Denmark, and the Little Mermaid, Part I

I arrived into Copenhagen from Helsinki, excited at the idea of staying with Ron, where a few more of my friends from California (hereinafter referred to as the A-Team) will rendezvous, where we will head out to Amsterdam on the 15th, rent a van and drive to Munich for Oktoberfest on the 19th, and somehow survive with our minds and livers intact. Sprinkle in a little Snoop Dogg concert on the 4th, and, well, I think September's going to be a pretty decent month!

It just so happened that Ron had a couple of other friends in town the day I arrived. One of them, Melanie, originally from the UK, but currently lives in LA, wanted to check out the Little Mermaid statue and the Royal Palace. As you all know by now, I am not necessarily keen on touristy things (nor do I ever read ahead of time about what to see and do) but I went along for the ride because you just never know what kind of fun you can get yourself into....

On our way, I saw this huge fountain with a woman whipping four huge bulls. I recalled thinking to myself, "Wow, this is surely a different Little Mermaid than what Disney would like us to believe...." and saying something outloud to Ron, "Dude, this Little Mermaid is whupping some serious bull ass!" Ron just kind of laughed a bit and we kept walking a bit. Then I asked him, "Where are we going now?" To which he responded, "To see the Little Mermaid, man!!" "Oh, you mean that woman whipping the bulls wasn't her.....????? Right." Such a sophisticated world traveller I am, eh?

Anyway, so we finally get to the real Little Mermaid after a few more paces. There were probably about 100+ tourists surrounding this statue, snapping away with their little cameras. I should have taken a picture of all these people taking a picture of a statue! I just found it a bit strange because, well, it's a very small statue. And it's not like she was some heroine who defended Denmark from Hitler (there wasn't one, I checked) or the lady who invented wooden clogs. It's a statue of a little mermaid, for crissakes! I guess the only interesting thing about the Little Mermaid, thankfully, is that it's perched on a few rocks just about a few feet off the shore. "Easily accessible," I thought to myself. I told Ron that I was going to jump on those rocks, and have him take a picture of me with my hand on her boob or something. Ron kind of laughed a bit and sort of rejected the idea that I would actually do something like that. He obviously does not know me that well. So I give him my wallet, cell phone, camera (just in case I slipped and fell into the sea) and hop over no problem (Still got it!!) I see Ron, he snaps the photo, and runs off into the crowd away from me! I finally catch up to him and the first thing he says is, "I can't believe you did that!!!"

"I told you I was going to do it, Ron!"

"Yeah, but I didn't think you were serious....As soon as you put your hand on her boob, I just heard the crowd breath in a collective sigh of astonishment, like so," as proceeds to demonstrate with his hand over his mouth.

"I wanted to take another picture, man!" I countered.

"Do you realize the Danish consider the Little Mermaid statue sorta like a national monument??" He states this, of course, AFTER the fact.

I paused for a bit. "Well, that's why I didn't go behind her and grab BOTH of her boobies!" Besides, the way I figured, if she was that important, they would have roped her off or something. After further consultation with Ron, the Danish do not need to rope things off to deter hooligans like me, they just know when something is ok and when it's not. Go figure!

All I know is, I hope it was as good for her as it was for me.

My three-month mark, retrospective and summary

Over the past three months, between the pub crawls and hangovers, I occasionally have had some downtime to think about the journey I have taken so far, and what really has happened. Where do I start??? (About fifteen minutes elapsed before writing the next sentence here.)

Obviously, I am having the time of my life and sooooooooooo glad I did not choose to do something stupid like buy a new Porsche Cayman S. (Although, it would be nice to have that with me to travel around the world with!!!) Travelling solo like this- I have met so many people from so many different countries that all I will be doing when I get back to the US is to go back and visit these friends (especially Australia!!!) Meeting so many like-minded individuals, whether they be Russian students on their summer break, Australians and Kiwis on their gap year, Europeans on their obnoxiously long vacations, or the occasional American who has decided to leave his family, friends, and career behind for a year, just makes me smile every day. It also doesn't hurt that everytime I look at my phone it reads, "No upcoming appointments!" Everyday is like a Saturday!!!

Speaking of work, I do miss it a bit. I mean, not the actual work itself, but the idea of putting money IN the bank, as opposed to the other way around. My budget, considering I set aside $100/day, is surprisingly doing alright. I am "only" $2,000 over so far, not bad, considering (my drinking ways) I have been in Europe this whole time. It will (hopefully) get much cheaper once I get to Africa and Latin America.

