A Long Walk

The sun was out today, and while it was ungodly cold I decided I would take one of my trademark walks. I got a late start...around 11 am. I hopped on the Metro and took it about 5-6 miles away to a stop I have never been to and got off. The walk itself was rather uneventful, but I saw a ton of stuff I have never seen.

There was one point where I was lost somewhere in suburban Copenhagen with that 20 mph wind blowing in my face that I almost gave up. I was within seconds of just laying down on the sidewalk and scribbling my last will and testament on the back of paper money. My memoirs in a hurry. I was a great and noble man taken by the oppressive Scandinavian cold much before my time. I do not feel sorry for myself as much as for the world that will be deprived of a man of my stature! I want Jared and Ryan to execute my literary estate. This I insist must be done by them, there will be no delegation of this responsibility. They will need to go through all my books and cull my margin notes, all my notebooks and make sense of it all (even the number theory!)...Most importantly, this must be done between the hours of 10 pm and 4 am, and they must be clothed in only their undergarments. This is my last will and testament and I expect that it be carried out in full so as not to make a mockery of my life. Just then I was struck with the strength of Achilles and decided to plod on (actually the sun came out from behind a cloud and the wind let up)...but it was soooo cold.

I had so much change in my pockets, which was also 20 degrees, that sticking my hands in my pockets offered no quarter to my delicate hands from the elements. Why are the Europeans so fond of change, how about some paper money. I think they just evolved from trading sea shells and rocks up here so change seems a more natural transition.

As I made my way through the cruel and cold Copenhagen streets I could not help but ponder the history of this hostile land and its people. Now we all know the Danes are a nomadic people and they carry their wigwams on their backs as they track to and fro in search of berries and small mammals for food. They were not always this way though, no, they were once the mighty viking culture! I am not that interested in the vikings...I deal with plenty of barbarians from day to day, but there is one little detail that is endlessly unsettling to me. History tells us that the vikings were early explorers of North America...where did they go you may ask? Northeast Canada, Greenland, and Minnesota...what is wrong with these people? How about Florida, California...even Alabama.

I do have to say this much for the Danes, they had the wherewithal to say "enough is enough!" They must have gotten here with the Finns, Norwegians, and Swedes at some point and breathed an exhausted breath, sat down and said, "this is as far as we are going...you guys can keep going but we have noticed that the further we go the colder it gets and we are not going any further." The other Scandinavians probably looked at the Danes and laughed a throaty viking laugh..."Ha! Fools...when we get to Valhalla and are drinking wine and eating bread in the warmth of the gods won't you look the fool." I do not mean to be blasphemous to the nordic gods but it appears the Danes were right and it just gets colder. The others must be wishing they had stayed down here too.

Ok...the point is that it was so cold that my blood almost froze...but I had a great day. I took about a 4 hour winding walk before finding my way back to my apartment, and the little bit of exercise has done wonders for my spirit. Its gonna start snowing again next week because the wind is still blowing out of the former Soviet Union so I am going to enjoy it while I can. I was reading the stupid responses that the Russian government gives for being so repressive...why don't they just state the obvious...nobody who lives in a place that cold is concerned with Freedom...today I would have traded my soul for a hot tub...I have nothing to say and plenty on the law of war crimes to read so goodbye for now!

NZ

Ok, New Zealand looks like the prettiest country I have ever seen (refer to last post). True, we may not need to gather intelligence on them, but its certainly nice of them to take pictures to send to us in the developed world. I think I have decided while reading this book that I am going to take my books and 10 surfboards to some desolate coastal region of New Zealand and live like Thoreau in Walden. Maybe I will become a shepherd, and not just in the metaphorical sense. So that is my plan. Ultimately I elect it to the "Congress of Tim" where it will compete with the several dozen representatives that others have elected to determine what I am going to do.

Contra Sensus Communis

I started a new course today because my Comparative Eastern European Law course has been cancelled for some reason. The new course is Comparative Law and Legal Traditions and it seems really neat. I will not go into it too much but its generally a cross-sectional and historical study of the major legal systems of world history. The lecturer seems really interesting too.

I am also feeling steadily better and besides a scratch on my nose (and the dumb splint thing I have to wear) you would never know I was injured. I go to the doctor on Saturday and the face shield goes on Saturday. I would love to go for a jog because the lack of exercise has me a bit down and facing some mild insomnia. That's it for the health update...I declare myself to be in full health, now we will see what the "professionals" think.

