Poland!

Adam and I just returned from an amazing week in Poland. With such a rich and sad history, it was interesting to see how surprisingly "normal" the country looks. For instance, after Warsaw was virtually leveled during World War II, and then was a center for communism, and then finally gained its independence about twenty years ago, and yet it looks rather like many older cities. Additionally, we were impressed at what a good value everything was. Often we would eat an excellent and extensive dinner including drinks, soup, main courses, and desserts and paid what we would pay for just entrees at the equivalent of the Danish Applebee's in Copenhagen. This made for quite a luxurious vacation, with lots of great food and a good balance between relaxing and sightseeing.

We started our time in Gdansk, a beach town in the north where solidarity against the Communist party was born. We had wondered if traveling in the wintertime would be a bad idea, but we loved having the city virtually to ourselves. We had lots of time to stroll around the pedestrian streets at night when they were nearly empty and to wander aimlessly into shops and restaurants and never have to wait for service. We also took a day trip to Malbork, the largest brick castle in the world, built as the headquarters of the Teutonic knights for centuries. Normally Adam isn't especially interested in castles, but the amazing history of this one, including secret passageways and excavated bones in the ground were appealing to us both. After two days in the north, we took a Valentine's day train down to Krakow, in the far south of Poland.
Krakow is a beautiful medieval city. We got a great off-season price for a hotel just off the main square. We spent our days wandering around the old town and castle, visiting old Jewish cemeteries and synagogues, and partaking in the coffee shop culture that doesn't really prevail in Copenhagen. The cemetery had an sobering history, having been ransacked by Nazis during WWII and the grave stones being stolen to pave the ground at Auschwitz close by. After the war, the grave stones still intact were returned to their rightful place and the ones that were broken up were used to build a wall around the cemetery. We enjoyed talking with local Poles who were very friendly and eager to suggest their favorite vodkas and sites in the city. We learned that we came at a perfect time, as we got clear skies and a romantic snowfall while the weeks previously had been cold and rainy. We also took a day trip out to Zakopane, a nearby ski town, to see the mountains we had been missing. We took a tram up to the top of a mountain and could see the Tatras mountains in Slovakia across the valley.Our last day was spent in Warsaw, the capital city. It is quite urban but also has an interesting old town and the rather dominating Palace of Culture and Science, built by Stalin as a way to combine communist efficiency with Polish architecture and culture. We flew back to Denmark in the midst of a heavy snow to moderate temperatures and our Danish lives waiting for us.

Love Those Danes

To our faithful blog readers- it has been a while since we have posted anything and for that I apologize. It has been a while since we did any extensive travel and without any new fun pictures to post we haven't been staying updated. In this post, we'll display pictures of our recent trip to Dragor, a nearby fishing village, and from the Carlsburg Gliptotek, a sculpture museum sponsored by the local brewery (I am posing by a mummified cat, in case you were curious).

Recently I had the opportunity to speak to a class of cadets at the Danish Naval Academy about American culture (on of the rather amazing things we get to do as foreigners here). This lecture caused Adam and I to reflect pretty extensively on the differences we've noticed between Danish and American culture. One major difference is that Danes really like to follow rules, and look down on anyone who appears to be a rebel. Jaywalking is not a crime and one cannot be ticketed for it, and yet everyone waits at street crossings for the little green man to appear, even if the street is desolately empty. Why? Because that's just the rule. Recently we were talking with some Danish friends about how, in Santa Barbara, biking under the influence of alcohol (a BUI) is a rather serious offense, punishable by a large fine and even the losing of one's driver's license. The Danes responded that BUIs are a problem here too, but that they usually go unpunished because the REAL problem is that when people get drunk and ride their bikes, they forget to turn on their bike light (a pinprick of a glow that really serves no function in the dark)- and that's the rule.

The Danes had some interesting things to say about Americans as well. One explained how he went to a New York Giants tailgate party one time and he couldn't believe how excited everyone got about the food they had. He said people were calling to each other about how their turkey had been steaming for two hours, and you should try that guys ribs, and so on and so on, and the only time he had ever seen humans get so excited about eating was every morning when he gets his two-year-old son breakfast. I wanted to respond that I don't get really excited about Danish food either, but I thought that might be impolite. Another Dane explained how he felt that Americans are pretty superficial because whenever they ask "how are you" they don't really want to know the answer, they just want to continue with their days.

More generally, Adam and I are doing well in Denmark. There have been glimpses of spring more and more often and we are looking forward to good travel weather coming soon. There are times when we feel lonely and we certainly miss lots about the States, most of all the people, but sometimes help and encouragement come from the most unexpected places, and then we feel comfort and joy and we are so glad to be here. Recently when we bought a TV just a few blocks from home we planned on carrying it back to our apartment ourselves, not realizing how large and heavy it would be. The kind Iranian family we bought it from offered us their double-wide baby carriage to use to cart the TV back- which we were most thankful for. Another time Mel made an appointment for a haircut in an unknown part of the city. I had to take two different buses to get there and through a variety of circumstances, ended up missing the first and getting lost to the second, finally arriving at my appointment twenty minutes late and unable to keep it. Discouraged at having woken early for nothing and with my very poor sense of direction, I set out for school and made it just in time for "bad Friday," a tradition where each week three people are assigned to bring treats to share during the morning break. (On a side note, I usually find bad Fridays quite distressing, as the "treats" in which people partake when they are being "bad" are usually fruit, cheese, bread, and pastries, pretty nearly the staples upon which I base my diet here in Denmark. I have no idea what these people fill up on the rest of the week, but I eat like bad Friday every day, but on Fridays, someone else pays.) On this particular bad Friday when I was feeling rather discouraged, a lovely woman from Texas had made a Tex-Mex style chicken dip in the design of an American flag, with salsa stripes and olive stars. And what a glorious gift it was! Perhaps the Danes are right, I may get too excited about food, but goodness, some yummy Mexican food cheered me right up.

