to cook for yourself, get yourself and education, etc, etc and then come back to the prison at night. They even get vacation days (6 wks like all Danes) and can leave every 2 weekends to visit family. And the prison itself is like nice little apartments or houses all set out in the middle of the countryside. It's rather like a free hotel. Only you cannot have a cell phone. 1) Why would you escape? and 2) if you do attempt escape, you are transferred to a closed prison (which is like regular prison). The focus is not on punishment but on re-integrating criminals back into normal society. I like this and at the same time I don't like it. What do you think?
And one more thing for this lovely Thursday: HOT SEXY GUYS ON THE TRAIN --again--- Also, it was again a busy train. A friend and I spotted some free seats and one of the guys had a British accent. So I asked if he was a student. Not really. He'd been studying in England for the past 2 years and was coming to back Denmark to finish his studies here with IB classes. Apparently his Danish is now "shit," and he wasn't really sure how to get back home to Odense. We chatted and then my friend remembered she had a train schedule to see how many stops to Odense. Then the other guy peered over. It turns out he was headed home to Munich, and at some point needed to make a transfer, so he was also curious about the train schedule. The British student was 17 and was coming back from visiting Danish grandparents with whom he had a very not-understanding conversation with. The German was returning after a three day IT conference in the city. Oh, how I kicked myself as I got off that train, for not at least introducing myself and shaking hands (if only to see if the Munich man had a wedding ring). A missed opportunity. And the British boy is too young for me, so no loss there.
Friday the 21st: Another big day! Practicing taking a history with a cardiology patient, Star Wars with my friend who had not seen Star Wars, the DIS midterm party (with free Agnes cupcakes, the most amazing cupcake you might ever taste!), and live band karaoke (a terrible experience but one that needed to be had).
Saturday the 22nd: Big research paper due next Friday, so I spent the morning at the Black Diamond library doing research, followed by shopping, cooking, eating. It was the group of friends who I had gone to Cafe Dalle Valle with. We decided to make a meal together and it in sum cost only 36 DKK per person (a group of 9 people)! That's about $7 for a 4 course meal. My Japanese seaweed tofu soup, followed by avocado spinach salad, then tortellini, then apple crumble. Wow..... And it was held at the ecohome, a set of apartments owned by DIS dedicated for those students committed to being green. It's a HUGE space.
Sunday the 23rd: I sacrificed my morning for writing the paper, but gave up in the afternoon to do pumpkin carving! It's not a tradition in Denmark, and I could not find any pumpkin carving sets, so using their impeccably sharp kitchen knives, I produced a very nice pattern of a black cat silhouette with the Danish flag in the background and the Danish daisy on the side.
Tuesday today!: Free Ben and Jerry's and fair trade bananas on the bridge today! So glad I passed by. Today our Human Health and Disease class went to visit the Panum Institute. The 1st half consisted of a fun pop quiz in the anatomy display cases. I don't have any background in anatomy, so the reference guides were helpful. The 2nd half was with a neurologist, who talked about eyesight and balance. We tested each other for visual acuity (reading letters on a white screen), visual field (if you stare at one point, can you see a flickering light on the side?), color blindness (the color dot diagrams), and depth perception (3D glasses!). Then balance testing consisted of being spun around in a free moving chair (held on a stationary base) and inverted magnifying glasses were placed on the victim so that we could see how the pupils darted around post-spinning. I volunteered for the 2nd spinning, which consisted of me sticking my head to the side and then being spun. Spun this way, when suddenly stopped and moved upright, it was like I was sitting in a chair with no ground underneath and being tipped into a cavern far below. My reflexes were 1) kicking out, 2) sliding backwards into the chair and 3) being absolutely terrified. That was a very interesting experience. Tonight I was rewarded for my troubles with a walnut brownie that was in the same room as the Queen (who was having a meeting at the Statens Museum for Kunst).
Epic travel break coming up (and my parents are visiting!) Therefore, I need to work on my paper, and surviving 2 weeks without proper internet.
See you until then!
Tuesday the 11th: It was a friend's bday party, and we went to a Cafe Dalle Valle next to Frue Plads. Apparently they have 50% off the entire menu Mondays, Tuesdays, Saturdays, and Sundays. For this reason (and they have good food), I highly recommend this restaurant. It's also very popular, so either wait a bit in line or make a reservation.
Thursday the 13th: I forgot to mention a story that my Danish teacher told us...
Several years ago, a group of small girls escaped their school by climbing over the fence. They then proceeded to the nearest Netto (grocery chain), took a shopping basket, and started loading it with candy. An adult realized they weren't actually shoppers and returned them to the school. In a separate incident, a group of 3 small boys escaped their school by digging under the fence. They made a similar trip to Netto for candy and was returned to their school as well. The moral of the story is that 1) kindergarten teachers do not watch their students like their hawkeyed American counterparts and 2) nobody seems to steal kids in Denmark. :D
Friday the 14th was Kulternatten! It's a special night when many buildings in Copenhagen normally closed to the public open and host special events and stuff (example, visit the zoo at midnight, run around Rosenborg Castle in the dark with a flashlight, etc). I and some friends went to see Parliament (Folketinget) first [there were long lines everywhere!!! rather like Disney World]. Inside we saw the main room for debate--it was like for a miniature Congress, and different rooms had events by different political parties. My friend was really into politics, so every room she bugged a politician with questions. I think just wandering around would have been boring (because everything was in Danish), but listening to the politicians and my friend debate was much more interesting. There were also free balloons from each party. I wanted a red balloon, but then I realized it belonged to Enhedslisten---the super extreme socialists--and I didn't want to be walking around as if I supported them. So instead I settled for the Konservative and Radikale balloon--who are close to US moderates.
Our next stop was food. In Gammel Torv, we found free potato and walnut soup and pancake making over an open fire. We were standing in line to visit the prisonhouse (for detainees about to enter court in the next building) and passed by a sushi place selling zongzi: chinese rice cakes wrapped in palm leaves. It took an hour and fifteen minutes to get into the prisonhouse, so we were glad for snacks. The prison had open cells for us to peek into, and down in the basement they held the most infamous (and probably one of the extremely rare) serial killers, an insane woman who adopted/temporarily held orphaned children, except she strangled them, chopped them up, and buried the pieces in the graveyard. At one point she moved far away from the cemetery, so she resorted to burning the pieces in a woodstove. But it got to the point where the pieces came in faster than she could burn, so she stacked them like a logpile. After 26 victims, she was finally discovered and arrested (although in court she was only charged with 8, not sure what got lost in translation). On a happier note, at the end of the tour they were selling crafts made by the prisoners. I bought some beads to support them.
Saturday the 15th: This day was reserved for hanging out with some Chinese friends, shopping and making dumplings (entirely by hand :D )! It was at a kollegium (like apartment-ish dorms reserved for students) in Ørestad, right outside of the largest mall in Denmark: Field's. It's an international kollegium, so my friend's roommates were Danish and Scottish!
Random interjection: my host mum got a Macbook!!!!! --celebration dance-- Sorry, as a Mac person, I celebrate all converts.
Monday the 17th: I keep hearing the most interesting things in Danish class. It was about janteloven: the belief or idea that no one should try to be superior than anyone else, and anyone claiming to be better or etc (such as a dictator) would only get laughed at. In this context, we learned that the Danes saved 98% of the Jewish population in Denmark--silently and secretly resisting the Nazis, but no one is celebrated today (only 1 tiny museum dedicated to the resistance) because of the janteloven: no hero recognition here. And it's the complete opposite of France, who trumpet their resistance efforts like nothing else--though my prof says it's all a lie, hehe. Lots of food for thought.
Tuesday the 18th: A BIG RAINBOW THAT YOU COULD SEE THE ENTIRE ARCH!!!! So awesomes but rain and hail are not exactly welcome. Someone got a picture and says it was a double rainbow. Well, it was interesting because you could clearly see one half of the sky grey and miserable with this rainbow and the other half of the sky blue and sun and clouds.
Wednesday the 19th: Our Danish class went on a field trip to Christiansborg Slot--the old palace no longer in use as a residence (but still used for royal events and connected to Parliament). Underground are the ruins (because several castles were built one on top of the other as they got destroyed). The tour is very interesting and the tour guide is both excellent in English and entertaining, and the ruins are cool to look at. They also took us inside the current palace. It's baroque and grand like the best of them. In the throne room, the two chairs are of different size--the queen's being taller than the king's! This was because these two chairs were originally in two different rooms and only had to look similar, nothing else. Now that they are together, the differences are clear. Anyway, because the monarchy is only symbolic, when the Queen receives dignitaries in this room, they put a nice screen in front of the chairs and the Queen stands in the center of the room on a special snowflake pattern on the woodfloor. Symbols of diminishing power :(. Also, there is a interesting painting which shows one of the kings as a small boy, except he's wearing a white dress with a blue ribbon--so he looks very girly. When this king ruled, he had the doors to this painting closed, but back in the day, the fashion was that all small children wore white dresses, only that girls had a pink ribbon sash and boys had blue. :D
That Wednesday was also the HALFWAY POINT OF MY STAY IN DENMARK (cries in a small corner). Therefore I took this day to do many fun things. I went to an interview at Fisketorvet (2nd shopping mall in the city) for possibly playing the piano sculpture that was to be installed in the middle of November. It's very exciting!! Hopefully someone will take pictures, because I certainly cannot narcissistically take pictures of myself while playing. Also, it means I will have to teach myself Danish Christmas music (their request for the month of December). Looks like my 13 years of lessons will finally pay off XD.
