hej hej hej ...

danemark! denmark!

land of so much cool stuff. for such a geographically small land (though technically, greenland is part of denmark, so not as small as you might think), a great number of truly awesome things have been given to us by denmark & danish design is superb: bodum, georg jensen, carlsberg, bang & olufsen, butter cookies, LEGO(!!), inwear/matinique, ecco, peter beier chocolate, bojensen chocolate (& loads more!). i have become a dane by proxy.

after the airport debacle, i got to denmark and nearly collapsed with joy in the airport (the modern, logical, user-friendly airport -- hah tegel, take a page from the danes). my friend, S, [who is really my twin on account of how freakishly similar we are in temperament & experience, and how freakishly similar our families are as well. clearly we were separated at birth] came to pick me up - so very nice. we went back to her place first. her apartment is really nice & really cheap! S is a doctor. so she qualifies for special housing near two hospitals, once of which she has to be working at in order to get the housing. not only that, but since she'll be done her rotations at the nearby hospital, she is being sent apartment listings (at a huge discount) from a medical association (i think) in copenhagen for when she moves. these are huge places at huge subsidies, compared to market value.

after my oooohing and aaaaahing over her apartment. & S almost having a heart-attack after i told her about the rent for my prior sh*tboxes in nyc, we decide to go into her town. She lives just outside copenhagen in a very cute, small place called hillerod. hillerod's village is truly quaint. and is mostly known for frederiksborg castle (the summer home of the crown prince & his family, built in the 1560s (at least part of it) by king frederik II.)

we then went into town for lunch. and had a burger at a pub-type place. we each had burgers. they were yum!!

the rest of the evening was wonderfully low-key. i took a nap (big news, since my sleep woes are well-known) and then we had yummy thai food & chatted up a storm. whoa. and then i passed out.