Once Upon A Time...

Though previous trips and destinations have been rather easy to describe, the city of Copenhagen is a bit more perplexing. It is almost like a storybook without a proper ending. The setting is reminiscent of Amsterdam - interlocking canals, streets draped with bicycles, and waterfront buildings with fairytale windows, almost as if one should be dropping bread crumbs along the way. The local characters are quite Nordic - light-skinned, blonde, and speaking a language that sounds like a distant, yet obvious blood-relative of Swedish. The city's chapters are short and clearly defined - North, South, and Central, all compact and within close walking distance. It has the iconic features of a storybook - the palaces, the horse-drawn carriages, the bustling town squares, and the wistful town maiden, a bronze Mermaid sculpture that sits perched on a rock in the harbour (which, unfortunately, is currently on exhibition outside the city). Somehow though, Copenhagen is lacking a bit in charm, as if the Prince has yet to arrive on scene. Or perhaps he has arrived, but no official transformation has taken place - the beast remains the beast, and the mermaid remains, well, a mermaid.

But, as we all know, the beauty still loved the beast - his princely transformation was merely an afterthought. How is this possible? Perhaps because the not-so-obvious moral of the story is this - a fairytale is only as good as the voices of those who read it aloud, and the people with whom it is shared, regardless of the written ending. Even children realise that a ho-hum bedtime story can become magical when read with excitement, and meaningful when one is curled up next to Mum or Dad. Similarly, we read each chapter of our weekend in Copenhagen with passion, as the day we arrived, 15 October 2010, marked our one-year anniversary of moving to London! An anniversary such as that one breathes passion, passion for our lives abroad and our ability to travel. We also read each chapter in the pleasurable company of Ingrid, our American friend who lives in Stockholm, who we have not seen since New Year's. Copenhagen was the perfect setting for a meet-in-the-middle rendezvous point, an opportunity to meander through the streets, window-shop, eat at canal-side cafes, explore contemporary Danish art and design, and swap stories about living abroad in London and Stockholm. Below are a few of this storybook's illustrations...

Bundled up in Nytorv Square,
along Stroget street (Central)

In Hojbro Plads square, near Stork Fountain,
along Stroget street (Central)

Kongens Nytorv square (Central)

Nyhavn canal district (Central)
Inside Kunstindustrimuseet,
the Danish Museum of Art & Design (North)
Outside the entrance to Tivoli,
an amusement park/cultural venue,
considered by the Danes to be a national treasure
Out for the night, in a Scottish Pub
Christianshavn, otherwise known as the
"Little Amsterdam" district (South)
Vor Frelsers Kirke, Our Saviour's Chuch
(notice the exterior spiral staircase!) (South)

Cityscape view from Vor Frelsers Kirke
Heading back to the train station

Though Ingrid's husband David was not able to join us, and we missed him so, all in all, it was still a lovely, fairytale-of-a-weekend away...

--THE END--
B&B

"Life itself is the most wonderful fairy tale." - Hans Christian Andersen, Danish author and inspiration to Copenhagen, most known for writing storybooks such as the Little Mermaid and Thumbelina