Back to Living the Danish Life!
OK, back to Danish life! We had a nice visit to the U.S., but we still have lots of good Danish living to cover.
Birthdays
My birthday happened while I was in the U.S., but we celebrated with some delicious BLTs and ice cream at home before I left. And for those of you who think a BLT doesn't sound like a very exciting birthday dinner, I feel sad, because it's clear to me that Zac has never made you a sandwich before. That guy is GOOD.
My colleagues sure didn't forget my birthday, either. I returned from the U.S. to find my desk decorated in traditional Danish birthday fashion.
Zac got me really some really cool earrings from Lövendahl that I had eyed when we visited their booth at Copenhell.
Kaden also turned 15 the other day! You guys! My baby boy is 15 years old! His birthday was in the middle of the week, which sucked because it was also the day that Zac and I had to take our Danish test. I sang him the first verse of one of the Danish birthday songs when he woke up, and then Harrison and I followed it up with the English version of Happy Birthday, but then it was just a normal school day.
We saved the celebration for the weekend instead. He requested homemade macaroni and cheese and chicken strips, so Zac used a recipe Josh and Kari gave us to make some epic baked m&c, and I did the chicken strips. He was very pleased.
He opened his gifts and spent a relaxing evening on the back terrace.
Kastager Festival and Slotsruiner
The weekend we got back from the U.S. was the long-awaited Kastager Festival! The Ihlemann family puts on a music festival at their summer house in Lolland every two years, and we somehow were lucky enough to be invited.
The last time we drove down to their summer house, Harrison got super car sick, so this time, even though we have implemented a booster seat and anti-carsickness glasses, we decided to play it safe and stop halfway to have a picnic lunch.
Zac saw a sign for Vordingborg Slotsruiner (Vordingborg castle ruins) and it sounded like a cool place to eat sandwiches. It was amazing!
The castle dates back to the Middle Ages. The Goose Tower is the only one that is preserved. The rest of the castle was destroyed after it was abandoned.
 |
| The Water Gate was bricked up since it was a weak point in the castle defense. |
We ate our lunch by a huge pear tree. The kids enjoyed climbing it and picking (previously royal?) pears.
We walked around the grounds digesting and it was really lovely. They have installments to show where the old walls used to be for the strongholds, the keep, the other towers, and the church. The outer wall still partially stands, including the base of one of the corners of the most well-protected parts of the castle. It has a little tree growing in the center now and it's beautiful.
We climbed around for a bit because people in Denmark can be trusted to do that responsibly without vandalizing the ruins or falling off the wall to their death, and I wished we could actually stay even longer!
We didn't climb the Goose Tower or look at the archeological finds, but hey, there's always next time! Onward to Kastager!
Admittedly, I didn't take very many pictures at the festival because I wasn't sure if the people who were performing were into that kind of thing. I got a little bolder toward the end after I saw that it was fine.
We pulled into the dedicated field parking space with the windmills in the distance. It was very crunchy and very cool.
We wandered around until we found Christina. She showed us a few options for areas we could pitch the tent, gave us a tour of the festival stages, the decorations, the toilet facilities, the bar, and the outdoor game and lounge area, and she helped us get our first drinks and festival bracelets.
We had borrowed a larger tent from Vibe (and she watched our dog while we were gone...we do not deserve her) and pitched it in the field. We tried out our Nordic Gear camping pads, too. Recommend. It was my first camping-in-a-field festival experience, and I think it was a nice intro.
Zac and I made a point to see all the artists performing on both stages. We had no idea what to expect, but we were totally blown away.
Infirmeriet was setting up when we walked in. I saw a giant upright bass and I knew we were in for a treat.
The music was really good, and I was pleased with myself that I was able to understand about half of the Danish they spoke in between songs. Getting there!
The second group, Sebastian & Andrea, was acoustic and, again, very talented. I knew Khloe would like that group, and she did come and watch them with us. The kids didn't actually watch very many of the concerts, but they enjoyed doing other things while listening to the music from outside the stage area. They especially enjoyed the bocce-like game of boules.
There was a really nice pulled pork dinner with coleslaw and a bunch of different salads. Everyone took some time to eat and chit-chat. We knew the Ihlemann family would be really busy the whole time and we didn't count on being able to visit with them much, so I was glad the kids were having a good time on their own and that my colleague and her partner were there, too. We crossed paths many times throughout the evening and it was really fun to spend some time with them.
After dinner, Lady Jerk played keyboard and sang. She had a lovely voice. After she finished, it was storytelling time, so out in the courtyard, anyone with a good story could come up and tell it for the crowd. Of course, they were in Danish, but we understood a little bit, and it was fun to see people reminiscing in such a fun, animated way.