I may have mentioned the next topic before because it has bothered me since I got here, but I will hop on an article I read to bring it up now. The following is an article by Andrew Sullivan in the London Times I think: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/printFriendly/0,,1-1501-1491500-1501,00.html. It discusses the "ipod" people in New York I believe. I am going to discuss the ipod people in Copenhagen.

Ever since I arrived here I was struck by two bits of technological nonsense-- the insane level of cell phone reliance here and the ipods. I always just assumed that Americans were the worst about cellphones. Perhaps it is because Americans are so obnoxious with the cellphones that my irrationally judicious mind would not accept a world where any set of people could be more inconsiderate with their cellphones. Danes are worse. The next issue is the ipod, which I do not recall seeing much of in San Diego. To be fair though I have not been to San Diego since Christmas-- the holiday when we celebrate the birth of our lord and savior, consumer-based economics. Perhaps the ipod was this year's hot item and they are crawling all over San Diego too...between the human-animal and humanity.

I take the "Metro" most places, which is the Copenhagen equivalent of a subway, and if you get on the Metro in a car with around 15 people you can be sure 10-12 will have ipods and 6 of them will be text-messaging someone on their cellphones. Nothing screams self-centered inhumanity like a person who is so disinterested in their social surroundings that they feel the need to box themselves sensually into a 2x3 inch gadget playing, no doubt bad, music. Nothing says I am not interested in talking to you like a person eagerly pounding away on the keypad of their cellphone to an unspecified recipient who is also probably listening to bad pop music on and ipod and sending a text message to another person, ad nauseum. Now I am not the world's most chatty person, and I can be downright chilly when I am hassled in a public place while I am busy or just enjoying some social ambiance, but even the unwanted social interaction has the benefit of society. I would prefer to tell the guy next to me at the cafe that I am really not interested in his opinion of the book I am reading than to have him sit down next to me in his own little digital universe as if I do not exist.

Hannah Arendt says human beings have an "urge to appear" as appearing things in a world of appearances. I have an urge to appear and this insensitivity offends my urge to appear. It also undermines society. Eventually we will need to develop a new language that is capable of necessary communication in a world where people refuse to acknowledge their own existence among other existential things. The fact is that we still move in finite time and space with other solid bodies and to avoid collisions we have to be able to acknowledge and communicate simple ideas to others. Most people are only capable of simple ideas anyway so I will not lament the thinking we lose due to the devaluation of community. I am going to start bumping into people just so they know I am still here.

This is not going well...I have nothing against ipods, heck, I like music as much as the next guy (unless the next guy is Ryan, he likes it more than me). Why doesn't anyone want to know the person sitting across from them on the train? Why don't they wonder where he/she is going? Where they've been? What they are reading and why? Next time the weird guy at the cafe asks me why I am reading Kant I think I will tell him...and secretly I will thank him for caring. Sometimes in the work I do and my studies I find myself asking, "how can anyone do that to another human being." Its less terrifying than studying human atrocities, but just as relevant...why doesn't anyone want to be in society with other people anymore?

Maybe I am just getting soft in my old age. Ha! I am so tragically authentic aren't I? Do you believe me? Look in my eyes. Who is that behind you? Its me! Now you have been undermined...that's too bad.

What is worse than a cold rain and snow? "Mixed" rain and snow. Really, this is not too difficult to grasp. Take yourself back to 2nd-3rd grade reasoning, not just any reasoning though, but the reasoning that accompanied sketching in your notebook while the herd-animals around you try to memorize multiplication tables (I am distressed about the state of humanity tonight and I won't hide it!). What could possibly be more terrifying than a Tyrannosaurus Rex...or a tiger? A half T. Rex-half tiger monster! How about a fighter jet or a shark? You guessed it, a flying shark that shoots sidewinder missiles from under its pectoral fins! Its that, "it would be cool if..." imaginary reasoning. Well, nature is a 3rd grader who finds computational mathematics boring, and, yes, "mixed" rain and snow is worse than either by itself.

I have nothing to say and nothing to do. My roommate went to Berlin. My friends were supposed to call cause they made chocolate cake and I said I would loosen the reins on my tyrannical food discipline to have some. They have not called. I could read, but I am exhausted of books today. I am just listening to music on my laptop and sending an impersonal message out to the electronic ether...I have a quote I would like to share.

People do not appreciate the sublime any more. They do not tremble with fear anymore when they encounter something so overwhelming that it cannot be grasped. No, they just scratch their heads and try to recall some category they have memorized, some "form" that ought to be there. Ah yes, the sediment layering of a canyon, the taxonomy of a redwood, the chemistry of an ocean. Sometimes I am still overwhelmed, I am not "scientific" enough to forget about the world. I have not learned enough "truth" yet to close my eyes.

