Sunday here was gorgeous, one of the nicer days we've had in a while. So Izabel and I took the opportunity to bike into the city. We've been meaning to do it for a while but somehow never quite got around to it until now. It was a far easier ride that we were expecting, it takes about an hour but after a few turns at the beginning, it's a straight shot all the way into the city. Piece of cake. We didn't get lost once (which is more than we can say for the last time we attempted to bike an unknown route). It was such a great ride that I got it into my head that I would bike into Copenhagen during the week. Great idea. I even woke up a little early on Monday just to make sure I would have enough time to make it to my eight thirty class.
Lets just say things didn't go as planned. I looked at the weather in the morning and saw it was going to rain. Well, that's no problem, I thought, it won't really rain. So I geared up and set out on my hour long bike ride. And, other than a ton of wind, it was great for the first half hour. Then it started to rain and by rain I mean downpour. I was soaked in minutes and by soaked I mean there wasn't an inch of me that wasn't wet (even with my wonderful raincoat). It was a miserable half hour. I honestly don't think I've ever been so wet in my life. And all the other bikers looked at me as if I was crazy for not wearing rain pants (yes, such things exist) and a giant rain poncho. I then spent my first class sitting on the heater attempting to warm up (it didn't go very well). My body basically spent the entire day trying to warm up. It was great fun. And why did I bike into the city even though I knew it was going to rain? Great question, I'm glad you asked. I'm convinced it's because of the ridiculous amount of vegetables I've been eating. That's practically all I eat for dinner. Not that I'm complaining, I love these vegetable-ful dinners. So do I have any logical reasoning for these claims? Of course not, but I'm convinced. Then of course today, when it was beautiful outside, I decided not to bike into the city. I've got to stop eating so many vegetables. Too bad that's all I crave now (other than chocolate, because let's be honest, who doesn't want chocolate?). The good news is that I now officially feel like a Dane since they're always biking around no matter how awful the weather.
Also, as a side note, I now see the complete brilliance of rain pants. Whoever invented them was a genius. The Danes clearly know what they're doing.
And now it's time for some Danish culture lessons. Let's talk about hygge. For those of you that don't speak Danish, in Claire phonetic spelling it's pronounced "who-guh". But the "who" really has to come from the back of your throat. And if you can't get it, no worries. I avoided saying the word for the longest time.
So hygge is one of those words that doesn't really translate very well into other languages, which is a shame because it's a wonderful concept. Basically it's the idea of coziness and having a warm atmosphere and good, comfortable time. Many things can be hygge. A dinner can be hygge a walk can by hugge. And while it often involves being with friends and family, it doesn't have to. With slight variations, the word hygge can be not only a noun but also a verb and adjective (hyggelig pronounced "who-guh-lee"). Basically, the Danes love hygge, especially around this time of year when it starts to get darker and Christmas approaches. I can't wait to experience more of it. I'll make sure to take lots of pictures to give lots of examples of hygge because that's really the only way to get a good understanding of this concept. And there will be plenty of it to go around in these upcoming weeks.
Another interesting thing to note about Danes is that they're very much about equaling the playing field. My Danish professor gave a great illustration of this. When she was graduating high school, she was the best in her class (and this was really hard for her to say because Danes really don't talk about being the best...ever). However, there are no awards given for academics. Instead, her school gave an award to the person they thought exemplified a good friend. And one of my professor's friends got the award. Later, someone told my professor that she had actually been considered for the award but because she was already the best academically, they didn't want to give her this award on top of that. So, in ways like this, Danes really tire to make everyone equal. They also don't really encourage personal achievement as much. Striving to achieve something isn't really considered to be as good of a thing as it is in the states. Not entirely sure how I feel about this. While I do like how they try to make everyone equal, I'm not so much a fan of the achievement thing. Personally, I think it's a good thing to strive for something you want.
One thing I'm not particularly fond of in Danish culture thus far is how they treat newcomers or people who aren't part of a particular social group. Lets say you're invited to a party and you don't really know anyone there. Well, if you're in Denmark you're kind of screwed because they won't introduce you to anyone. They think this draws attention to what you're lacking (aka knowledge of who these people are and it just emphasizes this inequality- a definite no-no). So you'll basically spend the entire party feeling extremely awkward and definitely not having a hyggelig time. This is part of why it's so hard to become friends with Danes.
Now it's time to go prepare myself for my trip to the Czech Republic. It's a trip organized by DIS and we basically hike, canoe, rock climb, and do archery for four days and then spend a day in Prague. It's going to be wonderful. :)
Vi ses!
No comments:
Post a Comment