One of the things I consistenly hear from people when I tell them about my trip is, "You must be rich to be able to do this," followed inevitably by, "I wish I could do that...." I have a secret everybody, all you have to do is save your money and not waste $4.5 on that "must have" mocha frappuccino twice a day, or that "gotta have" $150 pair of jeans... For example, most everybody I know makes fun of the flask I carry around but the way I figure, it saves me at least $50 bucks a night every time I go out. Multiply that over the course of a year, (assuming you go out just once a week, every week of the year) and tada, I have an extra $2,000-$3000 bucks in my bank account! That flask carrying allowed me to spend one extra month on this trip. It's really that easy, guys.

Other things I have learned:
1) Being able to put everything you have in one bag is incredibly liberating.... and horribly burdensome. I may act like a monkey sometimes, but when I get back, I guarantee you I will look like one. Or at least my shoulders will.

2) Everybody can understand American English just fine, but nobody can understand the Scottish.

3) If Europe could vote in America's elections, Obama would win in a landslide.

4) Conversely, if America could vote in Europe's elections, you wouldn't have to pay to use a public toilet. "You can get all the free education and healthcare you want, Mr. Bean, but when it comes to leaking the lizard, why yes, you have to PAY for that privilege."

5) Australians are everywhere except in Australia. Apparently, nobody lives there, only 'roos and Kylie Minogue. Oh wait, she lives in London!

6) Football (soccer) is a great sport to watch and I am convinced America would be a football loving nation if we could watch more than just David Beckham and Victoria prance around LA.

7) All I ever needed to learn about travelling the world (so far) I learned with a map, a beer, and a bar. (Please do me a favor on your next trip, do not buy a Lonely Planet or a Frommers' or any other overpriced travel guide as you're only destined to meet other people who did the exact same thing.)

8) Santa Claus really does exist!

9) Getting hit on by women in their 50's is not flattering. At all.

10) When I get home, I am going to make a bikini calendar consisting of Spanish sanitation engineeresses, Polish bartendresses, any Estonian girl, Swedish policewomen, and Finnish girls who work at Subway, and I will be a very, very, very rich man.

"When I go to Sveeeeeeeeden, I am going to rent a Volllllllllvo........"

Aside from having a Guinness in Dublin, and a handful of other "things to do before I die" I can proudly say that I have crossed off another on my list while I was in Sweden: I finally got the chance to go to Sweden, rented a Volvo, called my friends on a (borrowed) Ericcson, to let them know I was going to Ikea to eat some Swedish meatballs! I know, most of you probably have no idea what this really means to me, but there is a thin line between insanity and genius!

On the ferry ride from Helsinki to Stockholm, I met three Swedes, Johan, Anna, and Helge. In our cabin, we overheard the captain saying that rough seas were ahead for our 10 hour ride. Somehow the subject of ships sinking came up, and I recalled visiting the monument in Estonia dedicated to the 800 plus people who died on the MS Estonia from Tallinn to Stockholm. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MS_Estonia for your reference) It turns out that Anna's uncle was the captain of the Mariella, one of the first ships to arrive at scene of the disaster. Her uncle, understandably, was so traumatized that he retired, and spearheaded a successful effort to improve and change the way lifeboats are designed, and more importantly, deployed, during an emergency. I really appreciated learning this, as it added another layer of depth and enhanced my experience to a site I had already visited in the past. These are the times when I truly feel like I am travelling AND learning. We spent the majority of the night drinking and playing poker. Needless to say, I lost all my chips (again) but won a few new friends from Sweden!

One night, I checked out a traditional Swedish restaurant called Ostagotakallaren (http://www.ostgotakallaren.gastrogate.com/) which came at the recommendation of a few locals I asked around. I met a couple of Dutch guys, Hans and Remko, who were sitting next to me and we ended up hanging out that night. I learned many things from Hans and Remko about the Dutch. First, the Dutch NEVER go Dutch. Bringing your own booze to a party (BYOB) is called an American party (I'm a bit skeptical of this... ) Dutch courage is also known as liquid courage, and "Watching the cat go out of the tree" is a phrase commonly used to describe the Dutch way, which is to describe how it is generally much safer to watch everything occur instead of being an active participant.