"Modern man suffers from a weakened personality. As the Roman of the imperial era became un-Roman in relation to the world which stood at his service, as he lost himself in a flood of foreigners which came streaming in and degenerated in the midst of the cosmopolitan carnival of gods, arts and customs, so the same must happen to modern man who allows his artists in history to go on preparing a world exhibition for him; he has become a strolling spectator and has arrived at a condition in which even great wars and revolutions are able to influence him for hardly more than a moment. The war is not even over before it is transformed into a hundred thousand printed pages and set before the tired palates of the history-hungry as the latest delicacy...Expressed morally: you are no longer capable of holding on to the sublime, your deeds are shortlived explosions, not rolling thunder. Though the greatest and most miraculous event should occur-- it must nonetheless descend, silent and unsung, into Hades. For art flees away if you immediately conceal your deeds under the awning of history. He who wants to understand, grasp and assess in a moment that before which he ought to stand long in awe as before an incomprehensible sublimity may be called reasonable, but only in the sense Schiller speaks of the rationality of the reasonable man: there are things he does not see which even a child sees, there are things he does not hear which even a child hears, and these things are precisely the most important things: because he does not understand these things, his understanding is more childish than the child..."

F. Nietzsche

Stand in awe! Sometimes one ought not know. And how quickly now our wars become soundbytes, not even with the time delay of compiling "a hundred of thousand printed pages."

Well, I just got back from eating chocolate cake at my friend's apartment. It was quite tasty. I ran my mouth off about how New Zealand is of such geopolitical insignificance that other countries don't gather intelligence on them, and asked if they still deliver their mail on horseback. So now I have been provided with a book about New Zealand that I am to read. I looked at the pictures (I am "such an American" I hear), it looks like a lovely country...but that doesn't answer my question, does their postal service deliver the mail on horseback?

A Crisis of Conscience

"To be or not to be?" If that really is the question then its already too late to answer, and if you dare answer then the question has come too late...its always too late!

Its cold, its snowing...its windy! I am feeling much better, but consequently I am quite restless. Restlessness leads to boredom, boredom leads to frustration, frustration leads to despair ("the sickness unto death" as it was called by an eloquent Dane), and despair leads to the ultimate negation of all things in the "apparent world." I am in rebellion right now and my rebellion appears as the thing fighting its inverse, thus victory will be quite bittersweet. So a quote on "solitary wandering" to tide over those solitary wanderers or maybe childish chatterers!

"In a world of compelled external uniformity philosophy must remain the learned monologue of the solitary walker, the individual's chance capture, the hidden secret of the chamber, or the harmless chatter of academic old men and children."

F. Nietzsche

My Will to Power

I chose the title because I think these last two posts have been products of pure and unadulterated will to power. Right now I am self-overcoming. I spent last night in the hospital after having "work done" on my nose. I use parenthesis because I am really not sure what happened. At this point communication between me and the small army of doctors I have dealt with is tenuous at best. I only remember being told something about "a lot of force" so "we may not be able to simply use local anesthetics." I am operating on faith, I guess that's what happens when its free. "This doesn't cost me anything? Ok, I don't really care what you do then, go to town."

I can clearly remember the near excruciating pain that the period after the procedure engendered. I had two things stuffed into my sinuses that simultaneously gave me intense nose, eye and head pain. This was pain that I could see, taste, smell, and hear coming even before I felt it. I think that it tricked my brain. "No, this cannot possibly be right...yep, this is the big one!" No amount of whatever pills they were giving me did anything to help. Actually, I may have passed out from the pain had they not given me the pain medication, which lowered the pain to a level where it could be consciously experienced. I have toyed with the idea that these things were actually stuffed so far up my nose that they were touching the part of my brain that delivers pain. It made me think of Catch 22 where the character is talking about pain and asks something like why can't we just have a red light on our forehead to tell us something is wrong. I would have loved a red light.

This brings me to one criticism of Danish healthcare, which so far I take over America's any day of the week despite the inefficiency and lack of communication. Just like the supermarkets here there is no choice. Of the pain medication I have been subjected to since my injury there seems to be nothing between morphine and children's tylenol. I don't like morphine because the way it makes me feel is pleasant, but much more frightening than pain. Pain is earthly, its real...its a steady companion really. There has to be something down the middle though...I cannot think of anytime in the US that I have been given 4 of whatever pain medication the doctor was using and felt no different. Actually watching The Thin Red Line did more to ease my pain than the medication.

