'Farvel'

CPH
27 degrees, snowing

Here I am, 120 days later, writing to you on my last night in Denmark.  What a country.  What a semester.
I don't think it is possible to sum everything up here.  Instead I will tell you about something the Danes call 'hygge' which just might be my favorite thing I'll take away from my time here.  There is no direct translation into english which makes it an even more Danish concept.  It is a noun, an adjective, a verb, a concept, a state of mind, a feeling, a habit.  In its most basic form it is a cozy warm feeling.  But, it is so much more than that.

Hygge is spending the evening sitting around the dinner table with family or friends just enjoying each others company.  It's delicious smells and tastes. It's living in the moment and really appreciating all the good things in your life.  It's books and wool socks.  It's walking through the snow on a cold cold day and having hot chocolate waiting for you at the end of the journey. It's candles and blankets.  It's catching up with old friends.  All of these things and SO many more can be described as hyggeligt.

And sometimes it's not as obvious as lighting candles and wrapping yourself in a blanket.  Sometimes the hygge sneaks up on you.  Sometimes it's just walking down the street and realizing 'Hey! I am in Denmark and what an amazing place this is.'

I hope to come back here someday but until then,

I wish you all the hygge in the world
thanks for reading

Allison

716 unites at Agnes cupcakes

CPH
20 degrees

It's always "sunny" in copenhagen.

I am not writing this entry to quip about the weather.  What I wanted to share with you is a little encounter I had in a cupcake cafe yesterday.  First I'll explain how I ended up in said cupcake cafe. 

It is finals week here at DIS so I have had a sizable amount of work to get done.  Add that to the mild case of insomnia that has been plaguing me for the past week or so and you get... well... you get some interesting side effects.  On Tuesday I turned in my term paper and took my Environmental Economics final and by the time I was done I was feeling pretty wiped.  But when Carolyn suggested we go get cupcakes for lunch I thought 'why not? let's throw some sugar on the situation.'  And we did just that- we ate cupcakes for lunch [they were delicious, and fancy and SO sugary - everything a cupcake should be and more].  The place was really crowded so we asked if we could share a table with two men who were there drinking coffee looking very out of place amongst a predominantly cupcake-loving-female crowd.  They said yes of course and so we got to talking.  As it turns out one of the guys studied abroad in the US... in Buffalo! So we chatted about it, played the "what street do you live on?""oh I know right where that is," game.  He studied architecture at UB and so we talked about Frank Lloyd Wright's Martin House too. 

Meeting this guy was such an incredible coincidence I just had to share it.

-Allison

 

Wednesday adventures

CPH
snow

The cultural infusion continues. 
Wednesday Caro and I went to see.. wait for it...wait for it... Den lille havfrue... the little mermaid!!

The statue was so close to the shore I couldn't believe it. 

This statue is beautiful and yet so sad somehow.

We also went to the National Museum where we saw tons of little trinkets, toys, jewelry, swords, wood carvings, paintings, statues, clothes and many many more Danish odds and ends.  I could have spent many more hours look at the collections here. 

A small clock

A goofy wooden animal head

Part of the dollhouse display

 

 

 

 

 

Period room.

More soon.

Allison

Ballet, flash mob, and a forest brewery

CPH
34 degrees, snow

Hej!
It's been a while since I've updated the ol' blog so lets get right down to it. 
A lot has happened in the last week.  It been business-as-usual at school- I am halfway done with finals just one more paper and three tests before I am home free.

I am trying to get as much Danishness into these last two weeks as I possibly can.  Here is what I have done so far.
Last week friday I went to see Sleeping Beauty (the ballet) at Det Kongelige Teater.  The whole performance was absolutely beautiful- the dancing, the costumes, the live music, the sets, you name it.  The theater is absolutely gorgeous as well.  The walls are covered in intricately carved wooden figures and moldings. And almost everything is painted gold..it is after all the king's theater.

The next stop of the night was a bit more... casual.  A flash mob in the metro!  This was the first flash mob I have ever participated in and I lurved it!  The metro car was PACKED but there was just enough space between the crowd and the ceiling for some crowd surfing ( I did not partake ).  Great, great flashmob.

On Saturday Carolyn and I headed north of the city to Ballerup in search of the Skovlyst brewery in the middle of Hareskoven forest. 

The inside of the brewery was rustic and warm.  It felt so good to step into this bright room after being outside.  Drinking beer, in a forest brewery, in a foreign country, with a great friend is an awesome memory.

Danish Humor

CPH
winter

I am giving a presentation about Danish humor next week for my Danish Language and Culture class.

Although google-ing "danish humor" doesn't yield as many hits as I would like... here is a description of Danish humor pieced together from a few different sources.
"Dry, literal, self-deprecating, pragmatic, closely linked to irony, sarcasm, ironic sarcasm, and word play that is often lost in translation"


YIKES

http://video.aol.ca/video-detail/whats-the-matter-with-denmark-pt-1/3793473276/?icid=VIDURVCOM05

 http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/thu-march-30-2006/what-s-the-matter-with-denmark----military-arrogance

vi ses

Taksigelse

CPH
35 degrees, cloudy


Here are some of today's sights from an old military base east of Copenhagen

 

And since it is after midnight here I am going to make this my thanksgiving post.  

