the metro lady

get comfordable, cause this might be a long one. in fact, there are so many fun things that i want to talk about today, that i'm even going to index them, so that you can skip ahead to the parts in which you are interested (and if you are not interested in any, then See ya next time, thanks for stopping by)

1) Eat One Live Toad Every Morning
2) my List
3) the title of this post

1) EAT ONE LIVE TOAD EVERY MORNING

well i left off in the prison hostel in oslo, with the strange man in the snowsuit. now i'm going to tell you about one of the most ______ [insert adjective that does not exist in english] days of my life. basically, it started out as the Worst Day Ever, and ended as the Best Day Ever. you might think i'm exaggerating. i'm seriously not. words can not describe the horror of the morning, or the happiness of the evening.

In high school, my friend's dad had a poster on his door that was something like "murphy's laws" or something like that... all i rememer is that it said something like: "Eat one live toad every morning and then you know your day can only get better."

so i went to bed after posting that last post and i read for a while, looked at my watch at 11:30pm, put away my book and drifted towards sleep. at 11:47pm (i know because i checked my watch again) i awoke to a loud and chaotic rumbling coming from the bed beside me. snoring. but not just snoring, SNORING. no no, not even. words cannot describe what i was listening too. it was the loudest, most horrendously sputter-tastic snoring i've ever heard in my life. at first it was hilarious, and i occupied my very awake self by coming up with insightful and comedic metaphors for the snoring. lawn-mowing olympics. rhinoceroses fighting to the death. being trapped in the engine of of jumbo jet. but as time passed, and i lay awake, slowing descending into exhaustion induced insanity, the metaphors became less comedic. isn't there a form of torture where your captors just don't let you sleep?
i actually got out my camera and made videos in the pitch black darkness, just to record the noise. i knew that i would need sound evidence to prove the volume and flemyness of this snoring.
i lake awake for what felt like years. years went by. i shifted and made noises, i threw things, i tried ear plugs, i tried headphones, i tried ear plugs and a scarf wrapped around my head. i tried everything. it was absolutely impossible to sleep.
i read a bit more but i was too tired to focus. but still unable to sleep. the noise. oh, the noise. i cannot explain. i just cannot.
knowing that the first train left the downtown station for the airport at 4:45am, i got up at 4:15. i packed up in the pitch blackness.
i openned the top pocket of my backpack to check that i had my passport.

it wasn't there.

again, something indescribable. the feeling of my insides falling through the floor and my head bursting through the ceiling, simultaneously. the physical symptoms of panic. my passport was gone.

how could this have happened? i was awake the whole night! i was awake and hugging my backpack the whole night! how could this have happened!?! i looked at my enemy. my nemesis. the man i hate most in the world. the snorer. could he have taken it somehow? maybe in that 17 minutes when i actually was almost sleeping? DID HE TAKE MY PASSPORT?!

but most of all

what the &%$# do i do?!?!

how could i have been so stupid? why didn't i move it to a different pocket? like the pocket in the INSIDE of my bag!?

wait a second.
i remember now.
i did do that. my passport is in the pocket on the inside of my backpack.

false alarm.

i left my room, still shaking. because it wasn't reception hours for my hostel, i had to find the hotel "next door" (note to oslo hostel: around the corner and through a sketchy parking lot is NOT "next door") and go there to check out. still shaking.

then i walked, in the pitch black night, in the misty drizzly snow, past all the drunken stragglers, still out at 4:30am, in creepy sketchy horrid oslo. i got to the the train station.

and it was locked.

the shaking intensified. the creepy people that hang out at locked train stations at 4:30am started yelling at/towards me in norwegian. i started walking away. fast, faster, i started running (wearing both of my backpacks) around the train station, towards a cab that i could see idling. i felt like i was in a movie. escaping.

as i come around the train station, i noticed that it's actually in two parts. i was heading towards another major entrance. lights were on and there were people inside. i ran inside. safe. lights. janitors. people with suitcases. early morning/late night commuters. i bought a train ticket and napped in the train station. then i napped on the train. then i full out slept for two hours in the airport. then i had a lovely chat with a somalian man at the airport.

