Sweden, Danish Birthdays & Futbol!!!

Goddag all and undskyld (sorry!) for being gone for so long. I’m going to try to give you an idea of what I’ve been doing for the past few months and hopefully make up for my long absence. :

September 30-October 1st

Well, the weekend after my Bornholm bike trip, I received an email from one of the girls that I had met at Bornholm asking some of us if we wanted to go to Sweden. It still strikes me as humorous to say, ‘hey do you want to go to Sweden for the day?’ I realize that this is the same (distance-wise) as saying, ‘hey do you want to go to Indiana for the day?” but really, Sweden sounds more exotic to us Americans. :) (LEFT: streets of Malmö)

So, we hopped on a train and 45 minutes later, we stepped out of the train station and there was Sweden! We had ended up in Malmö, which is on the southern tip of Sweden and directly east of Copenhagen across the Baltic Sea. The train ride across is on the world’s longest suspension bridge, which was an EU project to bolster cross border travel after the Schengen Agreement legally opened its member states’ borders. (RIGHT: Musicians on Malmö streets; yea, he was definitely playing Bob Dylan :) )

Anyways, as you can see from the pictures, Malmö isn’t too different than Denmark, mainly because we only ventured far enough to just hit the shopping areas. They say Swedish shopping is cheaper than Denmark’s (which really isn’t that hard to do), but after exchanging money and getting hit with international ATM fees, it’s all about the same. We spent the afternoon in Malmo, wandering around, and eventually came back home with proud smiles saying that we had stepped foot on Sweden. (LEFT: Us Americans walking in Sweden!)

That night, Anna and I went out for sushi (I know, I know :) ) and to a movie to celebrate her 14th birthday. Her actual birthday was the next day, but I thought we could have some girl celebration before the entire Jørgensen family came in the next day. With only bikes and trains, it amazes me with what ease Denmark’s youth is able to travel around to friends or into the city. I’ve said before that the youth’s maturity is striking and I believe a lot of that has to do with their independence and parents’ trust in their independent mobility since Denmark’s streets are relatively safe.

The next day, I woke up to find little Danish flags all over the house and decorating the yard and driveway. The Danish flag is the symbol of ‘celebration’ here, so whenever there is any sort of party, usually Danish flags are put up for decoration, especially in the case of birthdays. (For example, on the Queen’s birthday, hundreds of little kids fill Amalienborg’s (royal palace) courtyard waving little Danish flags as the Queen waves from a balcony…cute, huh?) (Danish Flag decor around the house)

It’s tradition to have birthday breakfast with the birthday girl/boy which includes the normal coffee, break, cheese, jam, but also lots and lots of Danishes! I’m not sure if I have mentioned this before, but the ‘Danish’ pastry in Denmark is not actually called a Danish, but called a ‘weinerbrød,’ which is roughly translated as ‘vienna bread.’ Apparently, the irony of eating a Danish in Denmark is something that I failed to recognize until someone pointed it out to me. Well, regardless, they are DELICIOUS! :) Whatever weight I have lost by biking and eating smaller portions here, I’ve firmly put back on by my consumption of Danishes…oops, sorry weinerbrød. (LEFT: Mmmmm yummy Danishes/weinerbrød)

So, anyways, the rest of the day was spent waiting for the filtering of Jørgensen family to arrive from all over Denmark. Most of them live in Zealand (the island that CPH is on) but about 1 hour away. Most of them are older and do not speak English very well, so I spent most of the time just quietly observing the chatting and present giving. Lise (my host mother) cooked up a wonderful Danish meal of lamb, carrots, potatoes, creamed spinach, bread, and other various sides. I did not take a picture of it, because I felt a little bit like a stranger to this family gathering as it already was, so whipping out my camera in the middle of the meal might just have confirmed my tourist status. ;) Well, I can tell you without showing you that the meal was delicious. (LEFT: Lykkke (host mom's best friend), Lise (host mom) and Anna's aunt at birthday party)

Afterwards, we took a walk around the Hellerup neighborhood. For October 1st, it was a gorgeous, sunny day, and we were lucky that the neighborhood fall festival was happening behind the museum that is right behind my host family’s house on the same day. Local artisans came out with handmade jewelry, handbags, or little knickknacks to sell them in little stands, and while Anna and I had a great time perusing, the older members of the family and the men were less than interested and took off to take a walk around the park. After we had gotten our fill of homemade apple cider and apple cookies, we took a walk around the park to do the æble (apple) scavenger hunt that the community had made for everyone. (By ‘everyone’ I mean for children probably under the age of 7, but Anna and I pretended that it was for all ages.) So, we whipped around the park, Anna rapidly translating the Danish clues into English and with my superior apple knowledge skills, we turned in our answers. All in all, I believe we won, but no one ever contacted us to give us our prize. I can’t imagine why. :)

Then, we all met back at the house for cake and presents. The Danish birthday song is this complex 4 verse song that has you “hurrah-ing” often and speaks a lot of chocolate. (I’m sure that to someone who can actually speak Danish, this is not a ‘complex’ song, but in comparison to the American ‘happy birthday’ song that has 6 words in it, it’s complex…) (LEFT: Birthday cake/ RIGHT: Anna blowing out her candles; next to her is her grandfather and her older brother Anders is in the blue shirt. Til lykke med fødselsdagen, Anna!)

So, then after cake and coffee, I left the party a little bit early, because DIS was taking us to a futbol (soccer) game! It was a game between FCK (Futbol Club København) and Brøndby, which are the two biggest regional rivals in Denmark. We were forewarned about how rowdy these games could get and that we really have no equivalent to it in America, and for the most part, I would have to say they were right. In a stadium that fits 40,000, which considering that that’s about 0.8% of the total Danish population, it was crazy. Flares being set off, garbage being thrown on the field, singing, screaming, dancing, and drunken revelry all resulted in, well a European soccer game experience. To a certain extent, I felt like I was at an extremely rowdy, uncontrolled big American university football game. Well, the game went well…FCK won (woo hoo!...we were told to be FCK fans) and only about 150 people were arrested after the game by the intimidating looking Danish police that were surrounding the field. (And by ‘only’ I mean that that’s a lot. When I came home that night, my host mother met with me a concerned look, because apparently the arrests had been all over the nightly news…oh Denmark.) (TOP LEFT: Outside the National Stadium / MIDDLE & BOTTOM LEFT: Fans and field / TOP RIGHT: Long line to get in / MIDDLE RIGHT: Crazy Brøndby fans lighting flares :) / BOTTOM RIGHT: Emily, me, Jenna and Kristin enjoying our first European futbol game!)

::sigh:: So, it was a good weekend, Sweden, Danish birthday cake, and lots of futbol rowdiness. :)

Love and Blessings,

Christine