This is the first thanksgiving I have ever spent away from home and I can't think of a better reason to be absent than to be off in Denmark.  I have a lot to be thankful for this year so even though most of Denmark doesn't technically celebrate thanksgiving I certainly will be.   

So to my family, to friends I haven't seen for a while, to friends I see here everyday, and to a certain tall-ish man friend - thanks, for being so great.  Oh and happy thanksgiving!

with love, 

Allison

Tis the Season

CPH
35 degrees, windy (understatement) and wintery mix

Thumbs down to who ever coined the phrase "wintery mix."  It's raining and it's snowing, just tell it like it is.  "Wintery mix" sounds like some sort of mixed bowl of holiday candy and treats - IT COULD NOT BE FURTHER FROM A BOWL OF CANDY.

There are better ways of spreading holiday cheer than to try and sneak it into the weather forecast.  Copenhagen is actually quite good at the whole christmas look.  Here are a few pix I snapped on the way to school (before the weather started).

Makes you feel all warm and christmas-y inside doesn't it?

vi ses

Allison

Do it like DIS

CPH
42 degrees, windy

Here is a depressing fact

November 22, 2010
7:58 Sunrise
3:53 Sunset

COME ON. No seriously, come on...

But let's move on to some happier news.

For those of you who know me (and I am assuming that most everyone reading this does, in fact, know me), you know that I like to design t-shirts.  My "portfolio" has had limited "success" in the past.  But I have moved on to greener pastures aka Denmark.  Maybe it's the water, or maybe it's all the rye bread i'm eating I DON"T KNOW, i just don't know what it is but I am on my A game because... wait for it...my group's t-shirt was chosen out of hundreds (out of 9), through a system of rigorous judging and voting (a "like" count on facebook) to emerge VICTORIOUS as the new DIS Fall 2010 T-shirt...!!!

Limited Edition 2010

Feast your eyes people.  This one goes in the win column.

Courtin out

Field Study to Aarstiderne Farm

CPH
44 degrees, cloudy

Hello all,
My first post since my glorious return to Denmark.  Just kidding- it wasn't glorious what with all the turbulence on the flight back, and the overpowering wind tossing us around as we stepped off the plane onto the tarmac.  Cool Denmark, really cool.  Haha get it? Cool?  Right well anyways... I'm back!

Today is wednesday and you know what that means- field study!

With my Environmental Economics class, I headed up towards Helsinør to Aarstiderne Farm which is an organic farm that is in the business of delivering boxes of vegetables and fruit to households all over Denmark and Sweden.

The buildings and the grounds of Aarstiderne are quite beautiful.

 I loved this yellow barn, the inside was full of hay and seemed like a pretty good place to live if I were, say, a farm animal.

Inside of the barn

This is the farmhouse where most of the administrative and public events take place.  There is a meeting room, a farm shop, and a kitchen where the "field to stomach" mantra of Aarstiderne takes shape.

We took a short walk around the fields and then headed into the farmhouse for a quick presentation on the business and some hot coffee.
Today was pretty chilly so I decided to embrace one of the Danes' wardrobe tricks- I tucked my pants into my socks and friends it was shockingly comfortable not to mention trendy as hell (in Denmark at least).  In fact, I'm rocking the tuck right now and frankly I may never go back to wearing my pants outside my sock...
Fashion snobs beware, I am bringing this to America so get all the judgement out of your system now.

till the next,
Allison

Last days in Greece

Athens, Greece
74 degrees, sunny

Our second day in Athens was mostly spent in museums, the Museum of Popular Greek Instruments, and the National Archaeological museum.  We also strolled through another agora of the Roman persuasion and then back to the olympic stadium.
The Olympic Stadium comes in at number one on the list of cool stuff I saw yesterday.  

        

          

I know I know a lot of pictures but I just thought being in this stadium was amazing!  Even if you aren't nutty about the olympics like, say, me the structure of the stadium in and of itself is impressive.  The whole thing is made of marble.  You can get 70,000 plus people in it and there is a pretty great view from almost every seat.  

Some of my other favorite sights of the day was the sculpture collection at the National Archaeological Museum. 

 There were also some really neat sculptures found underwater off the coast of athens.

we walked around the city until the sun went down, grabbed some dinner on a rooftop cafe near the acropolis, and then headed to the train station where we took a night train back to Thessaloniki.  

The night train was hellish.  Hot, noisy, people speaking loudly in greek, and bright- conditions not conducive to sleeping in the least.  

Today, in Thessaloniki we searched unsuccessfully for one of the public museums the New York Times suggested.  We went to a greek orthodox church instead which was insanely ornate and fragrant.  We came across many other mosques and churches all of which were closed.  So instead we played cards in the park, watched a pack of dogs wrestle, and just hung out enjoying the sunshine.

Tomorrow, at 11 we begin our travels back to Copenhagen.  I can't believe how fast this break has gone by.  There have been so many great experiences all packed into a short amount of time! 

