A Danish Christmas

This past weekend was my last in Copenhagen, and my host family and I celebrating by having an early, traditional, Danish Christmas: jul. For dinner my host family invited friends and family, and we enjoyed roast pork, red cabbage salad, sugar potatoes, regular potatoes, and brown sauce. And my cranberry sauce!

We decorated the tree with candles, real ones!, and lit them after dinner. Everyone held hands and "danced" around the Christmas tree while singing Danish Jul songs. Some of us sang anyway...I either mumbled the Danish lyrics (which I could look at in a songbook) if I knew the melody, or just concentrated on walking around the tree without hitting it and lighting the house on fire. I was proud that I knew the final song "Nu det jul igen" -"Now it is Christmas again", at least somewhat. For this song, we all put down the songbooks and RAN around the Christmas tree. Everytime a new chorus started, we quickly switched directions, much to my surprise.

After all our dancing, we needed dessert. Nina had made the traditional Ris a la mande. It's a sort of cold rice pudding, with lots of crushed almonds and whipped cream in it, cherry sauce on top, plus one whole almond. The person that gets the almond has to conceal it somehow until everyone is done eating. Nina won the "almond gift" by getting the almond in a hiding in her port wine until Stine noticed.

After eating, around 11:00pm or so, we played a gift swap game. It's a little like our "Yankee Swap" but with dice. A 6 gets you a present, and after the presents are distributed a 6 or 1 redistributes the gifts. It was a great time, with a lot of presents, a lot rivalries and some bribing.

One Last Adventure: Budapest

Stine and I took a weekend trip to Budapest, Hungary this past weekend. I had just finished my classes, exams and papers for my DIS classes, and that evening we jetted off on Malev Airlines. I was amazed that this cheap airlines that still serves free meals, drinks, and even free wine on a 2 hour flight!

After getting into the airport, we found a taxi driver with my name on a sign, and hopped in. Unfortunately, it turned out he didn't know English and he didn't even know what hotel we were staying it, which was a bit discomforting as the hotel booked the ride for us! But we got there OK, and for a very cheap price.

I was lucky to meet up with Alex Howard on Saturday morning, an old friend from summer camp. She took Stine and I to breakfast and shopping at the huge Christmas market. The market was fantastic, with rows and rows of little shops. Everything had to be handmade and authenticated, but it was still very inexpensive. There was so much pretty jewelry, ceramics, candles, food...everything! Needless to say, I spent a lot of Hungarian Forint.

Hungarian food was really nice to try. We sampled goulash soup right away for lunch the first day. The cookies, "chimney" cake, potato pancakes and chicken dishes were all delicious too. And the hot wine and hot chocolate!

After a busy day of shopping, Stine and I retreated to one of the famous Turkish baths. We got half hour massages and a nice, but limited, time bathing outside in the hot baths. It was so pretty, the snow was falling, lots of steam coming off the water, and a beautiful old building surrounding the courtyard. The whole evening didn't go so smoothly though, we got lost, went to the lockers too late, made the towel-return lady mad, and finally had to get a security guard to unlock the door and let us out. That's the short version anyway.

Sunday was our sight-seeing day, and a rainy day. We walked across the Danube and to the "Buda" side of Budapest. We saw the castle, Fisherman's Bastion, and lots of old beautiful buildings we didn't know anything about! Across the river we could see the huge, gothic building for parliament.

It was a wonderful, but short weekend. I'm glad to be back in Copenhagen for my last week in Denmark. Since I have no class, I'm spending my time shopping, sight-seeing, and finally celebrating a little Christmas on Saturday night. My host family will show me all the Danish Jul traditions, I can't wait!

Mine Venner i Danmark- My Friends in Denmark

I have been so lucky this month! Usually November is sort of a cold, boring month except for Thanksgiving. But this year, I've spent my November with my whole family, and several friends from home coming to see me in Denmark.