I realize that I am speaking to some women here who either have born, or may someday bear children, you are probably thinking "he doesn't know pain." Maybe I don't, but I do know humanity and a bit of the law and what I just had happen to me is a crime against humanity. In fact, I endear anyone considering to have a child to think about whether or not they want to bring someone into a world where broken noses must be fixed. This is not a world fit for peace-loving human beings.

Now, after a week spent mostly in a hospital I have a new perspective on my life here in the apartment. First of all, I do not have a television here and I have not watched television in almost two months. In almost a week in a hospital bed with absolutely nothing to do I found the television almost intolerable. It just irritated me most of the time. There was a good documentary one day on Iraq in Arabic with English subtitles and The Thin Red Line. They were worth watching. Also, if the Danish language sounded even 10% like the way it was written then I think the television could be a learning tool cause I expanded my vocabulary while watching the subtitles on the movie. Danish, of course, does not sound anything like the way it is written though so I can still not understand or speak a lick of it although I can read a little more.

The other thing I am quite tired of is sharing a room with 150 year old men. These men's bodies sound like an untrained, out of tune, and poorly conducted brass section in and orchestra. Most of the time I have been alone though. It is mind-numbing to sit in a white hospital bed, in my white hospital shirt, and the white hospital underwear that are supposed to pass as shorts looking back and forth from the white hospital walls and ceiling to the white/grey Danish sky.

Last night there was hardly anybody in the ward though so the nurse was in my room a lot and she had been to California once and wanted me to tell her all about San Diego. Well! We all know how much I love to talk about my beloved San Diego, and my mind was taken back as I answered questions and painted the most vivid picture with words that I could muster up on my pain-drug and pain deluded mind. It was as if Monet had painted San Diego though my friends, it was beautiful if I must say so myself! This brings me to one perk about the hospital stay for this humble American moocher of free Danish healthcare...the only nurses that speak English well enough to deal with me are the pretty ones around my age. Hey, I have had a head trauma and things inserted in my face...I am trying to make the best of this!

I have double-vision from this asinine thing that I have to wear on my nose for a week so I am going to wind this down before I get a headache. Oh yeah, I had a bizarre experience today. While sleeping in my apartment I was listening to Elliot Smith, but I dreamed I was listening to somebody else. When I woke up I thought the other band (I cannot remember who) was covering Elliot Smith and thought to myself, "what a bizarre version of this Elliot Smith song." It was, of course, the original recording and I cannot for the life of me figure out why it sounded "bizarre" to me today. This is only interesting if anyone remembers when this happened to me in high school with "Castles Made of Sand" by Hendrix. I scooted over to Jared's as fast as I could in the morning to wake him and Paige and show them how the version of "Castles Made of Sand" on my CD had changed mysteriously overnight! Jared has never lived that down, and secretly, though I have never said it before now, I still think my fantasy-land version sounded better and the original never compares.

Mr. Graceful

What is my favorite hobby? My memory is a bit shaken but I swear it has to do with standing on a 2.5 inch piece of fiberglass on top of moving water....staircases though, now that's a different matter! I have no memory of what happened, but let's face it, I fell down the stairs and you can spin that from a thousand different possible scenarios and it never adds up to what a 14 yr. old would call "cool." I feel much better...I am already quite bored with the sitting around and unless I get struck with a mad spell of migraines I would say that two weeks away from class is a bit over cautious. Anyone who has considered the size of my head in relation to the insignificant amount of brain it encloses will understand that me falling on my head is like the average person falling on his/her head in a football helmet.

So I went in today to get my nose checked out and after 2 hours in the lobby asleep against the wall (the longest I have been out of bed since Saturday) I was called in by the doctor. First he asks me if I have any photos of myself, luckily I keep my modeling portfolio with me in case I run into a talent scout....no! I have a driver's license that tracks my near obsessive habit of regular appearance changes and most people would not even recognize me, but that's all. Then the doctor said it doesn't look broken but he cannot tell unless I come back on Friday. I told him to look at my CT scans where the neuro-sawbones said they saw the fracture..."Oh yes, perhaps it is broken." In any case I still have to go back on Friday when the swelling goes down for another look...it doesn't look like a need a nosejob though! So one more day at this hospital, which is tantamount to a Soviet breadline, and then hopefully this fiasco is over.