We are headed to Poland next week for the February "ski week" break, but we wanted share a bit about our everyday lives here. We hope you all are well and we miss you lots. We love getting updates hearing about details from the States.

New Years and Our Old Apartment

Hello! We've had a busy few weeks. To start, we celebrated the transition from 07 to 08 in a quiet part of Copenhagen with a few friends. We had originally planned on going downtown, to what Danes call the "Times Square of Copenhagen." Luckily, we talked to some people who were in the know and found out how crazy it becomes throughout the city on new years. We heard stories of how protective eye wear is necessary, of people having been hit with firecrackers being set off horizontally down streets, and an assortment of other wild stories, all of which were confirmed as we watched the news coverage and saw news reporters with their own bouncers keeping the public clear from their cameras- and bodies- from all the way across the street. Even being in the quieter part of town we still got quite a fireworks display. We had sparklers to celebrate with, which seemed rather puny in comparison. When Adam and I talked with Danish friends and students later in the week they were surprised that cities in the US don't allow fireworks as grandiose as those and that there aren't as elaborate displays. Truly, it was like the finale of the San Ramon Fourth of July show going on in twelve different places at once. You can view the video at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=btdxlOdVrAQ.

Since New Years, we both have gone back to work and we moved into the city of Copenhagen. Our new apartment is at an amazing location. It is so refreshing to walk downstairs and have about ten eating options within two blocks as opposed to Lyngby where there were only about four restaurants serving dinner and the city is dead if we come home as late as 6pm. We live in a very happening, artsy part of Copenhagen with design shops and parks close by.

Having gone back to teaching after a six month break has been wonderful. I didn't realize how much I missed it until I got back into the classroom. My students are sweet and hardworking and the school has given me experiences in teaching that are completely unique from anything I've done before. In lots of ways I've had to rethink the things that I take for granted in teaching. I feel like I go to the UN every day as I am teaching students all over the world with such unique sets of experiences. When I tell them I have lived my entire life in California they can hardly imagine it because their families are so international. I tried to explain the concept of a 24-hour Safeway and they truly didn't understand what I meant by a store that doesn't ever close.

I also am getting some perspective on world literature. Yesterday I taught Shakespeare's "Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer's Day" for about the twentieth time, but it was the first time I understood the true gift a summer's day can be in a place where truly the sun sometimes cannot be seen for weeks at a time. Before we came, we thought lots about the cold weather, but really, what Adam has come to miss most are the mountains and I have missed the daylight. In Denmark, the highest point is actually the bridge leading to Sweden (it is so flat here!) and in December, it would not be light out until 9am and would be dark again by 4pm. It was crazy to begin teaching in the dark in the morning and finish teaching in the dark in the afternoon. However, we have some exciting news- it is getting lighter by two minutes each day, and last weekend the temperature hit 8 degrees C- the warmest it has been for us yet! So we see glimmers of the spring coming and are so excited for it. In the meantime, we are planning trips to fill our vacation time in February and March and we're enjoying the new experiences that come every day as we are living here.

Christmas

Merry Christmas to you all! We had a wonderful Christmas celebration, but of course missed all of you we would have seen had we been back in the US. We so much appreciated the love we got through cards and emails, letting us know what you all were doing and helping us feel we were still able to keep up with all of your lives! What a blessing it is to celebrate the holiday in a different part of the world with different traditions that still point to the same glorious event!

Adam and I did lots to keep our Christmas traditions going even here in Copenhagen, although some went better than others. Actually, since we are here we got the opportunity to host our first holiday as a married couple! We got a Christmas tree from a local seller and still made and decorated Christmas cookies. Since our Danish kitchen has no measuring cups or spoons, we had to estimate or convert American recipes. The Danes use a scale and weigh all of their ingredients out in grams when they are following a recipe. This worked well for the first round of sugar and spice cut out cookies, and so we got a little careless and the second batch of chewy cookies actually turned out like crumbly little cakes- no doubt because of too much baking powder or soda. Luckily for us, when the Monkowskis came to visit they brought some measuring devices, so we won't have that problem again.

Adam's parents and sister came for Christmas and we had a great time relaxing and traveling around with them. In accordance with the Danish system of work, Adam's school is completely closed for eleven days during the holidays. The heat is turned off and lights are out. However, for Christmas Eve, Christmas, and Boxing day, most of the rest of Denmark is closed as well, so there wasn't much to get to see and do. For Christmas Eve we made the seafood stew that is a Monkowski tradition and for Christmas dinner Adam cooked a duck, as is the Danish custom. We went for a long walk Christmas day into the local park and saw many huge deer. We were hoping for some snow or some sunshine, but got neither. At least there was no rain and so we were able to spend some time outdoors walking around Copenhagen and showing off the city. We took several day trips with the Monkowskis, to a local castle in Hillerod, south Sweden, and a Viking museum. The Viking museum provided costumes to try on and so Annie, Janice, and Mel had a great time dressing like Viking women and taking pictures in a model ship.