For Thanksgiving, Eliza Giroux flew from Vermont to Copenhagen to see me! She spent almost a full week here at my host family's house, and I got to show off my new city.

The day after she came, Krysti and Jessica came to Copenhagen! Krysti has been studying in Berlin, and Jessica flew out to have a tour of Europe with her. So the four of us girls had a lot of fun seeing the sights of Copenhagen, trying all the Danish food (smørrebrød, pastries, Christmas treats, cider, pølser...), and trying out a Danish club. I took them to see the Little Mermaid (Den lille havfrue)--which I still hadn't seen! She's been in Shanghai up until recently, at the World Expo. We walked on Strøget, checked out the Nyhavn Christmas market, visited Christiania, the Black Diamond, and the Danish Museum of Resistance.

Then, to continue my fun week of visitors, Marion came to Copenhagen on Saturday! She could only stay one night, but it was a good night to pick :-). Eliza and I made an entire Thanksgiving Dinner for 8 people. Neither or us had cooked a turkey before, or several of the other dishes. There weren't any big catastrophes- actually it was quite a success! Some little things went wrong...like I bought some weird vegetable when I thought I was getting sweet potatoes. But it was still delicious! For dessert, of course, we had two pies: pumpkin and apple.

The day after Thanksgiving, Eliza, Marion and I spent a great day in Tivoli. Right now, it's completely decorated for Christmas. There are lights everywhere, a Christmas market, elves playing Christmas songs, ice sculptures, Christmas glog and æbleskiver (a Christmas dessert/pastry), and many other things!

Too much to say, so far behind

So I've missed about a month's worth of events on my blog, sorry that I'm so far behind! I had a couple of weeks of school that were hectic because we had a lot of duedates then. I enjoyed a fun weekend with Fiona Allen, who came to visit for the weekend. It was so nice to see another Vermonter!

Then I enjoyed TWO WEEKS of break! Mom, Dad, Brian and Emily all flew to Copenhagen, and I spent half a week showing off my new city with them and my host family. There was much tower climbing, a lot of eating (including a big brunch with my host family), a lot of Danish beer sampling, and not nearly enough sleeping.

In Norway the five of us explored Bergen, Oslo and Drammen. We took trains, busses, and a boat to explore the Norweigan fjords which were gorgeous. It's a completely different kind of beauty from Vermont, with lots of waterfalls, lakes, tall cliffs, cute houses with grass roofs, and a very old feel to everything. We all loved it! And of course, getting to see Mom's Norwegian host family was a highlight. We met and remet so many friends, enjoyed lots of big Norwegian meals with reindeer, salmon, pølser, goats milk cheese and of course aquevit.

Then it was on to see our next adopted European family! We (except Brian, he had to fly back to work) stayed with Marion and her family in Northern France. Again, everyone was so hospitable. We spent days in Bruges, Paris, and Lille. While we were there, we celebrated Marion's birthday with her family! This included a surprise (surprise for my family, everyone else knew what was going on!) dinner at the cabaret! What an experience, everyone had a great time singing to the songs, waving our napkins, and watching the performances.

And now I'm back in Copenhagen with my host family, and starting to realize how much work I have to do in the next couple of weeks! I miss the Colorado College block plan, where we only have one big thing due at a time. But, I have Thanksgiving to look forward too, with visits from Eliza, Marion, Jessica, Phil and Krysti!!!

I'm only putting a few pictures on this post, but there are ton on my facebook to see.

***To get a much better, much more detailed, post on our trip, look at my Dad's blog. He's way better about blogging than I am!!!***

Min Danske Fødselsdag

My Danish Birthday was very memorable! I woke up at 6:30am for my early class on Monday Morning, October 18, and by the time I was ready to go upstairs and eat breakfast, Nina, Brian, Stine, Lasse and even Lasse's friend who'd spent the night, were all awake around a beautiful breakfast table. As soon as I got upstairs they started singing the Danish birthday song...I was just amazed, and so happy! And this was on the first day of vacation for everyone, but they still got up and ate breakfast with me while it was still dark out, so that I could experience a traditional Danish birthday breakfast.

