ຈັດພີມມາ: 06.08.2017
Hello boy/girl!
My second and last day in Copenhagen started pretty early, but also pretty nice. After packing everything, I had breakfast with my roommates in the hostel. We also met two Australians and together we talked about all kinds of things. From our ID card pictures to funny boy stories to our time in driving school, we covered it all. Since we had a lot of fun together, it was a bit sad when our group had to split up. I still had to check out and lock up my faithful Manni in a locker. After all that was done and I still had some time before my 3-hour city tour would start (I would like to note - see, Mom, Grandma - I can indeed be punctual), I took out my book and made myself comfortable in the beautiful outdoor area of the hostel. There was a young woman in front of me with the same brochure for the city tour who was pacing back and forth (probably because the city tour was supposed to start 2 minutes ago), so I approached her and asked if this was the right meeting point - just then my seat neighbor also joined in, who is from India, and we assured each other that we were at the right place at the right time. This was later confirmed by the nice bearded tour guide who picked us up in front of the hostel with his green umbrella and took us to the large square in front of the City Hall. There we introduced ourselves and among other things, we found out that Tanja (the young woman I had approached in front of the hostel) is also from Germany. So, I finally made contact with a German on my trip. During the tour, we also met another German couple who were passing through to Norway. By the way, Tanja is 26 years old and already an elementary school teacher in northern Germany.
The tour was like in Amsterdam, a 3-hour city tour where you give as much tip as you consider appropriate afterwards. Our tour guide was super cool, sympathetic and funny, so the three hours went by quickly despite the rather semi-good weather. Since I learned a lot, I would like to share some of my knowledge and tell you a little bit about Copenhagen.
- Did you know that the oldest as well as the second oldest amusement park in the world are in Copenhagen? The second oldest is called Tivoli and is still in operation. A pretty famous American came to Copenhagen, visited Tivoli, and decided to spend his entire vacation in the park. When he came back to America, fresh with inspiration, he built his own park. Now, do you know who it is? That's right, Walt Disney built Disneyland after being inspired by Tivoli in Copenhagen.
-Did you know that the City Hall of Copenhagen had to be built 5 times? That was mainly due to the many fires that Copenhagen had to deal with.
-Did you know that the longest shopping street in Europe is located in Copenhagen?
-Did you know that despite their high taxes, the Danes are considered the happiest people in the world? And I can confirm that the people there all walk around with a smile on their faces rather than a grim expression.
-Did you know that the husband of the queen is not particularly liked by the people? This is because the king, although he has been married to the Danish queen for 50 years, does not speak a word of Danish.
-Did you know that, on the other hand, the wife of the prince speaks perfect Danish in front of the people and has been warmly embraced by the people? Another reason for this is that Mary Elizabeth still rides her bike to take her children to kindergarten every morning.
-Did you know that you can find the largest flag of Christiania (the free city) in the Copenhagen Opera House? And this despite the fact that the owner of the opera house is the biggest enemy of this free city and would prefer to ban it (so the gentleman was fooled by his own workers).
Well, that's enough for now. Our tour ended with a group photo and then Tanja and I exchanged our numbers because we wanted to go out together in the evening. I spontaneously decided to walk from the royal palace to the Little Mermaid, and when I arrived there, I could hardly believe my eyes. There was such a huge crowd of people. There were even special bus tours and several souvenir shops - all because of the Little Mermaid. A statue that has already had its arm and head cut off. In my opinion, this big hype about the Little Mermaid is completely incomprehensible and our Melsunger Bartenwetzer (an event in Melsungen, Germany) deserves three times as much attention considering this rather pitiful figure.
Anyway, I had to make my way back to the hostel because I had a secret appointment. Now it's time to reveal the big secret. When I was on the bus to Copenhagen for 12 hours, I woke up at around 4 am and had a grand idea in my head. I wanted to create a memory for my life and so I looked for inspiration on the internet and quickly found the right one. I took out a notepad and pen, scribbled a bit, and then took a photo of my end result and contacted someone from Copenhagen via Instagram. Since I still hadn't received a response later in the morning, I typed the Danish number into my phone and called. Unfortunately, only the Danish answering machine answered, so I decided to just go to the bus by myself. When I later stood in front of this address, I had to ask a young man to translate the many notes on the door for me because I couldn't open it and was afraid that the store might be closed. The nice man had to smile a lot when I said completely confused that I couldn't open the door even though it should actually be open. While he opened the door for me, he explained to me that it says on the other note that you have to push the door really hard to open it. That was pretty funny. Attention, attention - it's a tattoo studio! That's right - I spontaneously got a tattoo in Copenhagen. Shocking, right? But I was very lucky because just at the moment when I spoke to the lovely Kathrine (the tattoo artist), the phone rang and a customer canceled her appointment for the next day. So I got my appointment. I would get my second tattoo at 4:30 pm. Stop! My SECOND? Yes, it's possible that I'm shocking you even more with this, but I actually already have a tattoo. Shortly after my 18th birthday, I had a small sun tattooed on my ankle. Anyway, back to the actual story. So I stood in the Fineline Tattoo Studio in Copenhagen a little after 4 pm, waiting for my appointment. There was a guy getting tattooed in front of me, which was good because I could see Kathrine's talent live again. But I also noticed that I couldn't pay with a credit card, which was a problem because we had already discussed the day before that the tattoo would cost about 700-850 kroner, but I only had 640 kroner in cash left. I immediately confessed to her and Kathrine reacted wonderfully. Not only did she apologize to me for not telling me that the day before, but she also said that I shouldn't worry - she would still tattoo me.