Afterwards, I met up with my roommate Lauren to visit Tivoli for Halloween! They went all out on decorations. You have to see it for yourself. They even replaced the central fountain with a hugenormous sculpture scene. And all these little vendors and stalls had sprung up where there was definitely empty space before. ALSO, we caught a show at the pantomime theatre! (I was lied too once more). It's about Kassander, a rich old man, his servant the clown Pierrot, his two sexy maids, his ballerina daughter Columbine, and her lover/fiance Harlequin. This particular show was entitled Kassander Loves $$. It has some suggestive scenes--so I guess Danish children are freely exposed to sex and stuff. Kassander is introduced counting his money, peeping at his maids, and storing his money in a cabinet. In a park, Columbine and Harlequin are searching for each other, and upon finding each other, Harlequin proposes. Outside the house, a macho thief has broken out of a prison, armed with a gun. He is about to break into Kassander's home when Columbine and Harlequin suddenly return home. The thief takes the opportunity to follow them inside discretely. Inside the house, we see the maids polishing Kassander's bar of gold, except that he's holding the bar of gold at his groin and the maids are crouching and rubbing on it. As soon as his daughter comes in, he shoos them away and welcomes her home. She presents the engagement ring. Seeing Harlequin in his colorful overalls, he tries to convince Columbine out of it and even attempts to give Harlequin the bar of gold so that he will leave Columbine. Pierrot scolds Kassander for trying to interrupt true love and Columbine runs outside crying, Harlequin following. While they're gone, the thief pops up, holds Kassander and Pierrot at gunpoint, and forces the maids to fill his trashbag with the money. He then leaves with the maids and the money. Harlequin and Columbine spot the thief taking off and the entire group goes searching for them. The chase is long and the thief has a good headstart. The thief arrives home and forces the maids to chug glasses of alcohol while he (turning his back to the audience) pulls at his pants (hmm, I wonder what he could be doing...) The good guys catch up and Harlequin and the thief fight. Kassander and Pierrot dive in to help and end up distracting the thief until Harlequin jumps in from behind and snaps the thief's neck (also rather graphically portrayed, with an audible crack in the soundtrack). They all return home in celebration and Kassander shows his support for true love. The show was all very fun--especially since it was pantomime.
Thursday the 20th: BATMAN LIVE OMG OMG OMG OMG. Batman Live World Arena Tour is stage performance of a Batman story touring throughout Great Britain, but they also happen to come to Copenhagen! And so very conveniently at the Forum venue, which is across the street from the music academy. Tickets were $70!! But it was very well worth it. A good show, with good use of technology and excellent acting and overpriced souvenirs and the Batmobile onstage!!! Interestingly enough, they styled the Batman actor in the manner of Christian Bale's Bruce Wayne. ALSO, they clearly had not mastered the art of fighting in the air hanging by wires. It had to be done in slow-mo, where Catwoman punched Batman in the chest, 2 second delay, and then Batman was flying very slowly backwards. Otherwise the ground battle scenes were very well coordinated.
And once more, Danish class exposes me to such interesting concepts. THE OPEN PRISON! Essentially, you can have money, you need to work, you can go out to the city and visit the library etc etc do shopping because you have to cook for yourself, get yourself and education, etc, etc and then come back to the prison at night. They even get vacation days (6 wks like all Danes) and can leave every 2 weekends to visit family. And the prison itself is like nice little apartments or houses all set out in the middle of the countryside. It's rather like a free hotel. Only you cannot have a cell phone. 1) Why would you escape? and 2) if you do attempt escape, you are transferred to a closed prison (which is like regular prison). The focus is not on punishment but on re-integrating criminals back into normal society. I like this and at the same time I don't like it. What do you think?
And one more thing for this lovely Thursday: HOT SEXY GUYS ON THE TRAIN --again--- Also, it was again a busy train. A friend and I spotted some free seats and one of the guys had a British accent. So I asked if he was a student. Not really. He'd been studying in England for the past 2 years and was coming to back Denmark to finish his studies here with IB classes. Apparently his Danish is now "shit," and he wasn't really sure how to get back home to Odense. We chatted and then my friend remembered she had a train schedule to see how many stops to Odense. Then the other guy peered over. It turns out he was headed home to Munich, and at some point needed to make a transfer, so he was also curious about the train schedule. The British student was 17 and was coming back from visiting Danish grandparents with whom he had a very not-understanding conversation with. The German was returning after a three day IT conference in the city. Oh, how I kicked myself as I got off that train, for not at least introducing myself and shaking hands (if only to see if the Munich man had a wedding ring). A missed opportunity. And the British boy is too young for me, so no loss there.
Friday the 21st: Another big day! Practicing taking a history with a cardiology patient, Star Wars with my friend who had not seen Star Wars, the DIS midterm party (with free Agnes cupcakes, the most amazing cupcake you might ever taste!), and live band karaoke (a terrible experience but one that needed to be had).
Saturday the 22nd: Big research paper due next Friday, so I spent the morning at the Black Diamond library doing research, followed by shopping, cooking, eating. It was the group of friends who I had gone to Cafe Dalle Valle with. We decided to make a meal together and it in sum cost only 36 DKK per person (a group of 9 people)! That's about $7 for a 4 course meal. My Japanese seaweed tofu soup, followed by avocado spinach salad, then tortellini, then apple crumble. Wow..... And it was held at the ecohome, a set of apartments owned by DIS dedicated for those students committed to being green. It's a HUGE space.
Sunday the 23rd: I sacrificed my morning for writing the paper, but gave up in the afternoon to do pumpkin carving! It's not a tradition in Denmark, and I could not find any pumpkin carving sets, so using their impeccably sharp kitchen knives, I produced a very nice pattern of a black cat silhouette with the Danish flag in the background and the Danish daisy on the side.
Tuesday today!: Free Ben and Jerry's and fair trade bananas on the bridge today! So glad I passed by. Today our Human Health and Disease class went to visit the Panum Institute. The 1st half consisted of a fun pop quiz in the anatomy display cases. I don't have any background in anatomy, so the reference guides were helpful. The 2nd half was with a neurologist, who talked about eyesight and balance. We tested each other for visual acuity (reading letters on a white screen), visual field (if you stare at one point, can you see a flickering light on the side?), color blindness (the color dot diagrams), and depth perception (3D glasses!). Then balance testing consisted of being spun around in a free moving chair (held on a stationary base) and inverted magnifying glasses were placed on the victim so that we could see how the pupils darted around post-spinning. I volunteered for the 2nd spinning, which consisted of me sticking my head to the side and then being spun. Spun this way, when suddenly stopped and moved upright, it was like I was sitting in a chair with no ground underneath and being tipped into a cavern far below. My reflexes were 1) kicking out, 2) sliding backwards into the chair and 3) being absolutely terrified. That was a very interesting experience. Tonight I was rewarded for my troubles with a walnut brownie that was in the same room as the Queen (who was having a meeting at the Statens Museum for Kunst).
Epic travel break coming up (and my parents are visiting!) Therefore, I need to work on my paper, and surviving 2 weeks without proper internet.
See you until then!
Thursday, October 13, 2011
Day 54: Food, Film, Travel, and Woes
It has been a LOOOONG while because of last week's long study tour :D.
First, where I left off, was Wednesday, September 28:
Twas my first visit to Sankt Peder's Bageri (St Peter's Bakery), a local super cheap-super tasty-student discount pastry shop. I'd been resisting buying pastries up until now because 1) they are most certainly not healthy for you and 2) saving money for a special occasion. I caved. (Also, "super cheap" is a relative term--it is only cheap in comparison to other bakeries in Denmark. The average croissant is 15 DKK, about $3.00). I have heard a mountain of reports that this bakery had the best pastries (for cheap) and I firmly confirm this opinion.
The same evening, eldest host sister Louise was hosting a party in honor of her graduation for her colleagues, but it seemed fewer were coming than expected, so we got to go too! It was held at a fancy venue, a large conference-like room with a kitchen down the hall in a nondescript building. It's interesting that you can find these very nice party venues in such normal-looking buildings,. I believe the food was homecooked? Not sure, but there was caramel popcorn, curry shrimp soup, spinach tomato pesto pasta salad, broccoli and ham focaccia, pineapple ham pizza, carrot cake, apple muffin, ice cream, berry granola cobbler, AND her boyfriend Tim was playing bartender. Like normal social gatherings, people tend to associate with people they know. Unlike social gatherings in America, no one will even consider attempting to get to know a stranger. Yes, everyone goes around and introduces themselves to everyone, but it's like the American "How are you?" It's a meaningless greeting with no expected follow-up. But it was fun chilling with the other sisters, who also didn't know Louise's air traffic control colleagues.
On Friday, my bike broke down! (I'm so very sad when this happens--it feels like I am cursed). It is an old bike, and I was shifting my weight to the back end of the seat when the screw holding it in place snapped. But in the wake of such bad news, I decided to spend the evening with a new good friend Shuyao. She's an international student at an American college, so that's why she was able to attend this program. Anyway, she had never seen The Princess Bride, so of course it was a must, followed by 23 kronor pizza at a nearby cafe (they fold their pizzas!!!! I wonder why?). A very hyggeligt evening :D
Saturday was LEGOLAND!!!! Tis an amusement Park, with lots of LEGO sculpture exhibits but also lots of rides. Legos were invented in Denmark in 1964, so it makes sense to go to the original Legoland. There is an adorable minitown built entirely of Legos with Lego people and there are vehicles and boats that move! Most all of it is a replica of real places. In some of the restaurants, there is a maitre'd that slides in and out holding a tray of goodies. It all reminds me of Mr. Rogers and the trolley town at the end credits, except it wasn't Legos. Traveling around Legoland was like traveling around the world. They built parts of Copenhagen, Amsterdam, Sweden, Norway, Germany, Los Angeles with the Chinese Theater filming Bionicles, the JFK NASA space center, the Statue of Liberty, the Capitol, the Acropolis in Greece, Abu Simbel of Egypt, an Arabian palace, Mount Rushmore, etc, etc. As an amusement park, it's not the BIGGEST thrill-which makes it perfect for me. The biggest ride was comparable to an enlarged version of Six Flag's Cat and Mouse. It's also divided into "lands" like Disney World, where different areas are themed. They also have various statues/decorations made of Legos: in Pirateland, there is a naked pirate who's covering his front with a hat, but his backside is in full view :P. Haha, it was a very fun afternoon overall.