When I got home from class, Nina and Stine immediately took me in the car for a surprise trip. We ended up at the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, and spent a really nice afternoon wandering through the galleries together. We had a really good time trying to "interpret" the modern, abstract art...it was really funny :-). In this picture, Stine and I are enjoying the cafe with a view of the strait between Denmark and Sweden. I tried some delicious "kage" and "varm chocolade".

For dinner we used the really cool grill you put in the middle of the table and cook as you eat...I can't ever seem to remember the right name for it, but I had this type of meal once before at the Destoops house in France. It's so much fun, and a great social way to enjoy and cook and meal. Then for dessert my host family made me the traditional "lagkage" which means layer cake. They make theirs with raspberries and blackberries, it was very "lækker"!

Legoland: Being a Kid Again

In case it wasn't obvious, LEGO is a Danish Company! It started production in 1923, and the same family has owned the business the whole time. I visited Legoland in Jutland with DIS October 17th. It's a themepark, with lots and lots of examples of the amazing things you can do with Legos. Below is a model of "Nyhavn" in Copenhagen. It looks exactly right!

Fun facts about Legos: there are about 62 bricks per person on this planet - LEg GOdt= play well - won "Toy of the Century" - about 7 Lego sets are sold each minute - children of the world spend about 5 billion hours a year playing with Legos - there are 914 ways to combine 6 Lego bricks

Brunch!

Food is always a fun thing to talk about. I had my first Danish brunch on the weekend I got back from England. It was so pleasant, and a LOT of food! The Danes all think it's very American to have big brunch, which I agree, but I can't say I've ever had one this big. My picture is from before the table was fully set, so you can't quite see the extent of the dishes. The plates didn't all fit on the table, and throughout the meal more things kept coming out the ovening!

I contributed by cooking American pancakes, with apple, and banana bread muffins. They were enjoyed, but the Danes don't eat as many sweet things for breakfast as we do. Our dishes included the typical "bøller", which are a certain kind of rolls, omlette, a chorizo, egg and cheese tart, scrambled eggs with smoked salmon, fresh fruit, homemade juice, bacon, bacon wrapped around chorizo with mushrooms. Then we had to have four glasses for the juice, water, coffee/tea, and champagne.

Notice the Royal Copenhagen dishes! That's what we use for company.

We had so many leftovers we had all of this again for dinner...though I wasn't hungry again by evening!

I'll be "retailiating" with a traditional American Thanksgiving in a month :-). Marion and Eliza will help me cook up a feast, I can't wait!!!

English Countryside: Devon

Devon is a beautiful place! I think it's the countrygirl in me that was very relieved to see green rolling hills again after the very busy, very crowded London scene. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed London, but Devon was so pleasant and beautiful.

The fact that we eat really well while we there probably helped too! We had an entire day basically about FOOD. Organic, homegrown, fresh, food. One of the best visits of the whole week was to Riverford Organic Farms, where we had a tour and tried some of the vegetables in the field.

Afterwards we were led to the Field Kitchen, below, where they fed us a huge, family style meal. The only meat we had was a little bit of duck, and besides that it was lots and lots of vegetables. I think it may have been the best meal of my life. The meal did not fit the English food stereotype at all! The cooks were gourment-trained cooks from London, and I think it may have been an expensive meal, but it was on DIS's bill. I, like most of the other students, couldn't resist buying a cookbook before leaving.

Besides the food being amazing (it really was, everywhere we ate) we stayed in what I'd call a mansion! It was the Sharpham Estate, below, where we slept, had class, and toured the grounds. I want to say the building is from the 1700s. Inside is a huge spiral staircase winding up three stories. I stayed on the top floor with a beautiful view of the River Dart and the surrounding valley.

