Monday, November 25, 2002.

I spent most of the day traveling. I flew from Bilbao (raining) to London Stansted (dense fog) had a lengthy layover at Stansted, and then flew to Copenhagen. Aside from suffering a little bit of culture shock and shock from the cold, everything seemed to be great. I successfully met Aaron at the statue of Hans Christian Anderson, as we planned. The hostel was relatively cheap, nothing else was. We found a bar, and got kicked out when it closed uncerimoniously half an hour later.

Tuesday, November 26, 2002. Aaron and I knocked around Copenhagen. We walked the length of the Strøget walking street, wandered out to the statue of the Little Mermaid (Den Lille Havfrue), saw the changing of the guard at Amalienborg, and ate great street sausages. In the afternoon, we visited the Carlsburg-Tuborg brewery, and while drinking our free beer I was dismayed by the 4pm onset of darkness. It was cold too. We spent the evening around Tivoli gardens, a great wander round the Christmas Market (Jul i Tivoli) Tivoli is lit up with thousands of lights at all times of the year, and the chill night was warmed by braziers of coals. The food was too expensive however.

Wednesday, November 27, 2002. This morning we left the hostel early and met up with this Mexican girl that Aaron had met earlier. We walked around Christianhaven and Christiana, but it was too early for much action to be happening. Just a few hash dealers setting up their kiosks. We wandered back toward town and hit a wonderful bakery with flaky pastries. We escorted Aaron to the train, where he was headed home to the States. I struck out by myself for the National Museum, which to my pleasant surprise, was free on Wednesdays. It was alright; the best part is newly created exhibitions. The old history stuff is pretty sad, done in that late 70s natural history museum drab. I whiled away the rest of the day, including a trip to Magasin, a big Danish department store and bought a set of long underwear. I returned to the hostel, and thus attired, I decided that Copenhagen isn't that inhospitable, so long as you are dressed properly.

Thursday, November 28, 2002. American Thanksgiving day. Not much celebrated here. Although, the Danes are getting excited about Christmas. They are really strong believers in candles. They are burning after dark (4pm) everywhere here. On the street, in stores, in houses, in restaurants, all have at least one candle lit. This morning I set off with a friend to Helsingor (Elsinore in English) to visit the castle there. It is famous for being Hamlet's setting. Not that Bill Shakespeare ever visited Denmark. Nice dungeons though. Heading back towards København, I stopped at Humlebæk, the site of the famous Louisiana museum. It was great, they had a wonderful show on Arne Jacobsen, as well as their permanent collections. I really like modern art above most other forms. I had a great cup of coffee and flaky pastry while staring out at the rough sea and Sweden. The waves were crashing and the early night fell. The museum has all of these torches around, and they gave the windy night a very romantic air. Visit there if you get a chance.

Friday, November 29, 2002. Shopping at Royal Copenhagen. Travel to Odense. Meet up with Nicolai. Christmas party with English Department at University of Southern Denmark. Many different herrings, plus traditional Danish ways of getting drunk.

Saturday, November 30, 2002. Around Nicolai's house, after rising late and with a headache. Not much action. Lord of the Rings in Special Extended DVD version on Nicolai's wide-screen TV. Not so traditional Danish Lasagna.

Sunday, December 1, 2002. A nice walk around Odense. It is great to be in a place where I don't have to worry about my stuff getting stolen. Also nice just to sit around and talk. In a real living room.

Monday, December 2, 2002. We watched Lord of the Ring special features for a very long time today. Good. It was raining. Nicolai went all out tonight, a few of his friends came over and we had a traditional Danish Christmas party, with their version of mulled wine (with spiced Aquavit), Marzipan, brandy filled chocolates, and a sweet doughnut-like pastry for dipping in jam.

Tuesday, December 3, 2002. After another late start this morning, we wandered around town again, in a few more stores since things were open. Danes are certainly earnest about doing their Christmas Shopping. Odense is certainly earnest about being Hans Christian Andersen's birthplace. Nicolai says that as soon as he was old enough, HCA took off for the big city and never looked back. There are more statues here than seems strictly necessary. Train to København. Tivoli gardens poster shop. I hope I can keep these things from getting crushed too badly over the next two weeks. Train to Kastrup Airport (Lufthavn). Go airlines flight to London Stansted. Painless and easy. Bus from Stansted to Cambridge, an hour's ride. The train trips from Odense to the Airport and the Bus to Cambridge took longer than, and cost more than, the flight.

Wednesday, December 4, 2002. Cambridge. It was rainy and gross this morning, but after a full English breakfast, I was able to set out. Nothing like a good breakfast to dispel rainy gloom. Eggs, sausages, bacon, hashbrowns, toast, baked beans, tomatoes, cereal & milk, yogurt, juice and coffee. I had to save the yogurt for a midmorning snack. Cambridge is really neat, the University buildings scattered all over a really neat town. Of course the Chapel at Kings College is amazing, as is the Wren Library at Trinity College. All the colleges have great architecture. Cambridge is also the home of dozens of really great bookshops. I spent much of the afternoon browsing. I got a great book of puzzling physics problems from the Cambridge university press. Early this evening, due to the continued rain, I ducked into a movie theatre and saw Michael Moore's "Bowling for Columbine." Brilliant film, even if it does reinforce some of those untrue stereotypes about Americans, especially Michigan. Fish & Chips and my book, back at the hostel.

