Believe it or not, in 48 hours I will be arriving at Terminal 3 of the Copenhagen airport to indefinitely say goodbye to Denmark and my life of the past 4 months. It’s been three weeks since I gave a complete update, but I’ve certainly been busy exploring! After returning from Berlin, I finished my regular lectures on December 1 and welcomed an American friend at the airport the following morning. I’m fairly confident that JP fell in love with Denmark even quicker than I did. Perhaps it helped that I’ve become a Danish ambassador of sorts and I exposed him to several of the Danish pastries with his luggage still in hand.
Over the past few months, I limited some of my activities and sight-seeing in the Copenhagen area knowing I would have a sidekick for adventures. Thus, when JP finally arrived and settled in, I knew that 2 weeks would easily be filled with fun.
Some of the things we enjoyed and visited:
- kages (otherwise known as Danishes or pastries) – I challenged JP to a fast-paced version of my goal to try every type of kage.
- We took a bike trip through Dyrehave (the nearby deer park) and along the Øresund (the body of water between Denmark and Sweden).
- With Christmas coming, we both shopped for gifts for friends and family. Okay, so we shopped for ourselves too.
- Swedish tomte (troll) hunting – not real trolls, but equally hard to find
- Of course we had to cook and eat! The Danes were quite intrigued when we brought home the template for a gingerbread house one evening. According to National Geographic, we tried one of the top 10 ice creams in the world at Vaffelbageriet. We also dined in Copenhagen’s oldest restaurant, Apotek, or The Little Chemist.
- We visited Tivoli, the world’s second oldest theme park, which is known for ornate Christmas decorations. The park offers rides and food, as well as gift shops and mini Christmas markets representing various areas of the world. If you remember, Bakken, the oldest theme park is about 5 km from my room, just on the edge of Dyrehave. Bakken is closed for the season.
- Of course, a tourist’s trip to Copenhagen wouldn’t be complete without seeing the Little Mermaid, who never fails to disappoint with her size.
- museums – Danish Design Museum, Frilandsmuseet (Danish WWII Resistance Museum), Louisiana Museum of Modern Art
- New Copenhagen tour – just as I did in Berlin, we joined a tips-only tour of Copenhagen, which even exposed me to several new sites and stories of the city.
- Although we have IKEA in the States, it feels special visiting the store in Scandinavia, knowing the concept and designs originate from nearby Sweden. Plus, they have Swedish meatballs.
- We enjoyed visiting nearby Malmö , Sweden, despite the absence of people. The streets were rather empty compared to Copenhagen. The response when we asked for a recommendation for Swedish food: “What’s Swedish food!? You can go try the meatballs at IKEA!” Nonetheless, Malmö was a fun afternoon adventure following one of my final exams.
- One of my Danish friends also invited us to join her and her classmates at a hockey game in Sweden. We took a few trains, a ferry, and a bus to get there, and had a blast experiencing the fervor of the Swedish hockey fans.
- Frederiksborg Slot – not too far north of Lyngby and Copenhagen, there’s a beautiful sixteenth century castle/palace.
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Over the course of JP’s visit, I felt myself take on the new role of Danish ambassador. (No, I don’t mean the pastries, although I think I’ve nearly completed my mission to taste every type of kage in Denmark.) Previously to December, I’ve had very limited interaction with other Americans, and I’ve been representing the States to all of my other friends. Conversations frequently discuss the customs and practices of our home countries. I’ve recently learned that the Danes don’t really have many formal manners; there’s no way to say “excuse you” and it’s not very common to say excuse yourself when pushing past someone. But I digress.
With a new American in town and that American being my guest, I played host and Danish encyclopedia. I frequently pointed out variances and challenged JP to make connections between various social systems. Do you know why they have holes in some of the coins? For people with poor vision! Do you know why there are bumps on the sidewalk with changed textures at street corners? For people with poor vision! Despite the fact that these bumps are on nearly every public sidewalk, I’ve surprisingly never seen them being used. Unfortunately, I don’t know everything about Denmark, particularly the language. Although I now speak quite a bit of Danish, I often found myself pronouncing a word and then telling JP not to listen to my version of the word. Remember, my friends are some tough Danish teachers.
All in all, JP and I both had fantastic experiences during his visit. He’s told me that he already wants to come back and I immensely enjoyed sharing the information I’ve retained since my arrival at the end of August. Although I alluded to my final exams, I feel like it’s important to summarize the academic courses, which I’ll do in the following post.