More from the north

Allison

Don't eat the olives

Athens, Greece
74 degrees, sun with clouds

Picture this:  Me.  Sitting on a balcony.  Eating olives that I bought at the athens market and they are delicious and tasty.  Looking at this.

SHAZAM

not. too.shabby

Athens is a pretty cool place.  We are staying in the plaka area which is right near the acropolis as you can see.
Before I tell you about today, let me go back 24 hours and tell you about the dinner I had with a greek family.  Dr. Lakis Nikolaou, who is a friend of Alex's family, had us over to his house to meet and greet his family and then go out to eat with them at a greek 'tavern.'  His house is pretty unbelievable.  First of all it's huge.  The second point about it is that it looks like some sort of decorating bomb went off inside the house.  Every surface is covered in something shinny which I believe is an accurate reflection of his wife's personality- vivacious, and some sort of North Carolina/Greece hybrid (they lived in North Carolina for a time).  Anywho, their choice of decor is not the point.  The point is dinner, which was awesome.  We ate with our two hosts and their three children Anna, Olga, and Costas who are all older than us.  Anna and Olga went to school at UNC and Duke so we got to swap study-abroad stories with them which I really enjoyed.
We gave them full control over ordering food so we could get a good sense of what a greek dinner is actually like.  Tzatziki, lamb and potatoes, crispy lamb, cheese pie, beet salad, a spinach-like salad (which they described as grass), fried potatoes, salad with feta, fried zucchini, and lots of yogurt and honey for dessert.  I coulnd't help laughing at the amount of food I was being served- lamb, lamb again, potatoes and lamb- it was all delicious though.  We spent four hours eating and talking and eating.  It is a dinner I won't soon forget.

Now on to today.
We started by heading up to the acropolis like good little tourists.  It was a beautiful, clear day so we got great views from the top

As an objective third party I would like to express my concern over the pace of the acropolis reconstruction project.  Furthermore I would like to give a "wag of the finger" to the previous unsuccessful reconstruction projects, which now need to be corrected.  That aside. The acropolis is great!

I think my favorite part about visiting was all the old marble.  **Nerd alert** Its cool to imagine the hundreds of thousands of people who walked around up here and what they were doing.    

Next we headed to the agora for some more ruin-y goodness.  

Here is one thing you shouldn't do when you go to the agora, or anywhere in greece for that matter, don't eat the olives from the trees.  Just don't do it.  I did and I'll tell you it is disgusting.  It didn't even taste like olive oil, or even like an olive! 

So if you ever go to the agora and see some ignorant tourist spitting near an olive tree try not to judge them too harshly I'm sure it seemed like a good idea at the time.

We also got a chance to see the Temple of the Olympian Zeus.  Or the former temple known as the temple of the ... you get it- there isn't a lot left.

A few laps around this and we were on our way once more to the National Gardens which is a great little park in the middle of the city.  

To end the day we walked to the original olympic stadium. We didn't get to go in because we got there a little too late but I'd like to go back tomorrow if we have time and walk a lap or two.  

There is SO much to see in this city.  So many gorgeous historic sites but also some really beautiful, quiet back streets.

The city, like this goofy-ass dog, can just sneak up on you and charm your socks off when you least expect it.    

 

The dog- named cow (by me) followed us home from the stadium.  I wish I had something other than olives to feed him.

-Allison

Thessaloniki

Thessaloniki, Greece
72 degrees, sunny


Where do I begin....
Thessaloniki is not exactly the romantic Grecian paradise I envisioned it to be.  There are several reasons for this I believe.  One - it is November and thus the "off season."  Two- Greece is poorer than usual right now.  Three- Greece is taking a lot of shit for the damage they did to the economy so moral is low.  And four is that I had unusually high expectations coming away from my trip to Barcelona.  Despite these factors I like exploring the city, have met some nice people (also some very rude people), and have had some delicious Greek food.

Quick observation:
I know it is sunday and people in europe are really into sunday as a day of rest, but Greece takes it to a whole new level.  The city was covered in nappers.  Literally people were napping everywhere: benches, beaches, grassy spots, you name it - they'll nap on it.

Moving on- here's what I saw today.

The White Tower, previously the tower of blood when it was used as a prison/ torture chamber by the Ottomans, is calleed the white tower because in exchange for his freedom a slave whitewashed the entire thing.  That's a pretty big job for one guy.
At the end of the ocean walk, the tower is a symbol of the city.

A little further down the street, a statue of Alexander the Great.  Thessaloniki is named after his sister Saloniki

We took a short little boat ride around the inlet and got some pretty great views of the city.

 

We headed to the old city at the top of the hill next.  What is so incredible to me is the way the ruins of this ancient city are incorporated into the city today.  In many cases this is a good thing but it can also be a little sad to see the foundations of some ancient building covered in plastic bottles and other trash.

 

There is also a SERIOUS cat issue here.  They beg for food outside restaurants, and like many of the people here can be found nappin' all over da place.

 

We had more amazing views from the top of the hill.

We also wandered around this gorgeous monastery for a little while.  Unfortunately like everything else here today, it wasn't open.  Maybe next time.

Tomorrow I off to Athens- more from there!


Allison