Østerport

Østerport is a train / subway station in Copenhagen. And for some inexplicable reason, I keep accidentally ending up there.


In the first 5 days I've been here, I've been to Østerport 3 times. Once by bike and twice by train (2 stops past where I need to be).

Dunno what that's about. Ideas? :)

A Birthday with a Palace, a Labyrinth and Hygge

Today is my birthday and I love my birthday. :)

And I love brunch. So after sleeping in, Chris, Louise and I went to brunch. We went to Cafe 22 for a buffet and sat outside by one of the lakes.


After brunch, I biked to Amalienborg, the Palace of Crown Prince Frederick VIII. It's been open to visitors while it's being renovated, but it officially closes to the public tomorrow.


On my first day here I found a labyrinth at Pile Allé. So I went back to that to check it out, which was very cool...


Tonight Louise and Chris cooked a vegetarian dinner. It was super yummy! Her sister Katrina came over with her husband Kasper.


From L to R: Louise, Katrina and me


From L to R: Chris and Kasper

Louise also made me a traditional Danish birthday cake, which was the most beautiful and tasty strawberry rhubarb cake I have ever seen or tasted.


Two things I have learned about Danish culture are that they love their flag (world's oldest still in use) and the concept of Hygge. There's no direct translation for Hygge, but Wikipedia says it's the presence of and pleasure from comforting, gentle, and soothing things, and is often associated with family and close friends.


Sitting comfortably in Louise's apartment, surrounded by wonderful friends, a delicious meal, happy Danish flags and warm candles, I felt the cozy meaning of Hygge. :)

Stockholm, Sweden May 26-28, 2010

It's not often that you get to wake up and say...I think I'll go to Sweden tomorrow, but that's what happened and here I am.

Stockholm is a really beautiful city, made up of ~14 islands. Pictures (well, at least the ones I took) can't really do it justice. But I'll share some anyway. :)


This is city view was taken from a walk around Södermalm (Southern Island).

I'm sure there are many things to do in Stockholm, but I only had one full day, so I walked...a lot. I ran into some cool things, like this really pretty Church of Catherine (Katarina kyrkan) on Högbergsgatan St, in an old area of town:


And this lantern (?) outside a building near the city center:


I also took an Under the Bridges boat tour, which gives a historical tour of the city while traveling under ~ 15 bridges and past the Stockholm City Hall where the Nobel Prizes (except Peace Prize) banquet is held.

The two buildings below as seen from the tour were particularly impressive. The one on the right is the Hotel Diplomat. The strip of land that these buildings lie on is the Strandvägen, which is one of the most expensive areas.


And, "Behold!" Here's a shot of the spectacular Royal Palace from the tour:


There's a lot of interesting news about the Royal Swedish Family these days, as Crown Princess Victoria is getting married to Daniel Westling, a high end gym owner and personal trainer on June 19, 2010.

There's a lot of places that "normal" people live too, here's what the ones on the water look like:



I also went to Vasamuseet, a ship museum. The interesting thing about this war ship is that it was elaborately built, but apparently without enough ballasts or weight to stabilize it. On it's maiden voyage in 1628, it heeled over after just 1,500 meters--less than a mile out--and remained sunk, but preserved by the fresh water and silt / mud it sank in. It was raised 333 years later and restored to 95%.



The coolest part about the ship was the adornments, like the ones below that were cast as re-makes so we can see them in color:



I have some more pictures of a miniature model of the ship and city views posted on flickr.

*...The Magic of Couch Surfing...*

I can credit Chris for introducing me to Couch Surfing.

If you don't know of this site, it's an amazing idea. The premise is that "CouchSurfing is a worldwide network for making connections between travelers and the local communities they visit."

Basically you sign up, post a profile and then you can find events, couches to crash on, travel partners, etc. It works on the premise that people are good, and allows you to spread that wealth of goodness while opening up a whole new world when you're traveling. The point isn't a free place to stay, it's a cultural exchange. You learn about other people and their culture, while they learn about you.

It was through couchsurfing that I responded to a post, and ended up going to a Built to Spill concert with Bjorn in Stockholm, Sweden. The show was at Tyrol in Tivoli, an amusement park on Gröna Lund (view from the other side of the water).


When indicating your chances of attendance at an event, the site gives you the option to indicate if you need a couch. Which I did. So Bjorn offered, and there began my ascent into the world of couchsurfing.

He met me at the train station and I dropped my stuff off at his house and off we went. I spent the next 2 nights on his couch in Södermalm, a really cool area of Stockholm. In addition to the couch, the experience offered me the opportunity to see life through his eyes--growing up in Sweden, daily living in Stockholm, a glimpse at his travel experiences and his take on the world. I would definitely include this whole adventure as a life enriching experience.

In case you're wondering, the show itself was great. I've never stood in a better place, on a balcony slightly above the crowd and about 6 feet from the bar.


Below is a picture taken while Bjorn was giving me a walking tour of his city:


Thanks again for everything, my new friend Bjorn!! You're welcome to stay on my couch anytime! :)

Softball in Denmark

After 28 years, I've finally played my first official softball game in another country.

Chris plays on a fast pitch team that had a double header in a suburb of Copenhagen. Someone had to leave after the first game, so I ended up playing in left field for game 2.

Danish softball is so much different, especially because many people here haven't grown up playing the sport and it's not common to find on TV, so basic fundamentals aren't always so basic. It's hard and expensive to find equipment like cleats, batting gloves, etc. There's also not always enough players to play, so his team combines 2 teams of varying skill (hence the different uniforms).



