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???

Hughes Grant or Antonio Banderas?

Morten said the type of Hughes Grant with all his indecisiveness would be very popular among Danish girls. I asked Jan about that and he agreed and went even further: The Hughes Grant type would adapt easily (no real opinion), would be presentable in every situation and fit well into the furniture. Here we go, again the huege! When I asked about this supposedly Danish being-exceptional Jan said Hughes Grant would talk modest but still think he is different or upper class. The latino type would generally be considered as ‚too much’ among Danes allthough he had once overheared a conversation in which a Danish girl was almost offended that her girlfriend had thought she would pick a Danish boyfriend! Guess I have to talk with Danish women about that.

18.11.2007, 18:39, Comment here hier kommentieren

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Esbjerg VIPs

Morten and I went out in Esbjerg. I asked two young men on the streets if there was something like half-underground in Esbjerg and they became very confused and said ‚we are just drunk guys“. We finally found a group of fun and young and very dressed up people (the Esbjerg VIPs?) who had just come from a dance contest. We listened to Danish Rock from the 80s and drank christmas beer. One guy in the room had glitter in his hair and the painting next to him was also glittery – I was very impressed. Discussing Copenhagen politics one guy said that the people of Ungdomshuset should just be shot.

18.11.2007, 15:37, Comment here hier kommentieren

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Elvis and the Old Ladies

Jan said it is important to be quiet here in public, unlike from what he experienced in Belgrad where people just put their loudspeakers outside their windows. Returning from this conference on sound and music in public space we sat in the train and I pulled out my small loudspeakers to listen to some Balkan music and Cohen and Elvis. I smiled at people and they were swinging and swaying to the music and tapping their fingers. Especially one old lady was almost singing when I played Elvis’ ‚Falling in love with you’. Then a young man sat down in front of us and he joined in with a wonderful voice and it turned out that he sings in musicals since 10 years and played a major role in Sound of Music in Copenhagen. The weird thing was that not one person made a comment or thanked us when we all left the train in Copenhagen. I found that very strange and am sure that in Vienna or Munich people would have started a conversation or at least would have made a remark. I think Nicoletta who is originally from Rumania was quite happy about this little performance and filmed us singing and swinging.

17.11.2007, 18:42, Comment here hier kommentieren

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Who is playing the First Violin?

Anders from Sweden said Copenhagen is a hanseatic city and just like Hamburg or Bremen mercantile and burgeois to the core. He pointed out funny references to the type of music that was typical for the 19th century in Copenhagen like music of the Bach sons, Johann Christian etc.. Apparently in middle class houses the purpose of practicing chamber music on a regular basis was to find the best husband for the daughters. So the father played the second violin in the string quartett because he did not have time to practice, the daughter played the cello to proove that she was capable of being a good supporting mother and the eager aspirant had to play – guess - the first violin to show his talent in mastering the hard work. Anders also said that piano music for four hands was mainly composed to observe whether the future couple would work well together... I asked if that was an assumption and he said it was a given fact.

17.11.2007, 18:35, Comment here hier kommentieren

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Two more Jokes about Scandinavians

Morten told me this joke about Scandinavians: The Norwegian have a good idea, the Swedish make it work, and the Danes sell it. Jan told me another joke, about marriage: When a guy asks a girl if she wants to marry him, the Icelandic woman asks „from which family do you come from?“ The Norwegian girls asks „are you through with other girls?“ and the Danisg woman wants to know „How much money do you have?“

16.11.2007, 22:32, Comment here hier kommentieren

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Different and yet the Same

There is a joke about traffic in Denmark: The Danes do not follow the rules but expect others to follow the rules. Jan also talked about this paradox that the Danes want to be exceptional but yet not different from the group. Morten agreed and said the Danes love the exception and ‚the crack in everything’ („That’s where the light comes in..“). The Germans love perfection, the Danes the exception? Jan said it is important here to have consensus within the given situation wich can be anywhere, public space, inside a home etc. Does this have to do with the ‚Jante Law: Don't think you're anyone special or that you're better than us.’ In Wikipedia I find: Jante Law (Danish and Norwegian: Janteloven; Swedish: Jantelagen; Finnish: Janten laki; Faroese: Jantulógin) is a concept created by the Norwegian/Danish author Aksel Sandemose in his novel A Fugitive Crosses his Tracks (En flygtning krydser sit spor, 1933), where he portrays the small Danish town Jante, modelled upon his native town Nykøbing Mors as it was in the beginning of the 20th century, but typical of all very small towns, where nobody is anonymous. All those words like Jante Law, consensus, huege start rotating in my head...

16.11.2007, 18:27, Comment here hier kommentieren

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Huege!

It seems that the „huege“, or „huegli“ feeling is quite central to the Danish. Jan said it has something to do with lots of candles, Marzipan and old ladies ☺. Ada, who is from Spain, said that at first when she got to Denmark all those rooms full of candles seemed like churches to her. In the context of huege seems to be standing the notion of „consensus“: It seems to be important to not challenge the consensus within your group. Confrontation is absolutly non-Danish. I had the idea that on a pilgrimage I could ask people to be nasty...

16.11.2007, 15:24, Comment here hier kommentieren

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Lost

A woman in Badehuset says she is completely tired and fed up with Christiania, that it is tough to live ‚out here’ and that she wants to move out. She needs a home, with toilet and kitchen and running water. While she was talking she kept rubbing her eyes and putting her elbows in front of her mouth so it was sometimes difficult for me to understand what she was saying. She said that Christiania is like a ‚woman’ who has lost herself. And I wondered whether she was talking about the city or about herself.

15.11.2007, 19:33, Comment here hier kommentieren

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Greenland

Norman said that Denmark always has been a monoculture so they have to get used to different mentalities and cultures. Like in the US for black people where it is not easy to mix with the white community it is like this here for Greenlanders - and seems even harder. 60% of the homeless in Denmark are not Danish, among them are a lot of Greenlandic people. Greenland is a self-governing Danish province and still stands under the Danish crown. Now that Greenland found the worlds largest oil reserve that might change the perspective since they do have the right to seperate from Denmark if they want. Norman supposes they will seperate since the Danes did not always treat the Greenlanders well. Both leading parties in Greenland are leftwing, quite different to here.

15.11.2007, 17:37, Comment here hier kommentieren

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Follow the customs or flee the country

In my second Thai Chi class Lars said: Your body should be like the trunk of an elephant, flexible but very strong. After class there was a discussion about the Peoples Party (Dansk Folkeparti) which is now the 3rd largest party in Denmark. Norman showed me one of their ads in the newspaper in which you see a group of veiled women and the sentence: „Follow the customs or flee the country“. They apparently walk on a fine line, know exactly what they are doing and when the antidiscrimination law comes they just laugh. Once a week they post an ad which the politicians then speak about the whole week. Norman says that Denmark is quite cool and not racist, no violent attacks against foreigners, but this populist tactic goes for votes - and gets them. For example Naser Khader, the head of a central right party is now publicly called to have an ‚Arabian carpetseller mentality’ by the Peoples Party... that freaks me out. I wonder why people here then vote for the Peoples Party.

image: object by Frenchdanish artist Thierry Geoffroy / Colonel, seen at Galerie Asbaek.

15.11.2007, 17:16, Comment here hier kommentieren

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