Sunday was bus bus bus. We boarded at 10 in the morning and would reach Berlin 5 in the afternoon. The middle was partly spent on a ferry to the German side of the Baltic Sea. During the 2nd half of the bus trip, we watched a movie "Life is Beautiful" It's an Italian movie with characters Guido, Dora, and Joshua, a family of Italian Jews suddenly faced with Nazi occupation. ALL MY CREYS. It was an extraordinarily super funny and sad movie with a happy ending. The bus took us straight to the Jewish Museum, designed by the same dude who did the Ground Zero memorial. Every aspect of the structure is very thought provoking: Garden of Exile reminds me of Inception, rows of grey buildings, I could just spend a good 15 minutes there walking and walking round and round, taking turns at a whim, and the Jewish Tower, which is a big, lofty empty dark space lit only by natural light through a tiny slit at the top, and you can hear faint whooshing from outside. Of course, it was followed by dinner at the museum restaurant: caramelized goat cheese salad, super super super melt at the poke of your fork beef brisket with potato and carrot stew, and apple cobbler for dessert. DIS feeds us well, and I'm glad to see that our expensive tuition returns well.
We stayed at the Transit Loft Hotel, where they fit 6 hospital-like beds into one large open room (~30 euro/night), acceptable bathroom (the shower requires constant pushing of the button, rather like some sinks and the hostels in Western Denmark, and this seems to be common in Europe). It is continental breakfast and the free Wi-Fi is marginally disappointing (it can only take 2 computers at once in the same room).
Monday morning: 1st the DDR museum. It's supposed to be an interactive exhibit showcasing life during the socialist era, but it was interactive in a rather lame way and very limited: opening cabinet doors and pulling out shelves to see/read the exhibits, sitting in a livingroom or car of that era. The museum size was also very small.
So we all finished looking and reading everything half an hour early and left. By "we" I mean a small group of friends. We walked further and found a flea market on a street branching from Unter Den Linden. It was nice window-shopping, and then we progressed to the Ritter Sport outlet store and bought cheap, brand-name, German chocolate (by cheap, I mean .89 euro for a 16 square bar that normally costs 12 DKK in Denmark). The cafe also allowed inventing of your own chocolate, but the process took 30 minutes so we just got the pre-made stuff :D.
A quick walk back brought us to the main street lined with souvenir shops. I paused by one of the stalls selling Russian Communist fur hats. I didn't realize they were bargainable, so I was going to walk away because I was only carrying 45 euro and was not going to spend 35 euro on a hat. The vendor, however, was very keen to have my business (1st customer luck) and somehow my reluctance turned into bartering strategy and I got the fur hat plus a marine green cap (the origami boat shaped kind) for 28 euro. Having thus spent a good amount of euro, I needed more just in case. Unfortunately, no banks were open! It was Reunification Day, celebrating the historical end of the separation between East and West Berlin (I also could not use an ATM b/c I foolishly believed I would not need extra cash and so didn't notify my bank BIG MISTAKE).
Anyway, the afternoon was a Fat Tire bike tour around Berlin. By the way, Fat Tire Bike Tours exists in Barcelona and Paris as well, and the Berlin one was very nice, so I highly recommend this company :D. Some of the sites we saw: Hitler's bunker (apparently Hitler requested to be burned in a pit so that no one could take his body, the Soviets found his skeleton and identified him by the decayed right jaw--he ate about16 bars of choco/day, and they conveniently didn't mention it to anyone else until they had gone wild goose chases around the world), Chkpt Charlie, parts of the Berlin Wall, Brandenborg Tor, and the Field of Stela. All of which are important sights to see if you ever visit Berlin :D
Afterwards was dinner at a tucked away restaurant Zur Letzten Instanz with supposedly traditional German food, which was a bitter salad, ground beef steak (rather like a large frikadelle) with crispy potato swirly things and carrots and greenbeans, and a crustless berry tart afterwards. Very delicious (excepting the salad). Then a concert at Berliner Dom. Berliner Dom is a very beautiful cathedral, but not the best place for a classical concert. The echoey acoustics ruined the pauses of the music and made for very noisy harmony. Also, the pieces chosen were not particularly ear-catching and the end result was that the poor L'orchestra de Sedici didn't sound impressive at all. Most of us slept. At the end, a group of us escaped to the TV Tower and enjoyed a late night snack on its rotating restaurant with a beautiful view of Berlin at night.
Tuesday morning: I began my search for a currency exchange. A sightseeing office told me to go to the train station (which Tripadvisor.com also advised), so I went to the AlexanderPlatz train station, where the ticket office advised the bank, so I went to Deutsche Bank, where the bank teller told me to go to the train station and seek a special exchange office (yellow sign). So after 15 min searching the train station, persistence was once again rewarded. I didn't realize Berlin had 3 types of trains: bus, street level tram, and underground AND aboveground S-bahn. Because the S-Bahn at Alexanderplatz was aboveground, part of the train station was aboveground in a huge building with lots of shops like an airport duty-free mall. That's where I found the Wechsel (money exchange). Still, I'm definitely going to call my bank next time, because the rate is cheaper and it's more efficient just to use an ATM.
Now armed with money, I could afford to enter the Pergamon Museum. LONG LINE. Dunno why it was so popular (although it did come highly recommended). Initially, I thought it was anticlimactic for a 5 euro student ticket. The audio tour was very interesting/informative, but I was short on time, so I skipped around. I got to see the Ishtar Gate (my goal) and also many other things I remember reading about and seeing in textbooks, so that was very exciting to relive history class, but I should have liked to spend a whole afternoon there. Then a quick walk/S train to Potsdamer Platz and the Sony Center. Beautiful modern architecture :DDDDD. The entire group had a scheduled lunch at Lindenbräu. It began with a tasty potato cream soup, and was unfortunately followed by a HUGE entree with pork hock and potatoes and sauerkraut and strange green paste. It was the most unpopular of all DIS-chosen restaurant food. People were disturbed by seeing actual animal anatomy, by the size, and by the hairy pork skin. I guess it's an Asian thing to be able to stand looking at recognizable food. It's also something that most Americans have never eaten or seen as food. American food is usually more processed.
Our lunch was immediately followed by an academic visit to the German Heart Institute: an overall nice specialist hospital place, very open and airy and well-lit compared to JHMI. The presenter had good information but went so quickly that a half hour presentation ended in 11 minutes, so he definitely received a lot of questions at the end. After a snack break, we were taken to see patients with an artificial heart system and then to the ICU (1 doctor per 8 beds, 1 nurse per 2 beds, not bad).
Afterwards we were left to our own devices----so we traveled to Kartoffelkeller for dinner. According to the Berlin Welcome card, this restaurant had a tantalizing beer garden (not exactly my kind of incentive) but I tagged along anyway. ALL POTATOES (as the name suggested). Personally, it was too much starch for my taste, the waitresses didn't really know English, the restaurant was 60% empty while the other waterfront restaurants were full (okay, it was ~80 m away from the water :P), they forgot what I ordered so they only brought it out after everyone else was nearly done. I had potato pancakes with meat/tomato/garlic, but it was really their imitation Italian pizza that was tasty (sampled someone else's dish). 11.90 euro for the dish, plus 4.80 euro for water, so not too bad, but without the 25% off from the Welcome Card, I don't think it would have been worth it.
Wednesday morning: very painful early wake up to get out of the hotel and off to the Center of Anatomy, a department within Charite Hospital. We had a mini lecture with the director, then off to the dissection lab to view actual dissected human corpses and organs. FUN! and interesting. He said that touching engages understanding and memory of the student, probably more instructive than staring at pics in a textbook. Their basic anatomy class is 1 year dedicated to the slow dissection of 1 human body per 8 students in a group. The instructor's job is less of how to dissect and more of check out what you've dissected.
A short break and it was off to the Medical History Museum. Of course, the focus was on medical history in Berlin itself, but also general progress in medicine like when anesthetics became available, how that really upgraded the surgery profession (used to be done by barbers), the unfortunate "medical" practices back when the knowledge pool was much smaller (mercury as a cure for insanity, inducing pus formation, etc, etc), and the progress of nursing as a profession. For those who might be vaguely interested in medicine, this is something extremely informative and not at all boring to see.
Then we were free to find our own lunch. My college roommate and her friend strongly advised visiting Mustafa's Gemuse Kebap. It was far out (jump on the S-Bahn to Mehringdamn), but super tasty. Too bad I only had 1 hour, and I was 3 minutes late back to the bus. Earned a good scolding, but hey, I was going fast as I could. There's a limit to how fast trains go. And Mustafa's was so popular I had to wait in line for 8 minutes. 3.90 euro for a foot long durum. Far surpasses the shawarmas of Copenhagen. It's funny that I assumed the entire process was only going to take 30 minutes. Ah well.
Then a LONG bus ride to Poznan, Poland, punctuated by watching a German movie Goodbye Lenin and The King's Speech. The German movie was well done, except I did want to sleep, but I couldn't (can't sleep with movie playing b/c their voices are actually interesting to listen to. Regular conversation I can sleep through). Unfortunate.
We ended up at the NH Hotel. 4 star. YESSSSS. The only downside is that free WiFi is only in the lobby, and that you have to ask the front desk for a passcode that expires in 30 minutes post usage, so then you have to go ask for another. WHY??? I don't know. A quick decamping and we were off to dinner at Pod Pretekstem. They already had appetizer waiting (fried ham calzone-like sandwich with green onions), followed by rather dry chicken cordon bleu with green beans, carrots, broccoli, cauliflower, and slightly toasted potato wedges. The dessert was also slightly dry apple tart (with a crust!) topped with a scoop of vanilla ice cream. If not for the dryness, I would recommend this place, because the venue is especially quaint and cozy, with blush red textured walls, high arch ceilings with peacock paintings, columns, etc. Very comfycozy to sit in. Then I returned to the hotel for a long shower in a luxury bathroom that I will not have for a while.
Thursday morning: late wakeup--breakfast buffet YES
My group was off to the Gynecology Department of the Poznan University Hospital--we rode the tram (simple train system like Berlin).