Luckily it is so cold and nasty outside that I probably would not be out much anyway. I did some quick shopping on the way home today, and I got some awfully funny looks..."yeah, I look like a bruised apple, what do you want to do about it?" I think I am going to start telling people I got beat up by the KGB. Right now I gnash my teeth at everyone and walk away (not really...just inspired by Dostoevsky's Notes from Underground and the movie Fight Club)...Its left to be seen if I will be nagged with headaches from time to time now...I figure we can add it to the growing list of mild physical unpleasantries that accompany me...but they do give me much needed excuses to get out of doing things I would rather not do (think quick! how often have I copped out of things cause "my stomach was hurting"...ok...if you are reading this then its likely you do not fit under that rubric...my stomach does hurt, everyday...I think I am pregnant with a porcupine)

I am a sick man...I am a wicked man. An unattractive man. I think my liver hurts. However, I don't know a fig about my sickness, and am not sure what it is that hurts me.

Dostoevsky, Notes from Underground

I don't know why I put that, but that "I am a sick man...I am a wicked man" ranks right up there with "Call me Ishmael" as one of the greatest openers! Of course, the Melville fellas are often quick to point out that Moby Dick actually begins with some bizarre historical stuff about whales (etymological I think), etc...give us the great existential opener! I have clearly nothing to say...I am well...I am not sleeping well but thats hardly abnormal...I am bored but thats not a problem (Kierkegaard said boredom was the source of creation...hmm, Kierkegaard lived in Copenhagen!).

I have been reading a bit of Marx lately because I do not have to think much anymore when I read Marx (most of Marx's readers never thought much at any point)...I am quite riled up about how tedious and specialized work hurts the "natural" human tendency to take pleasure in change and stifles our mainspring of creativity! To be fair though I think I take pleasure in not changing things and my creativity is usually at a height when my life is most mundane...I get into a rhythm, "the zone," when I get to the point where I am doing exactly the same things at exactly the same time, you can set your watch to me in San Diego...the chaotic nature of my life here has gone a long way to frustrating my thinking...I have been near distressed at points here in my inability to think quickly or write..."Discipline yourself! Give yourself a style! Overcome yourself!" That is the mantra here.

I should have taken a picture of my face and posted it...without a doubt this will be the experience of the trip so I should have carefully documented it from my various hospital rooms to my nurses and doctors. My face would have been quite a treat though...when my neighbors walked in to the emergency room one girl started crying and another sat down and put her face in her hands and said "oh God." Ha! At least I have an excuse for repulsing people now...well, it is like 104% better (Saddam Hussein once won 104% of the vote with 100% turnout, now thats a mandate!)...my eyes are bruised but not swollen, I could not open them at the hospital. I cleaned up my face and my cuts look a lot less substantial than they once did...I have a little nazi scrape on my upper lip...why does the face always seem to cut like that upon a fall or something...its really ridiculous looking...ok, I am going to bed...

Wait! One last thing, the doctors said that I was speaking French to them when I was unconscious...maybe some of it did sink in! I need a psychoanalyst to now bring it out of my unconscious, I want a postmodern one, but leave its little Freudian friends down there! Ok...insane rambling limit has been reached today...man, I must have hit my head or something!

All Orchids and Smiles

The weather hath turned a spell gloomy here and thou sayest that one shall too turn gloomy, nay!

Today I was walking home in the rain from my workout (I think you can still call what I am doing a "workout") when I happened across the most beautiful Brittany Spaniel. I decided I would stop and pet her, and after a few seconds I realized she belonged to the owner of a flower shop so I strolled in for a look.

I have to admit that I cannot resist the sight and smell of flower shops...if I was 5 minutes late to a life-saving doctor's appointment and I passed a flower shop I would almost certainly take a walk through. I just realized how Id driven this tale is...I could not help playing with a dog on the side of the road or strolling through the tulips. Often it is suggested that I am the most disciplined person...its simply not true. I cannot exist in the middle and my high degree of self control is due to an excessive impulse to make things orderly...I am excessively moderate! Get your head around that.

Anyway, after I had felt the texture on the leaves and smelled the blooms of most of the flowers in the shop I could not help but buy one. It is one of the nicer strains of orchid I have ever seen...do I know how to care for an orchid? Of course I don't, but I spoke to the shop owner and I am going to give it a shot. Besides our place needs some spicing up, its way too anaesthetic in here...white walls that we cannot put anything on (ha, yeah right...I am an empire of wall covering)...I think I will name it Ho Chi Minh...for short we will refer to it as Hochie...by now you may be wondering what the deal is with the totalitarian communist dictators...I don't know, they are just really funny to me. I mean, a cat named Pol Pot...that would be funny to me...its an overly tragic and political sense of humor...

