A Decision and a Story

Since my last post on Sunday of last week, I have been wrestling with the question of candour and openness on the internet.

Well, more specifically, exactly how much of my daily mundane routines, should I hang out to dry for public viewing? Should I just write in 'stream of conscious,' devoid of grammatical structure? My uncensored thoughts and emotions vomited out onto a blank page for your casual viewing? Or would you be more interested in a list-like, narrated news bulletin?

I can tell you what you will not be seeing, and that is the latter.

Sorry. That is far too compartmentalised and boring to me and I will doubtlessly grow very, very tired or writing that way very, very quickly. Not to mention how tiresome it would be to you, feeling the pressure of being forced (that is right family, forced, unless of course you are lucky enough not to be related to me so you are no longer obligated to waste your precious minutes here) to read these lengthy tomes.

And so, I have tonight made a very serious decision, no longer am I playing the field. The field stinks. Both economically and socially (name that movie).
Instead, I will attempt to amuse you with anecdotes and trivial tales of my life here, and occasionally (and for your sakes hopefully not too often) sermonise to you on the things that I have discovered whilst living in my little nook of the world.

I am glad that has been cleared up. Shall we proceed?

On December 13'th I was invited, along with the other parents and care-givers, to attend a celebration of Santa Lucia at the local kindergarten.

I had no idea what that meant, or what this day is all about, so I quickly looked it up on Wikipedia before running out the door to be there promptly at 3 pm.

Apparently it is originally a Catholic religious holiday to honour Saint Lucy, a woman whose eyes were gouged out for her faith. Consequently, she is also the patron saint of blind people.
In Scandinavia, it is traditional for children to dress in white, flowing robes, and carry candles and sing a song for Lucia every December 13. Usually, one girl is chosen to represent Lucia and is given a wreath with four lit candles, to wear on her head.

I was ready and waiting with my camera to capture this spectacle, only to be told that there were no pictures aloud as it may distract some of the littlest ones who should stay concentrated on not lighting the child in front of them on fire with a wayward candle.

I apologise for the blurry, grainy quality. I felt that I was pressing
my luck taking not one, but two pictures.

It was an adorable afternoon, and I did manage to sneak a picture on my cellphone just for this purpose.
After the processional was over, the kindergarten had prepared homemade appleskiver and gløgg for us to partake in. And then shortly after, the Julemæn himself (Santa Clause) made a surprise visit much to the children's delight!

As for the rest of my week, it was fairly low key and uneventful.

Yesterday I went to a dinner hosted by my Spanish friends to say goodbye to the people leaving to go back home to Spain for the holidays.
They made traditional Catalan food for around 30 people, consisting of bread and grated tomato sauce, and tortillas, which are essentially egg and potato omelets.
We then all packed ourselves into a bus headed towards downtown Aarhus, and spent the evening at a ping pong bar and a disco.

I discovered something last night- that certain styles of glasses can be very polarising.

For instance, because it was drizzling and my hair was a wet, curly mess I decided to abandon the whole- sleek, chic, put together thing in favour of a more grungy, messy urban look. So I pulled out my new 10 kroner glasses from H&M and promptly forgot I was wearing them, until...

I must have been approached by no less then 10 strangers telling me they liked my glasses and were they real, and where did I buy them?
On the other hand, I was also told by certain people I looked much, much prettier without them. But little comments like that did not dissuade me, so I kept them on.

At the end of the evening, while waiting for the bus a homeless man ambled up towards me and proceeded in a raspy, smokers voice to mumble something in Danish. I explained to him I do not speak enough Danish to understand him, and could he possibly repeat that in English? And so he did.
What did he have to say?
He liked my glasses.

The end.