It’s that time of the year. When, although it may not be any warmer, you can tell the winter is waning. When, although I didn’t think I minded the dark of dead winter, I feel a profound sense of relief. When suddenly, I don’t need lights on my bike when I leave work.
I took these on my ride home after work this week. Compared to the shortest day of the year, there are now two and half extra hours of light every day. And the shortest day of the year was only eight weeks ago.
It may be over three months late, the nevertheless, the pictures that Lisbeth and I took with the family when we visited the Western Danish coast after the wedding are finally posted.
This year I spent New Years in Copenhagen for the first time, having been invited to a party by our friends Anja and Torben. I’d heard a lot about it, and it sounded like fun. Indeed it is fun, but unfortunately I was completely jet-lagged, having gotten back from New Mexico the previous day. I was so tired that I fell asleep on the couch of people I’d only just met, with five adults and three kids running around.
Apparently I thought that since Americans have a special relationship with fireworks, Europeans didn’t. It turns out that Europeans (or Danes and Germans at least) LOVE fireworks. Our fourth-of-July is their New Years Eve.
They love fireworks so much that some of them drive four hours to Germany, where they can purchase fireworks that are illegal in Denmark. They love fireworks so much that some fireworks are ignited at the dinner table. They like fireworks so much that extra fire fighters, paramedics, and clean-up crews have to be deployed.
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Pictures from my trip to New Mexico for Christmas are posted.
Perhaps it’s just because I’ve been busy. Perhaps it’s because it’s winter. Perhaps it’s because I’ve lived in Copenhagen for almost three years now and just don’t find it as exotic as I did before.
Whatever the reason, I haven’t felt as motivated to take pictures recently. And so, last week when I managed to pull my camera out of my bag and snap a few pictures, it seemed worth posting.
Magasin is the iconic department store in Denmark. Most big cities in Denmark have one, but the one in Copenhagen is clearly the flagship — sort of a Danish version of Macy’s in Manhattan, I suppose, never having been there…
At any rate, it looks pretty nice at Christmas.
As a way of thanking Lisbeth’s parents for all they did for the wedding, we took them on a tour called Sort Sol, which means black sun. It’s the nightly resting place of the starling, which settles in massive flocks in different areas in Southern Denmark as part of migration. We were told that this particular night there were up to 600,000 birds.
We were also told that one of the reasons that the location varies is because people (who are not, it was made clear, on one of their tours) occasionally use loud noises to rouse the birds once they settle in order to see them darken the sky again. Read More →
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I’m no wedding expert, but I’ve been to enough to know that the couple getting married doesn’t always have a very good time. It’s easy to see why, with all the planning, the expectations, the logistics, and the fact that — hopefully — you only have one chance to get it right. So I was a little surprised that it was such a fantastic day, and we enjoyed ourselves so much. That’s not to say that it was perfect, but the imperfections were harmless and pretty funny.
There were a lot of things about this wedding that weren’t like others I’ve been to. For example, Lisbeth made the wedding cake. It’s not unusual for the bride to make the cake in Denmark, but I’ve never heard of that in the US. (It was utterly fantastic cake!)
The party (or reception as it’s generally called in the states) was held in the back yard at Lisbeth’s parents’ house. If you’ve been following this blog then you know that they live in a really pretty setting, and so there was no debate where we wanted to have the party. Read More →
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On Saturday, September 20th, Lisbeth and I were married in her hometown, Vejle. We’re both very pleased with the way everything went. The weather was great, the service was beautiful, and the party afterwards was a lot of fun. More here.
My least favorite part of living in Denmark is the scooters. I wouldn’t mind so much if they were limited to the street, but they aren’t. Most are on the bike lanes. Worse yet, they are there legally.
There are two types of scooters: those that are speed-limited, and those that aren’t. The speed limited ones are required to use the bike lanes by law. Their speed is limited to around 30 km/h (about 18 mph), which is just a bit faster than I often ride my bike. So when one passes you, it does so slowly, and then you’re stuck behind a machine that’s spitting out 2-stroke oil. Then you have a choice — slow way down or breath fumes.
But some of the scooters are on the bike lanes illegally because they aren’t speed-regulated. Apparently it’s easy to modify a speed-limited scooter to be a un-regulated. So it’s not unusual to by passed by a scooter that’s going two or three times faster than you are. That’s much more dangerous. So, it’s either be subjected to fumes or be overtaken suddenly and at speed.
That’s bad enough, but scooter drivers seem to be annoyed by all the bikes in the “bike” lane. They honk their honks and blow past you as if you had no right to be there. And then you get to wait at red lights with them, inhaling more fumes.
And all the while I can’t understand why it’s legal for a motorized vehicle to travel in the bike lanes in the first place.
Earlier this month we went to Århus to visit Hanne and Kaspar and to attend the party the collective they live in throws every year. The party is for the Arbejdernes internationale kampdag, or “worker’s international fight day”, which Americans know as Labour Day.
I’m embarrassed to admit it, but ‘ve never really thought much about labour day before. I just took the eight-hour workday for granted, but it had to be fought for. In Denmark labour day is very much a socialist day. Hence the red flag outside the house. Read More →
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