i found the check in, found food, things were looking up.
i slept on the plane.

and all of a sudden i was in munich. germany. GERMANY! i'd never been there before but i'd always known that i loved it. or at least since blenheim (in nz, when i lived with lots of germans), i'd known that i would love it.

and i did.

i navigated my way to the main train station in downtown munich (yes, i'm pretty proud of myself), stored my bags and wandered for 4 hours. and it was sunny and warm. i changed into sandals and rolled up my pants. and wandered. taking pictures, drinking coffee, nosing in on easter church services. i lay in a park and read. i took a picture of a place called "The Ratsgellar" for RJ. then another picture of an accordion player, also for RJ. it was a great afternoon.

i found my way to my train seat, chatted with a friendly german man. declined his only-semi-creepy offer for drinks. and tried to sleep. but i was too excited. i was heading to blenheim people! BLENHEIM PEOPLE!

when my train pulled in to würzburg, i had another moment of doubt. i was ten minutes earlier than i'd told Jork that I'd be there. and i'd never actually even confirmed with him that he'd come get me. i had no idea where i was supposed to go. i stood in the train station for a few minutes, reading signs, pretending a knew what i was doing while my mind raced to figure out a plan of action. did i know the name of the hostel? did i know how to get there? did i know if the reception would be open so late? did i know what name the booking would be under?

then from the far corner of the station, a group of people, in shorts and sandals and holding beers were walking towards me. and before i know it, i'm being hugged, and i'm shaking hands, and these people know me. they know my name and they KNOW me. somewhere deep down, between the base of my spine and the bottom of my stomach, a knot relaxes. unties. these people KNOW me. I know that none of you will really understand this, except for Nicole, but I just gotta say it anyways: for the first time in a long time, i was Home.

what a crazy day.

-----

BANG. right here. i was writing the above blog post on tuesday, when right when i finished typing "what a crazy day" my computer crashed. and never recovered. it´s at the apple hospital now, and i´ve already been told that the 100GB harddrive is completely unsalvageable. i lost everything. sorry rj, no more pictures of german accordian players. i´m still waiting to find out if whatever killed the harddrive is covered by the warranty. hopefully i will get a new harddrive for free. and soon. but either way, my computer died.

i´ve been visiting the computer labs on campus every day and quietly morning my loss and licking my wounds and trying to figure out just exactly what i have lost. i know that i have all of my pictures from 2nd year uni up until i moved to cph backed up. but nothing from before that and nothing from after. thankfully, i had already given some of my norway pics to Esta and i´d posted an album of pics from my weekend in wurzburg on facebook, so i have those. and my parents have backups of most of the pics from when they were here. so that´s good. but i lost the rest of the pictures from my trip and 30 GB of music and all my journals and my writings from the last 10 years and hundreds of documents that i probably won´t ever need but still feel insecure not having.

but anyways
back to where i left off:

-----

2. MY LIST
As many of you may already know, I found out a couple weeks ago that I´ve officially been "hired" on as a research assistant by an orang researcher whose work i´ve admired for years. it´s a big and scary and very exciting opportunity and, if everything goes as planned (which is pretty unlikely, because there is sooo much paperwork and i can´t for the life of me figure it all out), i will be leaving for Borneo in early july. how nuts is that? and i´ll stay till december and then be back in vic in time for my last semester of uni, starting january 2010.

but, my point here, is that i very abruptly realized that i only have one month left in copenhagen. only one month left in europe! and i just wasn´t feeling like i had really made the most of it. and i was very sad. SO, i made a list. yes! a list! of all of the things that i want to do before i leave. and over the last week, i have crossed 3 out of 15 things off of the list (i need to speed it up here). Number One was get a bike. I am so mad at myself for putting off getting a bike for so long. but the day after i made my list, i bought a bike. and i think i´m pretty much the happiest kid in denmark now. i ride around all day, everywhere. i have named my bike Zoo Transport, because mostly i use it to go to the zoo. the weather here is sunny and warm now, and my bike is one of those old-school mary poppins bikes, with a big basket on the front, and i just ride around with my hair blowing in the wind all day. it´s pretty great. i will take some pictures and post them. maybe. i dunno how these computers would handle me trying to post pictures. i miss my mac.

