Slut Spurt (or The Final Days)

Let me just begin by saying that Slut Spurt is Danish for the Final Sprint or Last Days. I saw this written on shop signs for the first couple of weeks I was in Copenhagen, indicating that winter sales were coming to an end. I figured it was a good way to close this blog, so many months after I started writing it back in March (which was not long after we finally got internet in our apartment...)

This post is also going to be a long one as I desire to finish this blog before my self-imposed deadline of December 31st.

Leaving Prague turned out to be as much of a drama as when I arrived. I left the hostel with lots of time to spare as I had to get to the Central Station to catch the Airport Express bus by 8am. Unfortunately I failed to complete a reccy of the station the day before which meant that I had no idea how to get to the bus stop, but it was well signposted. That said, I just missed it by 30 seconds because I had difficulty finding the door out of the station. The bus drove off just as I found it....

But it wasn't all bad as there was another one just 30 minutes later, though I was going to be cutting it fine. That bus driver decided to wait 10 extra minutes for this large group of last minute people who ended up being packed in like sardines (insert payment issues here as well). Compound that with the huge group of Japanese tourists lined up ahead of me at the check-in counter at the airport and I just managed to check in with mere minutes to spare. The fact that my bags were the first off the carousel in Copenhagen shows just how fine I was cutting it, as they were likely the last bags loaded. But we got there in the end.

Having returned from Prague and having managed to get through Copenhagen airport without having my passport checked (not sure how I pulled that off), I decided to have a post-holiday holiday by spending every day that week at the beach, lying in the sun. Bliss.

However, I couldn't stay at the beach for too much longer as I still had a few things to knock off the list of things to see and do.

Carlsberg Brewery


I decided to go check out the Carlsberg Brewery which was only a 15 minute walk from where I lived. It was not that terribly interesting, especially not when compared to the awesome experience I had at the Guinness Brewery, but it did have some historical factoids and a room filled with some 20,000 bottles of beer from around Europe and the world. Other than that: Yawn.

Bagsvaerd Church


I had this one on my list for quite some time but I was waiting for a really nice sunny day to go and visit. This Church was listed in my Wallpaper guidebook as being well worth the trip to Copenhagen's outer suburbs. It was designed by Jorn Utzon, who designed the Sydney Opera House and the key theme in its construction was light.

Found on Taxvej, about 10-15 minutes walk from the train station in the suburb of Bagsvaerd, it looks from the outside like an industrial building. Inside however was really amazing. Concrete and light wood formed the basis of the construction and there were rows of naked light bulbs on the walls. Skylights filled the ceiling space letting in vast quantities of light from the outside.

The Church proper had a white colour scheme with an amazing undulating ceiling and tapestries made by Marrimekko (a Finnish textile design company). The pews were classic Scandinavian design showing woodwork skill that indicates a long history of working with this material.

It would have to rank as a highlight from my time in Copenhagen, along with Grundtvigs Church.

Grundtvigs Church


Now that I mention Grundtvigs Church, I realise that I never mentioned it in one of my earlier blog posts. I shall rectify that immediately.

Whereas Bagsvaerd Church was small and unassuming on the outside, yet beautiful on the inside, Grundtvigs Church held no such pretensions. It was grand and monolithic, and visible from quite a distance away. Found about 15 minutes walk from Emdrup station, this Church took several decades to build and the son of the builder ended up taking over after the father ran out of money and left it in a half-finished state for quite some time.

This Church was HUGE and GRAND and EPIC. It is one of the few Churches I have ever been into that took my breath away when I entered. Built entirely out of light brick, and with original chairs designed in the 60s, it was pretty awe-inspiring. I'm going to stop now and just let the photos do the talking.

Danish Design Museum


This one was also mentioned in my Wallpaper book as a good place to check out. It has examples of lighting and furniture design that go back several decades and includes all the main Danish designers like Arne Jacobsen and Poul Henningsen. It was set in a lovely building surrounding a Courtyard, and isn't too far from the City Centre.