Well, I am much happier now that Ho Chi Minh has moved into my apartment. Now I have a pet project, some life in this dungeon of an apartment, and my own little joke living right next to me!

Can anyone guess how unbelievably bored I am? I have to be entertained every 5 seconds here. I cannot do the things I did at home to keep myself busy like skate and surf so I feel like a 5 yr. old living in an office cubicle. I am going to read or something...its amazing how easily my restless energy can be transferred to study...its why I am destined for greatness! Ha! Just kidding...I hope everyone is doing well...seems as though everyone has been a bit incommunicado lately...remember your friend/relative is condemned to another few months in the People's Republic of Denmark! Stay in touch.

Sweden Pix and Resistance!

http://www.msnusers.com/PrinceofDenmark/shoebox.msnw?Page=1 <----Pics!!!!

These are the pictures that made the final cut from Sweden. I still have my Sweden post in draft, but I am too tired to finish it! Save it for a rainy day I suppose. Today I went with a friend to the Danish Resistance Museum, which chronicles the German occupation in Denmark. It was really interesting. Besides that nothing is really going on. I am looking forward to the weekend and a relaxing stay in Copenhagen. Tomorrow I have to go defend America in my Law of War Crimes class (even my friend said she was surprised at how argumentative our book is) so wish me luck...

Confessions of a Luddite

The internet has been down again for a while. The maintenance guy said that it has been a problem all across Copenhagen...I don't buy it. I just wanted to drop a quick line...it looks like I may not get to the pics until this weekend. There are just too many and I have too much to do for class. My human rights book is not in so I get to read 4 court opinions off my computer screen, which sounds about as good as dental surgery to me.

My war crimes book has some neat, high-European, America-bashing in it. Its funny cause the book is completely ignorant on American law...it mischaracterizes American sovereign immunity and makes us sound like an absolute monarchy.

In one instance it points to American courts applying our Alien Torts Claim Act extra-territorially as evidence of our tendency to want to be "world police." What is funny is, first, the court case it relies upon for this understanding was one circuit appellate decision that was part of split jurisprudence in our federal appellate courts...this split was resolved by the Supreme Court last year and the case referred to is no longer legal precedent. Not even a first year law student would make such a mistake. If the book published before the Supreme Court decision, as it did, it is still dishonest not to point to the fact that the case cited was a minority appellate court doctrine and resolution was pending certiori at the Supreme Court...you could be sanctioned as an American attorney for such inadequate case history. Secondly, the case that the book refers too critically is a case that is lauded by liberals and human rights scholars for showing a proactive tendency by the American courts to recognize the importance of international human rights law. The alternative appellate approach would gut the ATCA and limit it to originalist international violations like piracy.

So "Americans are world cops," "Americans do not respect human rights," "Americans are isolationist," well, what is it? How about, Europeans do not understand federal republicanism...who again still has monarchies...and for all the high-minded, Eurocentric, cosmopolitanism its nice to add that there is still probably no more a racist and nationalistic continent in the world than Europe...and huge world problems still abound from European colonialism...which Europe has conveniently turned a blind eye to in its commiserating over the damage it has done to itself in the last 100 years...1938 was not to long ago my European friends...

Copenhagen

I am back in Copenhagen, unfortunately. I have class all day today so I doubt I will have time to sort through the pictures from Stockholm, but I will try to get some of it done tonight.

Quick Update from Stockholm

I am not going to go in depth here cause I have another post in progress that will recap the trip and hopefully feature the 100+ pictures I have taken. I absolutely loved Stockholm, a truly wonderful, interesting and beautiful city. I may even come back. I actually found myself saying at one point, "I could live here if it were not for surfing..." I have only said that about two other cities...although I am tied to San Diego.

Well, then today the grand finale! I was walking home a new way and what did I see...a Quicksilver shop. I figured they were selling snowboarding stuff but they had a surfboard on display some video from the Wedge so I thought I would mosy on in. When I was in there I asked the owner if they ever sell surf equipment, or if anyone around here surfs. Turns out he is an avid surfer (having lived in Hawaii and California), the guy that was working the counter was a surfer, and the girl working there was to have her first session tomorrow. The owner said it was supposed to be head high, and I was talking about how much I missed surfing back home and the girl asked if I wanted to come tomorrow! Are you kidding me? Well, I don't have equipment...the owner says "I am sure I have what you need and can loan it to you for the day." I wanted to die on the spot...as I looked back up to the spongers taking off at a gnarly day at the Wedge I realized...Stockholm has surfing!