Let me take this opportunity to applaud the train system of Berlin and Poznan. THERE'S ONLY 2 or 3 ZONES! Denmark has several tens of zones, some of which don't make sense (I think I ranted about this in another entry). So there.
We went round and round in a tour of the 120 yr old hospital building (new section for outpatients). They don't turn anyone away (how can you turn away a woman in labor??) so they sue gov't at end of year for overflow costs and the beginning of the next year the gov't pays them back. We also got to practice a pelvic examination, spoke to a woman waiting to give birth, and a woman with 10 hr old baby.
Then lunch at Pod Koziolkami, a cellar restaurant in Old Market Square with traditional polish food: begin with beet soup (a little too vinegary for me) and sour cream carrot salad, then breaded chicken with potatoes and carrots, BUT we had to leave early w/o dessert b/c it was taking some time to serve and we had to catch our walking tour. Many of my fellow students were disgruntled.
Poznan's sightseeing is mostly old buildings, such as the town hall and basilica minor and remnants of wall fortifications, otherwise Poznan does not have much to show for itself. Afterwards we went to a cafe called Cacao Republic, our tour leaders treating us to one drink and one snack each as compensation for lost dessert. I ordered Classic hot choco and this polish dessert called a Halvah--a biscuit/cake thing that was too grainy for me, but the hot choco was extremely concentrated and therefore very tasty.
The evening was again left to ourselves, so we visited the mall Galeria Malta, since we heard shopping is cheap in Poland. Shopping in a mall is NOT cheap. Prices are just like in the US. The only cheap thing in Poland is FOOOOOOOD (which I will demonstrate later)
After the mall, a friend and I went to another restaurant in the Old Market Square, entitled Fenix. Very well to do place. I had a breadbowl with bacon/egg/cream soup inside (reminiscent of Panera bread and equally as tasty) and a choco cake with ice cream and raspberry sauce, all for the grand total of $10 (including tax and junk). See how cheap food is???
Friday: the day began with the Pediatrics, GI department, which was noticeably less interesting b/c the tour was mostly standing in one place and talking about what goes on, examples of patients, etc, etc. The other problem was that we were all lacking sleep (who doesn't lack sleep when waking at 5:45 am?)
Therefore, I treated myself to browsing the souvenir selection at the Old Market Square, where we witnessed the headbutting of the goats at noon (statues on the town hall clock) and the legendary bugler. The story of the bugler is that one day long long ago, a bugler found a injured raven. Being the good hero that he is, the bugler nurses the raven back to health. What do you know? The raven is actually a dwarf king who thanks the bugler for his help and promises to return that help in the future. He tells the bugler to blow his horn in all four directions to summon this promised help. Then the dwarf king flies away. Some years later, Poznan is about to be invaded by a huge army. The bugler blows his horn in all 4 directions. Suddenly, the air grows black with a million ravens, who descend upon the army and frighten/peck them to submission. Henceforth, all the Poznan noon buglers blow in all 4 directions for the sake of tradition.
For lunch we found very well-to-do restaurant called Chatka Babuni, dedicated to "Grannie's pierogies," which are essentially dumplings. Who came first? Dumplings or pierogies? Considering Chinese civilization originated long before Western Europe, I put my money on dumplings. 9 delectable pierogies (and they are filling!) plus sauce plus salad mix plus a small tip came out to $7. FOOD IS CHEAP!
Haha, afterwards, the tour leaders held a wrap up in which they brought famous Polish pastries called marcińskie rogale, which is essentially a croissant filled with a fruit/nut/raisin paste. Unless you like that sort of thing, the paste was not the best part… but it certainly was an experience. That was followed by a trip to Lech Brewery: learning the process of brewing beer is not exactly necessary for life, but it was very hypnotizing to watch the bottles go round and round, from cleaning to filling to capping to labeling to boxing. And then they provided us beer samples. I don't like beer, unfortunately. So instead I looked forward to the last DIS provided supper at--ironically--Brovaria (Polish for brewery). It began with mushroom cream soup, then grilled marinated duck leg with pickled cabbage and 2 mantou (Chinese styled steamed bread). I om-nommed the bread (missed chinese food), followed by cheesecake filling inside a real cake, with drizzled raspberry sauce and decorated with kiwi and clementine slices. A very mouthwatering end to a splendid trip.
A looooooooooong bus ride home. I kept switching sleeping positions, and at one point had my head near the aisle. The bus turned and the leftover pastries from the overhead compartment fell and bopped me on the head. I think no one was awake to hear my yelp. The poor pastries lay scattered on the ground. Ah well, they weren't too tasty anyway.
We returned Saturday morning and the rest of Saturday was spent in exhausted catching up of homework.
Sunday: it happened to be other host sister Cecilie's bday partay with homebaked rolls and raspberry jam topped with cheese (OOMMMMMNOMMMM) and carrot cupcake and cheescake-ish fondant birthday cake. So much starch and sugar haha. And of course the Danish flag was everywhere. Fun times.
It's finally cold---got stuffed nose again >.< and had to pull out my big woolen coat for the 1st time. Too early, if you ask me. In fact, the cold weather has already put me in the Christmas mood :D.
Now I am tired. Blogging takes a lot of time. And I have hw...and 3 papers to write.
Night night >.<
First, where I left off, was Wednesday, September 28:
Twas my first visit to Sankt Peder's Bageri (St Peter's Bakery), a local super cheap-super tasty-student discount pastry shop. I'd been resisting buying pastries up until now because 1) they are most certainly not healthy for you and 2) saving money for a special occasion. I caved. (Also, "super cheap" is a relative term--it is only cheap in comparison to other bakeries in Denmark. The average croissant is 15 DKK, about $3.00). I have heard a mountain of reports that this bakery had the best pastries (for cheap) and I firmly confirm this opinion.
The same evening, eldest host sister Louise was hosting a party in honor of her graduation for her colleagues, but it seemed fewer were coming than expected, so we got to go too! It was held at a fancy venue, a large conference-like room with a kitchen down the hall in a nondescript building. It's interesting that you can find these very nice party venues in such normal-looking buildings,. I believe the food was homecooked? Not sure, but there was caramel popcorn, curry shrimp soup, spinach tomato pesto pasta salad, broccoli and ham focaccia, pineapple ham pizza, carrot cake, apple muffin, ice cream, berry granola cobbler, AND her boyfriend Tim was playing bartender. Like normal social gatherings, people tend to associate with people they know. Unlike social gatherings in America, no one will even consider attempting to get to know a stranger. Yes, everyone goes around and introduces themselves to everyone, but it's like the American "How are you?" It's a meaningless greeting with no expected follow-up. But it was fun chilling with the other sisters, who also didn't know Louise's air traffic control colleagues.
On Friday, my bike broke down! (I'm so very sad when this happens--it feels like I am cursed). It is an old bike, and I was shifting my weight to the back end of the seat when the screw holding it in place snapped. But in the wake of such bad news, I decided to spend the evening with a new good friend Shuyao. She's an international student at an American college, so that's why she was able to attend this program. Anyway, she had never seen The Princess Bride, so of course it was a must, followed by 23 kronor pizza at a nearby cafe (they fold their pizzas!!!! I wonder why?). A very hyggeligt evening :D
Saturday was LEGOLAND!!!! Tis an amusement Park, with lots of LEGO sculpture exhibits but also lots of rides. Legos were invented in Denmark in 1964, so it makes sense to go to the original Legoland. There is an adorable minitown built entirely of Legos with Lego people and there are vehicles and boats that move! Most all of it is a replica of real places. In some of the restaurants, there is a maitre'd that slides in and out holding a tray of goodies. It all reminds me of Mr. Rogers and the trolley town at the end credits, except it wasn't Legos. Traveling around Legoland was like traveling around the world. They built parts of Copenhagen, Amsterdam, Sweden, Norway, Germany, Los Angeles with the Chinese Theater filming Bionicles, the JFK NASA space center, the Statue of Liberty, the Capitol, the Acropolis in Greece, Abu Simbel of Egypt, an Arabian palace, Mount Rushmore, etc, etc. As an amusement park, it's not the BIGGEST thrill-which makes it perfect for me. The biggest ride was comparable to an enlarged version of Six Flag's Cat and Mouse. It's also divided into "lands" like Disney World, where different areas are themed. They also have various statues/decorations made of Legos: in Pirateland, there is a naked pirate who's covering his front with a hat, but his backside is in full view :P. Haha, it was a very fun afternoon overall.
Sunday was bus bus bus. We boarded at 10 in the morning and would reach Berlin 5 in the afternoon. The middle was partly spent on a ferry to the German side of the Baltic Sea. During the 2nd half of the bus trip, we watched a movie "Life is Beautiful" It's an Italian movie with characters Guido, Dora, and Joshua, a family of Italian Jews suddenly faced with Nazi occupation. ALL MY CREYS. It was an extraordinarily super funny and sad movie with a happy ending. The bus took us straight to the Jewish Museum, designed by the same dude who did the Ground Zero memorial. Every aspect of the structure is very thought provoking: Garden of Exile reminds me of Inception, rows of grey buildings, I could just spend a good 15 minutes there walking and walking round and round, taking turns at a whim, and the Jewish Tower, which is a big, lofty empty dark space lit only by natural light through a tiny slit at the top, and you can hear faint whooshing from outside. Of course, it was followed by dinner at the museum restaurant: caramelized goat cheese salad, super super super melt at the poke of your fork beef brisket with potato and carrot stew, and apple cobbler for dessert. DIS feeds us well, and I'm glad to see that our expensive tuition returns well.
We stayed at the Transit Loft Hotel, where they fit 6 hospital-like beds into one large open room (~30 euro/night), acceptable bathroom (the shower requires constant pushing of the button, rather like some sinks and the hostels in Western Denmark, and this seems to be common in Europe). It is continental breakfast and the free Wi-Fi is marginally disappointing (it can only take 2 computers at once in the same room).