A C Perch's Thehandel (Tea Shop)


I found out about this place when I went to Cafe Retro and bought a cup of tea a couple of months after I arrived in CPH. A C Perch donate tea to Cafe Retro, and it was jolly nice, so I decided to track down the shop (I figured: better late than never).

A C Perch have been purveyors of tea in Copenhagen for nearly two centuries, have a Royal Warrant to supply to the Royal Family, and I don't think their shop has ever moved. Found on Kronprinsengard it was really cool, with the traditional brass scales for weighing, and bins of loose leaf tea all round the walls. It looked like it has never changed in all the years it has been there. I ended up buying four different ones to give Dad for his birthday. One was a Kenyan blend which went well with milk; another was an Indonesian blend; the third was the Queen's blend which was very fragrant and smooth; and the fourth was a white tea called Yunnan Golden Tips. This white tea was surprisingly creamy and very nice to drink.

I was able to get all my teas packed in coloured gift tins and nicely wrapped. And I got through NZ Customs with no issues (surprisingly). I just wish I had found it in early March and not late June, so that I might have been able to enjoy their teas while I was living in CPH.

Tivoli


This is an amusement park found near the centre of Copenhagen. It is a few minutes walk from the Central train station and only open during Spring and Summer. I went because a) I had to see it and b) every friday when Tivoli is open they have a band you can watch perform, and the particular day I went they had Aqua. Some readers may not remember Aqua but they were really popular in the nineties and their most famous song is Barbie Girl. The concert was really cool, and all I had to pay was the entrance fee to the park.

Afterwards, I went for a walk around. I thought that while it is a little tacky and gaudy, it has this really sweet charm about it as well. The lights in particular were really pretty.

The Final Pack


It is surprising how much one can accumulate in just a few months, even when one is aware that each purchase needs to be thought through. That said, I do have one justification in that I did buy several birthday presents for people, and also had a shopping spree at H&M (a fantastically cheap clothing retailer) because they aren't open here in NZ. In the end, my main bag came in at 19.9kgs, my carry-on was full to the brim and I had to post two 10kg boxes home that cost me an absolute fortune, and that doesn't include the other 10kg box I posted back in May. In total I left NZ with about 30kgs of stuff, and returned with 60kgs of stuff. Not bad.

Final Reflection


I quite enjoyed my time in Copenhagen, though I never felt that engaged with the city. Maybe if I was going to be living there permanently it might have been different. That said, there are several things I will miss about my time there.
1) Cargo bikes. Two words: I WANT.
2) H&M: fashion-forward clothing at Hallensteins prices.
3) The look of amazement on my Italian roommate's face that I could eat vegetarian noodle stir-fry 5-6 nights a week and not die.
4) Hearing my roommate's English go from him appearing to think every sentence through before saying it to speaking just as well as I can in just a couple of months. In hindsight I think I should have attempted to learn Italian...
5) A C Perch: seriously good tea.
6) Cheap flights all round Europe: 30 Euros to fly to Paris? Yes please.
7) Public Transport: we are so far behind in NZ it is sad to see.
8) Bottle Return System: what a fantastic idea, charging people 25c when they buy a bottle of beer, then giving it back when they return the empty to the supermarket. Best way to encourage recycling.
9) Being able to lie on a beach for two hours and not get burned to a crisp.
10) Most of all, I miss my amazing warm apartment with its inch thick double glazing, that was always just the right temperature.

Many thanks to all of you who kept up and read my blog, and for all your patience over these last couple of months as I crawled to the finish line.

Goddag, and farvel.

Kutna Hora and the Bone Chapel

While in Prague I decided to do a day trip to a sight I had recommended to me called the Ossuary in the town of Kutna Hora.

After spending about an hour on the train from Prague, with a change in the town of Kolin, I arrived (having spent the first part of my trip sharing a coach with an old lady who repeatedly hoicked, spat and spewed into her handkerchief).

Armed with a trusty, hand-written map from the hostel I eventually found the Ossuary which was an impressive sight to behold.