Tea Time

Afternoon tea at the Orangery in Kensington Gardens was definitely a highlight on the London trip! It is set near the Kensington Palace, and is a popular place for a traditional English tea.

The Orangery was built in 1704 for Queen Anne as a sort of green house (which I assume is why it's called the Orangery). The restaurant used to be a favorite of Princess Diana; she lived in the Kensington Palace.

Our DIS schedule recommended the Orangery as "HIGHLY RECOMMENDED! FOOD & SETTING AMAZING"...how could I not go? The description included enticing phrases such as "head for the gleam of starched white linen glistening through the Orangery's spectacular floor-to-ceiling windows....A truly English experience!"

Anyone who says English food is bad is not talking about their tea. I ordered the Orange Breakfast tea with the classic tea meal. It came on the plates as seen above, with cucumber, salmon and ham sandwiches on the bottom, an orange-flavored scone in the middle and delicious pastries on the top.

Cheers!

Yankees in London

Last week my Sustainability in Europe (SIE) class visited England on our Long Study Tour. DIS does a really great job of planning educational and cultural visits to some big European city for every program they run. We were given plenty of free time in the afternoons to explore the city. My visits included Westminster Abbey, above, and Big Ben right next to it (bottom). I always think of Peter Pan when I see that tower!

I've been to London once before, with Marion, Eliza and Georg. It was a whirlwind trip back in July 2008 and we tried to pack as much into one day as we could! This time I was able to see some new places, such as Kensington Palace and Gardens, The Lloyd and Gherkin Buildings, and the Monument to the Great Fire. Karen and I climbed to the top of that one...there were 311 spiral steps to get up the 202 foot tower! I also went back to the Tower of London and went inside this time, where you can see the crown jewels, lots of armour, and 6 ravens. The legend behind that is that if they leave, the kingdom will fall. I believe it actually a law in England.

Notice the skirt I'm wearing on this day! Actually, almost everything I'm wearing that day I bought recently in Copenhagen. (The lovely scarf was a gift from Eliza when she studied in Rome) Shopping is going to be (rather, IS) a major problem here. All the shops have cute clothes, and everyday when I get out of class I step right on to the main pedestrian shopping street "Strøget". So if I'm in a bad mood, had a bad class, celebrating that it's Friday, trying to get through a Monday, if I'm in a really good mood, if I just went to the ATM....I'm tempted to shop!

A Day at the Zoo and a Skirt Story

On a rare weekend when I was actually home, my host family took me to the Copenhagen Zoo! They have a foster child, Siff, who comes and stays with us every Wednesday and some weekends. She's four, and adorable. So all of us packed into the car, and drove to Fredericksborg where the zoo is.

Brian and Nina were very helpful in that they stopped in downtown Copenhagen on the way there, so I could exchange a skirt! I had bought this very pretty, very professional pencil skirt for my business trips in London. I tried it on for a second time when I got home Friday afternoon, and the zipper decided to stop working! So I was stuck in this kind of expensive pencil skirt until Nina came home and could help me. Nobody could get the zipper unstuck...we tried everything from liquid soap, candle wax and a needle.

Finally we gave up and called the story, to see if we could cut it off and then get a new one! They agreed, and set one aside for me to pick up Saturday morning. In the end, were able to forcefully yank the zipper and avoid using scissors. But, just to make sure I could still get a new one, Nina cut the fabric a little by the zipper. It worked, and I looked very professional in my NEW skirt in London while visiting Transport for London!

My Day in a Danish Prison

On Wednesday, my Crimonology and Criminal Justice in Scandinavia Class went to Jyderup State Prison, about 60 minutes outside Copenhagen. Jyderup is one of about 11 open prisons in the country, which altogether can hold 1,470 prisoners. There are 5 closed prisons, with a capacity of 762 prisoners.

