Fall in Copenhagen...

Hey Everyone,

Things are going well in Copenhagen as the cold and wind are setting in. I have had a cold which is still persisting now which is quite annoying. Although this didn't stop me from visiting Helsingor last weekend, on a warm sunny day. Really got to take advantage of those over here.

Helsingør is only about an hour ride north on the train from Copenhagen. It is a fairly small town on the water where you can actually look across the sea to see Sweden. But what Helsingor is most famous for is the castle of Kronborg where Shakespeare set his play of Hamlet. The castle sits on a strategic position, with an excellent view of the Swedish Coast, and close proximity to the sea which they used to charge all ships that came through a tax. This ended in 1857, when under pressure they decided to make it free after one lump sum of around 33,000,000,000 crowns, although I have no idea how much that really was at the time.

The castle was quite nice from the outside but the inside was fairly barren. I think most of it had been taken away and placed in other castles. The most interesting part of the castle were the catacombs, that even though I visited during the middle of the day were nearly pitch black. You were led through the passages by torches on the wall which just illuminated an arrow pointing to which direction you should go. Quite spooky. Also down in the catacombs was a statue of Holger Danske, a mythical character that is said will rescue the Danish people in times of need.

Beyond side trips, my courses are going well. In my advanced written Danish course I always get my assignment (a short translation) back with so much red pen marking all my errors on it it is a bit depressing, but I will keep trying... I just started my courses at studieskole, which is a just a general language course, and unlike my courses at the University, this course has many Americans in it. This one should be very easy compared to my one at the University as the teacher purposefully speaks slowly, and in contrast to my other courses, I am one of the best in the class.

I had a good time the other night with classmates from the University. We met at Giuseppe's apartment and all brought some food. I got to have some authentic Italian pasta, Lithuanian cookies, Finnish cookies, and Lithuanian alcohol among other things. There was also one Dane there that taught us a Danish drinking game that was quite fun. Here's an interesting fact that I learned that night: In Denmark you can order alcohol (for example, a bottle of vodka) 24 hours a day and have it delivered to your house!!! Was definitely a surprise to me...

I also just began playing badminton. It is kind of hard to get involved with sports here because, nothing is free and nothing is public. For example, there are absolutely no, that is not 1, public tennis court in all of Copenhagen. I decided to try badminton because it was a much cheaper option, and is fairly popular in Denmark. While at the sports store buying my badminton racquet I noticed why tennis may not be so popular here. Although everything is more expensive here (the cheapest badminton racquet they had was $50), tennis balls were $3 a piece!!! Crazy stuff.

I didn't know what to expect when showing up for the first day as to how many would be there or skill level. It turned out it is a very small group--there were only 4 of us there for 3 hours, and they are all VERY good. I am not a badminton player but lots of it carries over from tennis, but I only won one game in 3 hours of playing short games. Thankfully I can still carry on some decent points but these guys have clearly been playing for a long time. The best guy there was easily 50 and doing in-between-the-legs shots and running my ragged around the court... It's really fun and good for me to get some excercise in.

Well, thats about it. My tandem-language partner gave me 4 free tickets to the Opera tonight, so I will be checking that out before working the late shift at studenterhuset.

Hope all is well. Here are some pics:

Jeff

Fall in Copenhagen and Helsingør