It was just my luck that I arrived into Stockholm just in time for this huge outdoor party/festival to celebrate the 8th day of the 8th month, in 2008, starting at 8pm. Paqui and Victoria, two Spanish girls I met in my hostel, were a bit confused as to the significance of this day, and as it turns out, "08" is the area code for Stockholm. I thought to myself, that's a good enough reason to get wasted amidst thousdands of other Swedes! We went out to check out the madness and I learned two things about what the Swedes do when they get wasted: 1) They piss all over the place, including the women. I think I saw about 4 beavers that night and it wasn't because I was a peepin Tom--- there WERE that many pissing on the sidewalks in not-so-discreet areas! You'd think they would turn around the other way, but that would make too much sense 2) They throw their empty glass bottles on the streets, (instead of in, I don't know, a trash can???) so that girls with open-toed shoes can get their feet cut up. On my way back to the hostel, I noticed an extremely drunk girl, who stumbled a few steps, and right when she was throwing up, she let out this huuuuuuuuuuuuge fart. At first I thought to myself, damn, she's fucked up! The second thought that crossed my mind was, "Have I ever done that????"

As most of us know, Sweden is a rather expensive country. I have been eating more McDonalds' in the past month than I ever have in my entire life in the US! Despite all this beer and Mickey D's, I had to go buy a new belt because my current one wasn't holding up my pants very well. I know, my family must be freakin out right now to hear me say that but don't worry, I will fatten up by the time I get back to the US. It was then a very pleasant surprise to have met Claudia, who works at this cafe I frequented since it had free internet access. I found out she was from Chile and we started speaking in Spanish (again! Why not, we're in Sweden!!!) and lo and behold, she did not charge me for lunch or coffee! Needless to say, I went back everyday.

Eating reindeer pizza and taking Santa hostage in Finland....(somebody had to do it!)

My Finland post, finally!

Hopped on the 3 hour ferry from Tallinn, Estonia to Helsinki, Finland. After almost three months of planes, trains, mini-buses, bikes, double-decker buses, subways, Tubes, Metros, trams, double-decker trams, I finally hopped on a boat!

Upon checking into the boat, I met Villu, the baggage attendant. I saw a sign that it would cost one euro to leave my backpack during the journey. So, I reached into my bag of change of random currencies I have picked up throughout my travels, and pulled out a one euro coin. I gave Villu my one euro, but he proceeded to poke into my hand and grabbed a British pound and spoke all kinds of Estonian gibberish. My first impression was that he was trying to take me for a ride because I saw very clearly on the sign that it only cost one euro. Then I thought, maybe I don't have to pay as much?? Or maybe that I need to pay more??? Or perhaps he didn't hve enough change to give me??? His English was worse than my Estonian, so if you can imagine how confused we both were. He just kept pointing to my British pound and this went back and forth for a few minutes, and for bettter or worse, there was nobody behind me to help translate. Finally, through tons of hand gesturing, nodding and naying, I figured out that he wanted to know what kind of currency the British pound was. He pointed to himself, then he pointed to a book on his desk, and he said, "I like" and I figured out that he was a coin collector and that he has yet to see, nor collect a coin from the UK. So I gave him my 2 pence coin, and he refused at first, (I think because it actually is a rather large coin) and perhaps thought it was worth tons, but I explained to him with more hand gesturing and nodding and naying that it was no biggie. This made him very happy, and it made my day.

Finland, as many of you know is an extremely expensive country. It cost me 15 bucks for a footlong meatball sandwich at Subway. That subway guy Jared would have lost a lot more weight in a shorter amount of time if he went on the Subway diet in Finland. Thankfully I met a few Finnish people while I was in Tallinn, including a girl named Emmi, whose last name literally translates into "wooden leg." The jury is still out on whether she is a pirate!!

I learned many things while in Finland, including the fact that Finland considers alcoholism a national disease. There was not a day that didn't go by with some crazy drunk causing a ruckus on the tram or on the street in the middle of the day. It's not that booze is cheap either. Finland has one of the highest tax rates on alcohol. Which reminds me of one of my favorite welcome signs so far. Prior to exiting my ferry in Helsinki everybody and I mean EVERYBODY hauls carts and trolleys of booze from Estonia. Grandmas and kids not excluded.

My buddy Cameron came out to visit me from Tallinn to travel with me a bit around Finland. After the first day in Helsinki we sat around a table, trying to decide what to do next-- hop on a boat to Sweden or head north to the Arctic Circle, to a town called Rovaniemi. Cameron did a quick search on google about Rovaniemi and it turns out it is home to Santa Claus! Needless to say, we decided to go pay a visit to Santa. I mean, the fat bastard never showed up when I was a kid so I had a few things to say to him.

