Jael and I were right there!

Just coincidentally I found this video of a flash mob in Copenhagen (where groups of people do artsy stuff, in public places, with no warning, just for fun).  Jael and I rode the Copenhagen Metro.  We rode on that line and the metro platform at the beginning looks pretty familiar (although it is entirely possible that other metro platforms look similar).  The point is, we sat on that metro (maybe even that same car!) with whinny babies and people who didn't understand the sanctity of the Stillezone (cars where you are supposed to be quite).  Why didn't we get to see something like this?  It is pretty nifty.  I wouldn't even have minded if they did it in the Stillezone.  Although, to be fair, if the ride was a little jerky, they could put someone's eye out with those bows. . .

Hup Holland Hup

This Wednesday, I get to go see a the Oranjes, the Dutch National Soccer team, play the Slovakian national team at the soccer stadium that is right next to my house.  It should be fun.  This game is part of the Euro-something Cup, a pan-European Championship.  (I keep wanting to call it the Eurovision Cup but that is a pan-European singing competition instead.)

I am going with a bunch of international students from the University which will be nice.  That way, if I can't find my seat or something, at least I will be amongst others similarly situated.  Also, apparently, the Oranje team is less likely to provoke riots than, say, Feyenoord (the Rotterdam team), so things should be less wild.  I don't think there is a big rivalry with the Slovaks so it should be relatively peaceful.  (The Dutch are all riled  up about Eastern Europeans coming in and taking all of their jobs but I think they are mostly concerned about the Poles and the Romanians as I don't think there are a significant number of Slovakian immigrants in the area.)

Hup Holland Hup is the Oranje fight song so I need to learn the words before I go, or at least write them down somewhere convenient.  If you go here, you can see a video bunch of picture of happy Dutch soccer fans, their fancy decorations, and can hear the Dutch football song.  It is kind of a nonsense song, I think, but part of the refrain (which is written below the video) is "Go Holland Go, don't let the lion stand in the bench . . . put on your football shoes . . . and take the whole world on."  I wrote a little bit about this last year, as well.

Now the only thing left to do is to decide if my hat clashes with my new hairdo.

The Viking Ship Museum

The Viking Ship Museum was pretty good.  However, they declined to give us our Copenhagen Card discount and we ended up spending more money than we intended which kind of colored our experience.  I think we both liked it but were not entirely sure that it was worth the $10 price tag.  It was a good day to go.  The sky was very blue and the clouds were very fluffy and the sun was very shiny.

Rows of model ships in front of the museums. 

These are the workshops.  They have a few displays here but mostly it is where they build life-size replica ships.  Some of them are for the museum and historical type places but, apparently, they have quite a business building viking ships for private individuals who want sail like their ancestors. 

A church boat--how you get to church if you live in
The Middle of Nowhere, Denmark

The Museum is set up around a huge collection of old sunken viking ships that were found twenty or thirty years ago.  They have all the bits of the ships that they found set up on forms so you can see kind of what they looked like.

The museum also had a series of little dioramas that depicted different things.  This set shows what typical Danish life was like in the viking era.

A large section of the museum was devoted to attacks on the Danes by the Norwegians.  Apparently they didn't get along.  This is the picture that introduced the exhibit.  They don't sugar coat history.  Below is a map of the attack..

There were, according to the exhibit, 108 war ships and 13 cargo ships that took part in the particular attack they were highlighting.  This shows the kinds of weapons that were probably on board the ship.  It looks like they were loaded for bear.  (Or for VIKINGS!  Ha!)

On the left is a diorama of the Danes lighting the signal fires to warn of the incoming Norwegians.

On the left they are skuttling a ship in the harbor to make it more difficult for the Norwegians to get in.  Below you can see the advancing Norwegian hordes.

They had a loom set up with information about the special way they wove woolen sails so that they stood up well to the weather and did not warp.
They also wove clothing.  And the museum had clothes available to try on so that you could look like an authentic Viking.  And, while Jael could have probably fit in the children's sizes, they had some cloaks and things which looked like they were sized for adult men.

Jael checking out the possibilities.  

Jael preparing to deal with some Norwegians. 

Jael beside a replica warship.  The room was set up with a video screen, which was showing a film about some guys who had lived on a replica ship for a couple of months.  There were two ships in the room that you could climb around on and which served as displays and as seating for people watching the film.  

You can see people watching the movie on the left.  I liked the picture because the still of the movie shows the Danish flag flying prettily.

On the right you can see some of the stuff that would have been brought with on a voyage.  The manikin is wearing the outfit of a monk and, if you look closely, you can see the head of a polar bear rug!

They had a display on burial rituals.  It wasn't the prettiest thing.  Abive is a picture of an actual grave.  The guy on the left was the dead Dane.  The skeleton on the right was a decapitated woman, probably a slave, who was killed specifically to be buried with him.  The other picture is an artists rendition of the burial preparations.  The horse looks unamused.

The Viking Museum Port area

The outside work-area where they work on building new replica old ships.

They even had specimens of all of the old varieties of trees that would have been used in old-fashioned ship-building, along with information about what they were used for and why.  There were at least a dozen different trees here, valued for different properties: growing tall and straight quickly, for masts, being flexible but strong and durable in water for the ships sides, etc. 

Roskilde and Inconsiderate People

The second day trip that Jael and I did was to Roskilde.  Once we finally got there, (and once we figured out what direction to go) it was a really pretty town.  They had a trio of giant vases outside the train station.

The train state is a from 1947 but the train line from
Copenhagen to Roskilde has been running since 1847.

The Roskilde train station

Ha!  Jael is short and looking up at stuff again!

This is the city map.  They had them all over the place because the touristy part of the city is pretty spread out.

Convent garden gates

Some detailed medieval murals

The Roskilde Tourist Bureau.  Isn't it old and fancy looking

Roskilde Cathedral

The thing that we really, really wanted to see was the Roskilde Cathedral.  This is the place where almost all of the Danish monarchs are buried, including Margaret I.  It is a really famous cathedral, and very beautiful.  Unfortunately, when we arrived in the city, some guy had died and was having a funeral in the cathedral, which meant that it was closed to visitors.  I mean, it was probably unfortunate for that fellow as well, but it was really unfortunate for us.  I think they could have let us in: we would have been really quite and wouldn't have bothered people or talked loudly.  Fortunately for you, though, I found a video tour of the cathedral and you can see all of the really cool, really beautiful stuff that we missed.  If you click here, you can see the video.

A fancy hammered metal door on the cathedral.  

Since we couldn't go through the cathedral, we strolled through town on the way to the Viking Ship Museum and check out the town.  It was mighty pretty.

There was a really nice park.  They had some cute bouncy animals to ride on and Jael was going to get a picture on one of them on the way back but there were actual kids playing on them when we went back through, so that seemed a little too awkward.  It was really sunshiny and pretty (though still cold) and, with the pretty little canals running through were  awfully picturesque.  

Looking down the hill, over the Viking Ship Museum, and out to the Sound. 

Crocuses.  Did I mention that it was sunny and beautiful out?
This was in the "Byparken" or city park.

I just thought that the house looked cute and like it has eyebrows. The word means "everything desired" or something like that (according to Google Translate).  It makes one curious.  And suspicious.  On the right, is St. Josef's Catholic Church.  Below is the Roskilde Museum and a pretty yellow building.

We walked by a bakery called "Sophisticakes"!

They had a theme going in Roskilde

I took this picture just for Ben.  I do not know why an argyle ice cream cone in a kilt is advertising in-store member-card discounts but I thought that Ben would appreciate the apparent, if inexplicable,  Scottish influence