Monday morning: 1st the DDR museum. It's supposed to be an interactive exhibit showcasing life during the socialist era, but it was interactive in a rather lame way and very limited: opening cabinet doors and pulling out shelves to see/read the exhibits, sitting in a livingroom or car of that era. The museum size was also very small.
So we all finished looking and reading everything half an hour early and left. By "we" I mean a small group of friends. We walked further and found a flea market on a street branching from Unter Den Linden. It was nice window-shopping, and then we progressed to the Ritter Sport outlet store and bought cheap, brand-name, German chocolate (by cheap, I mean .89 euro for a 16 square bar that normally costs 12 DKK in Denmark). The cafe also allowed inventing of your own chocolate, but the process took 30 minutes so we just got the pre-made stuff :D.
A quick walk back brought us to the main street lined with souvenir shops. I paused by one of the stalls selling Russian Communist fur hats. I didn't realize they were bargainable, so I was going to walk away because I was only carrying 45 euro and was not going to spend 35 euro on a hat. The vendor, however, was very keen to have my business (1st customer luck) and somehow my reluctance turned into bartering strategy and I got the fur hat plus a marine green cap (the origami boat shaped kind) for 28 euro. Having thus spent a good amount of euro, I needed more just in case. Unfortunately, no banks were open! It was Reunification Day, celebrating the historical end of the separation between East and West Berlin (I also could not use an ATM b/c I foolishly believed I would not need extra cash and so didn't notify my bank BIG MISTAKE).
Anyway, the afternoon was a Fat Tire bike tour around Berlin. By the way, Fat Tire Bike Tours exists in Barcelona and Paris as well, and the Berlin one was very nice, so I highly recommend this company :D. Some of the sites we saw: Hitler's bunker (apparently Hitler requested to be burned in a pit so that no one could take his body, the Soviets found his skeleton and identified him by the decayed right jaw--he ate about16 bars of choco/day, and they conveniently didn't mention it to anyone else until they had gone wild goose chases around the world), Chkpt Charlie, parts of the Berlin Wall, Brandenborg Tor, and the Field of Stela. All of which are important sights to see if you ever visit Berlin :D
Afterwards was dinner at a tucked away restaurant Zur Letzten Instanz with supposedly traditional German food, which was a bitter salad, ground beef steak (rather like a large frikadelle) with crispy potato swirly things and carrots and greenbeans, and a crustless berry tart afterwards. Very delicious (excepting the salad). Then a concert at Berliner Dom. Berliner Dom is a very beautiful cathedral, but not the best place for a classical concert. The echoey acoustics ruined the pauses of the music and made for very noisy harmony. Also, the pieces chosen were not particularly ear-catching and the end result was that the poor L'orchestra de Sedici didn't sound impressive at all. Most of us slept. At the end, a group of us escaped to the TV Tower and enjoyed a late night snack on its rotating restaurant with a beautiful view of Berlin at night.
Tuesday morning: I began my search for a currency exchange. A sightseeing office told me to go to the train station (which Tripadvisor.com also advised), so I went to the AlexanderPlatz train station, where the ticket office advised the bank, so I went to Deutsche Bank, where the bank teller told me to go to the train station and seek a special exchange office (yellow sign). So after 15 min searching the train station, persistence was once again rewarded. I didn't realize Berlin had 3 types of trains: bus, street level tram, and underground AND aboveground S-bahn. Because the S-Bahn at Alexanderplatz was aboveground, part of the train station was aboveground in a huge building with lots of shops like an airport duty-free mall. That's where I found the Wechsel (money exchange). Still, I'm definitely going to call my bank next time, because the rate is cheaper and it's more efficient just to use an ATM.
Now armed with money, I could afford to enter the Pergamon Museum. LONG LINE. Dunno why it was so popular (although it did come highly recommended). Initially, I thought it was anticlimactic for a 5 euro student ticket. The audio tour was very interesting/informative, but I was short on time, so I skipped around. I got to see the Ishtar Gate (my goal) and also many other things I remember reading about and seeing in textbooks, so that was very exciting to relive history class, but I should have liked to spend a whole afternoon there. Then a quick walk/S train to Potsdamer Platz and the Sony Center. Beautiful modern architecture :DDDDD. The entire group had a scheduled lunch at Lindenbräu. It began with a tasty potato cream soup, and was unfortunately followed by a HUGE entree with pork hock and potatoes and sauerkraut and strange green paste. It was the most unpopular of all DIS-chosen restaurant food. People were disturbed by seeing actual animal anatomy, by the size, and by the hairy pork skin. I guess it's an Asian thing to be able to stand looking at recognizable food. It's also something that most Americans have never eaten or seen as food. American food is usually more processed.
Our lunch was immediately followed by an academic visit to the German Heart Institute: an overall nice specialist hospital place, very open and airy and well-lit compared to JHMI. The presenter had good information but went so quickly that a half hour presentation ended in 11 minutes, so he definitely received a lot of questions at the end. After a snack break, we were taken to see patients with an artificial heart system and then to the ICU (1 doctor per 8 beds, 1 nurse per 2 beds, not bad).
Afterwards we were left to our own devices----so we traveled to Kartoffelkeller for dinner. According to the Berlin Welcome card, this restaurant had a tantalizing beer garden (not exactly my kind of incentive) but I tagged along anyway. ALL POTATOES (as the name suggested). Personally, it was too much starch for my taste, the waitresses didn't really know English, the restaurant was 60% empty while the other waterfront restaurants were full (okay, it was ~80 m away from the water :P), they forgot what I ordered so they only brought it out after everyone else was nearly done. I had potato pancakes with meat/tomato/garlic, but it was really their imitation Italian pizza that was tasty (sampled someone else's dish). 11.90 euro for the dish, plus 4.80 euro for water, so not too bad, but without the 25% off from the Welcome Card, I don't think it would have been worth it.
Wednesday morning: very painful early wake up to get out of the hotel and off to the Center of Anatomy, a department within Charite Hospital. We had a mini lecture with the director, then off to the dissection lab to view actual dissected human corpses and organs. FUN! and interesting. He said that touching engages understanding and memory of the student, probably more instructive than staring at pics in a textbook. Their basic anatomy class is 1 year dedicated to the slow dissection of 1 human body per 8 students in a group. The instructor's job is less of how to dissect and more of check out what you've dissected.
A short break and it was off to the Medical History Museum. Of course, the focus was on medical history in Berlin itself, but also general progress in medicine like when anesthetics became available, how that really upgraded the surgery profession (used to be done by barbers), the unfortunate "medical" practices back when the knowledge pool was much smaller (mercury as a cure for insanity, inducing pus formation, etc, etc), and the progress of nursing as a profession. For those who might be vaguely interested in medicine, this is something extremely informative and not at all boring to see.
Then we were free to find our own lunch. My college roommate and her friend strongly advised visiting Mustafa's Gemuse Kebap. It was far out (jump on the S-Bahn to Mehringdamn), but super tasty. Too bad I only had 1 hour, and I was 3 minutes late back to the bus. Earned a good scolding, but hey, I was going fast as I could. There's a limit to how fast trains go. And Mustafa's was so popular I had to wait in line for 8 minutes. 3.90 euro for a foot long durum. Far surpasses the shawarmas of Copenhagen. It's funny that I assumed the entire process was only going to take 30 minutes. Ah well.
Then a LONG bus ride to Poznan, Poland, punctuated by watching a German movie Goodbye Lenin and The King's Speech. The German movie was well done, except I did want to sleep, but I couldn't (can't sleep with movie playing b/c their voices are actually interesting to listen to. Regular conversation I can sleep through). Unfortunate.
We ended up at the NH Hotel. 4 star. YESSSSS. The only downside is that free WiFi is only in the lobby, and that you have to ask the front desk for a passcode that expires in 30 minutes post usage, so then you have to go ask for another. WHY??? I don't know. A quick decamping and we were off to dinner at Pod Pretekstem. They already had appetizer waiting (fried ham calzone-like sandwich with green onions), followed by rather dry chicken cordon bleu with green beans, carrots, broccoli, cauliflower, and slightly toasted potato wedges. The dessert was also slightly dry apple tart (with a crust!) topped with a scoop of vanilla ice cream. If not for the dryness, I would recommend this place, because the venue is especially quaint and cozy, with blush red textured walls, high arch ceilings with peacock paintings, columns, etc. Very comfycozy to sit in. Then I returned to the hotel for a long shower in a luxury bathroom that I will not have for a while.
Thursday morning: late wakeup--breakfast buffet YES
My group was off to the Gynecology Department of the Poznan University Hospital--we rode the tram (simple train system like Berlin).
Let me take this opportunity to applaud the train system of Berlin and Poznan. THERE'S ONLY 2 or 3 ZONES! Denmark has several tens of zones, some of which don't make sense (I think I ranted about this in another entry). So there.
We went round and round in a tour of the 120 yr old hospital building (new section for outpatients). They don't turn anyone away (how can you turn away a woman in labor??) so they sue gov't at end of year for overflow costs and the beginning of the next year the gov't pays them back. We also got to practice a pelvic examination, spoke to a woman waiting to give birth, and a woman with 10 hr old baby.
Then lunch at Pod Koziolkami, a cellar restaurant in Old Market Square with traditional polish food: begin with beet soup (a little too vinegary for me) and sour cream carrot salad, then breaded chicken with potatoes and carrots, BUT we had to leave early w/o dessert b/c it was taking some time to serve and we had to catch our walking tour. Many of my fellow students were disgruntled.
Poznan's sightseeing is mostly old buildings, such as the town hall and basilica minor and remnants of wall fortifications, otherwise Poznan does not have much to show for itself. Afterwards we went to a cafe called Cacao Republic, our tour leaders treating us to one drink and one snack each as compensation for lost dessert. I ordered Classic hot choco and this polish dessert called a Halvah--a biscuit/cake thing that was too grainy for me, but the hot choco was extremely concentrated and therefore very tasty.
