Copenhagen & Christiania / Blog

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irma clausen zu The Shift:

Jørgen Hedegaard zu Never Ask for Help: Hi It's true, and even danes who move from one part of the contry to another have the problem ! Danes live and stay in one place, there "hometown", only exception is Copenhagen (people come to this town, if they have money :-( ). I have lived in different places in Denmark (and Germany), and I feel like a foreigner here myself. All Best Jørgen Hedegaard

Jørgen Hedegaard zu Never Ask for Help: The Url :

Jørgen Hedegaard zu Never Ask for Help: The Url again ... . www.FlatTV.dk

Gerd Gerhard Loeffler zu Winter Depression / Part II: If you think you look worse you probably really do? ;) That's time and gravity!

Gerd Gerhard Loeffler zu Coffee Flowers 2008: @gowing down of europe: If we consider the Hippie-idea as the strongest in the western world I do not woder why europe is going down!

Gerd Gerhard Loeffler zu Coffee Flowers 2008: @downfall of europe (again): Maybe the fact that capitalism bought the hippie-idea was the biggest mistake the hippies could ever make. They sold out their ideals, didn't they? @production: I'm not sure if production is the actual key to a society. In my opinion the eastern countries produced quite well. The stuff just worked. Try that with China's stuff...

Gerd Gerhard Loeffler zu Coffee Flowers 2008: @ ALL* the rest of what you said: Gimme some stickers!

Gerd Gerhard Loeffler zu Humour: Humor in Austria? What did u expect???

Winter Depression and Hyldeberries!

Last week I had a hard time. It is so f** dark and grey and rainy! I missed friends and family and almost decided to give up this Scandinnavian endeavour and fly home. I woke up usually at noon (!), hungry, ate and almost fell asleep again. My system was lower then I had ever imagined it could get. I just wanted to sleep. I hardly got outside in the daylight. That is terrible! And I am not prone to depression at all, I have an active and extrovert character, so what on earth do people here do who tend to phlegmatism?
Friday night I dragged myself to an opening of Stalke North, where friends of mine from Vienna exhibited, Bella Angora and Christian Falsnaes. There beautiful K. told me that I have to go outside every day around noon. And S. lives here since a few years and completely understands me so it was good to talk though I still felt like a More >>

08.12.2007, 16:18, Comment here hier kommentieren

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A Rose is a Rose is a Rose or Christiania is a Dream

At the Vegetarian restaurant I met M. who invited me to a Wednesday late night Christianian meeting. I went there and there were around 5 people, among them some First-Days-Christianians. It was quite fascinating in what way the discussion evolved and I got a glimpse of many years of a specific discussion culture. All were quite interested in my political opinions. Basically I got the impression we agreed in terms of politics and on the Danish culture and how it changed over the last years. The government cannot risk a second civil war like with the Ungdomshuset. One man said There should be more young people in Christiania with energy. He also said: The energy here stopped when they were not allowed to build anymore.
During our discussion B. scetched a drawing that he publishes in the weekly Ugespejlet. B. is an impressive personality who sometimes talked in a way that reminded me of Indian philosophy... good is bad is good... a rose is a rose is a rose... I mentioned Margrittes ‚ceci n’est pas une pipe’ and thought about Staces teaching at the Yoga camp in Sweden.
We talked about that some people here negotiate with the Government while others think once they negotiate Christiania will sell out because it will be on their condidtions. I commented that to me there seems to be a general disagreement in terms: The Government talks about money while Christiania is not about money.
N. had told me earlier that the rules have to stay simple, otherwise it will not stay Christiania. A few days later Britta says to me: Christiania is a dream.

07.12.2007, 16:21, Comment here hier kommentieren

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In the Village

Met J. at Moonfishers who said the people here in Christiania have a better sense of democracy than in a normal 20th century city. Christianians recognize really easy where democracy is disfunctional. That people internalized lessons of the 1960s. We talked about the village mentality here and that the ‚social transaction’ is much more important here than the ‚financial transaction’. But social transaction is much more sticky and slower than the free market. Here people don’t just moove or cannot ‚just give a shit what their neighbours think’. They have to cooperate and are dependant on their neighbours, so that supports but as well binds them. The village of Christiania is built on constant recognition of oneself, but on the other hand that limits your ability to recreate yourself. I was wandering abou that since Christiania to me seems to be built on the premises of freedom of expression of ones personality. But wouldn’t that bet the ideal – to have the strength and binds of the community and yet the freedom to change?
We were talking about the philosophical question of legitamacy of justice and self policing and that sometimes the consensus really works while other times it is a barrier. In the socalled violence meetings More >>

06.12.2007, 16:19, Comment here hier kommentieren

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Naked Lunatics!