I suppose I should say that I cannot go because I have to be back for class and I have readings to do. Darn my sense of responsibility and bad conscience infused super-ego! Who am I kidding, certainly not myself, darn my non-refundable train ticket and the later train tix that run 2-3x as expensive. OK, I am not going! I AM NOT GOING SURFING WITH THE BEAUTIFUL SWEDISH SURFING GIRL. I am riding a long, oh so long, train ride back to Copenhagen. But............I am riding back with the names, email addresses and phone numbers of some Stockholm surfers and some Danish surfers they know! Will I come back to Stockholm? Yes, I think I will.

PS, don't tell me about how its firing in SD for at least the next week...I already heard about the offshores!

Torsdag i Aften

I arrived in Stockholm at around 5:30 yesterday evening after my "fast" train took a not so fast 6.5 hour trip from Copenhagen to Stockholm. Apparently there was trouble with the track at parts so we had delays, etc...It was quite boring despite the picturesque Swedish countryside dusted with a light covering of fresh snow. When I arrived in Stockholm my first priority was finding a room since I had read that you have to check in to some of the hostels by a certain time. I reserved my room for the night in a hostel close to the central train station, only for the night because my plans were still up in the air (don't you love my pretenses of spontaneity). There was a steady snow falling and darkness had already set in so I made straight for the hostel and found it in short order.

The hostel is nice. Its rather cozy and even a bit homely, especially when compared to my spacious, but bare, Copenhagen apartment. They have free Internet access, which is why you are hearing from me, hot showers, free laundry (I should have packed it all with me!), television and the works. I took immediate liking to the "living room" type area where I could curl up with a book for the evening. My room is shared with 7 other people and the bed is comfortable enough. I still have not bought a pillow in Copenhagen and I had forgotten the pleasure of letting your head hit the pillow after a long day.

Almost right away I met 5 of my roommates. They are from Tokyo and on there way north to catch "the lights." They are very friendly and invited me out with them for the evening. I considered declining and just relaxing for the evening, but why not? I want to get Stockholm from every angle. I highly approved of their choice of venue for the evening, a high-end jazz club featuring a live jazz quartet led by a popular Swedish jazz guitarist. The music was great and the company pleasant so I have no complaints (I was a bit out of place in the club though amidst the suits and ties, etc...the grungy kid in the corner! How odd it is, my delicate balance of bourgeois sensibilities and my "everyman" ethos.). The show ended just after 11 so I made it back in time to hit the sack early and get a fresh start today.

This morning I awoke around 6 am and hopped in the shower. Ah, the lost art of waking up in the morning...by 7:30 I was still the only person awake in the entire hostel! So I proceeded down the street to the train station to buy my ticket back to Copenhagen and tie up this little masquerade I have been carrying out the last few days about my undisclosed plans. After speaking to my new friends from Tokyo, and a few Swedes I met last night, it seems the northern lights will not be forthcoming on this trip. My roommates are catching a 16 hour overnight train to northern Sweden this evening and have a cabin for 4 nights. The Swedes said that is the way you have to do it since there is snow and cloud cover at the moment. Unfortunately, my schedule does not allow anything near 32 hours roundtrip on trains. As for Helsinki, well, its just too much money to take the boat, and I would be spreading myself too thin as far as time spent exploring the city. So its Stockholm until Sunday morning!

So far Stockholm reminds me of a big American city, like New York. Or at least certainly much more American than Copenhagen for instance. The buildings are massive edifices that rise out of a concrete landscape crawling with thousands of anonymous pedestrians. I actually feel a little more at home here, but I also realize the perks of Copenhagen, which has not fully bought into the phallic city-planning of many other major urban centers in the West. In Copenhagen many of the buildings are short, boxy, and pragmatic...not beautiful or sublime like some modern skyscrapers, but the benefit is that you can walk around any part of the city and see the sky or the towers from the castles and churches that reach toward it. These major metropolitan centers that try desparately to spread in all directions, horizontally with the sprawl, vertically with skyscrapers and subterranean transport, they often make me feel like I am walking in a box!