The evening was again left to ourselves, so we visited the mall Galeria Malta, since we heard shopping is cheap in Poland. Shopping in a mall is NOT cheap. Prices are just like in the US. The only cheap thing in Poland is FOOOOOOOD (which I will demonstrate later)
After the mall, a friend and I went to another restaurant in the Old Market Square, entitled Fenix. Very well to do place. I had a breadbowl with bacon/egg/cream soup inside (reminiscent of Panera bread and equally as tasty) and a choco cake with ice cream and raspberry sauce, all for the grand total of $10 (including tax and junk). See how cheap food is???
Friday: the day began with the Pediatrics, GI department, which was noticeably less interesting b/c the tour was mostly standing in one place and talking about what goes on, examples of patients, etc, etc. The other problem was that we were all lacking sleep (who doesn't lack sleep when waking at 5:45 am?)
Therefore, I treated myself to browsing the souvenir selection at the Old Market Square, where we witnessed the headbutting of the goats at noon (statues on the town hall clock) and the legendary bugler. The story of the bugler is that one day long long ago, a bugler found a injured raven. Being the good hero that he is, the bugler nurses the raven back to health. What do you know? The raven is actually a dwarf king who thanks the bugler for his help and promises to return that help in the future. He tells the bugler to blow his horn in all four directions to summon this promised help. Then the dwarf king flies away. Some years later, Poznan is about to be invaded by a huge army. The bugler blows his horn in all 4 directions. Suddenly, the air grows black with a million ravens, who descend upon the army and frighten/peck them to submission. Henceforth, all the Poznan noon buglers blow in all 4 directions for the sake of tradition.
For lunch we found very well-to-do restaurant called Chatka Babuni, dedicated to "Grannie's pierogies," which are essentially dumplings. Who came first? Dumplings or pierogies? Considering Chinese civilization originated long before Western Europe, I put my money on dumplings. 9 delectable pierogies (and they are filling!) plus sauce plus salad mix plus a small tip came out to $7. FOOD IS CHEAP!
Haha, afterwards, the tour leaders held a wrap up in which they brought famous Polish pastries called marcińskie rogale, which is essentially a croissant filled with a fruit/nut/raisin paste. Unless you like that sort of thing, the paste was not the best part… but it certainly was an experience. That was followed by a trip to Lech Brewery: learning the process of brewing beer is not exactly necessary for life, but it was very hypnotizing to watch the bottles go round and round, from cleaning to filling to capping to labeling to boxing. And then they provided us beer samples. I don't like beer, unfortunately. So instead I looked forward to the last DIS provided supper at--ironically--Brovaria (Polish for brewery). It began with mushroom cream soup, then grilled marinated duck leg with pickled cabbage and 2 mantou (Chinese styled steamed bread). I om-nommed the bread (missed chinese food), followed by cheesecake filling inside a real cake, with drizzled raspberry sauce and decorated with kiwi and clementine slices. A very mouthwatering end to a splendid trip.
A looooooooooong bus ride home. I kept switching sleeping positions, and at one point had my head near the aisle. The bus turned and the leftover pastries from the overhead compartment fell and bopped me on the head. I think no one was awake to hear my yelp. The poor pastries lay scattered on the ground. Ah well, they weren't too tasty anyway.
We returned Saturday morning and the rest of Saturday was spent in exhausted catching up of homework.
Sunday: it happened to be other host sister Cecilie's bday partay with homebaked rolls and raspberry jam topped with cheese (OOMMMMMNOMMMM) and carrot cupcake and cheescake-ish fondant birthday cake. So much starch and sugar haha. And of course the Danish flag was everywhere. Fun times.
It's finally cold---got stuffed nose again >.< and had to pull out my big woolen coat for the 1st time. Too early, if you ask me. In fact, the cold weather has already put me in the Christmas mood :D.
Now I am tired. Blogging takes a lot of time. And I have hw...and 3 papers to write.
Night night >.<
Sunday, October 9, 2011
Day 39: Music, Anarchy, and More Sightseeing
Wednesday, 28 September 2011
For all you foodies, Sunday was a most delicious meal: pumpkin soup, followed by veal roast with baked veggie roots, herb potato wedges, carrot paste, and watermelon slices to finish off. It's almost like a Hogwart's feast!
Tuesday night, I attended a recital at the Music Conservatory. Most of their concerts/recitals are free for all, and they host musicians and groups from all around Europe. So this one I watched Jacob Shaw (British cellist) accompanied by David Lau Magnussen (Danish pianist). This wasn't one of their biggest events, so the venue was the Studiescenen, a modest but still very lovely recital hall, with excellent acoustics. The music menu was:
Bloch, 3 pieces "From Jewish Life"
Bach, Gamba Sonata No.2 in D
Messiaen, Louange à l’Egernité de Jésus from "Quatour pour la fin du temps"
Faure, Elegie
Grieg, Sonata in a minor for piano and cello
I will say it was very worth my time and effort to go see, and best of all, it was free! So if you have free time in Copenhagen, stop by for a concert.
Wednesday was another adventurous day. In the morning, we had our DLC field trip to Christiania. It is a small district on the eastern edge of the canal-made island Christianshavn that has isolated itself from the rest of Denmark. How did this happen? Back in the 1970s, it was an abandoned military site, and a bunch of homeless people, junkies, hippies, and otherwise societal rejects moved in. Nobody bothered them, and they decided to create their own "free" society. They have 9 rules (no violence, no weapons, no sale of hard drugs, no sale of fireworks, no private vehicles like cars/motorcyles, and other things....) It's equal parts slum and suburbia. Pusher street is the sketchiest place, the one central road where people openly sell marijuana. There's a sign that says no photos and no running. The 1st, because selling marijuana is still illegal, and 2nd, because running implies the police are nearby. The community has no government, only that people have the option of attending general meetings to decide things. Their state animal is the snail, because the prime minister once termed them "slow as a snail," which is about the fastest you can be with a communal gov't like that. It is supposed to be equal, but I think in real life, it ends up being "rule by elocution." The territory encompasses a beautiful nature park and stream, and if you follow the trails, you can spot some interesting architecture (the banana house is worth seeing, except it doesn't look like a banana) and see the prettier side of Christiania.
Still, it seems there are things festering under the egalitarian peaceful facade. There is a children afterschool center, where it opens to a beach on the streambanks. Unfortunately, the building used to be an ammunition factory, so the soil underneath the beach is toxic, and they put a membrane over the soil and add new sand every year to keep the children safe. My prof said that if it was under city control, they would've dug out the entire bank and filled it with new soil. Also, the tour guide took us to a dog's burial. Apparently, one day, a plainclothes policeman came to check out pusher street. A chase ensued, ending near the burial site, where the dealer and policeman came to blows.
The romanticized version: someone's pet dog ran over and started barking from excitement. The stupid policeman didn't know what to do and asked someone to shut the dog up. No one did, so the policeman did what all policemen do (quoting), shoot whatever they can't control.
The more likely realistic version: someone's attack dog was set on the policeman, and in defense, he shot and killed the dog.
In any case, the community rose up in retaliation, rioted outside the Christiania territory, ransacked/smashed some stores, set fire to a high school, messed up a library, etc, etc. All for a dead dog. And this was honestly told by the tour guide, who lives in Christiania, and appeared to think this was an eye for an eye.
In other news, Sept 26 was the community's 40 year birthday.
It's an interesting site, at least for a tourist to see, but certainly they don't really generate revenue for the city because the community is self-enclosed, doesn't really pay taxes or city-managed utilities/public services (they installed their own trash compacter thingy and their own electricity and plumbing). Some kind of negotiation is happening next year btwn Christiania and the gov't. The Christiania-ans believe they will be able to buy and finally own the piece of land. The rumor going among the Danes is that the gov't will price it high and sell them out. Who knows.
Wednesday night was more music. At Tivoli, they have a Pantomime Theatre for free (after entrance fee). I didn't get to see the actual pantomime show, but that night they had a dance show, "Catching the Bolero." It was a storytelling dance (I dunno if there is a technical term for that), where in a population of birds, a white bird fell in love with a black bird. Both birds flirted with/were tempted by other colorful birds but they eventually came together, to the tune of Ravel's Bolero. The only strange moment was they actually threw in a scene where the lovers embrace and kiss for several minutes while the other birds dance around them. I have never seen black-and-white PDA in a dance before. Maybe it's a Danish thing, maybe it's me not being very familiar with dance.
Last weekend was a trip to Sweden, to the Kullaberg Peninsula!!!! Sweden is luuuuvely, or probably because we just went to the nature reserve. Saturday we canoed down Ronne Å (Ronne River). Slow and gentle river, with fall foliage and willows hanging over the edge. The canoe business family stopped by halfway to give out ice cream to everyone. A very well-spent morning. The afternoon they took us to Nimis. Actually, it's a micronation called Ladonia (probably recognized by 0 countries). An artist built a huge structure of random driftwood nailed together and called it Nimis. The Swedish authorities said he wasn't allowed to build random stuff in the nature reserve. Therefore, the artist delineated a border and declared it an independent nation. You can sign up to be a citizen online for free, or pay 12 bucks to get yourself a nobility title.
Outside of the political technicalities, the beach is a beautiful place, if you are fit enough to cross the treacherous slope and make it to the entrance of Nimis. It's essentially a maze of tunnels and towers built of wood and nails. The beach itself is all big rocks, not sand. Once you reach the shoreline and turn left, there's another structure of rocks and cement, the artist's second masterpiece. This is a must-see place!!
In terms of housing, we stayed at a manor-like hostel. They provide linens (though you have to put it on the bed yourself), and simple but delicious food (personally, I found a country vegetable beef stew preferable to the calorie/butter-high feast at the Vejle Danhostel). The bathrooms are in the hall and are common use, which is okay, BUT my biggest complaint is that there is only 1 shower room per floor, and the two shower heads are in the open, not separated into stalls or even with a curtain. Therefore, I left while everyone was still at the barbecue and occupied the shower room all to myself. :D Other than that, everything is clean and the grounds are also beautiful grass with a gazebo and picnic benches.
