Copenhagen cont'd

A few other, more random, items to report from Copenhagen...



We saw this guy cruising around the outdoor skating rink in the middle of the city. While the crowd was mainly families slowly weaving their way around the ice, this guy was a machine--he just kept doing lap upon lap with a very determined look (as though he was in the middle of his daily 50 lap workout). Of course when you do this with a big smoking pipe in your mouth, it's hard to be taken seriously. He cracks me up.



Here is an example of a Danish hotdog. Hot dog stands were quite common in Copenhagen and also in Helsingor, where I took a day trip. Unfortunately I didn't get a picture of a stand, but I did snap a photo of the one hot dog I had. Looks delicious, no? I had several guidebooks from the Toulouse library with me and all warned of this culinary disaster. They all said it's typically Danish and none would go so far as to actually recommend eating one. However, no French person was going to keep me down! I can't say that it was especially good. Stupid touriste americaine.



Perhaps hot dogs are popular because they're great after visiting the bars. Danes, I've been told, love their beer (our room key even had a bottle opener attached). Carlsberg calls Copenhagen home and you can find it on tap everywhere. And as the sign says, it's "probably the best beer in town". Who am I to argue? We had our share of both Carlsberg and Tuborg (also brewed by Carlsberg).

Copenhagen / Copenhague / København

Last week Katie and I spent 4 fun days in Copenhagen. What a pleasant trip! Katie had been invited to speak at a small conference organized by the University of Copenhagen. I tagged along and played tourist (a recurring theme this year). While February isn't the optimal time to visit CPH, we lucked out in that it wasn't too cold (thanks to one of the warmest European winters in recent history) and it didn't rain at all. From what I understand, the climate is somewhat like Seattle in that summer is mild while winter is to be avoided (at least for tourists). So though we didn't experience the sidewalk cafés that were pictured in our guidebooks, we did get to stroll around the city in comfort. Here are some of my impressions...

Maybe I was just homesick, but CPH reminded me a lot of Seattle. First of all it was cold (near freezing--okay, cold by Toulouse standards) and gray!!; there is also lots of water (CPH is located on the sea and has several large canals and man-made lakes). For me, it was refreshing to see the ocean and feel the breeze. And like Seattle, there is very little jaywalking. It was bizarre walking back to the hotel and seeing people stopped, waiting to cross a nearly deserted intersection! I even saw a woman on a bike grind to a halt and wait. Crazy yet comforting (perhaps only a Seattleite can appreciate this?).



One of the first things you notice in CPH is just how many bikes there are. The city is very progressive about bikes... nearly every street has dedicated bike lanes, and on larger streets, the parking is actually inside of the bike lane to avoid cars pulling out. What's also neat is that you see all types of people on bikes (students, kids, business people, etc). Granted, it's quite flat in CPH, but it's definitely part of the culture as far as I can tell.



Ah yes, notice how CLEAN the sidewalks are!!! Back here in Toulouse, the Danish sidewalks are but a distant dream for me. Yes, I'm obsessed.

It was somewhat surprising to see how commonplace English is in CPH. While most signs are in Danish, there were still a number of billboards in English and nearly everyone we ran into spoke excellent English. Bilingual menus were also quite common. I suppose when you're a country of 5 million or so, it's a necessity to speak another language to interact with other countries (and these days English is the standard).

Another surprise was our reaction to the more American style of meal service and hello/goodbyes. Dining out in France is very leasurely activity that is not rushed. You're "given" plenty of time to review the menu and then wait for your food to arrive. When you're finished, there's no race on behalf of the server to give you your bill and get you out the door. In Denmark, I felt as though we barely had time to decide and that our food was delivered with lightning speed! It's nice when you actually need to go somewhere, but dinner certainly felt very abrupt. I've heard that the French complain about eating out in America--now I can see why. And in France, whenever you meet someone or say goodbye, you shake hands with the men and kiss every woman at least twice on the cheeks (the women have to kiss both the men and women). In CPH, our hosts (who we had hung out with several times) did the American thing of simply saying "goodbye" or waving a hand from one side of the group to the other. I also have to say that this felt so abrupt! I guess our time in France is having an affect on us.