Bonfires and strings of lights were lit up everywhere and the party really started to come alive.
Val Demo was a sort of rap duo performing for the first time, and despite some technical difficulties, they were able to draw a pretty big crowd and we all had a good time.
Kaleidoscope Mechanic was one of our favorites. Zac and I agreed they had a very cool vibe and they were a little metal. I don't know how they are associated with the hosts of the festival, but we were happy to have seen them. They sounded a lot like Blood Ceremony.
Stuart Ackridge came from the U.S. and had a kind of Americana sound, and of course, we had fun listening to that, too.
People were dragging a little bit, but the festival hosts were ready for it!
We were very excited when we saw Lars Grand take the main stage after that with nothing but an accordion! It was such a surreal experience to see someone rock so hard with an accordion, and not only that, the younger crowd of 20-somethings were *so* into it. They even knew a bunch of the songs and were singing along! We understood some of the lyrics, but we had *all* of the fun.
I talked to him afterward to try to get a contact for getting my accordion fixed. We'll see if it pans out.
The final performance of the night included my colleague, Ann-Louise! She performed with Banjo på Klubben, a DJ playing popular club hits intermixed with banjo riffs while he (and Ann-Louise) sang the lyrics. It was so incredibly fun. We danced with Ann-Louise's partner, Lars, in the front row the whole time.
Of course, no one was ready for the party to end, even though it was like 2 a.m., so there was a DJ scheduled to bring us through the final hours of darkness. The kids had gone to bed in stages much earlier, and Zac and I were starting to wilt, so we stuck around to dance for a few songs and then retreated to the tent. The music was still super audible from the field, but it was kind of comforting to hear everyone having fun well into the morning.
The National (and Eee Gee)
I think I forgot to post about it previously, but I finally got to see The National!!! This is hands down my favorite band in the world. I never got to see them in concert in the U.S., but I have all of their albums (except the ones only released to Cherry Tree members and the 9-hour art experiment called A Lot of Sorrow) and I was thrilled to see they were going to be in Copenhagen.
We went at the beginning of August, and it was just great. It was our first time at the Royal Arena, and it's so clean and well organized, we just walked around in awe. I had heard of Eee Gee, the opening act, because I follow a lot of Danish concert venues on social media and I have seen Eee Gee play a lot, but I have never heard the group and we didn't really know what kind of music it was.
It was really good! The band's front-person has a phenomenal voice, and there was just some really unique music and backing vocalists. We had a great time, and I totally bought one of their albums when I found it a few weeks later at Beats.
The National gave a great performance, as expected. I don't know if I expected Matt Berninger to be so...extra(?), but it was really fun and every band member is such a talented musician in their own right, you could just feel that you were in the presence of greatness all evening.
Look! We made it on their Instagram page. :D
Danish tests
I mentioned earlier that on Kaden's birthday, Zac and I had to go take a Danish test. It was actually our second test for this module. The first test was on Monday, 02 Sep, and that one was for reading and writing. We had four different test sections, and we had to read through some information and then fill in answers based on our comprehension of the things we read. Then we had the writing part, where we were given a printed email from "Maria" and we had to answer her questions with at least 70 words.
Anders, our instructor, told us that if we didn't hear from him before Wednesday, then we passed, and it was only bad news if he contacted us. Zac and I checked and checked, but we didn't hear from him, so we passed the first part and were eligible to take the oral exam on Wednesday.
On Wednesday, we had to speak and answer questions on one of six topics with our instructor to demonstrate our Danish skills. If we passed that part, we were paired up and had to ask/answer questions about a fictitious person based on picture cards we were given about the person.
I am happy to announce we both passed our entire Module 3.2 test and will be starting Module 3.3 on Monday! Kind of wish we had a break though...
Feature LinkedIn Article
And on a super fun note, Zac and I were interviewed by ALK's social media department about our unique mobility journey!
We were featured in an internal article on ALK's intranet and then they posted a shorter version of it on LinkedIn.
* * *
Anyway, that's what's been going on lately in our Danish lives. We're going to be soaking up the last few weeks of summer weather and daylight, going to more concerts, and getting back into the swing of school. Harrison started swim lessons and is learning to play chess. (Oh, and Narine, if you read this blog, Harrison misses you and wishes he could take swim lessons from you again instead.) Khloe is going to be playing bass in her school music class. Kaden is prepping for some internships for his business classes. Busy busy!
Comments
Post a Comment