Hihi Denmark!

I’ve had a lot of great experiences while abroad; it’s awful hard to just pick one. I guess, if I had to chose, I’d say I really had a great time during my visit to Copenhagen. I went to the town the weekend I was leaving for Poland. Kristine, one of my coworkers, and I had this plan that I could just get a plane ticket from Copenhagen to Poland, and then that weekend I would come and spend at her place. And so it went!

In the morning, Kristine came to pick me up for work. I found her wandering the front garden in a daze. After running out the door to inform her that, yes, she had FINALLY found the right house; we lugged all of my 40kg of baggage into her little car. My last day went well, though it was so very sad saying good bye to everyone. As the work day ended and Kristine and I headed out the door, there was still one glaring problem. Oh yes, this extra 20kg of baggage that I had no idea what to do with. Apparently, you can take 40kg of stuff into Europe, but you can only travel within Europe with 20kg. Who thought of this? So we drove to Arhus, where we would take the bus from, and stopped at the post office. I guess I just settled on stuffing that huge duffel bag onto a boat and hoping for the best. It was pretty funny, we wrapped the bag up with packing tape and sent it off. That bag looked pitiful! Let’s hope I see that thing again sometime this year. Doubtful! Whatever, I remember it felt so great to now have my baggage reduced by half. So we took the bus into Arhus, and took another bus to Copenhagen, and then, wow, we took a ferry. Now I mean this seriously, that may have been the coolest kind of transportation I have ever taken. That thing was HUGE! And speedy as well. Oh man, I was in total awe of this contraption. The whole bus fit on there, along with hundreds of other cars. Sweet deal. After the ferry we got back on the bus. It was really nice getting to see the other part of Denmark, as I feel I’ve seen the majority of Jutland. It was a lot of travelling for one day, but I think by now I should be used to that. At last we made it to Copenhagen! It’s such a beautiful town. It’s got that old European feel that I find so familiar, but it isn’t as stodgy as a lot of other places I’ve been. It was just very happy, vibrant, and alive. Upon arrival to Kristine’s apartment, we were met by her boyfriends, Mads, who had cooked us a lovely meal. Now there’s a man worth keeping around =)

The next morning was actually pretty hilarious. I woke up around 10 and was just lying there, thinking about getting up, when suddenly I hear a click and the stereo comes on. And it’s loud. I jolt up as there’s some CD that’s magically started playing in the room. I’m a little bewildered, but I say to myself, ‘haha, Kristine has probably set an alarm on it or something to get your lazy self out of bed!’ So up I go and wander into the hallway, where Kristine and Mads are staring at me with wide eyes. ‘Did you just turn that on?’ they ask. Well no, of course I didn’t. That thing just… started playing. We couldn’t figure out what happened all weekend. It is a mystery to this day, dun dun duuuuun! What an interesting way to start the day! Kristine and I finally managed to work our way out around noon and took the Metro, this subway/train system in Copenhagen, to get to the middle of the town. Oh the Metro was so nice, about 1000x cleaner and less shady than Chicago’s L. I miss it already. We really managed to fit a whole lot into one short day, now that I’m looking back on it. We took a boat tour of the harbor town, which was amazing to say the least, visited a few essential Copenhagen landmarks, shopped, went to see a movie, sat around on the harbor and watched weird looking people, and just walked around the streets at night. One thing we saw that day really is stuck in my mind, only because it was so hilarious that I almost fell over laughing. We were walking through one of the main town squares when we happened upon these American Indians playing music, singing, and dancing in the square. At first, I got a little sad, as I got all reminiscent of the Chief, but then hilarity ensued. There were these two old men sitting in the square, drunk as skunks, and when the music started, they got up and started dancing. One of them was wearing this big woolen sweater, and he was just boogie-ing in one spot, but the other guy, he was just SO into it. He was jammin’ to the beat! I didn’t know old people could dance that fast, but this guy did. He was twirling around, tapping his feet, and making these really intense faces. Every once in a while he flashed his old toothless grin and just danced away. The sweater guy got tired after a while, but not this one, he went on for a long time. Omg it was hilarious, I guess probably one of those ‘you had to have been there’ moments, but I will never forget it as long as I live.

I love Copenhagen. I’m coming back next year… hopefully I’m still not broke.

It was a bummer once the weekend was over, but I was eager to get to see my family in Poland, as I hadn’t been back in over three years. But oh, typical typical, my life is never that simple. We made it to the airport just fine, and I went to check my bags in and get my boarding pass. Great surprise my baggage is overweight! (This is the theme of my whole summer, actually, because the same thing happened in Poland, except more complicated) 4kg to be exact. Kristine and I just stood there for a while. ‘So now what?’ she asked me. ‘I guess…. I’ll… take some stuff out?’ was the answer. So I threw a few of the heavier looking things into my carry on, and at the end of all of this, I really looked like a bag lady carrying around all of her clothes or something. I really think the lady behind the counter felt bad for me, because my bag was still 2 kg over, but she let it slide. Success! Kristine and I finally said our good byes; she’s an awesome girl, I hope we meet again some day. And just like that, I was on the plane and gone from Denmark. Where did the time go?

The thing I now feel I missed out on, I didn’t actually know I was missing out on it when it was going on. Does that make sense? Hm, probably not, but maybe it will. Every summer, Denmark hosts one of the largest music festivals in Europe. The whole thing lasts over a few days, maybe even a week, I’m not sure. Basically you can camp out there in tent, hang out with people and listen to music. I heard that it was happening when I first got to Denmark, but I didn’t actually want to go until after it happened. Two of the younger women who I worked with went, Kristine being one of them, and from what they told me, it just sounded amazing. There were a lot of well known bands this year, like Coldplay, Kanye West, Nine Inch Nails, etc. Every year there is someone different and exciting playing at Roskilde; I think in general there are over a hundred bands playing there. The whole week after I just heard story after story, and with every one I felt like I missed out more and more. Of course, thinking logically, I couldn’t have been able to make it over there because of work; I don’t think I could’ve taken a few days off just to go run around and have fun.

I have this crazy idea to come back and see it next year, if the line up is good. As far as my motivation to experience this goes, well, I’m not exactly sure. It’s just one of those gut feeling you get when you really want something. It’s really in my character, to go see something like this; I love loud music and big crowds. I think it would be so overwhelmingly amazing. I think, when I get home, I am going to start recruiting people to come with me. Huzzah!