Sunday we went cliff rappelling. They started us off on a 25 ft cliff and then progressed to a 100 ft cliff. You can either walk down the cliff, sitting in your harness, or progressively bounce down the wall as in (I quote) the James Bond style. The cliffs are by the Øresund overlooking the coast towards Denmark, but it was extremely windy, so the view was accompanied by a frigid chill.
That afternoon, before we left Sweden, they took us to a cafe where the former king of Sweden was a regular customer, and we all tasted his favorite snack, a Vanilla Heart. It's a dough pastry in the shape of heart sprinkled with powdered sugar, simple and elegantly sweet. A wonderful end to an equally wonderful trip.
Last week Wednesday was also Sofie's birthday, so as a gift, I bought tickets to Voice 2011, a big concert with a pantheon of artists at Tivoli (Rasmus Seebach, Aqua, The Wanted, Medina, Sak Noel, etc, etc). (125DKK for those with the season pass) And the concert was this Monday. Man, was it crowded! It reminded me of China, until the concert started, and then it reminded me of Auschwitz, the great hordes of people packed together. The only artist I knew was Aqua, but I enjoyed discovering the others. The only sad thing was that I didn't know the lyrics to any song, while you could hear the crowd sing to almost every one of them. It was definitely an experience, I'll say that, having never attended a modern pop music concert, but it also made me value the experience of sitting at home and watching these things on TV for free with easy access to water, food, and a toilet. So stay at home, peeps.
And finally today, Wednesday September 28, we had a field study trip to Frilandsmuseet, an open air museum of reconstructed homes. It was like Den Gamle By, except the focus was on the homes of countryside farmers and stuff rather than a town with cobblestone streets. So we progressed across canals, up grassy hills, through fields, to see different homes of different time periods. There were also animals of the same original breeds, geese, goats, moocows, and sheep. It was most interesting because our Prof (this is for the european storytelling class) once worked here, so she knew a lot about each place and gave an entertaining and informational guided tour, which is better than if we wandered about staring at wood and thatched roofs and grass without a clue. I don't know if it's a must see, but it is definitely a nice looking place.
Tonight, we have a party at Louise's, originally dedicated to celebrating her graduation with her colleagues, but she invited the family and us students too :D. Next week is the long study tour to Berlin, Germany and Poznan, Poland, so you will be hearing a LOT from me next time.
Until then,
Cheerio.
For all you foodies, Sunday was a most delicious meal: pumpkin soup, followed by veal roast with baked veggie roots, herb potato wedges, carrot paste, and watermelon slices to finish off. It's almost like a Hogwart's feast!
Tuesday night, I attended a recital at the Music Conservatory. Most of their concerts/recitals are free for all, and they host musicians and groups from all around Europe. So this one I watched Jacob Shaw (British cellist) accompanied by David Lau Magnussen (Danish pianist). This wasn't one of their biggest events, so the venue was the Studiescenen, a modest but still very lovely recital hall, with excellent acoustics. The music menu was:
Bloch, 3 pieces "From Jewish Life"
Bach, Gamba Sonata No.2 in D
Messiaen, Louange à l’Egernité de Jésus from "Quatour pour la fin du temps"
Faure, Elegie
Grieg, Sonata in a minor for piano and cello
I will say it was very worth my time and effort to go see, and best of all, it was free! So if you have free time in Copenhagen, stop by for a concert.
Wednesday was another adventurous day. In the morning, we had our DLC field trip to Christiania. It is a small district on the eastern edge of the canal-made island Christianshavn that has isolated itself from the rest of Denmark. How did this happen? Back in the 1970s, it was an abandoned military site, and a bunch of homeless people, junkies, hippies, and otherwise societal rejects moved in. Nobody bothered them, and they decided to create their own "free" society. They have 9 rules (no violence, no weapons, no sale of hard drugs, no sale of fireworks, no private vehicles like cars/motorcyles, and other things....) It's equal parts slum and suburbia. Pusher street is the sketchiest place, the one central road where people openly sell marijuana. There's a sign that says no photos and no running. The 1st, because selling marijuana is still illegal, and 2nd, because running implies the police are nearby. The community has no government, only that people have the option of attending general meetings to decide things. Their state animal is the snail, because the prime minister once termed them "slow as a snail," which is about the fastest you can be with a communal gov't like that. It is supposed to be equal, but I think in real life, it ends up being "rule by elocution." The territory encompasses a beautiful nature park and stream, and if you follow the trails, you can spot some interesting architecture (the banana house is worth seeing, except it doesn't look like a banana) and see the prettier side of Christiania.
Still, it seems there are things festering under the egalitarian peaceful facade. There is a children afterschool center, where it opens to a beach on the streambanks. Unfortunately, the building used to be an ammunition factory, so the soil underneath the beach is toxic, and they put a membrane over the soil and add new sand every year to keep the children safe. My prof said that if it was under city control, they would've dug out the entire bank and filled it with new soil. Also, the tour guide took us to a dog's burial. Apparently, one day, a plainclothes policeman came to check out pusher street. A chase ensued, ending near the burial site, where the dealer and policeman came to blows.
The romanticized version: someone's pet dog ran over and started barking from excitement. The stupid policeman didn't know what to do and asked someone to shut the dog up. No one did, so the policeman did what all policemen do (quoting), shoot whatever they can't control.
The more likely realistic version: someone's attack dog was set on the policeman, and in defense, he shot and killed the dog.
In any case, the community rose up in retaliation, rioted outside the Christiania territory, ransacked/smashed some stores, set fire to a high school, messed up a library, etc, etc. All for a dead dog. And this was honestly told by the tour guide, who lives in Christiania, and appeared to think this was an eye for an eye.
In other news, Sept 26 was the community's 40 year birthday.
It's an interesting site, at least for a tourist to see, but certainly they don't really generate revenue for the city because the community is self-enclosed, doesn't really pay taxes or city-managed utilities/public services (they installed their own trash compacter thingy and their own electricity and plumbing). Some kind of negotiation is happening next year btwn Christiania and the gov't. The Christiania-ans believe they will be able to buy and finally own the piece of land. The rumor going among the Danes is that the gov't will price it high and sell them out. Who knows.
Wednesday night was more music. At Tivoli, they have a Pantomime Theatre for free (after entrance fee). I didn't get to see the actual pantomime show, but that night they had a dance show, "Catching the Bolero." It was a storytelling dance (I dunno if there is a technical term for that), where in a population of birds, a white bird fell in love with a black bird. Both birds flirted with/were tempted by other colorful birds but they eventually came together, to the tune of Ravel's Bolero. The only strange moment was they actually threw in a scene where the lovers embrace and kiss for several minutes while the other birds dance around them. I have never seen black-and-white PDA in a dance before. Maybe it's a Danish thing, maybe it's me not being very familiar with dance.
Last weekend was a trip to Sweden, to the Kullaberg Peninsula!!!! Sweden is luuuuvely, or probably because we just went to the nature reserve. Saturday we canoed down Ronne Å (Ronne River). Slow and gentle river, with fall foliage and willows hanging over the edge. The canoe business family stopped by halfway to give out ice cream to everyone. A very well-spent morning. The afternoon they took us to Nimis. Actually, it's a micronation called Ladonia (probably recognized by 0 countries). An artist built a huge structure of random driftwood nailed together and called it Nimis. The Swedish authorities said he wasn't allowed to build random stuff in the nature reserve. Therefore, the artist delineated a border and declared it an independent nation. You can sign up to be a citizen online for free, or pay 12 bucks to get yourself a nobility title.
Outside of the political technicalities, the beach is a beautiful place, if you are fit enough to cross the treacherous slope and make it to the entrance of Nimis. It's essentially a maze of tunnels and towers built of wood and nails. The beach itself is all big rocks, not sand. Once you reach the shoreline and turn left, there's another structure of rocks and cement, the artist's second masterpiece. This is a must-see place!!
In terms of housing, we stayed at a manor-like hostel. They provide linens (though you have to put it on the bed yourself), and simple but delicious food (personally, I found a country vegetable beef stew preferable to the calorie/butter-high feast at the Vejle Danhostel). The bathrooms are in the hall and are common use, which is okay, BUT my biggest complaint is that there is only 1 shower room per floor, and the two shower heads are in the open, not separated into stalls or even with a curtain. Therefore, I left while everyone was still at the barbecue and occupied the shower room all to myself. :D Other than that, everything is clean and the grounds are also beautiful grass with a gazebo and picnic benches.
Sunday we went cliff rappelling. They started us off on a 25 ft cliff and then progressed to a 100 ft cliff. You can either walk down the cliff, sitting in your harness, or progressively bounce down the wall as in (I quote) the James Bond style. The cliffs are by the Øresund overlooking the coast towards Denmark, but it was extremely windy, so the view was accompanied by a frigid chill.
That afternoon, before we left Sweden, they took us to a cafe where the former king of Sweden was a regular customer, and we all tasted his favorite snack, a Vanilla Heart. It's a dough pastry in the shape of heart sprinkled with powdered sugar, simple and elegantly sweet. A wonderful end to an equally wonderful trip.
Last week Wednesday was also Sofie's birthday, so as a gift, I bought tickets to Voice 2011, a big concert with a pantheon of artists at Tivoli (Rasmus Seebach, Aqua, The Wanted, Medina, Sak Noel, etc, etc). (125DKK for those with the season pass) And the concert was this Monday. Man, was it crowded! It reminded me of China, until the concert started, and then it reminded me of Auschwitz, the great hordes of people packed together. The only artist I knew was Aqua, but I enjoyed discovering the others. The only sad thing was that I didn't know the lyrics to any song, while you could hear the crowd sing to almost every one of them. It was definitely an experience, I'll say that, having never attended a modern pop music concert, but it also made me value the experience of sitting at home and watching these things on TV for free with easy access to water, food, and a toilet. So stay at home, peeps.
