So I’ve been in Copenhagen for a month already! Yesterday I went to a lecture at Copenhagen University; the class is a course in Danish culture. Yesterday’s lecture was about mythology and legends. It was pretty interesting! I am not enrolled in the class so it felt kind of funny to sit there, but it was a large lecture class and so people probably thought I was enrolled. The lecture hall was very stylish, by the way. If I go again I’ll try to take some pictures. It’s true that the Danish people seem to love well-designed and stylish buildings. At least,  it seems true from what I’ve seen so far in Copenhagen!

Well, on to the purpose of this entry. Here are some Danish words I’ve picked up from my first month of living in Copenhagen. It is far easier for me to read them than to pronounce them, though. I can get by with speaking English, but it is fun to try to understand the local language.

First, a little about Danish:

• The Danish alphabet – the Danish alphabet uses the same 26 letters that the English language does, plus 3 vowels that do not occur in English. These vowels are represented by Æ (with lowercase æ); Ø (with lowercase ø); and Å (lowercase å). They come at the end of the alphabet, after “Z”, in the order I’ve presented them.
• So, “æ” is pronounced close to “e” in English word “best”
• “ø” is pronounced close to the “i” sound in the English word “bird”
• “å” is prounounced like “o” in “coke” or “often.”

Some Danish words I picked up this past month (note – many of these words look similar to English but are pronounced totally different):

• Days of the week (in order): mandag, tirsdag, onsdag, torsdag, fredag, lørdag & søndag.
  • I’ve noticed that days of the week are not capitalized when used within a sentence.
• dag = day
• i dag = today
• og = and
• med = with
  • I’ve even seen “m/grøntsager” meaning “with vegetables”, the same way we would write “w/vegetables” in English!
• mod = against
• tryk = push (I’ve seen it on doors)
• udgang = exit
• adgang = entrance
• grøntsager = vegetables
• kort = card
• næste = next
• til = to (as in “going to some location”) or can also mean “until”
• klokken = “at …. o’clock”; for example, the time for my kitchen’s weekly dinner is written on the board as Kl.19:00, meaning 7:00 p.m.
• åben = open
• på = on; at; in
• parkering = parking
• øl = beer
• løg = onion
• have = garden
• hvidløg = garlic
• vask = washing
• vaskeri = laundry
• varm = hot or warm
• lufthavn = airport
• luft = air or sky
• frugt = fruit

This is just a short entry. I am happy because I managed to cook rice the other night, it wasn’t perfect but it came out well enough to eat. I bought some vegetables and there are many small ethnic markets that sell stir-fry sauces and oil, so I have made stir-fry 2 times so far. It’s not that bad and it’ll save a LOT of money.

Also I did my laundry for the second time a few nights ago, this time my clothes weren’t sopping wet and were mostly dry after coming out of the dryer. I glanced at the dryer settings when someone else’s clothes were in there; I decided to put my clothes on that setting when it was my turn. It was the opposite setting from what I had last time. Whatever it was, it worked, so I didn’t need to hang anything this time around.

Now I am going to a lecture on Danish culture at the nearby Copenhagen University. More later…

It’s been a while since I’ve posted last. This post will be a general update. There are new pictures up on Flickr as well.

Discovering Copenhagen #2 – A walk around Nørrebro
Last Wednesday Barbara and I went on a walk around Nørrebro, which is a multi-ethnic area of the city; a lot of immigrants have settled here. This is also the “rougher” part of Copenhagen. Riots have occured here in the past, and we walked by the site where famous riots have occured in the past (including a site where a youth hangout spot had been torn down due to clashes over its ownership). We also visited the historic cemetery where many famous Danes have been buried. Nørrebro is very interesting to say the least and has a lot of multi-ethnic restaurants and shops. Plus, Barbara was a great tour guide!! I took lots of pictures, and they are up on Flickr.

Discovering Copenhagen #3 – Central Station, the Bus System and Rådhuspladsen
Another discovery from the past week included a visit to the Central Station (which is near or part of Nørreport Station) and riding on the S-Train and having my first Danish hot dog at the Central Station (delicious!). I went with Kathrine, one of my classmates who is also from the US!

On Saturday we’d originally planned to go to the zoo, but it was rainy and yucky in the morning, so I decided not to go and to do some shopping instead. I decided to try out the bus system in the process. The bright yellow busses are very well organized and they run on the dot. I also like how you can buy a 10-ride ticket and it works on all of the public transportation options — the Metro, the bus and the S-Train. I ended up at the central city square, Rådhuspladsen, while waiting to catch another bus, so I did some quick exploring of the shops around that area. I will return on a later date to see more! Riding the bus is also a good way to see how the different areas of the city are all connected, because to me Copenhagen still feels like several separate cities rather than one large one.

On Saturday afternoon I visited my friend Hana, a fellow classmate, in her dorm room for tea (she lives in the same dorm as I do, but in a different building)! I had a really nice time, and stayed for dinner as well. Then, Saturday night I went to a kitchen party; I had been invited by my friend Iveta, a fellow international student who also lives in this dorm. The party was fun and I met some nice people!

Discovering Copenhagen #4 -A walk around the park
On Sunday I went with Hana, on a walk around this gorgeous park near our dorm. It looks very much like the countryside! So Copenhagen has it all — big city, quiet, green pathways and of course the beach (which I have yet to visit). It was a very pleasant walk and I took pictures of course; they are on Flickr.

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That is pretty much it for this entry. My week to clean the kitchen is coming up starting on the 28th. That should be interesting. I bought rubber gloves so it’ll be easier for me to do a good job without worrying about touching something icky. Ha!

On Monday (yesterday) our school hosted this interesting lecture about persuasive design. B.J. Fogg, a professor from Stanford University, gave a talk in the morning and a workshop in the afternoon. I attended both and found it quite neat. He talked about how websites, especially Facebook, uses certain techniques to persuade users to do certain things. Then in the workshops we looked at profile pictures and discussed how the lighting, angles, facial expressions and degree of cropping can affect the viewers’ perception. At the end of the workshop we broke into groups and put together a survey using our own profile pictures and apply some of the principles we’d discussed all day.

That’s it for now, more entries later!