Despite a lot of obstacles, all the players I've met have an amazing spirit, and they're very enthusiastic to play and learn the game. I'm super excited that they let me join them! :)


Other random notes about today include lunch and transportation.We packed a smorgasbord for lunch. In case you don't know what that looks like:


It includes carrots, apricots, apple and varieties of open-faced sandwiches on tiny bread made of hummus, cucumber, cheese, salmon and pate for Chris.

After the game, we biked home through Copenhagen suburbs (approximately 13km).

Getting Lost

I've spent the last two days biking around the city and getting lost. It's been so much fun! I've found the Royal Palaces (again!) sometimes twice in one day. Also I've found streets called Frederiksborggade and Frederiericiagade--which look very similar when you're whizzing by in a crowd of bikes. Apparently I inadvertently biked 15km last night, which should have been 8km. Oops. :)

I think it's a function of the fact that the streets aren't on a grid, the names change every few blocks and they tend to run NE-->SW instead of the more familiar N->S. But it's been a constant adventure, and I've stumbled upon some interesting things. Most of them I didn't stop to take pictures of, but I did like this bright green statue of Moses from 1853.


I also biked to Christiania today. It's a small, anarchist community that used to be a military barracks, was overrun in the 70s and became a free community. It's a little dirty and hippie-ish, but that description really doesn't do it justice. There are no photos, no hard drugs, no taxes and no automobiles allowed. I went for Morgenstedet one of the city's only vegetarian restaurants.



I had a delicious miso vegetable soup and 2 salads--one noodle with pumpkin seeds, red peppers, lettuce and onions and one rhubarb, lentil, carrot salad. It was all awesome. And the weather was sunny, so I got to sit outside.

I've been mentioning a lot about biking, so I guess I should mention that it's the main type of transportation. Taxes on motor vehicles in Denmark can be up to 180%, so a $10k car can cost you almost $30k.

Having said that, it's impossible not to notice all the bikes immediately upon entering the city. This was my first picture as soon as I got off the bus:



You can see rows upon rows of them in the town squares as well. It's such a great way to get around. But as a pedestrian watch out for bikes--don't get in their way!



There's a bridge in town that I cross each day that has a counter for each bike per day that passes by. In this picture, it was only 12:14am on May 25, and already 40 riders had crossed the bridge.


By the time I passed it again this evening around 7:30pm, there had been over 10k riders going just in that direction.

Copenhagen, May 23, 2010

This morning Chris, Louise and I had a typical simple Danish breakfast of tea with bread, butter and cheeses. Then we went to the Copenhagen Marathon to cheer on the runners, just a few blocks from Chris's flat.

After that he decided to take me on a bike tour of the city. We headed from his apartment to Kastellet, where the Little Mermaid lives. This is an incredibly famous statue portraying The Little Mermaid by Hans Christian Andersen. Unfortunately she's currently visiting Shanghai for the World Expo.

So...in her place is a screen showing the Chinese visiting her. Underneath that was, uhh, a couch with a live mermaid who is sitting there all day to show support for people who need psychological help. No idea what the connection is...but here's Chris in front of it.


Next we biked through Langelinie Park, a well known tourist area and saw the Gefion Fountain. It's a really cool statue depicting the goddess Gefion driving her oxen sons to plough the earth.


We biked around the palaces of the Queen Margrethe II and the Crown Prince (despite the guards, the palaces are very accessible, a taxi dropped someone off right outside one of the palaces). Even the Queen herself is very accessible to the Danish people. She's an artist...a painter, illustrator and translator in addition to queen.

We ended the day with more Carnaval events in the Faelledparken. It didn't really get dark out until after 10pm. I took this picture of Chris and Louise at 9pm. It was a lot lighter outside than it looks:


The Carnaval events included another parade--the same one as yesterday. It also had multiple live music tents and stages, and there were tons of vendors, vending anything you can imagine (including dental instruments??)


And finally, amusement rides for little kids, that I found to be kinda frightening.


More pictures from the Carnaval event are on Flickr.

Copenhagen - Day 1, May 22, 2010

I arrived in Copenhagen around 10 in the morning. By 1pm I was at a Carnaval parade.


Who knew the Danish celebrated a Brazilian holiday in such a boisterous way? The streets were lined with brightly colored dancers, drummers, costumes, and there was lots of loud music.


There were alternating sections of dancers and then drummers. And sometimes the drummers surrounded the dancers:


Maybe it's a product of living in SF, but I have an incredible appreciation for good costumes. There were a lot of good ones there, especially the ladies' highly detailed Carnaval dresses:


But elaborate dresses don't always have to be for the ladies, sometimes a devil needs a good dress too, even if it's not blue:

The men had pretty elaborate costumes as well, including these ones from the Bolivian / Danish Association (whaaaa...?). The best part were the boots, with jingling bells on them.



---------Part 2: In addition to the Parade----------

I'm staying here in Copenhagen with my friend Chris. He's really an amazing person--besides letting me stay with him in his (borrowed) palatial apartment for 10 days--he phases through life alternately working and taking time to volunteer for extended periods of time doing disaster relief. (He spent months in places like in Gonaives Haiti with HODR after the 2008 Hurricane Gustav and in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina).

Chris played on my pool team in SF a few years ago and is in Copenhagen now studying for his Master's degree. The best part is that his Master's is in disaster relief. Yup, he's going to officially be a "Master of Disaster!" Here's a pic of him and his Danish girlfriend Louise. :)


If you're really interested, you can see more parade pics on Flickr.

Later that night, after the parade and a picnic in the King's Garden...


...we went to see Snow Patrol at KB Halle. It was here that I realized the perils of being short in a crowd in a country of very tall people. It seems that many people have elbows at the exact height of my face and after some really close calls, I worried that I was going to leave the show with at least one black eye.

Luckily for me I escaped unscathed. Chris is one of those people who are very tall, so I credit him for the picture. :)