Anway, back to Stockholm. I awoke early, of course, and I enjoin all of you to do the same...it is my new religion! Get up just before sunrise. I did some light walking in the surrounding areas and took some photos, the theme was Sunrise in Stockholm. I hope they turn out well cause it was quite beautiful. Although I do wish I could have gotten to a different part of the city, a different perspective, so I could better frame the beautiful and antiquated architecture that dots the Stockholm skyline. I also took a picture of a monument by my hostel...I don't know anything about it, but it made me laugh out loud when I saw it. It looks like Stalin surrounded by enamored on-lookers! Probably an inside joke, but whatever.

The plan for Stockholm is simple. Today I will start of with a guided bus/boat tour (Stockholm is actually situated on a series of islands) that will last either 2.5-3.5 hours. After that I will return to places that peaked my interest for a closer look. This evening I will be on the prowl for a good cafe and a high quality cup of tea...part of my "banal tourism" project that seems to really have blossomed. Tomorrow I will hit up museums if they are not too pricey and if I am not too over budget...otherwise I will just pick one and really soak it up. Then Sunday morning its back to my home-away-from-home in Copenhagen. I will try to keep updates while I am here.

Farvel

This is the final post before the northern excursion begins. So here is the final tally, Jokkmokk may be out of the question cause it is between 15-20 hours from here and with the rail schedule it would be about a day and a half each way, which is all I have. So I am tentatively heading toward Stockholm at which point I will decide if I am going to go further east, like to Finland. The question depends on cost...how much the boat trip costs, how much a hostel in Stockholm/Helsinki costs, etc...I suspect Stockholm is where I will settle for the weekend, and there is nothing wrong with Stockholm.

It is unfortunate I cannot make it to Jokkmokk cause it would have been really neat to go to that indigenous festival and see the local culture...plus to say that I have traveled north of the Artic Circle! Yesterday a friend pointed out yet another benefit of traveling up there...the northern lights!

I am compelled northward and at least the first day of this trip will be a struggle to get as far north as I can...my goodness, the northern lights! Can you imagine? Well, I am...right now...and all that stands between me and the northern lights is a little creativity, the ridiculous cost of everything in Scandinavia, and time...well space too...but its all relative anyway! I am relatively confident that my will-to-northwardly will bear out. Next update, Sunday night or Monday morning. Wish me well as this southern Californian surfer goes where no sensible San Diegan would ever go...somewhere cold.

Oh yeah...for those of you following my reading, and I am sure that is nobody, I will be bringing the Fragments by Heraclitus...maybe the clear cold air will help me finally get my head around the Heraclitean flux...

Icy Weekend Adventure

The plans for my weekend excursion are beginning to take shape. It looks like it will begin Thursday morning with a train trip into Sweden. When I arrive at Malmo I will quickly gather information on trains to Stockholm or possibly a bus to Kristinehamn. If I can get to Kristinehamn in a reasonable time then I will head for their where I will board the Inlandsbanan train for Jokkmokk. Jokkmokk is a small indigenous village in northern Sweden where they have a winter festival every year in the first weekend of February. I winterfest inside the Arctic Circle! Plan B is to head to Stockholm and when I get there see about taking a ferry to Helsinki and departing for an overnight trip to Helsinki where I will spend Friday and much of Saturday before departing for Stockholm and beginning the trip back to Copenhagen. Plan C is to spend the weekend in Stockholm. Finally, and this is Plan D, if I lose the urge to leave Denmark then I will head for the west coast of Denmark and cruise the towns and fishing villages there for life.

If I do not return then I am likely taking a dogsled over the ice caps to the North Pole where I will see about establishing a colony of disaffected law students.

On the Brink of Class

Tomorrow my classes begin. The final schedule is "International Human Rights," "The Law of War Crimes," and "Comparative Eastern European Law." These classes sound interesting, but I will hold back judgment until a week into school. After 2.5 years in law school I know that a law school class of riding roller coasters would end up dry, boring and tortuous. Thats the only update I have!

The pace has really slowed here. I don't feel sick anymore, but I feel very rundown all the time. I could go to bed at 7 pm every night and sleep all day. I usually take off right after I wake up so that I don't sleep all day, but all I can really do is wander around cause I am too tired for anything else. At night I look for something to keep me awake till at least 9 like talking to my neighbors about the all the neat trendy clothes they are buying...

I think I need some "me-time," but I do not see much of it in the near future. Its either the constant company of my roommate or a room full of Danes and their cigarettes. Lately I have chosen the latter because anonymity is as close as I can get to solitude right now.

On a brighter note the weather has been very pleasant here. The last few days have been between 45 and 50 degrees and very sunny. I have even been able to go out without a jacket on, which is great cause I am really getting tired of wearing one all the time. I think I will go work-out...