Today’s clouds are from the Botanisk Have again.

The above steeple is part of the International Church of Copenhagen. We didn’t go inside, but a fellow faculty member went to church there once. I think it is the only place in Denmark with services in English. I asked him how it was since religion is mostly dead in Scandinavia. He said there were only about 20 people at the service. The place holds hundreds.

When we were in the Vor Frue Kirke their service was about to start. The place seemed big enough to hold several hundred people–maybe even 500–but there were no more than about 30. They all looked pretty unhappy and pretty old. The average age was well over 50.

Of the less than 2% of the population that attends church in Denmark, some are still atheists who attend for social reasons. Even a Danish priest, Thorkild Grosboll, came out as a non-believer and his congregation supported him.

Many, if not nearly all, of the churches in Norway, Sweden, and Denmark only continue to exist because of state support. Some have been converted into museums, restaurants, and other facilities. We saw one in Gothenburg, Sweden that had been turned into a fish market.

I wonder how long it will take the rest of the world to follow Scandinavia’s lead. In my own town, in the U.S.A. even, churches are closing up shop left and right.

Posted on August 5th, 2008 under Denmark. Tags: clouds, copenhagen, living in copenhagen, nature, norway, pictures, sweden. Comments: None

Gothenburg has Scandinavia’s largest mall. The thing is absolutely huge. But malls aren’t fun to take pictures of so I didn’t. The shopping spills out of the mall and into countless, cute, cobblestone streets. Unless you are earning a living in Swedish Kronors or Norwegian Krones I can’t imagine really wanting to shop here as those of us with U.S. dollars can’t get much bang for our buck.

Gothenburg reminded me a bit of San Francisco, and the above picture may give you one indication of why.

In front of the opera house flew the four Scandinavian flags. Maybe someday, when the U.S. dollar is worth something I will get to take another trip to see Norway and Finland. Right now things in those two countries are even more expensive than Denmark and Sweden.

Gothenburg has a canal that rings the city center. We took an hour long canal tour which was very nice. We plan to do the same in Copenhagen this coming Sunday.

Gothenburg was filled with very cool statues and parks. The batteries in my camera died early in the day so I don’t have many pictures of them though.

This was the only picture I got off from our canal tour before my camera’s batteries needed recharging. After the tour we walked around the Haga area which was very pretty before scrambling back to the train station to head back to Copenhagen.

The train took us back through beautiful countryside with occasional views of the ocean. Towns included Kungsbacka, Varberg, Halmstad, Helsingborg, and Malmo. We may head back over the border at some point to visit Malmo from more than the seat of a train.

Posted on July 4th, 2008 under Denmark. Tags: goteborg, gothenburg, Malmo, pictures, sweden. Comments: None

Gothenburg was a really nice place on many levels. As noted in a prior entry, we stayed at the Hotel Barken Viking, an actual boat in the harbor. We later learned on a canal tour of the city that the Viking can no longer physically leave the harbor because bridges have subsequently been built which are lower than its height.

The above photo is of my kids in the lobby of the hotel. You can find more pictures of the ship on their blog.

If I look really thin and sickly in the above picture it is because I was. Although I had a great time anyway, I’d love to do this trip again now that I’m no longer sick, jetlagged, and tired but unable to sleep. I had not slept for over 30 hours when this shot was taken. And the last time I had slept was for only a few hours.

You can’t really trust the reviews in guidebooks or on sites like tripadvisor as the Viking was totally restored and remodeled in May of 2008. We were told that it used to be somewhat hostel like, with small rooms, shared bathrooms, etc. The rooms are now larger than they used to be. They are also nicer and each has a really nice bathroom (made completely out of wood). The prices are also higher now and a free pass to the amusement park is not included in most rooms.

Breakfast is included though (and is very good!). The scrambled eggs at breakfast were, by far, the best I’ve ever had. I didn’t realize scrambled eggs could have flavor like that. I wish I knew the secret ingredients.

