Denmark: The Centre Pin of Scandinavia

I'm breaking up, for the gravity's won (before it snaps where the warm blood runs...)

My time in Denmark came and went faster than any country previously visited. It started with an overnight train from Amsterdam through Hamburg, and into København. The German and Danish border controls both woke me up at one point or another throughout the night, and the blonde Danish girls next to me spoke great English but chose to break into Danish often, and their looks, smiles, and giggles towards me after nearly every sentence made me wish I'd gotten their numbers.

Unfortunately, my time in Denmark was on the strictest schedule yet, for I was to attend the Danish Atlantic Youth Seminar (DAYS). DAYS was held on a Danish airbase in Åalborg, in northern Denmark.

I met a great deal of like minded political science and IR majors from all over East/West Europe, the US and Canada, and even Russia and Georgia. I also learned a good amount of things I didn't know about the EU and NATO from Danish, British, German, and many other professors and experts, as well as from my peers.

To the right you can see David Cole, British Journalist, and Mogens Skødt, the Danish legend and organizer of DAYS and the founder of the project, walking through an old viking graveyard in the light rain.

Åalborg is a bit of a dreamy city, with a central church, many beautiful old examples of architecture, and at the same time a lively shopping center where I was able to buy some cheap clothes for the warmer part of my journey.

Denmark also has better weather than the other Scandinavian countries I'd visited. Maybe that's why the Danish are so damn friendly and happy? At any rate, the girls were just about as pretty as all the other Scandinavian ones, though for some reason Norwegian girls were still my favorite, which is a claim I can't really crystallize and explain unfortunately. Maybe it's just something about their style of dress. I dunno. There was a good sale in the city, so I picked up some bright Scandinavian clothes and was then on my way.

But there were many pretty girls in the DAYS group, so the Danish girls on the street weren't really in my attention for very long. The Danish girls themselves were quite pretty and friendly, though they weren't able to take things as lightly and carelessly as the other participants during the social activities and free time as they had to organize the events. All business. Here are some pictures of our lovely Danish organizers. First Alina on the bus organizing something or another-- I can't remember what exactly it was.

I'm sad I didn't have more time to hang out in Denmark and see København more. But at the same time I knew that I had to grab a plane down to Spain and meet up with Dylan to run with the bulls. Plus, I had a good feeling that Spain was going to win the world cup, and I would make it to Barcelona just in time to see them beat the Dutch. Turns out I was right, and Barcelona blew up and things went insane, but that's for my next post...