Last night was Kultur Nat in København: once a year the city has an arrangement when all the museums, libraries, theaters, and the government HQ itself are open for free access from 6:00 in the evening until midnight. Marianne & I ate in our favorite local Pakistani Resturant, met some friends at Cafe Sommersko for a cappuchino, then wandered on just us two because it's too hard to be in a big group. Well, we ended up in a big group anyway: everybody in København was out on the streets. We tried to go into Thorvaldsens Museum but the lines were too long, then Folketinget--the Danish Parlaiment--but ditto. We finally pressed into the National Museum for an exhibition on "the missing link" with robots animating the displays, but there was almost no air left to breathe, there were so many people. Outside it was drizzling very slightly, no one took notice of that, it was actually quite warm. There was a Free Film in front of Folketinget, "Pulp Fiction", so people were standing in the drizzle having a great time. Finally we dared the line to Folketinget and came into the grand old building which corresponds to The White House. One of the famous politicians, Uffe Elleman Jensen, ducked out the door past us as we entered--he'd had enough of sitting on his roost and wanted to go out on Kultur Nat just like the rest of us. Anyway, it was very "hyggeligt" in there (which means cozy), we went down to the "Snapsetinget" where the important people meet and have a "Snaps" or a pint or two, and around to the meeting salons where the various parties discuss politics during the daylight hours. There were lots of faces we see on TV every day, but then Denmark is not USA, and looking out the window we could see over to our apartment, 3 blocks away. As I said, "hyggeligt". After a few more stops, we went home at midnight-- we could hear that for many people the night was just shifting into 2nd gear, but we old farts were quite satisfied. I mean, how much culture can you really take? 3R |
