The Longest Day

June 23, 2008

It is longest day of the Calendar Year and the Danes know how to celebrate it. (more on this later) These long days are taking a toll on me. This morning I woke up at 3:30 am and looked out my window and could see that the sun was coming up. Great I thought. When I am at home in Charlotte the sun shines right in my window and then I wake up. So, of course this morning was no different even though I had about 5 hours of sleep over the past 48 hours. I decided to make the most of my time by reading my Copenhagen maps and guide books I feel like everything is sinking in and making sense. I found that as I walk around I begin to absorb how this city is laid out. It is not complicated only a little daunting due to the large bike lanes. You think Charlotte is bad and over run with bikers on the loop, well Copenhagen is a city full of bikers. Biking is one of the major modes of transportation and there are wide bike lanes made especially for bikers, not cars or pedestrians. If you happen to find yourself in this lane you will get mowed down. This has not happened yet, but is very easy to see how it might before my time is up here. I really think that Charlotte city council could learn a lot from these bike lanes and many Charlottean bikers could just come here and bike in proper lanes instead of the car lane. Everyone has their specific lane and the must stay in it. Novel Concept!!!!

Well now after that little side note, once I finished reading my maps and figuring out where I wanted to go today I still couldn’t sleep. It was now 4:30 am and the sun had been up and light was flooding into my room, so I read some of my book True Evil which takes place in Mississippi, mentions Charlotte, and Denmark. I am finally sleepy again about 6:30 am and I fall asleep until 11:00. I force myself out of the bed so I can begin to adjust to the time.

After a trip to the corner coffee shop I ventured to the Internet café. As most of you know I was able to email loved ones. I can’t call yet, but a few more days and I will hear your voices.

Today I wanted to explore the canal area of Copenhagen. The official name of the neighborhood is Slotsholm, Stroget and the Latin Quarter. Slotshholmen is the seat of the Danish government and located on a small island surrounded by canals. I plan on going back to all these places during my stay. I am just trying to get my bearings and I don’t really know what I am looking at in most cases.

For lunch today I dined at Café Sorgenfri (b/c Bill has a friend with that last name) and it was a cheap eat. Cheap is relative in Copenhagen. I haven’t found much that is cheap here. Be glad we live in the US where you can get cup of coffee under a dollar or under two dollars. Here it is more like $2 for small and $4 -$5 for a large. I might get off caffeine while I am here. Any way back to lunch, I finally had my first Smorrebrod, which is a traditional Danish open-faced sandwich. I opted for the roast beef, pickle, lettuce, some un-identifiable sauce, cheese, and herbs of some sort. It was actually very good. I will survive on Danish food not Quaker granola bars and Lance crackers.

After that I stopped in a shop to pick up some much needed peanut butter, bread, and cereal. I also went to the Apple store to pick up a charger that I would be able to use here. Now I have adapters for China, Korea, Australia, UK, Europe, US, and some other random country. Let me know if you need to borrow them ever.

As I mentioned before the Danes know how to celebrate the longest day of the calendar year. This evening I am going to venture pretty far north of the central city to a park called Faelledparken to celebrate Midsummer’s Eve. No need to worry about me though b/c I will be walking the entire way there and back in the daylight! My hope is to finally get a decent night sleep by staying out a little later. Midsummer’s Eve is held on June 23rd every year and is also called Sankt Hans Aften. The Danes light bonfires at the beaches and in the parks. Remember Niels from yesterday . . he told me they light fires b/c they are scaring away some witch or bad spirits. Hopefully I can report on the accuracy of this after I have attended the festival.

My plan is to leave around 8:45- 9:00 to head to the park. Right now I am listening to thunder in the distance and watching clouds roll in. The weather here is a bit unusual, well not to the Danes, but to me it is. I can’t quite figure it out, because this morning b/t 3-6 the sky was clear of clouds and by the time I woke up clouds were rolling in and haven’t stopped. It does rain, but not too much, you just don’t want to be caught off guard with out a rain jacket or a place to duck into. If it is not raining then the wind is howling. But no complaints from me, because this is a much needed break from the Southern summers I am so accustomed to.