The history behind it is that once upon a time it was just your usual chapel, until someone brought some soil back from the Holy Land and sprinkled it around the graveyard. Suddenly everyone wanted to be buried there and so the graveyard filled up, and fast (from memory, the Plague didn't help matters). At this point a monk was in residence and he decided  to start exhuming the skeletal remains (to make more room for newly dead people) and stacking the bones in the chapel crypt. Needless to say he was a bit loopy. Many years later we have the tourist attraction that houses the bones of an estimated tens of thousands of people and an incredible bone chandelier made from every bone in the human body.

After the Ossuary, I decided to walk up the hill to the old town of Kutna Hora which used to be quite wealthy on account of silver mines in the area. It was beautiful though a bit sleepy, and after half a day I was ready to head home.

To sum up the day trip is to quote a fellow guest at the hostel who commented that it is a long way to go for a 10 minute attraction. That said, I thought it was totally worth it as there is only one such Bone Chapel that I know of in the world.

What follows is a photo essay of some of the more interesting sights.

Another Church in Kutna Hora

Plague Memorial

View from Old Town hill

Kutna Hora Street

Communist-era Apartment Block

Freud, Kafka and that Other Guy (Part Two)

And now for Part Two!

The Big Babies and Freud

On the Castle side of the River in Prague is a park you can visit that has huge baby sculptures in it, designed by Czech artist David Cerny. Now when I say the sculptures are big, I am not joking: they were taller than me, and they had no faces. From memory, the lack of faces showed the artist's belief that new-born babies have no unique personality, and that they develop one over time based on surrounding stimuli. It is certainly an interesting theory, and made for quite disturbing looking art. You can also see giant babies by the same artist climbing up one of the TV towers in the city.

Also by the same artist is a sculpture of Sigmund Freud hanging by one hand from a pole suspended over a city street.

The Prague Castle

Crowning one of the hills overlooking the city is Prague Castle which is where the President is based. The Castle has a long and delightful history of conflict, including one incident involving people being thrown out the windows....

On the Castle grounds you can find a Singing Fountain, which has been designed in such a way as to be quite musical when the water tumbles into the pond underneath it. Sadly it seemed the Fountain had laryngitis the day I went, but I did see a really cool robo-mower zipping around and keeping the lawns trimmed while I was looking for it.

There is also a ceremonial guard and if you get there around lunchtime, you can see the changing of the guards. It doesn't have the same pomp and ceremony as the Buckingham Palace one seems to have but it is quite cool to watch.

The Concert

After checking out all the formal touristy attractions for a couple of days, it was off to the concert that I won tickets to on my first night at the hostel. 

As I had two tickets, I found someone at the hostel to tag along, as the Aussies who helped me win were feeling, er, 'under the weather' as it were. Turns out they took part in a rather complicated drinking game that they lost quite badly.

That concert would have to rank as one of the weirdest things I have ever experienced. I knew none of the acts and the MCs were bizarre. One of the MCs was Czech and the other was British. The Czech guy spoke his native language while the British girl spoke English and they both seemed to understand the other. The result: monolingual me getting only about one-third of the whole story. But hey! it was free and kinda fun. 

Oh yeah, the other really strange bit: about two hours into the concert my vision switched from analogue to hi-def digital (only way to describe it). I'm still not sure what brought it on though the guy just a few feet away working his way through a serious amount of weed could have had something to do with it...

The Market

After a day spent in Kutna Hora, which I will talk about in a separate post, I decided to spend my final day in Prague looking for a market I had been told about. It turned out to be a couple of blocks from the hostel and was run by Vietnamese people. The market was huge and EVERYTHING was counterfeit. The salespeople were really pushy and would say things like "you like this bag? I put whatever logo you want on. Converse, Adidas, you pick".

I did make a purchase but I won't tell you anymore than that, other than the fact that it took a lot of haggling over price and ended with me getting a 70% discount off the original price plus a feeling that I had been screwed as the item was probably only worth half what I paid for it...

John Lennon Wall

The following morning I concluded my European sojourn and flew back to Copenhagen. But that is another post.