J. yesterday at Moonfishers told me this wicked story that a Christianite had told him: In the Mid70s due to big conflicts with drug dealers the Christianites locked all the dealers in one house and barricated it. When the dealers ran out of water and food and one by one came out they stripped them naked, threw them out of Christiania and then called the police and said there is a lunatic on the street. He also said that the ‚soft’ drug dealers keep out the hard drug dealers. But that some of them are really influential in Christiania.

05.12.2007, 11:08, Comment here hier kommentieren

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Telenovelas, a hooded Coat and where is John Wayne?

I was sick for a few days. But wow, I am sooo happy well again! First time among people again, sitting at Moonfishers tapping my way along on the keyboard, drinking strong double espresso coffee. Nice. Different from Danish filtercoffee (quoting ‚Out of Rosenheim’: sat’s not coffee sat’s brown wota). When you are sick you forget how life feels. I feel like awakening from a bodykoma now. My hole timeschedule still is completely screwed, I slept at day and could not fall asleep at night, so at night I watched bad German telenovelas and this new popular dokusoap ‚Bauer sucht Frau’ (transl.: farmer searching woman) in which a bunch of actual farmers search a women to marry, all everydaylife situations encluded. Had to laugh when I thought about what someone had told me about the Christianian men: More >>

30.11.2007, 12:18, Comment here hier kommentieren

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Have to be Perfect

Met a very nice artist at the Academy of Fine Arts. She has a tattoo on her arm with the words ‚I have to be perfect’. She said the facade is important in Demark and you need to have guts to be vulnerable... we talked about how to fail beautifully. I mentioned the art selfhelgroup ’schönerscheitern’ (en: failmorebeautifully) I had invited to the program angels in Munich once. They talked in public about their personal failures and nobody knew if it was true or fake. The audience was fascinated and embarrassed simultaneously.

Gudruns website: http://www.gudrunhasle.dk/

23.11.2007, 20:23, Comment here hier kommentieren

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La Cuisine Perfecte or Opium for the People. Laurence & Lene Part 4

They also said that for many Danes the perfect kitchen would be the core and more important than actually cooking or socializing in their kitchen. The French spend double the amount of money on food than the Danes. But both agreed that it is quite an easy life from a materialistic point of view, quite laid back, lazy and – safe. Nothing to fight for and actually quite provincial. Denmark seems to be the country with one of the highs depth per country and per person. The general opinion seems to be: You are stupid if you are not in depth because you pay less taxes if you are in depth. So everybody here is in depth, even more than in the US.

21.11.2007, 12:56, Comment here hier kommentieren

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Use your Talents. Laurence & Lene Part 3

Lene and Laurence agreed that if they would be the good fairy they would donate a good dose of curiosity to the people. Jürgen had told me this story that he had worked a coupld of years in Paris as a young men. When he returned to Denmark not one of his family or neighbours asked one question about how it had been there. Though the Danes travel a lot they are not really curious about how it is actually living elsewhere -?. L&L said that this has to do with (again!) the ‚Jantelaw’ (see older blogpost): More >>

21.11.2007, 12:17, Comment here hier kommentieren

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Falling into Cold Water. Laurence & Lene Part 2

Lene and Laurence said: Most important for Danes is their job, otherwise they are quite closed and reserved in showing warmth. The Danes would prefer to have friends who are alike and tend to stay in quite closed circles. Danes have a hard time expressing their emotions. Laurence said they actually have no real respect for emotions -?-. More >>

21.11.2007, 11:49, Comment here hier kommentieren

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Hi, my name is xxx . Laurence & Lene Part 1

Went to this opening of the Frenshdanish artist Colonel at gallery Aesbek. Actually quite clever comments. Mainly dealing with the Danish mentality, so not so different from my endeavours. Ada introduced me to the artist, a quite impressive and charismatic Frenchman. Then there were two friendly women and we started to talk and they invited me to come along with them. Turned out that More >>

21.11.2007, 11:28, Comment here hier kommentieren

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