Open prisons are now a "cornerstone of the Danish Prison system" with the goal of "the deprivation of liberty, not...harsh living conditions." [Oct 1996 "Jyderup State Prison" Pamphlet, by Governor Hans Jørgen Engo]. This means there aren't bars on the windows, a ring wall, or electronic surveillance. The fence that is there is only to keep other people out! But the gate is usually open during the day, so it's easy to drive in or out.

The goals of the Danish Prison and Probation Service are: normalization, openness, responsibility, security, least possible interference and optimum use of resources.

So, our visit was VERY interesting. My group was led around by prison staff and one of the prisoners. He was serving four months for punching a guy twice in the face, but he also had a record before from being part of Bandidos, the biker gang (arch-rivals of Hells Angels, they fought in the "Great Nordic Biker War" at the end of the 1990s). We saw the wood workshop where some prisoners made staircases and other such projects, the iron workshop where they did custom ironworks, such as a decoration for a church, the kitchen where some worked and the construction project the youth were working on.

Everyone in Danish prisons are required to work, usually they do so at the prison, and they were paid by the hour for their work. It is less than minimum wage, because obviously they have free housing, but they do pay for their own food. The prisoners have their own kitchens to prepare their food in, and they buy food at the on-site store (where the prices are ridiculous). Some prisoners get special permission after a while to work off-site. Our guide was an example, everyday he takes the train to his old job where he works with school kids who have problems with the law.

As American students, the things we found really strange to find in a prison were knives for cooking, machines to do their work (saws, iron-working tools, etc), TVs in the youth cells, a tanning bed!, and prisoners walking around in their own clothes-not orange jumpsuits. Sometimes on the tour, it felt like I was being shown around a college campus...that's how nice and normal it was.

So does it work? That's the big question, why would Danish people avoid crime if they can end up at a place like this??? The statistics to think about are:

- The US has 714 prisoners per 100,000 people, the highest rate in the world.

- England, comparison, has the highest rate in Western Europe at 142 per 100,000

- Denmark has 63 per 100,000 (and the average prison sentence is about 6 months)

Recidivism rates (for released prisoners):

- US: about 60%

- UK: about 50%

- Denmark: 30%

Of course, there are lot of other factors to consider. But it's something to think about! If you're intrigued, check out the Danish Prison and Probation Service.

Weekend with Marion

I got to spend a lovely weekend with Marion this past weekend! She flew in from Brussels on Friday night and stayed through Monday afternoon. Our adventures on Saturday included window shopping, real shopping, lunch on the harbor, Canal Tour (as shown above) with my host sister Stine, and then all of us meeting up with Dan, who also studied at Lamoille when Marion did. We walked around Nyhavn, Strøget and to the Royal Palace, and I even made Marion experience Copenhagen the way you're supposed to: by bike! During our walk we found this fountain full of bubbles..so of course we had to play in it.

After sleeping in on Sunday, we made American Pancakes (with REAL Putnam Family Farm Maple Syrup) and biked to Fredericksberg, where the Carlsberg Brewery is. We took the self-guided tour, which ended with free samples of Carlsberg or Tuborg beer. Then we walked around the parks of Fredericksberg...but apparently we missed the beautiful gardens I meant to see! Good thing I'm going back this weekend with my host family, so I'll know my way around. (We're actually going to the zoo! Which is in the same area)

Our cooking adventures continued with quesadillas, homemade guacamole, salad, and French cake for dinner with my host family. So good! They'd never had quesadillas before, so that was exciting! In the morning us three girls made French toast, again with the real maple syrup.

The shopping continued on Monday, of course! Then Marion checked out a cool tower while I was in Danish class (I'd already missed one class that morning, so I thought I should go to at least one!) and then in the afternoon we explored the King's Garden and Rosenburg Palace (built by Christian IV, as a summer house for the royal family).

Tivoli!