Thursday, December 5, 2002. Train to London this morning. To Kings Cross. Pulled in to Platform 10. No sign of platform 9 3/4 (actually, in the films, located between platforms 3 and 4). I checked in to the Generator, part of my quest to find a London hostel that doesn't suck and isn't too expensive. I don't think this will be it. This afternoon I basically knocked around town, in the touristy spots. I saw a new play by David Hare, called "The Breath of Life." A two woman show, played by no one less than Dame Judi Dench and Dame Maggie Smith. It was great to see both of those famous ladies light up the stage, even if the work was rather pedestrian. While reading my book in the least smoky of the Generator's common rooms, I met a stage manager from Ashland Oregon, starting her freshman year at SUNY Purchase next fall. This world is very small.

Friday, December 6, 2002. Because the Generator was both full and Sucks, I moved to Ashlee House today. Fortunately, it seems like the showers have been fixed since I was here 6 weeks ago. I hope one can get something other than boiling water out of the tap. Jasmine (the stage manager) and I visited the Barbican this morning; I booked a seat for ENO's concert production of Wagener's "Siegfried" next Tuesday. En Route, I ran into Patrick Rooney, an Australian friend from Madrid and Spain, he was headed to Edinburgh today, but he and I made drinking plans for Monday. We walked to St. Paul's. It is really neat, and I was eventually able to get "Feed the Birds" out of my head. The 400 odd steps to the top of the dome (No Aaron, I didn't count, I just believed the brochure) afford a great view of the skyline. Of course, it was windy and cold, and quite cloudy besides. Fun anyway. We tubed two stops to Holborn (That's Hoe-BURN for all you Americans out there) and had a nice lunch of Savoury pancakes en route to the British Museum. Once there, Jasmine and I split up, and I poked around for three hours. The Assyrian stuff is very good, and the Egyptian stuff first rate, albeit crowded. I didn't make it to the second floor where the mummies are, but I will see them later this week. In general, a very well curated and maintained museum. It would be very difficult to appreciate without speaking English however. The Rosetta stone is there, one of their star attractions. Cool. Upon leaving the museum, Jasmine headed back to the Hostel, I hopped a double decker bus toward Oxford Circus. I knocked around a little bit, and saw the film "8 Femmes" (8 Women, in the bizarre practice of translating film titles, but not redubbing) a delightful French Agatha Christie style murder mystery with some musical numbers thrown in. Brenda, you need to see this one. Actually, everybody should.

Saturday, December 7, 2002. Today seemed mostly about lines. I arrived at Covent Garden too late to get one of the 72 Day seats available for tonight's world Premiere of Nicholas Maw's "Sophie's Choice" at the Royal Opera. I arrived almost 45 minutes before they went on sale, but I estimated I was about person 80 in line. Curtain was at 6:30, and at 4 hours before, returned seats would be released. I headed over to the National Gallery, and whiled away the rest of the morning cheerfully enjoying one of Western Europe's great museums. Although, like the Met in NYC, most of the paintings probably should be in different countries. The British built their collections with a lot of conquering. Seurat's "Bathers at Asineres" was a highlight. I'm not exactly sure what all the fuss over Van Gogh's "Sunflowers" is. I like "A Wheatfield with Cypresses" much more. Probably against my better judgment, around 1:00 I went back to the Royal Opera House. Finding no one in line for returns yet, I went to Marks and Spencer, spent an age sandwich shopping, and walked back and joined the queue, as person #2. At 2:30, when returned seats were due to be released, the line was 25 people strong. The box office announced there was only one seat thus far. The woman in front of me bought it, a £25 restricted view seat in the Amphitheatre. We were free to wait, in hopes that some one else might return unwanted seats. It was a long shot, especially since this was a World Premier, and any seats had been few and far between for a month now. I am glad I waited. About an hour and a half later, a lady from the Box office came up to me and told me there had been another return. This one, though, was a £50 seat in the Stalls Circle. Of course I bought it. So at 4 pm, I headed back to the hostel for a brief rest. Curtain was at 6:30 and the production expected to be quite long. Sir Simon Rattle, new Principal of the Berliner Philharmoniker, conducted. I don't what to say about the opera. Initially, I was quite indifferent, but on reflection, I see that the slow beginning is a dramatic technique. The third act ended with very few dry eyes in the house, and the fourth was an amazing climax. Maw created sweeping Orchestra scoring, along the lines of Britten, but with much of Jake Heigge's good sense thrown in. In fact, it did remind me a lot of "Dead Man Walking" but less emotionally strong, even though the words fit the music better. It was really great to be at the premiere. I wonder if it will get picked up by other companies, only time will tell. At 4 hours and 20 minutes with intermission and applause, it might have to be cut down for American audiences.

Wednesday, December 11, 2002. Walk down the Islington High Street. Shop for music. Canary Wharf, and Greenwich. Set my watch by Greenwich Mean Time. Met Richard Lambert at his flat, popped out for a Curry. Went to East London's famous White Swan for an evening of fun. It was late when I got back in, and I had to rise early.

Thursday, December 12, 2002. I got up very early this morning, hopped a Piccadilly line tube for Heathrow. No snags in getting my self checked in for the flight home. No decent movies on the plane, but otherwise, Virgin Atlantic continued to be good. Seven hours and 10 minutes of flying. Shortly after 1:30 NYC time I was catching the A train toward Manhattan and my other life.