3.THE METRO LADY

the metro here is very simple. when you're standing in the metro station, waiting for the metro to come, there are only two tracks, one going in each direction. and there are screens that say how long until the next metro, and where it is going. but then, as each train rolls in, there is a lady who announces something. for three months i have been trying to figure out what she says. For the train heading towards my house, it sounds like "Toes spok toes t´ Vanløse" and for the train going the other way it sounded like "Toes spok ind t´ Lufthavn." now seeing as how Vanløse and Lufthavn are the end stations, i figured that whatever she was saying meant "train going to ___" but i couldn´t for the life of me figure out exactly the words that she was saying. nor why it was different for each direction. and my danish teacher told me it was "Toget kører til ____" (train going to ___) but i knew that was wrong. then finally, just a few days ago, i went and made lasagna with my italian friend (holy crap it was the best lasagna ever. i take no credit for it. all i did was spoon stuff into a pan) and it occured to me to ask her danish boyfriend. AND NOW I KNOW. it´s been driving me crazy!!!

"Toget i spøg to til Vanløse"

"Toget i spøg et til Lufthavn"

train on track two to vanløse

train on track one to lufthavn

as i am writing this i am realizing the extent to which this means NOTHING to you and you can´t possibly CARE about the metro lady. but it was one of those things that was driving me totally nuts. and i can´t express how happy i am to FINALLY KNOW.

also, i feel like, just over the past few weeks, i´ve really settled in here. now, with my bike, and my comprehension of the metro lady, i LIVE in copenhagen. i don´t speak danish to people, but i often understand them now when they speak it to me. that´s the first step.

i live here now. i love this city. i love their crazy rediculous language. and their bike lanes and traffic lights just for bikes. i love how they never get out of the way and how there are just as many dad´s pushing strollers as there are mom´s. I love when the sun is out and so are all the people. I love how unnecessarily fashinable everybody dresses. I love how friendly danish people are once you get to know each other. I love the dice game that they play in dingy bars, and dingy bars where they play the dice game. I love when i don´t lose the dice game and so i don´t have to buy the next round. I love the zoo and the babboons and the gibbons (who, i swear, know me now), and the chimps and the camel that is my one true love, and the baby ring tailed lemurs. And i love the friendly guys at the falafel place by my house - i love how they can´t speak a word of english but they try anyways, and that they make the best falafel in all of copenhagen (yes, i have eaten enough falafel here to be able to say that with authority).

my close friend Laura left today and it´s made me all introspective.
this is all coming to an end, apparently. even though I feel as if it´s just beginning.

I will miss this place.

kickin it in norwegia

k so
wow
i'm bad at keeping up with this
are any of you still reading this?

the task of a post about family time proved far too overwhelming for my computer (which couldn't handle uploading the pictures) and my own sense of initiative (i tried once then was too overwhelmed by the task to try again, so just gave up).

so instead of a full post about family time, i will just tell you the best part. the highlight, if you will.

three words: ice. cream. truck.

i will paint you a picture:

me and jenny. sitting on our beds at a tacky-fancy bed and breakfast. the curtains match the bed spreads. we are in a little town on a little island that is all deserted and ghostly in the off season. it is dark out. but not too late. 7:30pm, perhaps. we are doing homework.

a noise outside. a bell. in the distance. getting closer.

we look up at each other. eye contact. a conversation between sisters. a conversation without words...
that sounds like an ice cream truck
holy crap, that sounds like an ice cream truck
are we doing this?
we are doing this
run and get money from mom, i need to find shoes
...eye contact

we run down the hall. we grab money from mom. we run outside.