Happy (Belated) Birthday, Katie!

Her actual birthday was February 14th. For my own sake, I'll refrain from revealing her age. Can you guess where she went to college?

Tomislav Fan Club Unveils Logo

I'm a little late in posting this, but it was recently our roommate Tomislav's (aka Tomi or Tom)birthday! We celebrated the big event by speaking English and having drinks with some friends at an English pub in Toulouse. To my surprise, our friends Rémi and Natasha gave Tomi (as they call him) a homemade t-shirt with their own Rub My Tomi for Good Luck logo (pictured above) on the front. They did a really great job! I don't know how well Tom likes it, but I absolutely adore it and I'm pretty sure that those who know Tom will as well. The Tomislav Fan Club now has a logo! I must admit that I'm a bit jealous... I want my own Rub My Tomi t-shirt for my birthday!

Enslaved by Nike+iPod (this has nothing to do with France)

This past Christmas I asked my family for the Nike+iPod running kit. If you haven't heard of it, it's a sensor that you put inside any Nike+ running shoe with a receiver that attaches to an iPod Nano. I already run with Nike shoes and I already had an iPod Nano so I figured, why not? Once calibrated, it basically works as a fancy pedometer (i.e. keeps track of time, distance, and pace). And if you press a button, it automatically mutes your music and announces (you can choose a male or female voice) your current time and distance or will tell you how much further you have to run in your workout. It also has a bunch of cheesy features like power song and celebrity voices.

The power song feature allows you to choose one song and have it readily available to be played. So say you need that extra push at the end of a run; all you do is hit a button and your power song comes on. My current power song is "I Hear Voices" by Tegan & Sara (a group I highly recommend, by the way--Katie will tell you that I listen to them incessantly but take my word for it).

And when you set a personal record such as fastest 5 km, longest distance run, etc., you get congratulated by a celebrity (i.e. Nike) athlete. Thus far I've heard Lance Armstrong and Paula Radcliffe (women's marathon world record holder). Today, for example, I heard the following: "This is Paula Radcliffe. Congratulations, you just set a personal best for the 10k." Yes it's cheesy, but I find it terribly amusing. So as you can tell by the tone of my writing, I'm pretty happy with the Nike+iPod. Now I know how far my various runs around Toulouse actually are.

HOWEVER, there is a dark side which I think speaks volumes about the sick, sick mentality of runners. When you synch up your iPod, its link to the Nike website that keeps track of every run that you do. That's fine. The insidious part is that you can also set goals for yourself. I decided to try to run 150 km in 4 weeks (the minimum amount of time permitted). On the surface, that didn't seem too bad. It averages to 5.4 km per day (around 3.3 miles). Of course, that's if you run every day and with Nike+iPod you can't really cheat because it accurately tracks your runs and the days left in the goal. It's sad, but the little numbers that appear on the website are highly motivating (and awful). Basically after each run I immediately consult the computer to see how far ahead (rarely occurs) or (more typicall) behind I am. And on the days I don't run, this thing has me thinking about how much farther behind my daily goal I'll be. It's amazing how guilty this goal makes me feel!!! In fact as my 4 weeks were coming to an end, I decided I would go on a really long run (15 km) to try and get back some of my losses. It well until I had to run/walk for the last 3 km or so. Given that it was a fairly cold day ended up feeling miserable that night and the following day!! I decided not to chance it the next day by staying in (I gave it some serious consideration, though), which, of course, only exacerbated the problem. So my first attempt at 150 km in 28 days ended in failure. I finished at 138 km (thankfully, Paula Radcliffe didn't tell me that I was a loser).

I just began a new 150 km challenge today. I was thinking I would take a few days off before starting a new one, but of course the computer promted me to do another challenge (after it informed me that I was a LOSER!!). So naturally I accepted. Yes, runners are gluttons for punishment. Anyhow, I'm proud to announce that I'm currently ahead of schedule (as you can see in the picture).

Sorry, I'll try to write something about France next time!!