My host sister, Stine, and I visited the 104 year old theme park situated in the middle of downtown København: Tivoli. We were SO lucky, we had a beautiful sunny day, an afternoon where neither of us had class, and free passes to get in! (Stine had a season pass, I had a DIS discount) The rides did cost us 205 kr. but they were definitely worth it! We barely waited in line, and we got to try all the rides.

These are two of my favorite: on the left, "Vertigo" and flying swings on the right. They are 30m and 50m high. You can get some really nice views of the city up there! If you're not terrified the whole time anyway. I definitely was on Vertigo! That ride has an "interactive" option (which we opted out of!) to control the plane on your own, so that it twists and turns and goes backwards.

But besides the rides, the park is actually very pretty. There are lots of fountains, lakes, gardens, birds (including a peacock!) and even a ship you can eat dinner on. There a lot of very nice restaurants, Hard Rock Cafe Copenhagen is there, and cute shops everywhere. We didn't spend any money besides our ride passes...og en is!

Windy Day

First, watch this video. It's great, but make sure you watch the whole thing.

They Energy Academy I mentioned showed us this video, so funny...I had to share. Wind is so important in Samsø (and in Denmark in general), it's easy to see how they get excited about wind power! I wanted to elaborate on the most exciting part of my weekend in Samsø, the wind turbine we visited.

The farmer who owned it turned off the wind turbine for an hour so we could climb up it! We did pay him back for the lost profit (I think it was a couple hundred dollars??). There are ladders on the inside, connecting about 8 platforms so that it's easy to climb up. It was a little scary though, you can feel the whole thing swaying! The whole tower was 50m, and the propellers were 27 meters I think?

I planned it so I went up with the last group of students to the top, just because I wanted to hear what our guide knew about the contruction, costs, etc. It turns out that was a great idea, because our guide knew we were in for a treat if we went last! The farmer turned the power back on while we were on the top, with a warning to not tell his insurance company! He can lower the sides the capsule so you are in the open air and have 360 views. So, all 10 of us crouched down on the top and watched as the propellers started to turn...what a rush! It was a very windy day, so it was a little terrifying, but mostly just amazing!

Sustainble Samsø

Samsø is an adorable, tiny, island in the middle of Denmark. Home to about 4,000 people, it managed to win a government competition to be completely sustainble. It's 10 wind turbines and 11 off-shore wind turbines provide all of the island's electricity and often more, which they sell back to the grid.

I had an amazing weekend exploring the island with DIS, and once again, we were lucky with no rain! We did a lot of biking and walking, and took the train and ferry to get there. I guess we had to stick to the 'sustainable' theme of the trip! We visited the energy academy, there's a great Time Magazine article about Soren, the guy who runs it and who talked to our group. The exciting bits of the trip included visiting a windmill, walking along the coast, visiting an organic brewery, and lots of cute rural towns.

What is Danish Design?

For my Danish Design class, we visited several design-related places on Wednesday. First, with some classmates, I looked at the Danish Museum of Art and Design where we supposed to explore 'My Precious', Margit Brandt's fashion exhibition, and 'Utopia and Reality'. Definitely going back there sometime, it's fun to see all the famous pieces we talked about in class and really be able to appreciate them! Arne Jacobsen's chairs for example are "very Danish" and the new "Nobody Chair" (made entirely of recycled materials).

In the afternoon, the whole classs met up to basically go window shopping together! On the main pedestrian shopping street in København, Strøget, there are three connected shops that we saw : Illums Bolighus, Royal Copenhagen and Georg Jensen. There's no way I can afford anything in the last two shops, but everything is gorgeous to look at! We were lucky enough to watch a Royal Copenhagen artist demonstrate painting the porcelain. Before the pieces are done, 30 people touch each plate, bowl, mug, etc. A 30cm plate in the "Mega" line is about 800kr...about $140 for one plate!!!

Enjoy the picture above! Once again, I couldn't limit myself so I had to do a slideshow. Be sure to read the captions (it's easier once you click out of the ad).