The staff at the Hotel Barken Viking were all very nice and helpful. They all speak perfect English (as does everyone in Sweden it seems). The Danes speak good English as well, but the Swedes are even better.

In other non-English speaking foreign countries when you ask someone if they can speak English you either get a blank stare, a “no,” or an answer of “a little.” In Denmark the answer is usually “yes.” In Sweden it is usually “of course.” And they aren’t kidding.

To say hello in Sweden you say, “Hey.” You shouldn’t stop there though (unless you speak Swedish), or the reply will be a load of Swedish. I found that saying, “Hey, do you speak English?” was the best greeting as it started in Swedish, but didn’t result in a response in Swedish.

Morning came after a nice 10-hour sleep on the Viking. The above is a view from the porthole in our room. The room smelled so good. I don’t know if the nice smell was due to the new remodel or if it will always smell like that, but all hotels should be so pleasant to the nose.

I actually have quite a few more pictures from Gothenburg so our less-than-two-day trip to Sweden is going to turn into a five-day blog with tomorrow’s final installment.

Posted on July 3rd, 2008 under Denmark. Tags: goteborg, gothenburg, hotell barken viking (hotel barque viking), pictures, sweden. Comments: None

Metaltown took place just over the bridge from our hotel. Although it was an interesting experience, and I thoroughly enjoyed myself at times, there were some problems. The first was that my ticket never arrived so I had to buy another one. The second is that the band I was most hoping to see, Opeth, cancelled due to Mikael Akerfeldt coming down with chicken pox. But the biggest problem of all is that I was sick and running on only about 8 hours of sleep in the prior 3+ days.

The final problem is with festival concerts in general. I think this was my last (of many). It just isn’t the optimal means to enjoy music. Too many bands and too many people in the audience do not make for the best of experiences. I wasn’t the only one spent after just three or four bands. How does one stay up (even with a good night’s sleep) for 10 bands over nearly 11 hours?

I was in the front for four of the bands (Dark Tranquility, Finntroll, Amon Amarth, and Nightwish). During the others I mostly rested. I was favorably impressed by Finntroll. The highlight, for me, was Amon Amarth who call their music Viking Metal. Satyricon filled in for Opeth. Lillasyster, Soilwork, and Nightwish didn’t do it for me. Dimmu Borgir did an amazing job of reproducing their highly technical and heavily produced (in a good way) studio sound live. I was expecting them to fall short in terms of sound, but that didn’t happen.

I should also mention that in addition to the two stages which almost always had a band playing (one at a time, switching stages, with a 15 minute break in between) there was a third stage which I never visited. Clutch played on that third stage. I met part of the band in the check-in line in Washington D.C. They came to Copenhagen on the same flight. After Metaltown they are playing at Roskilde this weekend in Denmark.

I ran out of Swedish Kronors early in the day and there were no ATMs to get more. This meant I could buy no food (other than a bag of chips). By 10:30 p.m. I had had no sleep, less than 1,000 calories, and had been standing or walking for the better part of 12 hours straight. I was also running a fever and felt like I would be a goner at any moment. With In Flames still to come I didn’t want to give up, but I had to in order to live to see another day. I left in the middle of the Nightwish set (which was boring me to tears).

(Plus, I was going to be very far from the stage when In Flames came on. I’ve become rather spoiled in the past year or so with being in or very near the front for concerts I’ve attended. This has now made the normal concert experience of being far away seem less than satisfactory. I was in the front row for several bands as mentioned above. I was only a few rows away from the stage for Satyricon. So sticking around to be far away to see In Flames just wasn’t going to cut it.)

A quick trip back over the bridge and I crashed on the Viking for the next 10 hours.

As you can see from the above photo, the Hotel Barken Viking was not far from Metaltown. Although it was after 10 p.m. the sky had yet to darken. This far north, things don’t get dark until very late in the summer.

Posted on July 2nd, 2008 under Denmark. Tags: goteborg, gothenburg, hotell barken viking (hotel barque viking), metal, metaltown 2008, sweden. Comments: None