And finally today, Wednesday September 28, we had a field study trip to Frilandsmuseet, an open air museum of reconstructed homes. It was like Den Gamle By, except the focus was on the homes of countryside farmers and stuff rather than a town with cobblestone streets. So we progressed across canals, up grassy hills, through fields, to see different homes of different time periods. There were also animals of the same original breeds, geese, goats, moocows, and sheep. It was most interesting because our Prof (this is for the european storytelling class) once worked here, so she knew a lot about each place and gave an entertaining and informational guided tour, which is better than if we wandered about staring at wood and thatched roofs and grass without a clue. I don't know if it's a must see, but it is definitely a nice looking place.
Tonight, we have a party at Louise's, originally dedicated to celebrating her graduation with her colleagues, but she invited the family and us students too :D. Next week is the long study tour to Berlin, Germany and Poznan, Poland, so you will be hearing a LOT from me next time.
Until then,
Cheerio.
Day 30: the Cold, the Danes, and Sightseeing
Monday, 19 September 2011
My host mum is a bike mechanic!
That's probably a common skill to have in Denmark b/c a bike is too commonly part of the household, but where I come from, that's beast!
So Monday night was the first proper venture into "hanging out" with Danes. I joined this Buddy Network program that DIS organizes, where a bunch of American students and Danish students are organized into groups that hang out, do whatever each network leader plans, and is paid for by DIS. So our first event (technically 2nd, but very few people had signed up when they had the real 1st event) was going out to eat at Cafe Dyrehaven på Vesterbro (meaning it's in the west end of town). Cafe Dyrehaven is famous enough to be included in my tourbook: it's an old pub turned cafe, with vintage French decorations and cozy seating. The menu is small, but worthy of a student-budget and each selection is rumored to be tasty. I myself had the Kalvefrikassé, or veal. It was a very tasty stew, with "new" potatoes and peas. I don't know the difference between new and old potatoes, but apparently everytime the potato season comes around and grocery stores stock "new" potatoes, they sell faster than Lance Armstrong biking at the Tour de France.
Food aside, the young Danes are extremely friendly. William, the network leader, is a student at the University (his last year), studying Danish (like how we might have an English major). He was there early because you can't make reservations at the small cafe, so I joined him to help chase away other customers XD. We made good intro conversation, and the interesting thing is that everytime there's a lull in conversation, he kept staring at me. From my experience, that usually means he's more than interested in you, BUT I was told that maintaining eye contact is key in Danish conversation, so I think that's what he was trying to do.
The other girl I became good friends with was Imam, a Malay who was born in Denmark and is studying Asian studies at CBI (Copenhagen Business Institute, not Californian Bureau of Investigation as in The Mentalist). And she is learning Chinese and has a separate Buddy program with Chinese exchange students at CBI.
The event after dinner was movie at the local Grand Theatre. They sell tickets with ASSIGNED seating!!! As such, people chill at the cafe until the movie start time, rather than rush in half an hour early trying to get the best seats. The movie was the British film Submarine, about an outcast boy attempting to figure himself out, figure love out, and keep his equally quirky parents from separating. It's not something I would have normally gone out specifically to watch, but it was a very good movie nonetheless. Actually, this theatre has a LOT of foreign films---the posters and previews are all German, French, English, and whatever other language that I can't understand. Probably because Denmark itself doesn't produce a whole ton of movies, AND sharing movies within Europe as a whole must be really easy.
Last week Wednesday I also wanted to go sightseeing in the city before it got super cold. Funny how the days I decide to go bike in the city it decides to rain on me. It was sprinkling when I made it to the Black Diamond Library (actually just the Royal Library, but the structure itself really does look like a black diamond, and it sounds cooler). The inside is just as architecturally striking as the outside---it's a modern attache to an older building. There is so much study space! (I think Hopkins pre-meds would love that...) Also, this library offers music manuscripts in addition to books, ancient texts, dvd/cd, etc, etc. When I get my CPR card, I can get a library card! Because of the rain, I didn't want to go look at the "secret" garden behind the library, so I biked on.
There's another beautiful garden near the Royal Palace in Amalienborg called Amaliehavn. You should go check it out. I was not able to stay for longer than a glimpse because then it really started to pour.
But my REAL goal of that adventure was to see The Little Mermaid. Earlier this year, this sculpture of a mermaid on a rock had traveled to Shanghai for an expo, but returned in time for me to see her! She looks nothing like Ariel, by the way. From the shore side and from the sea side, you can never see her face properly. She looks to the side, a sad and pensive expression from where I was standing.
And then I hightailed it back home.
Did I mention I am under the weather? After coming home Monday night, I developed a sore throat, which morphed into stuffed sinuses for 2 days, which has now become intermittent coughing (thankfully I can breathe now). It's cold/flu season! In all of my classes, you can hear other students hacking or blowing their brains out. Several classes were also cancelled because teachers were feeling the same (mine included). I have not seen any flu vaccines advertisements, but I have also not heard anyone getting the flu yet, only the coughing and sneezing.
Thursday was the election! My European Storytelling professor decided to comment on the state of true democracy. She said we should do away with this running for candidacy stuff, and just do a lottery of random people from the populace. Because of the way statistics work, this would get a real equal representation of the people (some rich some poor, equal men and women, some young some old, some native some immigrant). Either way, we would still get a mix of the incompetent as well as competent, which is essentially what we get with the voting system anyway. She also said this was the way Athenians did it (the founders of democracy)--except that they limited it to adult well-to-do men. But until that day we switched to the lottery system, she added, we should all actively use our right to vote. Food for thought :D
One more thing to add before I close off: the touchscreens in the cars cannot be touched when driving!! All the options fade until you stop driving, and then you can poke them. Safety first!
My host mum is a bike mechanic!
That's probably a common skill to have in Denmark b/c a bike is too commonly part of the household, but where I come from, that's beast!
So Monday night was the first proper venture into "hanging out" with Danes. I joined this Buddy Network program that DIS organizes, where a bunch of American students and Danish students are organized into groups that hang out, do whatever each network leader plans, and is paid for by DIS. So our first event (technically 2nd, but very few people had signed up when they had the real 1st event) was going out to eat at Cafe Dyrehaven på Vesterbro (meaning it's in the west end of town). Cafe Dyrehaven is famous enough to be included in my tourbook: it's an old pub turned cafe, with vintage French decorations and cozy seating. The menu is small, but worthy of a student-budget and each selection is rumored to be tasty. I myself had the Kalvefrikassé, or veal. It was a very tasty stew, with "new" potatoes and peas. I don't know the difference between new and old potatoes, but apparently everytime the potato season comes around and grocery stores stock "new" potatoes, they sell faster than Lance Armstrong biking at the Tour de France.
Food aside, the young Danes are extremely friendly. William, the network leader, is a student at the University (his last year), studying Danish (like how we might have an English major). He was there early because you can't make reservations at the small cafe, so I joined him to help chase away other customers XD. We made good intro conversation, and the interesting thing is that everytime there's a lull in conversation, he kept staring at me. From my experience, that usually means he's more than interested in you, BUT I was told that maintaining eye contact is key in Danish conversation, so I think that's what he was trying to do.
The other girl I became good friends with was Imam, a Malay who was born in Denmark and is studying Asian studies at CBI (Copenhagen Business Institute, not Californian Bureau of Investigation as in The Mentalist). And she is learning Chinese and has a separate Buddy program with Chinese exchange students at CBI.
The event after dinner was movie at the local Grand Theatre. They sell tickets with ASSIGNED seating!!! As such, people chill at the cafe until the movie start time, rather than rush in half an hour early trying to get the best seats. The movie was the British film Submarine, about an outcast boy attempting to figure himself out, figure love out, and keep his equally quirky parents from separating. It's not something I would have normally gone out specifically to watch, but it was a very good movie nonetheless. Actually, this theatre has a LOT of foreign films---the posters and previews are all German, French, English, and whatever other language that I can't understand. Probably because Denmark itself doesn't produce a whole ton of movies, AND sharing movies within Europe as a whole must be really easy.
Last week Wednesday I also wanted to go sightseeing in the city before it got super cold. Funny how the days I decide to go bike in the city it decides to rain on me. It was sprinkling when I made it to the Black Diamond Library (actually just the Royal Library, but the structure itself really does look like a black diamond, and it sounds cooler). The inside is just as architecturally striking as the outside---it's a modern attache to an older building. There is so much study space! (I think Hopkins pre-meds would love that...) Also, this library offers music manuscripts in addition to books, ancient texts, dvd/cd, etc, etc. When I get my CPR card, I can get a library card! Because of the rain, I didn't want to go look at the "secret" garden behind the library, so I biked on.
There's another beautiful garden near the Royal Palace in Amalienborg called Amaliehavn. You should go check it out. I was not able to stay for longer than a glimpse because then it really started to pour.
But my REAL goal of that adventure was to see The Little Mermaid. Earlier this year, this sculpture of a mermaid on a rock had traveled to Shanghai for an expo, but returned in time for me to see her! She looks nothing like Ariel, by the way. From the shore side and from the sea side, you can never see her face properly. She looks to the side, a sad and pensive expression from where I was standing.
And then I hightailed it back home.
Did I mention I am under the weather? After coming home Monday night, I developed a sore throat, which morphed into stuffed sinuses for 2 days, which has now become intermittent coughing (thankfully I can breathe now). It's cold/flu season! In all of my classes, you can hear other students hacking or blowing their brains out. Several classes were also cancelled because teachers were feeling the same (mine included). I have not seen any flu vaccines advertisements, but I have also not heard anyone getting the flu yet, only the coughing and sneezing.
Thursday was the election! My European Storytelling professor decided to comment on the state of true democracy. She said we should do away with this running for candidacy stuff, and just do a lottery of random people from the populace. Because of the way statistics work, this would get a real equal representation of the people (some rich some poor, equal men and women, some young some old, some native some immigrant). Either way, we would still get a mix of the incompetent as well as competent, which is essentially what we get with the voting system anyway. She also said this was the way Athenians did it (the founders of democracy)--except that they limited it to adult well-to-do men. But until that day we switched to the lottery system, she added, we should all actively use our right to vote. Food for thought :D
One more thing to add before I close off: the touchscreens in the cars cannot be touched when driving!! All the options fade until you stop driving, and then you can poke them. Safety first!
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