August 1 through 7, 2022
Hard to believe we've been in Copenhagen for about a week already! The travel to get here was long and hot and overwhelming (especially for me), but we survived. We took the train from the airport to our Airbnb which was super convenient, and then we got very lucky on finally figuring out how to get the key for the apartment (who knew it was at the candy kiosk store next door? not us 😐). We got in just in time for me to collapse. We gave ourselves the whole next day to recover which we sorely needed.
The weather has varied from slightly cooler than Sarajevo to downright chilly at times (I had to break out my puffy coat once). Art is somehow managing with just his flannel shirt and/or sweatshirt 😦 Our Airbnb apartment is spacious, has a great kitchen, and is full of hygge vibes. We did laundry (to wash out the Sarajevo smokiness in our clothes) and discovered the combo washer-dryer kinda sorta does work. We're also making good use of the drying rack provided 😉 There isn't any A/C but apparently opening a window helps a lot (so they claim) and besides, most of the year Denmark doesn't need A/C anyway. We also went grocery shopping, conveniently located across the street (we're not far from the city center, in a lovely suburb called Frederiksberg), so we can finally eat home-cooked meals for awhile. The area seems well appointed with food, restaurants, kiosks, hair places, and tons of bike shops. Denmark is second in the world in bicyclists (second to Amsterdam) and the city revolves around them. We thought about renting one but we're not sure our biking skills would be "up to speed" 😜 Using public transportation, especially trains, has been super easy and you can get pretty much anywhere you need to go.
We've taken some tours of Copenhagen (including a beautiful canal ride in Nyhavn) and the outlying areas (some together, some separately) and have a pretty good overview of the city and a sense of its history. I have visited castles and a Viking museum, and together we even went to Sweden for a day (just a one-hour train ride!) and saw funky architecture (Turning Torso) and a super cool bridge that connects the two countries. Going from Bosnia to Denmark has really made us appreciate our first-world privilege and all that being a European Union member has to offer a country. Denmark seems to have a strong infrastructure with its citizens' needs all being met (e.g., covered healthcare) and it shows 😀 Also the cost of everything here is way higher than Bosnia ($5 ice cream vs $1). I guess that's the price you pay to have all your other needs met 😅
Having two weeks here has also allowed us to have some downtime days which was more necessary than we thought. It also gave Art the chance to seek out and find the backgammon community, and me the chance to find a Toastmasters meeting (and gave us some time apart which was also a good thing 💕). Cool aside: the TM meeting theme happened to be "sabbaticals" - what are the odds?!
Added bonus: One of Art's backgammon friends told him (yesterday) about a concert happening in Copenhagen, and it was none other than Ed Sheeran! And since we are real fans (not fake fans, as some people might think 😆), we hopped online and amazingly managed to get tickets. The concert was outdoors at a park venue and was fantastic, with Maisie Peters as the opener (we're also big fans of Maisie). The queue to leave by train afterwards, however, was horrendous (and by then it really was cold). We were so impressed with how patient everyone was and how efficient the trains were. We were back in our apartment within 1.5 hours which could have been way worse in some other cities we know 😛
Enjoy some pix of our recent adventures (below)! More to come soon.
Art and Deena
Waterways in Copenhagen
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