we are wearing socks on the cold cobblestone.

darkness.

a light at the end of the street. a truck. a white, square truck. danish is being spoken in the distance.

we approach. a man with a dog and a little girl, saying favel to another man standing by the lit up truck. the man with the dog is holding a box. A BOX OF ICE CREAM.

we speak words. incoherent slews of english words. we are too excited to make sense. with are met with a confused look by the man next to the truck. he doesn't speak english. let alone giddy-spewey english. wildly we gesture. ice cream! ice cream!
we look at the sign. we point to it.
we want one of those
and one of those
please

more gesturing. more danglish.
not possible to buy just one of each. must by a box.

en hel kasse.
a whole box.
awesome.

we choose the tastiest looking ice cream cones.
we buy a whole box.

we yell thankyous.
tak
tusind tak
tak skal du have
all the danish thankyous that we know

we yell and we laugh and we run in our socks back to our house.
we sit on our parents bed and the four of us each enjoy two ice cream cones.

four words: highlight. of. my. life.


k now. anyways.
back to the present.
so it's easter break here.
and we get a week off. which, because i only have class on wednesday and thursday, is actually 11 days. and because i flew to norway instead of going to class last thursday, it's actually 12 days. awesome.

quick summary:
-spent two nights in Bergen at Eyv's apartment with him and Esta. awesome. i love bergen. i want to live there. forever. it's amazing. it's like a combination of victoria, jasper, and the place where Wallace & Grommit live.
-spent one night at Eyv's family's country house with him and Esta and his parents. also awesome. a quaint little country house on the shoreline of a norwegian fjord. complete with a composting toilet, fishing rods, and the best vegetarian-food-cooking mom i've ever met.
-spent one night at Eyv's family's house in Haugesund (with him and Esta). also on the edge of a fjord. no wait, a sound. there is a difference, apparently. explored some cool historical sights around what used to be the center of norway.
-spent two nights at a totally hilarious hospital hotel in Stavanger (with just Esta). went to two cool museums, one of which featured an exhibit about homosexuality in nonhuman animals. a whole exhibit. with big huge colour photos. holy crap, i love norway.
-left Esta and took a boat back to Bergen. did homework in a cool coffee shop. stayed in a hostel that was totally great cept it had the worst beds in the history of horizontal surfaces. didn't sleep much.
-today: took the train to Oslo. went and saw the original "Scream" painting at the national gallery. very cool. drank coffee and wandered and read my book and wandered and drank more coffee.

tonight i'm staying in a hostel that i'm pretty sure i saw featured on America's Most Dangerous Prisons on sunday at Eyv's house. it's all kinds of awful. but whatever, just for one night. i think i'll sleep hugging my backpack. if the next hostel i stay in doesn't have lockers, i'm going to carpenter one out of another bed and used that to store my stuff in (the major downside of travelling with a laptop and non-pocket-size camera).

but when i came back after my wandering, there were three very friendly german girls in my room, so that made me feel better about this place. then i went in to the shower and when i came back out, there was a man lying fully dressed in snow-suit gear on the bed next to mine. boots and a tuque and everything. oh hello. no answer. sleeping? nope. eyes wide open and staring at the ceiling. deaf? maybe. he got up a few minutes later and when into the shower. from the sounds of it, he showered five times. like, water on for a few minutes, water off for a few minutes, water back on, water off, etc. then no noise for 30 minutes. then all of a sudden, he reappears around the corner, fully clothed in his snow suit gear. lies back down. snores for a while. gets up. leaves the room.

i am so unbelievably and profoundly confused.

but anyways
bedtime now.
tomorrow i'm leavin early and flying to munich, then train to würzburg to see blenheim people! yes! blenheim people! people who nicole and i lived (and worked) with when we lived in blenheim, nz! awesome! great! holy crap! i'm so stoked!

hope you could stay interested despite the lack of pictures.... i'll try to put some up when i get back to kbh next week.