On our way to Rovaniemi from Helsinki, we met Rohan on the train and we played poker for quite some tome. He recommended we visit his hometown of Oulu on our way back down which was really cool. He mentioned there were tons of outdoor parties and concerts during the summer. That was enough for us and we decided to head down later. Anyway on our first day in Rovaniemi we rented a couple of bikes for, get this, 30 bucks a day! From a rental car agency of course. To put it into perspective it cost less to stay in our cabin for the night.

The next day we decided to go visit Santa. Cameron thought it would be a good idea to put a gun to Santa and take a picture. Sold! We went to a market, picked up a couple of cap guns and off we went. We weren't sure if there were any 9/11 type security measures in place but while we were in line we asked one of the elves if we could take a picture of Santa with a gun pointed at him. He said that in his enitre life as an elf, nobody has ever asked that and that we would have to take it up with Santa himself. When our time came and I told Santa that we had a special request and that we wanted to take a picture with a gun pointed at him. He paused for a moment and asked, "Will you be nice the rest of the year?" to which Cameron and I nodded assuringly and said in unison "Of course!" I mean, why would he have any reason to doubt us? Besides I gave Villi a two pence coin earlier, which counts, right??! Anyway needless to say now that Santa is under our hostage we have total control over all the toys, and whether or not Christmas will happen this year! (This is actually a picture of a picture we had to fork over 30 Euros for 5 pictures. Santa needs money to pay the elves apparently.)

Cameron and I played poker one night, because there was nothing else better to do in the cabin. We made a pretty serious dent into a bottle of Captain Morgan, and needless to say we (ok, fine, I, made some stupid wagers.) After 7 games, I ended up having to wash the dishes, carry Cameron's backpack back to town (about 20 minutes bike ride away, on top of my own 15 kg backpack!), buy the son of a bitch a cup of coffee, AND carry all of our trash into town. Cameron came out alright... all he had to do was give me the fifth postcard that we paid for together, and to take a shower without the use of a towel or clothes to dry off with. Sigh... I guess you guys won't be seeing me on the World Poker Tour anytime soon....

The next day we went to Oulu, about two hours south of Rovaniemi, at the suggestion of Rohan. Our first evening there, we stumbled into an outdoor concert-- something Rohan mentioned was quite common during the summer. When we arrived into the area, the scene was pretty dead... it was actually a Christian concert event, headlined by a Finnish rapper, who apparently, used to be a "gangsta" rapper and has since reformed and cleaned up his act. His name, I kid you not, is Rudolph. Rudolph the reformed Finnish gangsta rapper.... soonafter, a mime act followed and I had no idea what was going on. I asked a girl next to me what the hell (sorry, what the heck) was going on and she said she had no idea either, since she was just passing through as well. We chatted a bit more and we ended up heading to a bar to discuss all things Finnish, American, and Australian. She recommended we go to Finlandia for some reindeer pizza. Wasn't bad...

One of the other things I wanted to do was to visit Nokia, the city. I thought it would be cool to call somebody on a Nokia (which Cameron had) while actually in Nokia! We arrived into town around 6am and virtually everything was closed so Cameron and I decided to sleep in the train station, on the concrete floor, between two locker stalls. Not exactly a highlight, but merely a point to demonstrate to what extent we were willing to go through to make a phone call from a Nokia, in a town called Nokia. I know, such is life when travelling with no real agenda. "Hey, let's go visit Santa and bust a cap in his ass!" OK! "Hey, let's go to Nokia and make a phone call from a Nokia!!!" OK!!! I expected the town of Nokia to be full of high rises, glass skyscrapers, with everybody talking on brand new space-age Nokias, with the occasional dog or two equipped with a cell phone chatting away. But, that would be too predictable. Instead, we found a pretty run-down, dare I say, depressing, industrial town with no signs of anything Nokia. So we decided that since it was beer o'clock, and we had a few hours to kill before the next train back, we knocked back a couple at a bar where supposedly they serve the cheapest beer in Nokia. At this said bar, there were quite a few drunks (wait, that was us) in the middle of the day. Cameron, ladies man that he is, was approached by a 60 year old hottie.... check out the slideshow and see for yourself!!