There's nothing more Danish than Denmark

Hej! I've made it safely to Denmark and am now in Bornholm, a Danish island off Sweden. I felt like I was flying forever to get here.. 28 hours altogether, and that's just flying time, not counting the waits in airports! Air China was actually good, so there you go, but if you fly with them, I don't recommend the fish - it was terrible. Other than that, they were pretty good! I managed to sleep for a couple of hours on the 10 hour Beijing to Frankfurt leg, but not the Sydney to Beijing leg. So I was preeetty tired when I got to Denmark, but still felt reasonably good! Bad thing is, I now have the beginnings of a cold which I suspect was from flying so long.. planes are cold and you're in close proximity to so many people! Aaargh!

I had a scary experience at Shanghai airport! A flight attendant told me I didn't need to fill out an entry card as I was just passing through.. it was a stop over on the way to Beijing. So at Shanghai, we had to get off the plane and go to the transfer place, where the snatched out passports off us and yelled at us to get in line.. yep, that's personable!! At customs, the guy looked at my passport and made me fill in an entry card, then said 'wait!' and pointed for me to stand aside. He didn't tell me why and I thought there must've been something wrong with my passport! Thankfully, the next guy through said he was also going to Frankfurt, so they made him stand aside too. It turned out we needed stay permits to just pass through the airports. This other guy was Robert from Poland, and we stuck together until Frankfurt so we didn't get lost, or arrested by the Chinese police!

Beijing Terminal 3 was really big! It's the new one just opened for the olympics, and the biggest airport terminal in the world. But it was easy to find your way around, thankfully. I managed to fall asleep on the boarding lounge seats for over an hour so that helped!

So anyway, I got to Copenhagen and walked out, and immediately recognised Ditte, my penfriend that I'd been writing to since we were 12, and who I hadn't yet met! She and her boyfriend Jakob are really nice, and we went back to their apartment in Copenhagen where I had another sleep, yay. Seriously, when you're sleep deprived (from the most mammoth flight ever) it's really hard to absorb a new place! Anyway, from what I saw, Copenhagen is very very small! Surprisingly so. We went and walked around a big open grassy area with a castle and lots of deer roaming around. It's where Frederik and Mary go hunting deer! It was just so quiet there. And the streets were very quiet too. Everything just looked sooo Danish. That's something I've been saying a lot these past days.. 'that's so Danish!' Just ask Ditte. She thinks it's funny. But it's so Danish in everyway: countryside, orange and terracotta coloured houses with straw or thatched rooves, little churches..

Later that day we caught a train across to Ystad in Sweden, and then the fast ferry (one hour) to Bornholm, the island where Ditte and Jakob both grew up. We're staying here with her parents. This is what I've learned about Danes: they are very very patriotic and Bornholmers are extremely proud of their island.. they raised the Danish flag when I came to mark the special occasion. They're not allowed to have it raised the whole time, so when it's not a special occasion they raise a small skinny version of the real flag! They also start the morning by drinking a tiny cup of what they call 'bitter', or what we call schnapps. I tried this. You raise your glass and say 'Skøl!' and then drink all in one go. And they often have beer in the morning, and as far as I can tell, it's common to smoke a cigarette or pipe. Isn't that so Danish? ;)

Something else I learnt about Denmark.. they have a social law that you shouldn't dress up excessively or wear lots of make-up, because if you do, you are thinking too much of yourself. It's true that people in Denmark don't seem to dress up much more than sneakers and jeans. The word they use for this law is 'jantelov'. Jakob explained it as an unwritten law in Denmark that if you start to think too much of yourself and lose your modesty, people will tell you that you're not as good as you think you are, and bring you back down to earth. Ditte said there's no point trying to be better than everyone else, cos there's always going to be someone who's better than you. She said 'because all is equal.' Interesting.

I have to tell you about Rønne.. this is the main 'city' (more like a town) on the island. You walk up from the harbour and it's like a maze of tiny stone streets, really narrow, and all the houses are very tiny with either orange or terracotta or red paint. The fronts of the houses are right on the streets. There is a small footpath which is tiled. Even the window panes on the houses have to be made to look like the cross on the Danish flag. They have Danish flags everywhere, but only the small skinny ones cos of course you can't have the other raised all the time, it's just not what's done! But Rønne is beautiful. I'll put a few pics up here, but more later, once I've been for a good walk.

We went for a drive up the west coast to the north of Bornholm today. There are big mounds in a lot of the fields in Bornholm, which are viking tombs. There is so much history from the middle ages, but no big tourism attractions showing it off, like we have with Port Arthur. Bornholm is very pretty and very green. Every house is perfectly maintained and beautifully built and painted. You never see anything looking run-down! They also have the famous round churches, which are only found on Bornholm.

I'm enjoying Denmark. But I'm still looking forward to starting to explore on my own! It's been great so far, and I'm learning lots. I hope this cold disappears quickly! But it probably won't until I leave Denmark.. It is freeezing here! People are still getting around in beanies and scarves, and still freezing! The wind is so icy.

Photos..

Smog makes the air hazy at Beijing airport

Ditte and I at a castle in a field (can't remember the name!) It's where Frederik hunts deer.

These are everywhere.. straw rooves! This is in Copenhagen.

Beautiful Rønne.. the streets are so pretty. This is Ditte's street, just up from the harbour.

The smallest house in Rønne.

One of Bornholm's famous round churches.

Ditte with Cleo, the cutest cat in all of Denmark.. he dips his paw in milk and licks it off! He'll drink a whole glass of milk this way! Aww!