And so we started the design. We clarified every detail, made improvements, changed the position and size, and a while later we had my perfect tattoo prepared. So finally, it was time for the needle. I couldn't have chosen a better studio. You could clearly tell that it was not about making a lot of money quickly, but about making me completely happy with my little work of art. Anyway, she put a lot of effort into it and even though she would receive significantly fewer kroner from me than usual, she didn't rush and took her time. When we were done and she had explained everything to me about care and protection, it was time for payment. Kathrine only accepted 600 kroner and gave me back my 40 kroner, saying that I would also need money for my bus ticket. By the way, she was right because my ticket had already expired. Oh, by the way - Kathrine and a friend did an interrail tour through Italy when she was 17 - pretty impressive, right? Beaming with happiness, I went back to the hostel where I had already arranged to meet Tanja. However, we abandoned our plans to go out because there was a pretty good musician playing live music in our hostel. We didn't sit there alone for long either because two guys we already knew from the tour invited us to join them and their other roommates at their table. 3 (Ryan, Patrick, Max) of the guys were from America, one was from Australia (I forgot his name, but I remember that he will go to Trolltunga in Norway, my life goal, in the next few days), and the other was the Indian we already knew (since his name sounds similar to Sugar, but was impossible for me to pronounce, we simply baptized him 'Sugar'). Well, there was not only a good atmosphere in the hostel - it was also happy hour and so it happened that Julia had a drink or two of Carlsberg beer with the group. All good - but eventually it was time to leave the nice group because my Flixbus was supposed to leave for Berlin that night. Unfortunately, I realized that I had spent my last kroner (which Kathrine had left for me specifically for my bus ticket to the main train station) on the good beer. Well - what can you do, after all, I had a nice evening. No matter what, I now had to walk to the main train station - at night, just before 11 o'clock. But it wasn't too bad, the only thing that was a bit creepy were the screams coming from Tivoli Park.
-So, that's enough for now. In the next report, you will hear about my journey because I was also surprised.
Oh by the way - a quick explanation of my tattoo. The triangles are glyphs that represent my personal life principles in a certain way. The two outer triangles actually belong together, but I separated them to create a kind of cycle. The two together form the glyph that stands for 'reflect'. Those who know me a little better know that I am a person who thinks a lot and especially thinks a lot about myself and my actions. For me, it is important to keep reflecting because that's how you can move forward - especially if you take to heart (in my opinion) the following:
- 'Overcome' } the meaning of my second glyph. I can be a pretty fearful person who is plagued by a lot of self-doubt. But that's exactly why I want to constantly step out of my comfort zone and remember one of my favorite quotes from Malala (an incredibly inspiring young woman who fights for girls' education) - 'I'm stronger than fear.'
- 'Discover' } Glyph number 3 is a reminder that there is an incredible amount of unknown to discover and should prevent me from getting stuck in a small world someday.
- 'Understand' } the fourth glyph makes a small but fine difference. I wish that more people would try to understand each other before judging. With a little more empathy, the world would be a bit better, I am sure. I never want to lose my will to understand the world around me. Because only those who truly understand can also learn.
- 'Learn' } is also the meaning of my last glyph. I think that you're never too old to learn something new and I find it terribly sad when older people say that they think they don't need to learn anything new anymore just because they have managed well without this new knowledge all these years. And I also think that you don't have to be ashamed if you don't know something. In my opinion, you should only be ashamed if you then resist turning ignorance into knowledge.
Development is a form of life, isn't it? Just because you're alive doesn't mean you're really living. Too many people are already dead even though their hearts are still beating.
So that's it for my little, very personal life guide.
And if you're still shocked - the tattoo can be perfectly covered by a clock.
Good night! And sorry for the delay in the report, but I spontaneously went to a festival.